A few years ago, if you'd told me I'd spend a weekend in a dusty Nevada ghost town holding a clapperboard that read "Skate to Hell," getting hugged by a zombie, and posing for photos with a guy in a blood-soaked jester costume swinging a rubber dagger at my throat I'd have laughed you out of the room.

But that's exactly where "why not now" took me.

## From the Audience to the Set

For years, my sons and I made a habit of showing up to tapings of The Price Is Right, America's Got Talent, Bar Rescue, Let's Make a Deal and even the X-Factor. We were always in the crowd. Always on the other side of the camera.

Somewhere along the way, that stopped being enough. So when the chance came up to actually be in something instead of just watching it get made, I said yes before I could talk myself out of it.

## Welcome to the Desert

The set for "Skate to Hell" was out in the middle of nowhere: an old mining ghost town with weathered wood buildings, rusted-out trucks, and a sign nailed to a barn door that read "Closed due to the abundancy of stupid people." That should give you a sense of the tone.

I spent the day around a crew that had turned actors into things I still can't quite describe a zombie with a rotted grin and reaching, bandaged hands; a wild-haired creature straight out of a nightmare; a jester with a bloodied face and a dagger that looked far too real for comfort. Somewhere in between takes, someone handed me a Freddy Krueger glove and I posed like I'd just been gutted with it. That's the job.

There's a photo from that shoot of me holding the clapperboard Scene 14, Take 2, director Shawn C. Phillips calling the shots and every time I look at it, I remember thinking: I am way too old to be doing this, and I have never had more fun on a Tuesday.

By the end of it, I walked away with a skateboard deck signed by the whole cast and crew, and a poster for another project already in the works "Desert Fiends." Turns out once you say yes once, more doors tend to open.

## The Priest, the Zombie, and Everything In Between

I've since played a priest in another film a role about as far from "getting chased by the undead" as you can get, which is part of what makes this whole detour so much fun. One week I'm delivering solemn lines in a collar, the next I'm getting a fake gut wound painted on for a horror-comedy.

None of it was on any life plan I ever wrote down. I didn't get into this to become an actor. I got into it because someone asked, and I'd spent 20 years in the Air Force and a career since then learning that the moments you almost talk yourself out of are usually the ones worth having.

## The Real Lesson

I'm not chasing a second career in film. At least I don’t think so. That's not the point. The point is that "why not now" doesn't come with fine print about what counts and what doesn't. It's not just for big trips or big pivots: sometimes it's a weekend in a ghost town in a costume you'd never have picked for yourself, saying yes because the alternative is watching from the sidelines again.

So, if there's something a little strange, a little out of character, sitting on your own "someday list” consider this your sign. Oh, and we all have that list…

But, Why not now?