Life in Stepping Stones

I’m 31 years old and I feel liked I’ve already lived a lot of lives. After I dropped out of high school at 16, I ended up having numerous experiences that I never could’ve dreamed of. Looking back, if I could tell my 18 year old self one thing, it would be to focus on the journey, not the destination.

It’s been hard to look back on the many things I’ve done and feel proud. A lot of times, I feel like I never achieved the success I aspired to and I see the flaws in many of the things I did.

But success is subjective, isn’t it? Honestly, even the most successful people look back on things they did at 18 or in their 20s, and think of all the ways they could’ve done something better; regardless of if they were successful. It’s part of growing up.

I’m trying to evolve my mindset: success doesn’t have to mean being prosperous. Maybe success is about the journey and the lessons learned along the way.

After all, if an experience helps you grow as an individual and learn an important lesson for the future, isn’t that just as, if not more so, a success?

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The Journey of “Little Blossom”

In January 2009, when I was almost 18 years old, my older sister and I ended up on a crazy journey. After hearing many stories about a high school friend of hers (who may as well have come straight out of “One Tree Hill”), I was inspired to write my very own TV show. I brought this idea to her and hundreds of scribbled notes later, we, along with a friend of mine, had written two scripts for the first two episodes of “Little Blossom”.

I felt proud. Accomplished. I had never fancied myself a writer and yet here I was, script writing. Our parents fell in love with the script upon reading it and decided to take a leap and finance its production.

The experience was once in a lifetime. After years of dealing with authority figures telling me I would never be successful and trying to destroy my confidence (read Confessions from a High School Drop Out), I was in charge. I was 18 and making hundreds of decisions daily.

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The Audition Process

We set out to audition actors in the Denver area that February. We had small expectations. After all, a production run by two 18 year olds and one 21 year old couldn’t possibly garner that much attention.

Boy, were we wrong. 

For years, I was afraid of being looked down upon; but this was important to me. I personally reached out to multiple talent agencies, colleges, newspapers, and more. I was pleasantly surprised (and shocked) to find they all took me seriously. Before we knew it, we had over 200 actors audition for us.

That First Weekend of Auditions

The first weekend of auditions was not an easy one. We dressed nice casual and walked in giddy, nervous, and completely mentally unprepared.

The problem was, not only were we already three young women, we were three young women who looked even younger than our ages. We had numerous people walk in and patronize us with comments like, “Aww, so you decided to make a little film?”. As most women have, I’ve dealt with this attitude throughout my life. Whether it was while I was pregnant at 24 and glared at from strangers as if I was a teen pregnancy, or ignored in the shoe department at a department store because I looked too young to buy something myself.

Make It or Break It

Wanting to be taken seriously for the first time in our lives, we decided to make a change. We showed up the following week in suits and heels, and I created an entire poster explaining our positions so the talent could familiarize themselves with us while in the waiting room. This also helped take away the look of shock when they entered the room because they knew what, and who, to expect.

It’s sad looking back now that as a woman, to be taken seriously, you have to throw on a suit and heels, and explain why you deserve to be in the room. My dad can walk into a room in a tattered jacket, or my husband can meet with customers while wearing jeans, and they’re both still taken seriously.

As three young women though, we had to become “actors” ourselves and begin playing our own roles as bosses in order to be taken seriously.

As the weeks went by, we became more and more confident in our roles and embraced our new positions. By mid April, we had cast 50 actors ranging in age from 13-60, from leading to non-speaking roles.

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Hiring Employees as a Young Female Filmmaker

To be honest, I had to pull out my diary to remember some of the details about what happened next. It’s been 13 years. Can you blame me?

It turns out, when my husband asks me for help reading a contract, or even writing one, the reason I know how is because of Little Blossom.

I’ve often wondered where I learned this extremely useful skill. Back in 2009, after casting our actors, I began researching, writing, and preparing contracts for our cast, as well as for businesses we eventually used for set locations.

“This Work is Too Hard for a Woman”

As we prepared to send out the contracts, we met with a potential assistant director.

Instead of this man interviewing for the job, he turned it into an attack on our personal abilities to do our jobs. As we asked him questions, he reiterated, many times, that our production was going to be a lot of work and we would never be able to do it because it’s so tough. He patronized us, insisting that while we could direct and edit, we really needed him, a man, to do it.

As you can imagine, we walked out of this interview disgusted…and determined. Cue the Elle Woods “Watch Me Shine” montage.

Sure, we were young. Looking back, we had a lot of maturing to do and plenty of lessons to learn along the way. With that said, even though we had our flaws, being incapable of taking charge certainly wasn’t one of them.

We learned an important lesson that day: Never let someone tell you what you are or aren’t capable of. If it’s your dream, you can make anything happen.

Our search for a crew eventually came together. From a camera crew to a makeup and hair team, to even a stunt coordinator. We were ambitious if you couldn’t tell already.

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Getting the Ball Rolling

Locking Down the Locations

We had 15 locations to scout for. Some of them were easy, such as homes. My parents had plenty of friends willing to help. Since my dad is a doctor, even the hospital was easy enough to land. The most challenging location to lock down was the school. They had many restrictions and rules in place. Finding a school willing to let us use the property during the summer time was not an easy task. We ended up having to use two different schools, one for the interior shots and the other for the exterior shots.

Ironically, the location that seemed like the biggest long shot of all, was a snap to get. One scene required the use of a restaurant. As long standing regular customers of The Counter, a burger restaurant located at Park Meadows Mall, we were able to reach out to the owner and get permission to use the franchise location. It turned out the owner was also the producer of Waterworld and was extremely supportive of our venture.

Beginning Production

You never realize just how much goes into a production until you’re in the throes of it all. Before we knew it, we were scheduling rehearsals, making call sheets, and designing props.

The first rehearsals were held in late June and we rehearsed throughout July. Two weeks before filming began, one of our lead actors decided they weren’t happy with their character, purchased an expensive wardrobe for the character they imagined, and asked us for reimbursement.

In that moment, we could’ve sighed and followed along. But we didn’t. We stood up to her, fired her, and cut the entire character out of the script.

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Taking Charge

The production of the show was an emotional experience to say the least.

The hardest day came midway through production. Unfortunately, our crew never took us seriously and did the filming on their own terms. On one day of filming, we ended up running over 6 hours behind schedule. My dad was having a nervous breakdown, my sister was having an anxiety attack, my friend was verbally lashing out at us, and I was left, along with our assistant director, to solve the crisis. I was exhausted but I garnered all the energy I had to forge ahead and get production moving. Once we began, we managed to film the scene within two hours.

We ended up firing my friend that day. We had no choice but to fire her from the production, which was not an easy decision. She had been my friend for two years and I had to choose the future of our production over our friendship.

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Hold On To Those Memories

It’s been 13 years and I feel like I have repressed a lot of my memories from this experience. The good, and the bad. The more time that has passed, the more I have focused on what happened with the production itself. It was a low budget production, by Hollywood standards, that never went further than a screening for the cast and crew.

I haven’t watched it in years. Sometimes I search YouTube to find old clips only to read comments panning them and my use of Comic Sans font for the trailer (which I 100% agree now- what was I thinking?!).

I wish I had written down more about the experiences I had. The feelings and emotions I felt. The decisions I had to make. In so many ways this experience shaped me and at the time, I took it for granted.

The Lessons I Learned Are With Me Forever

For the first time in my life, I was in charge and rising to the challenges that arose on a daily basis. I learned that I could handle a crisis. I learned how to organize and manage over 60 people. I learned how to balance being a boss and a friend to our employees. I learned how to write contracts and schedules. I learned how to make quick decisions, and tough decisions, even when it meant losing a friend.

But when I flip through my old diary, I find only glimpses of those memories. At 18, I didn’t grasp the full weight of this experience. My diary for the most part, despite the unequivocal life journey I was partaking in, is still about me, on a quest for love. My embarrassing crush on an actor on our set who had a girlfriend, who I constantly was throwing myself at. My crush on our assistant director, who I stared at like an emoji with hearts in my eyes.

Sometimes I forget the confident young woman I became during this experience. I remember the doe eyed girl who was nervous about failure and far too preoccupied with who from our production I was crushing on the most.

I’ve looked back all this time, seeing the failure of a show that never materialized. It’s time though, that I evolve my mindset and focus on the journey.

Maybe “Little Blossom” didn’t succeed. But in the end, I did. And that’s all that truly matters.

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I have a lot more stories to come, so please follow me on Instagram and Facebook to hear more about my journey.

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Despite all of the challenges this production brought, it was also full of amazing and hilariously fun moments. Enjoy the blooper reel!

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