The Essence of Failure
One of many life defining failures in my life
Truman Capote once said, “Failure is the condiment that gives success its flavour.”
My life can be defined by a series of epic failures, with some failures more devasting than others. When I fail, I fail hard, but that’s because I try hard. Every one of my failures has made me stronger because I picked myself back up, and learned from it.
I wasn’t always the perfect angel. I had my difficulties, but I was starting to open roads to a better life. Writing was always a passion for me, a passion I had kept to myself. I was healing from a massive trauma and thought I should learn scriptwriting. At the time, it was just a way to keep my mind busy.
So I signed up for this script writing course, which was more of an introduction to script writing. I had become friendly with the teacher through chatting about my life. She thought I had a story to tell and told me if I needed to make it in this business, I needed a leg in the door. Weird things like this always happened to me, but this teacher managed to get me a job on set for a TV series they were filming in my city.
It was only a pilot episode, so filming was for a week or two. My job was simple. Make sure everyone is happy. My duties ranged from making coffee to building sets. I was the gopher, but I loved every minute of it.
The director took a shine to me, which never happened in other jobs I had done. I felt like I belonged. They felt like my people. Eventually, filming wrapped up, and I was sad to be done with it, but I was grateful for the experience.
The production company I was working for was contracted by RTE, which is our national broadcaster. The show was called “At Home with the Ryan’s.” and it was a comedy set in my home city of Limerick, Ireland, so it was kind of a big deal for me.
A few months later, out of the blue, I got a call from the director I was last working with, asking me if I could come back for another round of shoots. I could barely hold my excitement. I couldn’t believe they remembered me or even liked me enough to have me back.
It was the first day on set, and the location was set in a rough part of the city. I remember it clearly. It was a cold morning in December, and what happened next I could have never foreseen happening at that moment in time.
Like I said, I wasn’t always an angel and owed some bad people money. It was even a lot of money, but I was dodging these fellas for so long that I had almost forgotten about it. Anyway, It was first thing in the morning, the camera crew hadn’t even gotten their cameras out of their cases, and all I heard from behind me was, “Where is my money.”
I looked up, and there he was, breathing down my neck, foaming at the mouth. I knew the guy, and he wasn’t a guy you would mess with. He was big and tall with a big gut, and he was screaming at me in front of the whole crew and actors who were standing there open-mouthed. I whispered to him to go away that I was working, and this seemed to piss him off, so now he’s punching me.
I did the opposite of what I should have done and started fighting back, not that it did much. I managed to hit him, but I broke my hand in the process. I held him off, but I got to walk away with a broken hand. After a few more threats to have his money, he walks off, but the damage is already done.
Word had gotten back to RTE about what happened, and they wanted to send bodyguards to keep the crew safe. This didn’t look good for the production company, so they asked me to go back to the hotel. In the end, I decided to go home for the day, but I knew they weren’t having me back on set. And a phone call later that night confirmed it.
Heartbroken is an understatement, but I learned that you can’t escape your past and it will come back to bite you in the arse. I knew after this what I wanted out of life and I was even more determined once I got the taste for it.
