Because I’d been struggling with building an audience for The Louise Log and because being on panels is one of the few free-bees that exist in the world of marketing a web series, the producer in me went to war with the scaredy-cat. “Go. Just GO.”

I remember my feet acting on their own, stepping down from the sidewalk onto the street to jaywalk and paying no attention to the silent scream in my head: “Hellllllllllllllllllp! Help me! HELP!”

The next thing I remember is an inexplicable and bizarre feeling of having a vertical version of a barcalounger type chair:

pressed against the back side of my body from shoulders down to my knees, pushing me, all the while supporting me, as I zoomed toward the front entrance of The Paley Center.

(dramatic recreation)

Once I have to actually function in the moment, like pulling open a door and asking a person which way to go, I seem to be able to manage.

And so I got to my seat on the stage and the panel went off without a hitch. People laughed at the right places. I learned things from the others, I even remember enjoying myself. And after it, Matthew Kirsch one of the best people in web series, introduced himself. How could I have let fear stop me from all this?

To quote Mr. Green (on his flaws of character): “I’m capable of anything.”

Back to 2016, after writing up Part 1 of this blog, the memory of the phantom barcalounger never even crossed my mind. For days I was relishing the new looseness and freedom from the plaster jacket in my back before I remembered the feeling of the barcalounger pressing into that same area.

It’s so obvious that the common elements seem to be:

a) extreme discomfort

b) surrender (which leads to:

c) asking for help

d) feeling

e) getting help from an inexplicable source

Sounds like I’ve only gotten to a) in the recipe to get me out the door to pitch.

Looks like I need a deadline.

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So before moving on to other topics, I want to tell you the story of an evening in 2009 when I had a very odd to downright bizarre but relevant experience.

I’d been invited to be on a panel at the Paley Center for Media on 52nd Street. Midtown. Fancy. It was an event organized by the Writers Guild on the subject of writing in the then-new medium of web series with Fred Graver as the moderator. There was a conference call to prepare us all after which I’d memorized some bullet points so I wouldn’t ramble or drift off-topic.

We were each supposed to supply a short video to screen and so I’d spent hours preparing a hi-res version of the episode about Louise and The Hot Repairman and had delivered it to the technician at the Paley Center.

Everything was going as planned.

With my unique ability to delay leaving the house until the last possible second and still squeak through the door on time, I’d headed off to the subway, nervous and wishing I’d worn more comfortable shoes.

But then as I rode uptown on the E train, a lump rose in my throat and with it, that strange experience of anxiety, the extreme fascination with but detachment from my fellow straphangers, the acute awareness of every passing second as if I were actually headed to my own execution.

By the time I got off the train at 53rd Street, nervousness had ratcheted up to panic and I decided that I simply couldn’t go through with it. I was too frightened. I’d make a fool of myself. Everyone would be better off if I got back on the subway and rushed back home, calling to say that I’d been suddenly taken ill … as I sort of had. (to be continued)

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Go Big or Go Bust: On believing that you're good enough (Part 4)

Go Big or Go Bust: On believing that you're good enough (Part 3)