Late Night Sushi - An anecdotal segment about taking chances in life

10 min read - by Lennora Esi

Life sucks.

Let me explain.

When I was young, my Mom and I would go to the market down the street to buy olives. After carefully disqualifying the nasty ones and sampling some of the fancier variations, we would choose a hand full of our favorite combos - red, black, and green, stuffed with pepper, almonds or garlic - and head home.

For a whole week, the smell of oily spices and herbs would sweep through our kitchen whenever I opened the fridge door. Paradise.

Now I'm lying on my Ikea couch, nibbling plain black olives from a can and can't help but wonder what the hell happened. Has being an adult always been this hard? All I've got are these lame, watery, punk-ass excuses for an olive. How did I go from peppers, almonds, and garlic to canned food? Easy … I ain't got time for no markets! I'm too busy trying to figure out my life! 

I'm a freelancer. An "I-do-day-jobs-while-trying-to-establish-myself-in-the-arts" type of gal. And just like every other artist, self-starter, or dreamer, I am faced with up to a million questions every day. Highlights include:  How do I go about this? How can I become successful? What does success even mean? Do I need 5K followers on Instagram? Should I dedicate more time and money into perfecting my craft or into expanding my marketing skills? If I haven't secured a career by now, is it ever going to happen? Should I just give up?

I went on tour with a theater production last year. One evening, while gathered in the common area of our hotel, the topic of suicide came up. I remember one of the actors - a beautiful man - say: "I don't get it … I enjoy living way too much!" And he really did. He would go to the sauna in the afternoons when we weren't performing. He would treat himself to fabulous lunches, and always buy the best and most expensive wine for our post-performance drinking sessions. The big difference between him and me? He wouldn't think twice about it. He just did whatever it was he wanted to do at that moment.  

One of the big problems we have in our society derives from the fact that we are so accustomed to stories of triumph and so unfamiliar with stories of failure. Let me help you with that.

A new horizon

Two years ago my husband and I moved to Vancouver on the West Coast of Canada. Vancouver is well known for its beauty: glass buildings painting the most striking skyline when you cross one of the various bridges into town - hiking trails, wild nature, and wildlife in the nearby mountains -  scenic boardwalks along the seawall capturing boats, sailors, and passengers on the way.

In the film world, Vancouver is well known for another reason. They call it "Hollywood North", the LA of Canada. Many TV and film productions are shot up here, and many post-production companies are stationed in the city, as taxes are way lower than in California. So when we moved, I knew that this was my chance to take my acting career to the next level. I came from a theater background and had a decent-sized bag full of experiences, but only a handful of actually decent paid gigs to look back on. So here was my opportunity to finally make a fresh start in a new city, give it my all and open my horizon to the world of film and television. 

Naturally, I spent the first few weeks doing everything I could to avoid that bright, new future. Yes, there were pressing matters to take care of. Finding a place to live, figuring out where to buy food, opening a bank account, navigating Canadian bureaucracy, all the fun that comes with moving to a new city. But even though I tried very hard to ignore it, finding a job was right up there at the top of that list.

As an actor in this particular business, the first step to finding a job is finding an agent. That should be a simple task, right? Send out some emails with your headshots, demo reel, and a juicy paragraph on why they should add you to their roster. Piece a' cake! If you are confident about the recipe. But every time I thought about it, my mind started boiling over with questions. How much butter do I add? Do I have enough eggs? What if they don't like milk chocolate cake? 

The Leap

Then finally, one day, I just did it. I pushed those nagging voices to the back of my brain, created a draft, and sent it to all 32 agencies in the city. Within a few days, 13 of them got back to me saying they would like to meet me! I couldn't believe it! I spent the next two weeks bouncing from one office to the next. I was actually in a position to choose who I wanted to work with! So after thorough consideration, I picked my agency and was ready to take over the city. That enthusiasm went quick.

My first audition flopped. So did the next 35. It took almost half a year for me to book a secondary role in a commercial. My second job took me a full year to book: a four-liner in a TV show. Meanwhile, I was auditioning between one to three days a week on average.

A few months in, I started having doubts about the whole thing. Though I was prepared for the rejections, the hard work, the frayed nerves, what I wasn't prepared for was staying on call 24/7. Getting audition calls the night before. Having to change all my plans for the next day with no time to mentally or physically prepare. Taking three to four hours of my day to find the right outfit, put makeup on, take the bus, then the subway, and walk to the audition room to be in there for a maximum of three minutes. What I wasn't prepared for was how much of a disruption auditioning would be to my personal life. I am well aware that I don't have as much endurance or dedication as some artists do. I tried my best nonetheless. But no matter how hard I did, I knew my best just wouldn't be enough. Not because I don't have the talent (we all know that in the end, it all comes down to who has the right nose, height, or credits) but because I couldn't keep up the lifestyle. I desperately wanted to quit. Yet I persisted. And with time, I became more and more miserable. 

In limbo

I remained professional. I always kept my agency up to date with scheduling issues, I always prepared my lines, always got to the audition room on time. But every time the email icon popped up on my phone, I prayed it wasn't my agency. Every time I went to an audition, I hoped there would be a traffic jam or an electricity outage that would prevent me from getting to my destination. Then, every time I left the audition room, I would feel light as a feather and tell myself, "see that wasn't so bad!". But as soon as that next request came in, I would go back to feeling miserable. 

"Just tell them you want to quit!" my husband urged me. He couldn't understand why I would put myself through this agony if I really hated it so much. But "just quitting" was not an easy decision. Wasn't this the life I chose? Wasn't this what being an actor was all about? Wasn't this what I needed to go through to be successful someday? Wouldn't my agent be mad if I told him all his efforts to get me into good rooms over the past one and a half years were for nothing? Wouldn't everybody be shaking their heads at me thinking I was giving up too quickly? Wasn't that how entitled people behaved, who believed they deserved better treatment than everybody else? I didn't want to invoke any of that. So I stuck with it.

A couple of months after my second shoot, I had a lunch date with my agent. Just a routine follow-up to recoup how things were going. He's a great guy, and I am happy I picked him as my representative. But after that meeting, it was clear to me: I wouldn't continue on this path. I realized that depending on others for jobs, having them determine what roles I can play, meanwhile living under the poverty line, waitressing another 5 years while waiting for my big break – that wasn't how I wanted to be spending my days. 

Reclaiming faith

Auditioning for film and television is a whole different ball game than working in theater. I can be hard-working, but I like to take things slowly. I prefer to feel comfortable and prepared before I showcase something. Lastly, I want to be in charge of my day as much as I can. 

Any route you choose in the arts is hard and comes with its own set of challenges. But some are more in line with who I am and what I want than others. 

So a few days after our meeting, I just went ahead and did it. I told my agent that I wanted to go back to the theater world. He was as understanding, helpful, and open as always. I haven't auditioned in a few months now. I am still far from where I want to be as an artist but a lot closer to who I want to be as a person. 

I wish I could take full credit for that. I wish I could say I was the one brave enough to stand up to my own doubts and fears. I wish I could say I pushed aside the notion of what everybody else would think of me and listened to my heart. But that would be a downright lie, withholding a vital piece of information.

Sometime before that last supper with my agent, I went to a community meeting. It's a shared space for people of African descent and our allies to come together, discuss, make music, and create. The young woman who introduced me to the group was also on my agent's roster. I hadn't seen her in a while, and at this particular meeting, she said something that struck me. She said: "I love acting, but I hated auditioning, so I quit. Now I can wear my hair the way I want, I can change my style the way I want without having to worry about looking like my three-month-old headshot!"

I can exactly recall the feeling in my stomach when she said those words: pure relief! If it was okay for her to quit, it would be okay for me to quit! Her courage to stand up for herself gave me the validation I needed to stand up for myself without feeling like a failure, layabout, or brat. 

What they don't tell you about taking that leap of faith is that you might end up falling on a rock. They sweet-talk you into the idea that if you just run fast enough, just spread your wings wide enough, just hold your head high enough, the wind will carry you to a fluffy cloud of fame and glory. Yeah, well, sometimes it won't. Sometimes you will plummet into cold, dark waters. Sometimes you will fly so high that the sun will burn you. Sometimes you will run and spread and hold as hard as you can just to come to a halt at the cliff. Why? Because life sucks. Because there are things we can't control. Because what we enjoy today might bore us tomorrow. And that's okay.

Life sucks, and it’s okay.

I don't regret my years auditioning for Film and TV. I would probably always wonder how things might have played out if I hadn't. Will I look back in a few years and wonder what might have happened had I just stuck with it a tiny bit longer? Perhaps. But will I also look back and know that it just wasn't right for me at the time? Absolutely.

"Just doing it" is not only about taking action on something that might make you happy. It's also actively deciding to not do things that will make you unhappy. 

We shouldn't have to sacrifice our personalities, ideals, and true selves for what we think is necessary to succeed in our field. And we shouldn't have to wait for other people to take action to legitimize our own. Because at the end of the day, when the lights go out, when the cheers die down and the makeup comes off, all you have is your bare self. And only if you like that plain, lumpy, unexciting version you see in the mirror, can you ride all the waves and take any chance coming your way. That is because you will not let your success and failures define your sense of self-worth. And showing up as your true, authentic self, rather than as what others tell you you should be, will more likely lead you to success.

The beautiful actor - the guy who liked going to the sauna on off-performance afternoons - it wasn't like he was an ever-positive bloke. He could be a terrible diva and really irritating at times. But because he knows life sucks, he understands the importance of loving and taking care of yourself. My Mom raised my brother and me while simultaneously working as a black freelance artist in Germany in the’90s. She knows that life sucks, but that is why she understands the importance of finding joy in the little things.

Accept that life sucks and enjoy the soothing effect of that realization. I'm not advocating we mindlessly try everything without considering consequences or give up as soon as things get tough. I simply think that we should ask the helpful questions and scratch all the destructive ones. The more chances we take, the more we comb through our failures, the more we will know where we really want to put our energy, what we really want to fight for, and strive towards. And if that fails as well? Go buy some fancy olives, go to the sauna and on to the next, I say! 

It's like stumbling into a hole-in-the-wall at 3am and ordering Sushi. It could give you food poisoning, or it might just be the best goddamn thing in the whole wide world! But if you don't try it, you will never know. 

So take a chance.

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