Embarrassment, what is it good for?

I was about five minutes into a lovely chat with a man backstage at an event recently when I casually asked him: “So what do you do then?” As he humbly explained that he tends to do things “on stage and stuff”, I suddenly realised, to my horror, that I was talking to a very famous actor. But no sooner had I started to turn scarlet and to say things like “Oh, I knew I recognised you” (a lie) than the actor lost his grip on the mini-cake he was trying to lift to his mouth, launching it into the air. It smooshed onto the floor, iced side down. “Oh God,” he muttered.

After I fetched him another one, I started telling him about the many other embarrassing things that had happened to me that day (there had been several). As we exchanged anecdotes, I began to notice a peculiar phenomenon: None of the things we were embarrassed about had caused suffering to anyone else. Quite the opposite, in fact. This actor probably quite enjoyed speaking to someone who, for once, didn’t know who he was; I was certainly relieved about having the attention snatched away from me in such theatrical fashion by an uncooperative mini-cake.