Responsibility

Last night was our counselors' Artshare. Essentially, this consisted of counselors performing their respective arts for the students. We had several soloists and duets, 4 visual art slide shows, and a dance duet. This was only the second day that our Live Event Production kids have been able to get their hands on equipment, and it went pretty rough. At least 3 of the problems were directly my fault. One problem was from a lack of communication on my part, and was the least noticeable. Another stemmed from being less than alert while clearing the stage, leading me to clear a mic that should have stayed. The most visible problem that I caused was a complete honest mistake due to my lack of knowledge about a connection that I thought would work. I created a really bad ground fault loop that made a counselor's video almost impossible to hear in the front of house. This last one is my favorite kind of mistake. A good mistake is one that teaches you something, and I definitely learned from this one. Though I felt pretty awful about my performance, I don't mean to give the impression that every mistake in the show was my fault; most of it stemmed from the kids' lack of experience (which is completely excusable in my mind).
After the show I apologized to J, my Tech Director, and my crew of kids. Then after everyone had cleared out, I asked J to teach me how I could have avoided my last mistake. We got out some paper and he diagrammed the situation. It turns out I had done several things wrong, all of which had reinforced the ground fault loop I had already created. There comes a time when a mistake is so large that it becomes humorous. We arrived at this point in an empty theater half an hour after curtains. It's nice to have a good laugh at your own expense.
In other news, Monday and Tuesday were both BEAUTIFUL days! Today it was overcast and moist again, but I took advantage of the weather and got a great panoramic shot from the front of our airplane hangar. The triangular peak in the middle is Mount Verstovia. I hope you enjoy!!