The Down-Slope

75 Minutes in Hell

Posted by Jess is Jess , Tuesday, January 26, 2010 Tuesday, January 26, 2010

Hell.

That's right. H-E-DOUBLE-HOCKEY-STICKS.

hell.

I'm talking about Business and Professional Communication at the University of Tennessee.

Now, in all honesty, I have zero problem with speaking in front of people. (This is why I did not take Public Speaking as I think that I should be able to test out of it).

However, the one thing I don't really like to do is speak about myself (which is interesting, now that I think about this here blog thing). I don't mind having a conversation with someone and we get to know eachother. What I don't like is having to come up with 3-4 things that symbolize who I am as  human, bring in objects associated with those things and then tell a room full of strangers, most of them between the ages of 18-21, about what makes me, me in under 2 minutes. I've said it before and I will say it again - It's a damn good thing that I talk when I'm nervous. This tendency has helped me out quite a bit in the past.

But here is the thing . . . I'm super insecure about having left a pretty promising career in arts education to go back to school and do something completely new at the age of 27.

I know, 27 is not old. But I'll let you in on a little secret . . . IT FEELS DAMN OLD WHEN I'M IN A ROOM FULL OF PEOPLE WHO WERE IN THE THIRD GRADE WHEN 9/11 HAPPENED.

Sorry. I don't mean to yell.

It's not that bad actually, most people assume that I'm 21-ish, give or take. (I won't pretend that that doesn't make me happy) And I see people on campus and in some classes who are very clearly much older than I am and I am so impressed with them.

Because I know how hard it is. I know how insecure you feel.

I don't regret the path my life has taken for an instant - not a single moment of it. (Except maybe I wish that I had dropped physics my senior year of high school). What gets to me is the nasty voice inside my head that is telling me what a looser I am for not having gone straight on to a normal college and gotten a normal degree (who are we kidding, theatre degrees aren't normal). At the same time I know beyond a shadow of a doubt that I would not be the person I am today if I had followed the normal path.

Here is the thing that I realized today.

This is what made that seventy five minute class a living hell.

Every person who got up to speak today, to share these pieces of themselves with a room full of virtual strangers felt the exact same thing. Everyone was miserable and almost apologetic for the things that are important to them.

I don't ever want to watch that happen again - my heart was literally aching when I left that room. This was a room with twenty five beautiful, creative, focused, driven people. And every single one of them got up and laid themselves bare. But this today, this was torture. No one should be ashamed of the fact that they love their families, or soccor, or hiking, or anything. It's just not right.

I'm so proud of all of us - it's really hard!

I will happily do anything infront of an audience when it's not really me but a character.

I'm sure that none of them will ever read this, but the following quote is for them, the students of  Communication Studies 240, Spring Semester 2010, TR 11:10

"We gain strength, and courage, and confidence by each experience in which we really stop to look fear in the face... we must do that which we think we cannot. "
Eleanor Roosevelt