When Patrick asked me to be co-emcee of the event, I wasn't sure what that meant. It could be anything from standing beside the stage pushing buttons for Powerpoint shows, or carrying the three day weekend by myself, like Jerry Lewis at the telethon. I figured I had better psychologically prepare for those two scenarios, or anything in between. The challenge would be to keep my ego in check in case, as it often happens, my intended contributions were not needed after all. Humility is necessary. It is easier to grasp this if one focuses on the needs of the show above all else.
As the time approaches, it becomes apparent that I may have more opportunity than I imagined to extemp on stage, or fill gaps with material that gives it a show feeling. Along those lines I have come up with what is perhaps my stupidest idea of all time. Patrick is opening the show/conference on Saturday morning at 9. He sent around the event schedule. I put in a few things like time to bring the house lights partially down, etc., and down the minute introduction (which of course will go out the window because breakfast will run late, but that's ok. The important thing is to have a schedule at all.)
My stupid idea is to introduce Patrick with a musical comedy number which I wrote and which I will personally perform. Why wouldn't I want the challenge of singing on stage at Nashville. The last time I visited that town, I came within a whisker of being pulverized by a furniture truck. There's not much worse I can do that almost dying, so why not go for it?
The song I wrote is a parody of a well-known country and western song, one that most people will know the words too. Except my words will be different--a parody, and they will partially poke fun at ourselves with a humorous background on how the community developed and how the conference came into being.
In college in Oregon I chickened out singing on stage in an opera. Looking back I'm ashamed at my cowardice and ego, especially since bailing on it meant they had to find someone else who could step in. I didn't realize at the time that such things can leave a mark on one's soul, and that at some point you find up having to make up for it in some way. It wasn't a big deal in the scheme of the world, or even my life, but it was a chance to push something forward and I failed at that, and let people down. It didn't take me long in life after that to realize that if nothing else, one should do everything possible to follow through on one's commitments to others like that.
Thus the confusion I feel at the moment regarding how much I should put into Threadfest planning is partially due, I believe, to that earlier failure, and to other earlier failures in my life. I didn't learn the lesson, and when you get a second chance, you usually start in a hole, in the rough, and you have to play your way out of it with the extra effort you failed to give in the earlier situation.
The good part is that if you do it right, and are sterling this time around, you can recover the lost ground and more (like this).
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