Post Performance Blues

December for Project. B. has been a culmination of a lot of hard work and dedication.  It started with the open rehearsal on December 3, performances on December 7 and 8, Spark mentorship program's Discovery Night on Dec 14, grants and fundraising coming to a close, my own teaching, rehearsals, student performances finish out the semester/year.

And if you've ever performed or been part of something that gets you on this spiral that takes you higher and higher, you'll also know of the performance blues that brings you back down.

There have been so many great things that have come out of the year.  Project. B. has now been around a little over 1 1/2 years and the momentum of our growth astounds me every day.  The lull isn't quite there yet but several things ended for me this week.  The high of all my friends and family coming to support me in shows, compliments thrown left and right, the camaraderie I felt with my dancers, the excitement and the nervous energy that comes when the stage lights and music comes on, took me on this adrenaline frenzy.

Then there's the low.  Your friends go on with their holiday plans, the dancers rest up and restore their bodies, my late nights of sewing, writing emails, checking my to do list, adding on to my to do list have all ended.  Shouldn't I be happy for that break?  Instead, I begin to doubt myself.  Was it all really a success?  Did everyone really enjoy my work?  Was it worth all the late nights?  Is it worth being so vulnerable- everyone seeing this work I seemed so longingly to want to create.

I should know that it is worth it.  I should know that it is proven by what we have accomplished this year and the many people who helped make it work.  From in-kind donations, volunteers, mentors, recommendations, advisors, donations, audience, and my dancers who have been so supportive of me and the work (9 am rehearsals- yikes!), my family, and my husband who continues to give and give, I should acknowledge the creation of this new community that makes up Project. B.

And in my post performance blues, I begin to pinpoint that what  I want is that adrenaline frenzy.  I want it to happen over and over again.  And the only way to do that is to keep planning for the future of Project. B.  The community that has been created is proof of where we can go and how we can continue.  I am very excited to work with all of them again. 


I would also like to thank the following people for all they've given to me and the company:

Dancers of Project. B.:  Katherine Wells, Kelly Del Rosario, Chin-chin Hsu, Norma Fong, and Vanessa Thiessen with    Tanya Bello

Marco Gallerizzo, Paulee and Matt Halloran, Theo, Mike Sugrue, Nadeem Jessani, Lisa Moresco, Leila Minerva-Rivers, Julie Johnson, KT Nelson, Amara Tabor-Smith, Janice Garrett, Charles Moulton, Joe Landini, Christy Bolingbroke, Kimi Okada, Krissy Keefer, Stella Adelman, Wayne Hazzard, Michelle Handberry, Kate Ahumada, Talia Baruch,  my donors, and my current dancers, Norma Fong, Kelly Del Rosario, Chin-chin Hsu, Katherine Wells, Vanessa Thiessen as well as the dancers that have worked with me in the past, Mayuko Hosoai, Diana Broker, Bethany Mitchell, Dudley Flores, and Yu-mien Wu.

It really has been a great year.  Can't wait to get over the blues.