You know when you’re feeling really unsure about something you’ve done, so you ask your friends about it and being your friends and nice people and all, of course they reassure you that everything really is fine? And despite what they tell you, you don’t know if they’re telling you the truth or just trying to make you feel better?
Yeah, that.
That’s what’s been on my mind the past couple of months.
When I wrote about my experience reading my essay at the May 3 “Listen To Your Mother” show, I mentioned that I messed up while reading my essay. It wasn’t a mistake that was noticeable to anyone in the audience (and thank god for that), but still, it was unnerving. I left the stage thinking to myself “what the hell did I just do, and how did that happen?!?”
It took me many days after the show to come to terms with it and accept that somehow my unconscious mind had a different, and apparently more important way to tell my story. But I knew that I wouldn’t have true closure on it until I saw the video and judged for myself.
Sooooo, this is all a lead-up to say that all of the 2015 Listen To Your Mother videos are now live on the Listen To Your Mother YouTube channel. They were all posted while I was away on vacation, and because I was not on email the whole time I was gone (what a glorious reprieve!), I didn’t find out about them until I got back home.
And even so, it still took me four more days to work up the nerve to actually sit down and watch it (Avoidance behavior, who me???? No, NE-VERRRRRRR.) And anyway, there wasn’t a lot of actual sitting involved in watching it, it was more of a curling-up-into-a-ball-on-the-floor-in-the-corner-of-the-living-room-holding-my-knees-to-my-chest-while-the-dogs-scrummed-around-me kind of thing.
Just a usual day Chez Fuller, that’s all.
But truth be told, I breathed a HUGE sigh of relief after I watched it. I am happy with it. I’m very happy with it, in fact.
(Though not so happy that I’ve gone back to watch it again. Um, no thank you. I’m not that crazy. Maybe someday, but not someday soon.)
So without further ado, I present to you me reading my essay called “I Knew You Could” at the Washington DC Listen To Your Mother Show:
PHEW, right?!?
And now you know exactly why the picture at the top completely and exquisitely sums up the whole experience for me.
I can honestly say that all of my castmates had excellent essays as well – some poignant, some thought-provoking, some outrageously funny. Do yourself a favor and watch – you will enjoy them, I promise!
Here is a link to the complete series in the Washington DC cast.