Jude’s blog, chapter 5: 🏆

Hey, I am sooooooooo sorry. This is like soooooo late and I try to be better than that. Oh man, so embarrassing. Anyways, let’s get into it.

I would’ve posted this a week ago but I’ve just been waiting for the right idea to post about. However, I think I’ve got something pretty interesting pertaining to AP Psych. Let’s get into it.

(This will be related to Psych, by the way, it just takes a minute to get there).

Okay, so I wouldn’t say I have an anxiety disorder (because it’s bad to self diagnose, shout-out Ms Halfen for teaching me that this week) but like when the pressure is on, I can definitely feel it. And I really felt the effects of anxiety on Monday with the reveal of Jerry Baber Award nominations. 

Yes, I am writing about theatre in a blog yet again. No, I swear I am not a theatre kid (theatre kids are weird). Rather, I am a kid who happens to be in theatre. If my writing about theatre bothers you, feel free to exit out of this. Unless you’re Ms Halfen.

Okay, so, explanation: The Jerry Baber Awards, named after the late great Jerry Baber (former theatre teacher at Kempner High School), are a 9-year old theatre awards ceremony held every May to celebrate excellence in theatre arts throughout schools in Fort Bend ISD. Categories include Best Musical (won by DHS last year), Best Play (also won by DHS last year), Best Performer, Best Supporting Performer, Best Lights… basically, it’s about being the best. Last year, our Viking Theatre Company won 5 awards, so the Jerry Baber Awards (or Babers, for short) are a huge deal for us. This year, we put on two shows (A Midsummer Night’s Dream for our play and All Shook Up for our musical) in the hopes of once again showing out for our Baber judges. I had been involved in our two Baber shows last year, but this year I felt added pressure, as I had a better-than-usual role this year in A Midsummer Night’s Dream and had been pegged by many of my peers as a possible contender for an individual award. In addition though, out of support for my friends, I was still eager to find out what we as a group would win, as (and I really don’t tell them this enough) I do love my troupe. 

(Made some edits to that graphic for y’all’s benefit, btw)

So, with all the judging finally done, the Jerry Baber Awards official Twitter tweeted this out on March 27:

Now I, like many of my peers, had already been waiting for these awards, but with this date we were given a day to anticipate. And what a day it would be. And so, we waited, and the day came.

Because of my inclination to get anxious, i really really hated that they wanted to tease us like this. I guess in a world where we have to eagerly await cast lists i should be used to this by now, but I’m not. And the thing is, I probably shouldn’t be so anxious, but the thing about anxiety is this: it is part of your body’s fight or flight response, and one’s fight or flight response is activated by the threat of potential danger or harm.

Obviously, no real physical danger or harm would’ve come to me regardless of what the results of the nominations were, but it all kinda lies mentally. It feels good to win. It sucks to lose. My brain, at the prospect of losing, started to freak out, and made me feel fear. I was plagued with “what if I didn’t make it?” questions inside. These nominations would be a kind of reinforcement; I found myself desperate for it to be positive reinforcement and not negative. My stomach ached that day like seemingly never before; legitimately, the most calm I felt that morning was going through FRQ questions in AP Econ. It wasn’t particularly easy, but it succeeded in keeping me distracted. In APES, my classmates and I were forced to put our phones up in those little holders, and so it made me worried the list would be posted in that class and I wouldn’t see it. I made it to AP Psych, and could hardly focus on the presentations that day. Like, Andrew and Mateo are two good friends of mine and even then, I couldn’t recall what they had gone over that day with their presentation, as my brain was too preoccupied, not only with the awards but with something that came out of my anxiety: nausea. Oh that sucked so bad. Fighting the urge to puke <<<<<<<. I got to 4th period (Theatre) but the big problem is that the theatre room has no service, so I would have to wait through that class without knowing. It didn’t matter though, since even when I got out they hadn’t posted it. And then, I got a notification that the Baber awards made a tweet during 5th period precal that day. This brought my physiological arousal levels up like crazy. The amount of cortisol that must’ve been flowing through me in that moment, man… my heart was beating, I was sweating, my body was shaking, and I couldn’t tell you what was being taught in that class. Hesitantly, I opened the notification:

This right here, man. Evil, evil stuff. They posted last years list, this year! They’ve actually since deleted this tweet, likely since they knew how cruel they were being by posting it. That raises a problem though, they knew how cruel it was! And they did it anyway. This totally sucks.

(You know what else totally sucks? Blogger on my IPhone Safari Browser, this is really difficult to work with. This is unrelated, I know, but writing this blog has been such a battle. Guess it serves me right for being a week late. If my font is weird in this blog, that’s why.)

Anyways, back to the story. I felt like I was going to have a heart attack in that moment. It was time for lunch. I eat lunch in the theatre room, which, if you’ll recall, has some truly awful cell service. I spent a good five minutes refreshing the Twitter page to see if they would post the list before I got in there, but they did not. I went in the room, and sat down.

I took more time to reflect, and it really emphasized my fears about the awards. It’s kind of stupid, I know, but I’ve had a pretty trying year and I’ve given so much time to theatre, and I told myself that the only way to make it worthwhile was to be involved with these awards. I didn’t want to fade out, i wanted to be remembered. And then, about halfway through the lunch period, i was thankfully able to get two bars of service in the theatre room (a rare occurrence), which I used to refresh the page. And at that moment, they had made a new tweet. “Congrats to the 2023-2024 Baber Award Nominees.” Theyre for real this time!!!! I knew my minuscule cell service in that room wasn’t gonna allow me to see the graphics for the list, and so I ran out of the room like a mad man in search of cell service. I found myself all the way at the dance room before my phone finally loaded the graphic, at which time I saw: 

Best Play! Best Musical! A litany of other Award nominations! I was so so soooo happy for my troupe, but then I saw something that really tied it all together:

I got nominated for an individual award!!!!! I was ecstatic!! I got the positive reinforcement that I had been craving so badly, and it was incredible. To put in psych terms… cortisol ⬇️, dopamine ⬆️. 

I walked back in the theatre room to my peers cheering me on. They were happy for me, and I was super happy for them (shoutout in particular to fellow AP Psych-er Vienna for their nominations in Best Scenery for Play AND Musical) We all celebrated our nominations, and I couldn’t stop myself from repeating “YOOOOOOO” and “That’s crazy, man!” I had to really struggle to come down from the emotional high I was feeling. We may not have won (yet 🤞), but that was really an incredible moment.

In closing, I turned myself (inadvertently) into a great subject for a psych blog with my own anticipation and elation getting to me. I will say, it’s really not healthy to put that much pressure on yourself; if you’re in a situation like mine, then remember to calm down and take deep breaths. Remember, also, your affirmations: you ARE good enough, and it doesn’t matter what other people think. Furthermore, pay attention in class: my grades are likely going to reflect my mental absence from this day. To the best of your ability, don’t be like me (unless you want to be an award-nominated actor- in that case, go crazy!)

Here’s some resources on anxiety btw:

https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/basics/anxiety?amp

https://researchfeatures.com/challenging-current-approaches-understanding-anxiety/

That’s it for the blog. Again, so sorry this is late, I know I’ll be getting points off but I’ll simply have to bear that cross. See you next time!