Growing pains of a spoiled little twat.

This year has been fantastic. And it has been horrible. It has been fantastic largely because of how horrible it has been. This year I have found out in a million different ways that it is only in hardship and adverse circumstances one can find opportunities to grow.

This year I have encountered rejection, bankrupcy, family feuds, death, you name it. This year I have survived all that. And I have come out stronger. I believe that this year I have finally started growing up, for lack of a better term.

I have started writing again. It had been more than ten years since I wrote anything worth mentioning. These last few months I have written almost an hour's worth of stage material that I have tried out at open mics. (Of which about 10 minutes survived.) And then there's this blog. It may not be much, but it has been very helpful to me.

This year, after losing out on a part in a tv show that I had put all my hopes on, and after watching my bar go bankrupt, I swallowed my pride, dusted myself off, wrote a few bits and climbed on stage. That is the toughest thing I have ever had to do. (I have had a very smooth ride of a life so far. I know that. I know I am a spoiled brat. That makes this kind of challenge the kind I have to surmount.) It has taken me 12 years from graduating theatre school to climbing back on stage on my own. That's a lot of wasted time. On the other hand, that's how long it took me. No one ever taught me how to gather up courage for something. No one ever taught me how to stop letting fantasies of success get in the way of achieving small victories. No one ever taught me how to swallow my pride. No one ever taught me how to get over myself, and my fucking sense of fucking entitlement.

So here I am, spoiled little forty year old brat, complaining about how hard life is for a little prince like me.

It's hard for anyone to turn their life around. In a few ways, this year, I have. That makes me feel proud. And I never realised how different pride in an accomplishment feels from the kind of pride that comes from a sense of entitlement and being a spoiled little shit.

Here's to next year. Here's to growing the fuck up.

"I'm the one who's winning this thing on the next edition. Or some other thing. Just give me a couple of years."

This last month has been a rollercoaster ride. For lack of a better metaphor. For lack of the energy of looking for a better one, to be honest. I am exhausted. I have played about 2 or three open mics per week this last month, with a stretch of four in a row last week. One of which was in Amsterdam. It took me four hours to get to Amsterdam on various trains, and four hours to get back. I’d already been to Amsterdam with my girlfriend the week-end before that to visit and watch my friend Bram perform comedy.

I have learned a lot, I am a different person on stage than I was before this month, but it has been BRUTAL.

Especially the drinking. And the hangovers. I need to get that in check. Well soon.

I have run into a few alcoholics this last month, and the difference between them and me is rapidly disappearing. I’m saying stuff I regret when I’m drunk, and I feel like I’m going to die when I’m sober. (Like right now.)

I have hardly seen my girlfriend this last month. Except for on our little trip to Amsterdam. But that was just an evening and a day.

I was feeling very much empowered when I first started doing open mics. It felt like I had transformed from an angry, frustrated complaining bitch on the sidelines to a young, promising comic. I have learned during this month that you can be anything from an onlooker to a successful participant of a discipline (like stand-up), and still be a frustrated bitch. I have seen it re-appearing in myself. And I have seen it blatantly in a very successful Dutch stand-up comedian that I had the ‘pleasure’ to meet in Amsterdam. His advice to me was to give up stand-up comedy, if that was the best I had been able to come up with after six months of doing it. Although I understand his point –my material needs work- telling me to quit helps no one.

I’m just rambling, I realise. I don’t have the energy to focus and structure my thoughts. I could have tried to tell the story of this last month in a nice story shape, but I’m too exhausted to concentrate, and frankly I’m just glad I’m writing. It’s been way too long. And the progress I have made as a performer this last month has made it clear that writing is what I need to focus on. Better soon than late.

And look. I’m writing. So that’s something, right?

Yesterday I went to watch the finals of Humo’s Comedy Cup. The drinking and the exhaustion made me say some stupid things to rather important people in the Flemish comedy world. I think I’m going to have to be a slight bit better than I was going to have to be if I hadn’t told these people these things.

Fuck it. I need the challenge.