Steve F. sent me a piece of philosophy this morning. Steve’s a very easygoing guy and played bass in the jazz trio I hired for the party last Saturday night. My brother’s known him for yonks and I knew I could depend on him to deliver that night. I’m also very glad they were there as we discovered the hotel’s mixer not working after the program started (it was working when we tested it at the beginning!), so I had to use their microphone.

Anyway, here’s the article Steve sent: The Tao of Fish Swimming

One of things I’m still recovering from is being an MC! I’m usually the unofficial photographer at events… I run around with my camera and am happy to stay in the background. Last Saturday I lost all feeling to my limbs as I stood in front of over 100 people as the Program Director and was up front and centre for over three hours. Kevin gave me a hand with things as I was running around and announced a few of the speakers for the evening, so I wasn’t the only one doing it. But I designed the program (printing it was a bit of a nightmare, but everyone liked what I’d done with it), and I was the one who had contacted all the speakers, so handing the emceeing job over to someone else would’ve meant I still would have to brief that person on everything. At the end of the evening I was totally surprised when Kevin took the microphone and introduced me, holding a big bouquet of flowers and a gift bag… was I ever stunned! Then I was totally speechless as the entire ballroom of people gave me a standing ovation… no wonder I’ve been feeling somewhat disoriented all week. Being in charge and being in the public eye for an entire evening made my head spin.

I was going to drive down to San Francisco after Christmas to visit Eric and family (Rob will be there, too!). Eric just relocated to the Bay Area to be the CFO of Banana Republic. But I decided not to go anywhere for this Christmas break so I could devote my time to looking after Michael and Maddy while Cheryl is on total bedrest and Allan is working. Eliza isn’t going anywhere, either, while Jason will be East and Kristin is back in Switzerland for Christmas, so at least I can hang out with Eliza when I’m not with the M’s… I can catch up on film!