I’ve known Margaret since the first time I went to college and she is a delight. Her, read this and you will see what I mean:
All Kinds of Awesome
I’ve never been a guest blogger before, much less a guest blagger. To be a guest blogger/blagger one might want to first admit to being a blogger in the first place. I mean, am I qualified to be a guest blogger/blagger?
My blog, Stationary Unicycle, which by the way has nothing to do with unicycles, stationary or otherwise, is a sporadic effort and I’m prone to confessional ranting or stream of consciousness spewing. I didn’t know when I came up with the ridiculous title, ‘Stationary Unicycle’ that stationary unicycles are a real thing, sort of like Bronies and flying monkeys.
Flying monkeys are a real thing, right? No? Huh…
Who knew?
I’ve always loved to write but I didn’t really think I had anything important to say and it was difficult to call myself a writer with a straight face. Because I didn’t take it seriously nobody else did either.
Lanna was encouraging. Lanna inspired me to break out of the little cell I’d built around myself. The act of writing my absurd thoughts and calling it a blog and putting myself out there makes this intangible writing thing a real thing. It’s like magic. Not real, real. The scale of the endeavor, how far my slightly unbalanced thoughts actually travel, doesn’t matter. The making something real does.
Lanna and I went to college together. She was a wild woman, vivid, enthusiastic. She was a real clown.
No, really, she was a clown.
One of the oddest things I have done in public was perform in a little show Lanna put together. We performed at the Ground Round, the restaurant where Lanna was employed as Bingo the Clown. We put together a show with some other folks and performed it on Halloween. My memory is foggy, so I think that’s how it all went down.
It struck me as completely audacious at the time to put on a show. Only REAL singers and actors can put on a show. I mean who am I? What business do I have calling myself a singer and an actor and performing in front of real live people?! I’m not qualified! I have no right to be doing this!
Well, DUH. You become a real singer and actor by DOING those things. It’s not outside the realm of possibility. You want to be something? You gotta DO something.
You think, hey let’s do a wild show for a crowd. There will be music, singing, and some other general mayhem and hijinx! Let’s make it happen, people! Let’s DO this thing.
That’s how it’s done.
You can’t sit around waiting for someone to hear you performing your cabaret act while you’re in the shower. If you wait around for other people to notice you while you’re singing show tunes behind the shower curtain, you may get squeaky clean, but you’ll also get kind of pruney, maybe moldy, frustrated, and sad.
So, back to the story. If memory serves, people paid money to see our intrepid little troupe chase each other around the restaurant and have fun. At some point in the evening Lanna and I sang Bewitched Bothered and Bewildered while I clutched a large power tool to my bosom. No really, a real power tool.
I may be the only person in the world to sing a duet with a clown in front of an audience at the Ground Round on Halloween while holding a Makita power drill to her bosom.
That’s significant, people. That’s all kinds of significant.
I sang in front of people. I’d always wanted to sing in public but had been afraid to try. It was weird singing with my clothes on and without the sound of running water for accompaniment and the smell of Ivory soap, but it felt good. Lanna made it happen.
When Lanna makes things happen, other people start to think, “Hey! I can take risks, I can be brave, I can rock this, I can make things happen.”
How awesome is that?!
HOW GLORIOUSLY AWESOME IS THAT!?!?!
So, I feel like maybe this blog post, my first as a guest blogger, is a toast to Lanna Lee.
I raise a glass to Lanna, and thank her for inspiring me and countless others on a daily basis. Lanna leads by example, shows shower singers and closet writers how this wild adventure Life is meant to be lived; without apology, with authenticity, creativity, enthusiasm, glamor, grace, and courage.
In case you didn’t notice, Lanna is sort of my hero.
I challenge myself and the rest of you out there who might be reading this to go out into the world and be a hero. Make something audacious, make something beautiful. Be brave. Do not cower. Dream something big and gorgeous and then do something to make it real.
If we do that we might seriously change the world.
It’s magic people. Real magic.
How awesome that?!
All kinds of awesome.
This content © 2013 Margaret Miller-Finch.
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