After the last StorySLAM I hosted, Jeff and I planned to get together and debrief, but we never got around to it. So a couple days ago, I sent him my thoughts, namely:
- Even though no host likes to do the “How’s everybody doing tonight?… I said, How’s everybody doing tonight?!” thing, and no audience member enjoys answering the former with a “Wooo” and the latter with a “Woooooooo!“, it serves a purpose. It raises the energy in the room. It gets people feeling. It opens the audience up to the possibility of enthusiasm. So it needs to be done. I needed to give the listeners the space to get excited, early. (They got there. It’s just took a minute.)
- The evening is about the storytellers. I was so nervous about getting my bits right that I forgot to highlight the people who had put their name in the hat. I would go up, do my piece, get the scores, and announce the next storyteller, which on paper is what I was supposed to do, but at the end of the evening, it felt disjointed, like two separate events, my part and their part. Jeff is very good about listening to a story and, for his next bit, riffing off it, whereas I sit in the front row looking at the storyteller and working up some serious butt-sweat. I can’t possibly pick anything up and run with it because the story is completely drowned out by the freight train that’s barreling through my head. Plus, even if I could quiet the locomotive, I have precisely zero improv chops. I cannot come up with stuff on the fly. The few lines I tried to do off the cuff that night, I flubbed. Thinking about improvising a whole three-minute segment—oh god, I just dry-heaved. So I need to either work on that or figure out another way to showcase the storytellers better.
When we spoke on the phone the next day, Jeff told me about an email he received when he sent out the promotion for the upcoming event. Apparently, a woman wrote something like, “We’re going to try this again. We’ve been there twice when the blond woman [I’m blond apparently?] has hosted, and she made it all about herself. We like it better when you’re hosting.”
Here’s what’s true:
- It was only my second time hosting.
- Hosting is hard.
- I worked my ass off to prepare.
- Lots of people told Jeff I did a great job.
- Lots of people told me I did a great job.
- One woman didn’t like what I did.
- Jeff said he disagreed with the woman, thinks I’m awesome, and wants me to host more shows.
- This woman and I are saying essentially the same thing, though my view of it is a little more forgiving and generous. (Hers: she made it all about her; mine: I was so goddamn nervous I couldn’t see straight.)
But, man, this kind of thing sends my day right into the shitter. Why does one random woman’s negative opinion trump all the positive?