Showtime

I blew my nose one last time as we left the garage, thanking the heavens that the Excedrin was finally starting to kick in and praying I’d make it through the next few hours. Dark clouds threatened overhead, scattering a few cold raindrops as we approached the designated meet spot. At our left was the monolithic wall of the parking garage; to the right, Progressive Field was lit up in all its glory as the staffers prepared for a 7:10 first pitch. In between, the walking alley between the two structures caught the wind like a tunnel, kicking the cold air up and blowing my hair into my eyes. I shivered, glad we’d thought to bring hoodies.

“You’re sure you’re up for this?” Baron asked.

“I kinda have to be,” I replied.

So in my alternate life, something that comes up frequently on my task list is representing the campus I work for at a variety of public-facing events. On this particular day, I was representing at the university’s yearly homecoming activity downtown, meeting and greeting alumni as they had a catered picnic before watching an Indians game. As an introvert, getting out and interacting with dozens of people you don’t know isn’t always the easiest of tasks, but it’s something I’ve surprisingly come to look forward to. You get to go to interesting places and encounter people that you wouldn’t meet otherwise. It pushes you out of your comfort zone and forces interaction.

What this means in my case is that in the right mindset one can forget who they are for a few hours and morph into someone else. It’s interesting to note the differences – Public Jen is a lot more bubbly and confident than Private Jen ever could be. She moves differently. She sits differently. She forces eye contact and greetings in a way that Private Jen shirks from. And she uses her surroundings to interact with her audience in ways that third persona Podcaster Jen is sometimes insanely jealous of.

Because what’s at play here isn’t just the event at hand. How we interact and engage with those around us is going to vary greatly depending on the medium of interaction and what the end goal is. Live interactions, actually being on location with the people, is very different than doing a live podcast from the comfort of your home office. The energy is different. With podcasts, sleight-of-hand is a lot easier – if something goes wrong, it’s not hard to push a button and be hidden for a few moments while your team has a private powwow to get things working again. The forced perspective of the camera gives a cover for which the podcaster can conjure off-camera magic. With live events, however, anything can happen – if someone doesn’t show up when they’re supposed to, it’s a lot harder to stall until things can get worked out. You’re on the whole time. If you aren’t feeling well (as was my issue the day of the ballgame), it’s a lot harder to hide that in face-to-face interactions than it is curled up in your comfy chair with the aid of well-placed lighting and mute buttons.

Anything can happen at live events. I’ve been at ones where key panelists no-showed, others where speakers had to ad-lib entire presentations when they showed but their research didn’t. I’ve witnessed guests go down with medical issues and others be led out in handcuffs. In one memorable information session I attended, there was one rather disturbed individual who kept stopping by my table absolutely convinced I was a government agent trying to spread propaganda and tap into his brainwaves. Entertaining, until he started screaming at me and trying to come over my table (I was very thankful for making new friends with the security guards earlier that morning). On the flip, there are a lot of positives that come out of physically being there. You make a lot stronger of a connection with your audience than you can through a video or a blog post. You get to see all the people who work behind the scenes to help things run smoothly. You get to remember that the essence of humanity is forged in the social natures of our being, in taking chances and stepping out into the world instead of hiding behind closed doors.
The best parts, for me, are the stories you encounter and the lessons that come about when you make yourself open to receive them. You get to go through the backstage passages and hear the histories and see venues in ways most people never do. You get to witness firsthand the little obstacles that come up and are creatively overcome with a smoothness that ensures the public never knows the difference. Especially in the field of education, you learn about peoples’ motivations, their hopes, their dreams, their fears. You learn about the odds they overcome, the small joys and interventions of the universe that give them that little push to keep going. As a writer, that kind of insight gives a vivacity to your narrative that’s hard to capture without having been there. It’s one thing to read about these things and be overcome with wonder; it’s quite another to get out there and allow yourself to experience it firsthand.

So yes, I powered through. I got to reconnect with some fantastic alumni and hear about all they’ve done since they left our campus. I got to see some old friends and make some new ones (shout out to little Ariel, who sat next to me during the game and at 18 months old was just as fascinated with the Hot Dog mascots as I was). And for a couple of hours, I got to set aside all the clutter that usually floats through my mind and just let Public Jen take control for a while.

It was showtime.