GGP Emoji.png

***Struggling, lately. Who Am I?***

That’s what I am struggling with.
Since as far back as I can remember, I have been working backstage for theater, for special events, company meetings, concerts, parties, and more.Then, COVID hit. 
Hit hard in fact.  And that little thing killed the live event business. I haven’t seen statistics, lately, but if I had to guess? I’d say, it is maybe half what it was at the end of 2019. Fewer large and small concert tours. MUCH few small venues, for small and mid sized bands. Live music is hurting. Corporate meetings are a new mix of Hybrid and Live.

Zoom taught people that is is easier to meet on a computer. Not better, but easier. People are more accepting of bad video, bad lighting, bad sound, rather than leave the house, travel to some far away place, for a meeting, or product introduction.  
Doesn’t matter that the metrics of attendance, and sales show that a virtual meeting is less effective at Product Sales. Business is done face to face. Good business is. But not any more. Many businesses did not survive. Others? Are watching pennies, hanging on by a thread. So, my industry is gone.Or at least, undergone a huge makeover and not for the better. 

So, where does that leave me?
Who Am I?
  I’ve tried over the years, explaining what an event, show, or my job means. I’ve been involved since I was a toddler, in some form or another. Literally onstage at under 2 years old. Doing backstage stuff since my early teens. Getting paid about that long, too. That’s DECADES.

  UNLESS you’ve experienced it, there is nothing like the call of the audience. That rush, from applause. That moment when the curtain goes up, and there’s an audible gasp. There’s a feeling on the back of your neck when an effect HITS. When the notes come together in a crescendo, to bring the audience to tears. When the words make people laugh. When a heart sings, because the couple onstage, or in the movie fall in love.

And I’ve been making that magic for decades.
Who Am I?

That’s mostly gone now. At one time in my life, it was daily, for months on end. No days off. Since COVID, it is maybe a week a month, or a few days a month. Before COVID, I expected to be retiring. Or be retired. That got set back, post COVID by 4 or 5 years. In fact, I’ve taken a few part time jobs, for income, to fill in the blanks. To preserve what’s left of savings, and retirement. 
When will it come back?
Who Am I?

I do not know any more. I used to easily explain who I was, and what I do. I know, intellectually, what I do does not define me. Yet, ask anyone I work with in Special Events who they are, and we’ll all go on and on, about what we do. Because, at the end of the day, who we are is very closely tied to being a loud, social invert, who makes people happy, sad, angry, laugh, and think.

I am not sure anymore...
Who Am I?

Dad, for sure.
Gardener, Photographer. Writer.

Sometimes, I am that guy backstage, making it all come together... but it is Increasingly missing in my life.