Rolling with the punches

Well last night I performed in my very first paid gig. Definitely a landmark for me. Not really happy how it turned out. No so much the show but my performance.

Lemme explain...
First and foremost the show entitled "Tokes and Jokes" took place in a former factory building. This ended up being cool and wack at the same time. Cool because it's just an interesting buiding to be in and whack because it was like 70+ degrees with only one fan. At times waiting for that breeze to come around was like waiting for the bus to come...smh.

Anywho...
The title again for the event was "Tokes and Jokes" it was a medical marijuana event...pretty cool. I figured to myself "how hard could it be to make a bunch of weed heads laugh?"...And for the first half of the show I was right...the other comedians had pretty much no problem getting a high crowd to laugh. But after about a good 2 hours of comedy and an intermission that included a spectacle called the weed olympics, highs started coming down. The heat started becoming more of a factor. 3/4 of the crowd went home.

In these settings you just have to LOVE performing. Which I do. Unfortunately I haven't developed that "don't give a fuck" (trait/quality/skill) yet. Ya see...the relationship between the comedian and the audience is a lot like a boxing match. A (good/tough) (comedian/boxer) can keep his head despite taking punishment from the(opponent/crowd) because they always know there is always the possibility that they can knock them out at any time. Whenever a (comedian/boxer) forgets that this happens...



The weird thing is, despite the small crowd I still got laughs. What got to me was this one couple. I'm positive the reason that I let them get to me was because they were black. And in my mind I figured if I can make them laugh then I'm really doing something. Which was more or less me stereotyping. Who knows what the reason was for them not laughing and giving me what I perceived to be the "nigga get off the stage" look was. The point is I shouldn't have let them faze me. I instantly felt bad after I got off stage. I should've stayed on and performed more. Stuck it out... "Rolled with the punches"

Ya live and ya learn.