Hello First Day of Forever...

My supervisor said it best: after your last day of work begins the rest of your life...

Although this time, it began a little early. Like, last Saturday kind of early, where for the first time since the Tagaytay workshop, I acted as a production assistant.

For two days at the workshop, I was a Production Manager. The job didn't really sink into my head, it was just sort of something that I had to do in order to get through the five days. An output. A requirement for graduation.

This time, it was for a legitimate production to be aired at a specific venue. I was doing it for no money and solely for the experience.

Honestly? I was expecting it to be like another Tagaytay Workshop experience...

Instead, it was an eye opener. The place we went to was an eye opener. 36 hours I spent propped up doing a lot of the grunt work was an eye opener. The people I worked with was an eye opener.

And suddenly, we are reminded why we want to be writers.

I knew that it was a lot of work, I was expecting it. But even though I readied myself for the physical demands of production, I forgot about the psychological strains of working with people who are already incredibly stressed out because of pre-production.

For someone who doesn't eat chips or drink much caffeine, I have consumed more Iced Mocha Fraps Venti's, sodas, energy drinks, Extra Joss!, and Redbull in the past two days than I would in at least two months. I even had the nerve to shovel in some junk food.

When I came home mid Monday morning, my body was still so pumped up that I was tempted to run around my room just to take the edge off.

But all it took was me staring in front of the workload left in my PC and I just quit. Crawled into my bed and just died on it, hoping to escape my responsibilities for even just a few hours.

I woke up at around ten to check on things. Chatted a bit with my friend concerning business, then passed out again an hour later.

It was exhausting.

I learned a lot. More on directing than production, though I learned some of that too. But mostly, I learned the process of handling people (or in some instances--how not to handle them). It was a bit of an eye opener.

Not the most brilliant 36 hours, but it was an educational 36 hours. Totally humbled me. Totally schooled me.