everyone sports a facade. everyone fronts. everyone wears a mask. at least some of the time. some might think me to be pretentious and ostentatious and arrogant. fair enough. but only some of the time. put me in front of thirty strangers and i'm a star. put me in front of three hundred strangers and i'm a wreck. tomorrow i'm supposed to stand before the student body and deliver a thirty-second speech prior to handing out a few awards. fair enough. but here's the rub. i'm terrified of public speaking. at least speaking publicly in front of three hundred strangers. i'm already thinking about what can possibly go wrong. oh, so much can go wrong. i can trip and fall upstairs walking onstage. i can pass out on stage waiting my turn. i can trip and fall on the way to the mike. the mike can go dead. the mike can be positioned too low. the mike can be positioned too high. i can knock myself unconscious struggling to remove the mike from the mike stand. my voice can crack. my voice can quiver. (or is it quaver?) i can mispronounce a word. i can mispronounce a name. i can forget a name. i can pass out at the mike trying to remember a name. i can become temporarily blinded by the spotlight. i can become permanently blinded by the spotlight. i can fall offstage walking back to my position. i can knock one of my colleagues offstage walking back to my position. i can trip and fall downstairs walking offstage. and that's just what immediately comes to mind.
the weight of the world: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ism9itDvKTk&feature=related
p.s. someone may indeed have said "less is more" but it sure as hell wasn't me. that's not how i roll, kid.
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Or… you could accidentally call him a her, and her a him… *cough*, as well as unintentionally setting off that annoying Snoopy Piano tune while you gloat about the success of the award winners.
ReplyDeletei bet you'll do fine. not that it matters much, i suppose. at the JA awards ceremony, one of the mc's kept on forgetting what she was saying and needing to disappear to find the proper script, the entire crowd clapped for her.
ReplyDeleteI found the reverse to be easier; performing in front of 300 kids turned me into a nervous wreck for a whole day, doing my English presentation in front of 30 kids was a snap, since it was like, "It's freakin' easy with only 1/10 of the people that I've been in front of before"
ReplyDeleteThough there's the setback of being known as the "glowstick guy", it was a good experience of perspective.
You could imagine it as the same as doing 10 speeches in front of 30 kids. Which you do every week at school.
^ oh so YOURR the glowstick guy! btw i have to say, your act was so amazing--should have won, you know i screamed for you HAHA
ReplyDeleteanywayss, you're speech was great! after reading this you must have been so nervous going up there, but you actually didn't seem to be, you looked pretty comfortable to me. so good job! And you shouldnt be nervous you know everyone loves you
You seemed fine during your little speech. Just uh, there were a lot of people that were out of control. S'okay though.
ReplyDeleteI would have never expected you to be so paranoid though. I learn something new each day. (:
just to let you know, you suck.
ReplyDelete