Random Acts of Kindness and Encouragement.
I was feeling a little forlorn about trying to drum up interest - and an audience - for Wednesday's preview, and all the admin that goes with it, until I received a nice email from someone I'd invited, expressing frustration that they couldn't come.
This might sound like a standard response, if it weren't for the fact that this person - who shall remain nameless - is of a high enough profile / doesn't know me that well to feel obliged to reply, yet they still did, and were really lovely in the process. They only said a few words, but it was still enough to make me feel more positive about what I was doing; particularly after a challenging day.
Working on your own can feel like a uphill slog. You fluctuate between feeling good about what you're doing and being generally unenthused by it. You have to constantly keep yourself in check, while splitting your time between writing, promoting, rehearsing, improving and keeping faith in what you're doing when faced with more than your fair share of obstacles, rejection and disinterest. With this backdrop, you'd be justified in giving in, if it weren't for the odd bit of kind encouragement here or there. A few nice words can turn everything around. So, I'd like to thank this secret person for their well-timed email; it really made a difference.
(Just to clarify, it wasn't Billy Pearce.)