Student Blog: Endings and Beginnings

Up until now in my college career, I have had the luxury of not worrying about my future. I have been studying both Marketing and Theatre for three years now, and I've never had to focus on one over the other. However, with summer internship applications taking up my entire brain space and senior year beckoning from the distance, I must begin to consider what my future will look like. 

I spent much of this past semester applying to various business and communications internships throughout the country, not necessarily because I wanted to, but because I felt like I had to. With no successes as of yet, I couldn’t help but wonder, am I not finding an internship because I’m applying to jobs I truly don’t care about? Well… yes. That would make sense. So, just recently, I reconsidered my values and thought deeply about what I want to be doing with my life in 2025. To no surprise, the path that I realized I need to be following in the new year is theatre. 

Starting January 1st, I will begin auditioning for several Summer Stock theatre companies across the nation. The idea of performing in a place I’ve likely never been with people I’ve never met should probably scare me, yet instead I feel such a great sense of excitement (in 2025, I’ve decided to banish all feelings of social anxiety. The stage should be scared of me.) Anyways, regardless of whether I get cast in a Summer Stock show, I hope to acquire some sort of internship or apprenticeship at a theatre company so that I can at least be working in an environment I feel comfortable in.

Besides my summer plans, I am also in the midst of preparing for auditions for my university’s production of Legally Blonde which are taking place in mid January. Interestingly, this is the audition I’m most nervous for the entire year. Legally Blonde has been one of my favorite shows for about a decade, and it is an absolute dream of mine to be in a production of it at some point in my theatrical career. What better time than now, right? There comes a point in audition prep where I have to come to terms with the fact that there’s nothing else I can do and that regardless of how the audition goes, the decision is completely out of my hands. So, I will maintain hope and trust myself to do the best job I can possibly do.

With 2024 coming to an end, I look back on the past 365 days fondly, but I know that 2025 has so much more to offer me. Although this is a year of change, I am entering the new year with my head held high and copious amounts of self-confidence coursing through my veins. This is the year that I find out who I am and where I’m meant to be.