Certainly the stage was larger! I had benefit of a fine 30' x 20' stage in our city's recently refurbished 1940s movie house. I found it helpful to reacquaint myself with the dimensions of international staging after so many weeks of club meetings in odd or small spaces.
And the stakes were larger. The run-throughs last night were with my coach, a 16-year motivational speaker and semiofficial (for me!) psychiatrist. But I also had another in my "audience" who, surprisingly, had never heard me speak in this fashion. I really felt that I needed to bring my best "game".
We ran through the semifinal speech and reached the decision that I have adjusted it enough. The ending got attention and we're ready to call it a day there. That speech gets one more run through for the attendees at Durham's "Speech Spectacular" on this coming Saturday.
We also ran through the finalist speech, which I described as "rough". The judges' verdict? Good, just needs work on the ending. Unfortunately none of us had enough working brain cells at that hour to improve, so I had homework. And it's hurry-up homework! I have to present the speech twice this week.
But most of all, the big story was validation. My coach was selected in large part because she understands the balance between improvement and encouragement. I got some serious feedback, and in cases, tough love. But I felt like a champion. Or at least more of one!
Next stop: vetting the finalist speech twice more this week. We shall see what happens to that enhanced mood.
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