🎧 138: Clarissa took to her work ...

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CLARISSA took to her work with wholehearted determination, though she seemed to have no confidence in her abilities at all. Whenever I gave her a job to do, she would begin stroking her muff and looking at the floor. She’d tell me that it sounded much too hard for her, but that she knew how much I was counting on her, and so she’d try, so long as I’d agree not to be angry with her if she couldn’t do the job the way it should be done. Then she would go off and do the job and come back for another, just as uncertain as ever. I was pleased to see that she had such pluck despite her fears, and I felt that working on the play was really doing something for Clarissa—she was getting to know lots of the kids in the fourth grade, for one thing. In no time at all, Clarissa had recruited a technical director, a property manager, a publicist, stagehands, a prompter, and so on.
     She actually made an asset of her timidity, especially when she was recruiting someone for a job. One afternoon I watched her, clipboard in hand, walk up to a group of kids in the hall and say, her eyes wide, her voice quavering, “I need six stagehands, but you don’t want to be stagehands, do you? Probably not. I don’t blame you. I do need six stagehands, though, and I need them right away. I don’t know why anybody would want to do it, really. There’s no glory to the job. You’ll have to work long hours, and you’ll get dirty and sweaty. While the other kids are taking bows, you’ll be backstage, out of sight. You’ll stand there with the applause ringing in your ears and a lump in your throat, thumping one another on the back, and the only satisfaction you’ll get is knowing that you’ve done something fine, really fine.” She brought her muff up to her face and rubbed her eyes with it. Then she swallowed hard, stood up straight and said, “It’s just not worth the trouble, I guess.” She started to walk away, but the boys and girls quickly surrounded her, climbing over one another trying to sign up.

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