Details are the Darndest Things

Details are an extrordinary thing. 

I’ve NEVER been one for details.

 It’s really just not in my nature.

I like to be the easy going girl, the one who just goes with the flow.  I’ve always been a bit of a gypsy. 

Had I grown up in the 60’s I surely would have played a guitar across the country, worn long beads and braids in my hair,  fought for love and not war and lived the life of a hippie.

Life has always been so exciting to me that way,

 It just “takes you” places if you let it. 

Details to me are like the antagonist of an exciting adventure. 

Like Captain Hook in never never land, or the wicked step sisters in Cinderella. 

In my perspective details have always put a dull spin on my life in and have always claimed the  ‘freedom” of me just being me.

I really have always known this, but there were many tell tale signs along the way that supported this solid truth about myself. 

For example when I was banned from writing the specials on the board  at the restaurant I worked at for many years, because my spelling was all phonetic.

Really……Why is it important if its spelled exactly right when one can simply sound out the words?  Besides the way I spelled it may not be right but it is certainly much more exciting than seeing that word the same way ever single time!

To be a detail oriented person means that you pay attention to every little thing.  No matter how miniscule it is.  Nothing slips by you.  You pay very close attention and make sure things are PERFECT.

 Bleeeeech. There’s that word.  Perfect.  Makes me cringe.  It’s a love hate relationship I experience with perfection. 

I know I  am not, nor will ever be so.  But for some reason there is this deep need inside of me to want it,  and I don’t even know why.

Funny how life almost always gives you what you need, not what you want.

Event Planner was one of the job descriptions that was  handed to me when I got my promotion at work.   I was sincerely excited because really….i would be in charge of planning fun times for loads of people!  One thing I know about myself is I am a fun girl! I KNOW I can create funness!  If my middle name weren’t Helen( to carry on my Grandmothers name) and my mother knew my personality when I arrived, she most certainly would have bestowed upon me the middle name FUN!  So really…..if there’s a little planning required on the side to embellish this FUN project, then that would be ok.  Piece of cake!  I have GOT this thing!

That was my perspective for merely a day.

If I could have “called uncle” or “tapped out” I would have already done it on day 2.

I quickly had to accept the notion that this was going to be a lot harder than I originally perceived. I would need to commit fully to it, if I was going to succeed and succeeding was my plan indeed.

If there was an “Event Planning For Dummies” book I would have read it front to back 3 times, done all the exercises and memorized it and would be able to recite any chapter on command.

 I may not be detail oriented…..but I most certainly will be prepared!!!!

Unfortunately for me no such book exists.

So I did the next best thing I could think of.  The thing that any new event planner would do who needed to find whatever it took to prove her ability, show people her talents, and most of all make sure she doesn’t get fired!!!

 I watched the Wedding Planner with Jennifer Lopez. 

Surely Hollywood’s version can give me at least SOME valid insight into planning a big event.

With the tools I could learn from this movie, along side the knowledge that there would be an open bar and we could get people drunk quickly so as not to notice all the glaring problems throughout the night…..I may be able to pull this thing off.

I might even be great!  And maybe look like Jennifer Lopez while doing it!

I was however both humbled and disappointed as  time went on when I realized how very different Jennifer and I were.

Apart from the obvious cultural difference of  Jennifer’s Sultry Latino heritage and myself , who has been called “wonder bread” by my friends for a reason, there were also some elaborate differences between us.  For example…..

Jennifer Lopez

Stunning, fresh looking skin, soft features, hair perfectly combed back without a single stray hair.  Her suits perfectly pressed at all times and dresses always accentuating her sexy legs.  

Mission:  To look good no matter how bad things get or how stressed out you are to ensure peoples perception of you being that you have it all together all the time! 

Erika

Even after having brushed my hair the crazy rampage of the morning inevitably would mess it all up. 

The creases in my forehead went from fine lines that could be reduced by the constant application of oil of olay, and quickly started resembling deep caverns created by daily facial expressions that co-existed with reactions like…..

“ OMG I thought we dealt with that.”

“ You have GOT to be joking!”

 and

“ Oh I see, so this thing we just spent 3 days working on and perfecting is no longer useful because somebody decided it would be FUNNY to change it all and see IF WE CAN PULL ANOTHER MIRICLE OUT OF OUR ASSES!!!!!”  

My clothes were often a fine combination of shaking as many wrinkles out as possible, spot cleaning and fabreezing the shit out of everything I owned just cause I didn’t have time to do laundry half of the time.  And although I feel that my legs are my best feature as a woman, I knew that if I sported any of my cute dresses to work, the question around the water cooler would have been “Is it possible that Erika may  be a man?”

Mission:  To get through my day without going postal and being taken away in fancy jacket with locks.

Jennifer Lopez

Conducted herself in a sweet and calm manner at all times and even in the most strenuous of circumstances, still had it in her to find inspiring words from the heart that would give people around her the strength they were looking for and live a happy life!

Erika

On my good days I dropped the fbomb only a handful of times, I often ran 

( yes ran) through the office, and I’m sure my co-workers came to recognize that panick stricken look on my face that would eventually find its way to me daily. 

By the end if someone came to me with a question it took everything in my body mind and spirit to calmly say,

“No problem…..let me look into that for you”  instead what I was DYING to say.

“ OMG COULD YA DO ME A FAVOUR…BRAD?  JUST FUCKIN GOOGLE IT!!!! 

Inspiring words are often my strong suit.  On the night of the big event many people came up to me and asked how I felt about the party now that all the work is done?  I should have said something about this amazing experience, light in the midst of darkness, looking into the future with hope and possibility. 

The only words I could muster up that was straight from the heart was…

” Where’s the tequila people….I am going to need a lot of it!”

 The truth was that in this moment of my life, all of my yoga experience, all the breathing exercises I had learned, hot baths and serene Jazz music I surrounded myself with, couldn’t dissapate the stunningly obvious insecurity that daily consumed me.

I can do a lot, I have conquered a lot, but I don’t think I can do this.

I was wondered  when they were gonna wake up and realize they picked the wrong girl for this job. 

Yup.  An open bar was really gonna help me I think.

I am NOT detail oriented and had never even been to the Christmas party.

The only 2 things I really had going for me at this point was the Christmas plays I would choreograph all of my family members in each year ( I think they still haven’t forgiven me for that)

And Martha Stewart’s party  planning tips.

I knew in that moment I had to make a decision that would define my character for years to come.  Very much like the time I shaved my eyebrows because I had not yet learned how to pluck and they turned out looking like MC hammer brows with the line through them, or the time I put cheap self tanning lotion all over my body and not only did it turn orange, but I put actual fingerprints all over my body. 

I would have to say to myself….

”Someday….this too will be funny.”

I was suddenly swimming in a pool of details.  Things I had no idea you had to think about.  Every detail you put into place and every decision you made had an outcome.  

Suddenly I realized that for the past couple of years I have not been that free spirited girl I thought I was or used to be.

 I have been trying to conduct the details of my life so much so that I’ve lost sight of what’s actually important. I stopped somewhere trusting the bigger picture, my gut, and my heart and I have driven by fear of slipping up a detail or two that would put me somewhere I didn’t want to be down the road.

This party I was planning was full of details.  There was no way around it.  And even with immersing myself in them, doing my best and working so hard to make sure everything was “perfect” I still fell short because there are always unforeseen things that you don’t expect.  That’s life.

Perhaps the truth of this is for me is about trust.  Trusting that I am exactly where I am supposed to be.  Trusting that there is a plan for my life.  Trusting that the details will work out in exactly the way they need to without having to orchestrate them.

Maybe I need to let go of  trying to be the conductor of  my own life and just be responsible for courageously walking it. 

“We must be willing to let go of the life we have planned,
so as to accept the life that is waiting for us."
~Joseph Campbell~