#dobetter

In our last golden shower of the semester, one student rose her hand and said that what she was getting from this talk is that w need to do better. I've had a lot of that this semester. Do better on Wrestling With Angels. Do better in events. Do better at the Writing Center. Do better in class. I would get yet another horrible grade from my New Testament test and think o myself, Next time I'm going to know this material backwards and forwards an next time I'm going to be able to answer these questions like a musical theatre category on Jeopardy! Then the next test would roll around and, once again, I'd be a deer in headlights, having no idea what I was being asked or when I was supposed to learn those things. I would show up to rehearsal determined to bring out something new, something worthwhile, this time around, and be stuck in the same head space as weeks before. In every aspect of my life this past three months, I've needed to do well and done poorly. I've set out to succeed and failed. Now here I am, just out of my final final on my second-to-last day of work, and I'm consumed by how little I've accomplished in this time. I was very angry when I found out that my set design professor had decided that our work was so worthless that we should all have to start over, and resolved after he tore up my third box that I would waste time attempting to gt it right, only when I had witnesses to my effort. By final presentation time, I wanted nothing but for it to be over so that I could put it behind me and get on with my life. Nonetheless, I couldn't help but dwell on the disappointment in myself I felt when I sat down after my presentation. Despite my general reluctance to try at something where there was no chance of succeeding, I genuinely want to do well in things that I do, even things I don't particularly want to do. Hence, my attempts to deal with ornery WRC clients and relate to my stupid spoiled classmates in WWA. I cannot look back at this time with a mile. Neither do my prospects appear any better looking forward. I couldn't manage a leading role in a community production, I wont have a steady job, and I have absolutely no idea what I'm expected to do with myself academically. In the prolific words of Eugene O'Neil, the pat is the present, and the future. I really shouldn't be so floored that this semester was such a monumental failure. I've been failing monumentally at everything all my life. Would it really have made a difference if I'd been able to go to Atlanta and audition for BOM when there were so many actual professionals headed there? Probably not. A ride to the audition wouldn't have made me a better actress or singer, or made me more likable. Receiving a paycheck those two months my contract was mysteriously missing wouldn't have made me any less open with those annoying clients. Maybe I can't do better. Maybe this is as good as it gets.