i was meant for the stage

when you're starting out at something, it's easy to be determined and believing. to stand at the gate and know that, if you work hard enough, you can make it. you that there will be challenges but because you know that, you also know that you won't give up and that that's the secret to making it. the challenge is exciting and you're ready to fight and take the punches and win the crown at the end.

when i was 22, i wanted to be a cinematographer. feature films would be awesome, but i'd be ok with shooting commercials, especially car commercials, since they looked amazing. as i neared graduation, things didn't go as i'd planned. the path to being a big director of photography was more vague than i was prepared for, and even people who seemed successful to me warned me of the steep and rocky nature of the path.
i had planned for challenges, but these weren't the challenges i'd planned for.

a few years later, i had found a new path: digital cinematography with pixar as my goal. still getting to compose shots and work with the details of lenses and framing, making some of the best movies ever made, all at a studio where i'd have a job every morning and could even go home in the evenings sometimes; it seemed to have everything i dared hope for in a job. plus, they like people with film degrees. i never thought i'd heard that.

but what if i don't get hired at pixar?
what if it's more demanding and intense than i would like? what if, even though i think i want to work there, i actually wouldn't feel comfortable there?
would i be happier at another job but i wouldn't know it because i'd want to be a part of pixar?
if i didn't get on there, would i be just as happy at disney or dreamworks?
what if i don't make it at any of those big studios and end up at some job that i never would have picked? will i love such that i'd be ok with not being at a big amazing studio?


i don't know.
i seem to always choose interest in industries that are rather narrow. with what i'm doing, there are only so many places to work and i manage to aim so high that i wonder if i'm fighting against people who seem much more talented and qualified that i am.
i briefly flirted with the idea of business school. i studied for the gmat and  even read part of a book about business efficiency. if i had a degree in marketing, there would be a lot more options for me out there.*

but that's not me.
and i'm doing what is me.
i don't know what's ahead down the pathway. somedays i wonder if that bridge wasn't supposed to collapse like it did, or that i missed a turn-off somewhere, but i never saw one.
so i'm going forward, doing the best that i know how.
and trusting that it'll work out. that the smart move wasn't to turn back a few miles ago.

(*editor's note: to the m.b.a.s and their families who may be reading, we acknowledge that having such a degree does not guarantee a job or a smooth path ahead. we raise an apple beer to all of your successes and accomplishments. you cool like a mule.)