Learning How To Tour & Sew & Say Yes & Say No
Radio City Music Hall
Seven years ago I rushed home to FaceTime my mother. I laughed-yelled into the video call that I’d accepted a summer job as a Wardrobe Assistant on a touring dance show.
My sister – ever the publicist - yelled from her bedroom “Leave the word assistant out of the job Josie. Jesus H.” I could see my mom’s face struggling to hear “What did she say?!”
“It doesn’t matter!”I screamed-yelled. "I need you to teach me to sew on a button – ASAP."
She laughed, held back her laughter, dropped her phone from laughing, picked up her phone and tried very hard to be serious.
Cry-yelling now, I reminded her this was not a joke. I had no clue how to sew and the job would start in two weeks! She tried to remind me about YouTube – everyone’s best friend but I would hear none of it. I needed my mother to teach me, via video call. I showed her the very basic sewing kit I had purchased from Joanne’s on the drive home from the job I had just quit.
My mom spent an hour teaching me how to thread the needle (yea I’m serious), sew the button, loop and lock the thread and cut it off. When we got off the phone, I continued. Using the seam ripper (I broke two of them) to tear out the button then starting all over. I searched through my sister’s closet and found all of her shirts with loose buttons, looked through my live-in boyfriend's pants, my cardigans.
Occasionally my sister would yell in my ear “Sew faster you idiot!” thinking that if I could sew under her pressure I’d definitely be able to fix clothing quickly for a live show. She was wrong.
The Forever Sign
By the end of that night, my fingers were red and shirts lined both couches in our shared living room. Instead of being exhausted, as I had been every single evening for the last three months, I was exhilarated. Images shiny and new loomed ahead of me, and I hadn’t even seen the official wardrobe yet.
I had no idea then that the three month tour to make a little extra cash in between paycheck to paycheck tv shows would take my life on the pivot that it did. That this tour would bring about best friends, betrayals, broken hearts all while opening a door the size of Narnia.
All I knew for certain was that I could now sew a button onto a shirt in less than a minute with someone yelling in my ear and the lights down low. They say fortune favors the prepared but I say fortune’s never met a beast like live entertainment.
To see more photos of my very first ever tour - click here!