Lessons from a Talent Show Sore Loser

Earlier this month, I entered a local talent show as part of being a tiger mom in the trenches.  I wanted to show my kids that not only am I pushing them to practice and perform on two instruments, I am getting down and dirty myself with my own practice and performance.  In February, I auditioned on the piano (a nerve-wracking experience in itself), and then choose to play “In the Hall of the Mountain King” from the “Peer Gynt Suite” by Edvard Grieg.  The piece was under the four minute time limit, something that I needed to finish learning and polish, and definitely a virtuosic showstopper.

Over the next couple months, I practiced the piece almost every day (along with violin practicing, working full-time, parenting, etc.), drilled through the technical parts, and memorized it.  There were many swearing sessions with sore muscles and fingers.  I have not performed solo piano in public since I was sixteen, so this is not something that I can whip off at a moment’s notice.  I also haven’t memorized a piano piece in ages, as my adult brain has a hard time doing so.  And let’s not mention the debilitating stage fright always that plagued me when I was younger.

I performed dry runs with anyone who had a piano to shake out my nerves and kinks while performing in front of others.  By the day of the show, I was nervous but ready.  I sized up the competition in the rehearsal the night before and figured that I had a pretty good shot at winning the “adult music” category if I could hold it together during the performance.  Here it is:



Here was my intro:

Angela… is software engineer and a mother of two (son & daughter).  She has been playing the piano since the age of seven.  Since last summer, she has also taken up playing the violin and fiddle.  Her favorite composers are Chopin and Schubert.  She will be performing “In the Hall of the Mountain King” by Edvard Grieg.

The success part:  I nailed my piece.  Doug said I was poised, confident and played perfectly with conviction and passion.  He said it was the best he ever heard me play the piece and I was the best performer of the night.  He also said I was the best dressed :).  (Yes, Doug is biased, but he never sugar coats.)  The kids beamed at me with pride when I sat back down with them in the audience.

The failure part:  I was a total sore loser when I lost to a piano duo whose performance was mediocre at best.  The performers were the wife of the sound guy and her sister, so I immediately thought that it was a political decision.  They were sloppy, dull, not in sync, played off tempo and made plenty of mistakes.  The piece was a piano four hands version of Beethoven’s 5th Symphony First Movement.  First of all, I thought we were limited to four minutes.  Their piece was an interminable seven minutes.  I actually decided against my first piece selection (Chopin Nocturne No. 10 in A-flat, Op. 32/2) because it was five minutes long.  See their “winning” performance for yourself:



Sure, there is a resemblance to Beethoven’s 5th, especially to the layman, but the huge swings in tempo and playing out of sync just made me cringe.  I remember playing duets as a teenager and being much tighter than that.  Even my kids thought they were terrible (they definitely don't have a problem saying when things are bad). 

At the end of the show, all the contestants lined up on stage. When they announced the winners, I smiled and clapped graciously as the announcer passed me by.  The woman standing next me, who later won for adult vocalist, said to me, “OMG, you were robbed, you were really, really good.  I’m so sorry!”  I just smiled, said, “That’s OK” in my best Stepford wife voice and wondered, WTF just happened?

Once off the stage, I refused to take the flowers that Dova presented to me and pretty much stormed out of the place.  I fumed the whole way home and could not believe that it was just a game of politics.  All that hard work for nothing.  Later, I started to doubt my performance and Doug reassured me that they weren't even close to the same league.  What was the problem then, was I too good?  Was the performance too perfect and inhuman?  Did it not appear that I WORKED REALLY HARD to get to that level?  The kids saw all this and had to tell me not to be a sore loser.  It was ugly.  So much for setting a good example. 

The next week, my co-workers gave me the usual “it’s not all about winning” spiel, but this quote really stuck with me, “Winning only lasts a few days.  Losing lasts for months.”  It’s been two weeks since the event, and I’m happy to say that I am no longer angry about it.  But I did teach my kids a few good lessons.  One, if you work really hard, you can reach your goals and be proud of what you accomplish (apparently not being a sore loser was not one of my goals).  Two, don’t ever be a sore loser like mom.  I can say that with conviction now and they will remember why.

First Photographs - Pieces of Giant Mom

Over at Photo Sleuth, Brett had found my first photograph post and included it in his post about first photographs. In my original post, I mentioned that I have no idea what my children's first photographs were. Brett's post inspired me to do a little digital sleuthing in Flickr so I searched for the oldest photo tagged with their name as photographer.

At Doug's birthday party in 2005, when Adam was four and a half years old, I handed him my Olympus C3000 and asked him to take a picture of me.  At first I thought this was his first photograph.



I love it! This was obviously long before he became the great photographer that he is now. Then I remembered that he first photographed my face, and when I looked at the photo, I asked him to include my skirt in the picture. So that was his second photo and this was actually his first.



Giant Mom towering over Adam! Here's a shot of Adam just an hour before enjoying Doug's birthday cake.



Holy frosted sweatheads!

Dova took the camera for the first time when she was just over three years old. She took Adam's camera, a Nikon E3200, and shot this photo of me at the laptop.



She followed with this one of me returning to geeking out.



In the Flickr description of this photograph, I had written, "Dova's first photograph?". Check the EXIF data, baby!  I was off by one photograph for both of them.  Now I have definitive proof of both my children's first photographs and I am honored that they are pieces of their giant mom.

Here she was just a few days before sleeping in my bed.



Hey, who stole my cute sleeping baby girl?

Somewhere Between 6 Million and 90 Billion Books

In first grade, Dova has become quite the questioner when it comes to estimating quantities.  She recently came up with a question that I simply couldn't answer off the top of my head.  The conversation went something like this:

Dova:  Mom, how many books are there in the world?
Mom:  You mean the total number physical books or different books ever published?
Dova:  Different books.
Mom:  I have no idea.
Dova:  6 million?
Mom:  No, more than 6 million.
Dova:  90 billion?
Mom:  No, less than 90 billion.
Dova:  Then what??

I have no idea how parents used to answer these questions before the age of Google. My guess is simply with smiles and rolling eyes. Luckily, Google Books came to our rescue with this post, Inside Google Books: Books of the world, stand up and be counted! All 129,864,880 of you.

So I was actually right, there are somewhere between 6 million and 90 billion books ever written. In terms of order of magnitude, 130 million is actually right between 6 million and 90 billion.  Now Dova can say with authority that there were around 130 million books ever written.  Time to get cracking on reading them!

Zumanity Glamour Shots - Doing It Right

Four years ago in 2007, I attended the Better Software Conference in Las Vegas. It was the first time I had been to Vegas, so I definitely wanted to take in all the sights and a show (as well as learn about agile software development and testing – woo hoo!).

Since I was in Vegas with no kids, I decided to see Zumanity, "The Sensual Side of Cirque du Soleil" (18 and older). The show was wonderful – light-hearted, sexy and fun. Beforehand, a photographer took me aside and asked whether I'd like some glamour photos taken. I was all sweaty from hoofing it over to the hotel in the late June desert heat, and was wearing a striped t-shirt, shorts and walking sandals. Um, I'm not really dressed for that?

The photographer immediately put me at ease and threw on a purple feather boa to glam me up. Since I don't know the first thing about posing for a glamour shot, she told me exactly where to put my hands and feet and how to look at the camera.





I appreciated all the tips, but it still didn't change the fact that I was sweaty and wearing a t-shirt and shorts. After the show, I asked someone to take this shot of me with one of the performers, a male stripper.

 

Star-struck and definitely not dressed for the part! I enjoyed the show so thoroughly, I vowed to Doug that we would see the show together someday. I wasn't sure how we'd be able to go as a family and ditch the kids for the show, but I was determined to share the experience with him.

Last month, we diverted our plans for our yearly getaway to Newport, RI to Las Vegas. Here was our chance to see Zumanity together and my chance to get the glamour shots right. This time, in a dress and heels, and with my man.



 

Oh yeah, now were talking! I am so glad that we went back to do the glamour portraits right. I love the close-up shot of us where the photographer asked us to say 'whiskey'. That word made for some great smiles. I didn’t get to redo the shot with the stripper, but the blue shirt man beats the sequined g-string.

I also took the opportunity to make a "Lo-Fi" version of this portrait. I love the well-worn look of a well-loved photograph. Check the Lo-Fi retro photography application here (Disclaimer: Lo-Fi provided a review copy of their software.)




So my new motto is:  If anything is worth doing, it’s worth doing twice.  Some famous examples include having kids, seeing Zumanity, and now taking BMW Performance Driving School (where I am blogging from right now from lovely South Carolina - more to come!).

Getting Gorgeous with Hair Room Service

If you know me, being girly, especially with my hair, is really low on my list of priorities. I am blessed with typical straight black (dark brown to be exact) Chinese hair that requires absolutely no maintenance. It is  trimmed about twice a year and I only need to keep those Asian grays away.

At the wonderful Getting Gorgeous event this year, organized by the super industrious team of Audrey and Vera, I waited through the long line for Hair Room Service.  There were three stylists and I carefully wished that my hair would be done by Michael Dueñas himself, founder Hair Room Service.  Before me, was Caitlin Knight of Raising Global Kids.  Michael transformed her extremely long curly locks into a sleek, shiny straight hair in a matter of minutes.  It was like magic!



Of course having lived with straight hair all my life (lets forget the perm phase in the eighties), curls were in order for me.  Michael asked whether I curled my hair often and I explained that really did nothing with my hair because I liked to keep it simple.  Here I am with (cardboard) Drop Dead Diva before my styling.



I seriously just washed and brushed my hair and hopped in my car for this event. Neat, but boring!

Michael was completely charming and explained his business of celebrity hairstyling.  Earlier that day, he had done Lady Gaga's hair for a video shoot.  I couldn't watch the process for my hair, but afterward, I was nearly jumping for joy.



Getting Gorgeous? Total success. Thank you Michael!