Shiny Day

Posted August 19th, 2004 by Michelle

Never in my life have I had a more accomplished day at work.

I’m going to try to remain focused here, as I’ve just now gotten around to reading some of Sean’s writing this last week, and I’ve had a couple glasses of wine… actually, probably only two glasses, or three, of about twenty different kinds of wine, and I’m a little distracted. But I’m also rather celebratory, elated, in fact, and I’m hanging on to it again. Today I had an amazing meeting with one of the other twelve people in this country with a degree in Musical Theatre. But this woman never used that degree (and I use that usage loosely) but has done a whole host of other incredible things, including becoming one of the most influential and connected people in this valley… and she is considering joining my board. Then, I finished the final draft of that goddamn grant proposal and sent it off. I then created a proposal for a meeting next week and THEN I went to my first-ever PTA meeting. It was held in the library of a grade school, and I saw books I haven’t seen in decades. The library was small, but so sweet, with hardcover copies of “Holes” on one side of the room and “MacMillan Encyclopedia of Dinosaurs” and “Poems for the Very Young” inexplicably side by side on the other. I was invited to sit before I was done coveting “The Solar System”, and I wondered how long it had been since I’d spent any serious time in a library.

To my disappointment, there were adult-sized chairs, but there were also more board members on the PTA then there are in my organization. And no cookies. But I was the first order of business, and my first words were, “I am here to propose an after-school arts program for the blahdey-blah school district. Here is what we have to offer”. Can you imagine? Can you imagine what it is like to sit down and offer to facilitate a program that 1) brings arts educations to little chickens and 2) enables the hiring of up to 24 arts professionals? I mean, seriously, ya’ll, this is my job. Five minutes later a motion was seconded to pursue the program I’d detailed, and I walked out of there ready to take off and fly.

My whole week has been building to this. I loved my job today, loved it and felt capable, which separates it from everything else meaningful I’ve ever done. Only on rare occasions, when I was singing, did I feel like I was not only showing my best but showing better than anyone else I knew. Even when I was working for the Red Cross, or as an EMT, or in hospitality, wine, theatre, ANYTHING I always felt like I wasn’t quite pulling it off, and that the person I was supposed to be affecting could sense my ruse of competency. Today, I knew, I KNEW I was the only one, in the moment, in the situation, who could accomplish what was laid before me. Only I could provide the language for the proposal, only I could connect with the potential new board member, only I could excite the principal of a lower social-economic school district about the prospect of teaching her kids how to mummify an apple. Clearly there is someone out there more qualified than me for all of these things; that person, that doubt, was deep beneath my heels as I stepped up to the plate. And it feels fucking glorious to hit a homer.

I know how hard next week might be. Hell, I know what tomorrow might be. But I am starting to GET this. I am starting to believe.