Compromise, Win, and Worry

Anxiety: a legitimate concern

COMPROMISE

 I rode my bike to The Instant Face Place, my last hope for a fully local print shop for KickStarter incentives. I walked in and saw a tag hanging out of one of their example t-shirts. instead of asking where the shirts themselves were produced I took a peak at that little white slip. "50% Cotton - 50%Polyester - Made in Honduras"... I searched for another tag "50% Cotton - 50% Polyester - Assembled in Mexico". So disappointing, so I got out of there. I have decided to order reusable water bottles as an incentive instead of t-shirts and I'm going to order them from TeamWorld. TeamWorld is located in Binghamton but orders from elsewhere, HOWEVER, they told me I have the option of getting my order made in the USA which I guess is better than nothing.

WIN

 I woke up today to an e-mail from a Caroline Quidort thanking me for my interest in the city of Binghamton and she's sorry but Mr. Abdelazim is no longer with the city of Binghamton (I'm assuming she meant he moved or quit or retired but just now I realize she might mean he's ... "no longer with us"... like he died) I hope he's not dead, if you remember from an earlier post he was basically the perfect contact for me to make for this project. perfect outlook and areas of expertise.
          the "Win" portion of this situation is that Miss Quidort said she would be happy to discuss these issues with me and I have an appointment with her next Tuesday afternoon for an interview.
[Question, how do you refer to a lady in a professional manner if you don't know her marital status? saying her first name seems unprofessional, but Miss or Mrs. might offend her if I choose the wrong one]

WORRY

 If you follow me on Twitter ( @K_R_Hallagan ) you will have seen that last night right before I went to bed I got a response to my KickStarter inquiry. I had planned on raising $15,000 as my goal and donating any amount I received above that to some local non-profits who do good work pertaining to my subject, for example education of adults, environmental cleanup, and helping people find jobs.
           The response I got from KickStarter was kind but to the point:

Hi Kevin,

Thanks for writing in. No aspect of a Kickstarter project can contain charity elements, and that includes where proceeds can go. Hope that clarifies!

Best,
Katherine

When I read that e-mail I realized how much I have been relying on the nonprofit thing for people to meet my goal and for me to be able to do some good and that was no bueno. I went into a crazy spiral of doubt and once again realizing how much money $15,000 really is and how impossible it will be to reach that goal if I can't get a really good video and some convincing marketing going on. Then, like Mr. Furious in Mystery Men I began to doubt my powers.

• Am I good enough to earn this money?
• if I can't raise that money how do I think I'll be capable of making a whole documentary?
• What have I gotten myself into?
• Does my concept even have grit?
• How am I going to convince people to donate without having any real footage yet!? Talking heads are BORING! 

 By this time I had logged into KickStarter and was studying successfully funded videos and only being able to find ones that basically had a talking head before a full-scale movie trailer, Which, by the way, is impossible for me because I have no footage!
So I lay down on my bed to calm down and stop my head from spinning when I remembered something Cortney Zamm told me once. She told me that I was the strongest filmmaker in the BU Cinema Department. and I am aware she said that to calm me down because at that time I was, once again, freaking out about my future and doubting my powers. [for the record I am not the strongest filmmaker in the BU Cinema Department, I know that and Cortney knows that, she was jsut saying that to make me listen to her advice]
Anyway, that memory gave me the courage to get off my bed, grab my camera and go shoot some stuff. I don't have to have a trailer for my KickStarter campaign, all I need is a good and honest explanation and some video/editing prove myself to funders.

Anxiety is a Boggart, so pick up your wand, think of something ludicrous and shout "Riddikulus!"

-Kevin