Think8 Women

Lights dimmed in the Paris Opera House as stragglers scurried to seat. The overture began. The high curtain swept back revealing a dingy Paris flat, circ 1935.

La Bohéme.

One of my favorite operas, set in eternally Bohemian Paris. Perhaps one of Puccini’s most haunting works, filled with the fleeting nature of time and the power of love.  A perfect night out with the love of my life in one of my favorite cities working with one of our favorite Think8 clients.

What could be bad?

As Italian tenor Massimo Giordano began singing I became increasingly annoyed at the thirty-something woman next to me fumbling in the jowls of her purse.

Finally she found what she was looking for — her cell. The light of her phone sliced my eyes as she held it high in order to unabashedly video the performance.

After a few minutes, she pushed stop, scrolled though her addresses and then sent the video.

Then she called someone (presumably the same someone who received the video) and assured them breathlessly that she would send more.

Now you might assume correctly that I had already tried every form of non-verbal messaging– the evil-eye, the sharp shushing, the loud sighing. Nothing worked.

Finally I turned and spoke low, “This is extremely annoying. Please! Stop! Now!”

Affecting a tragically insulted pose she finally stopped.

 We move seats at intermission and the performance was again filled with ever-new emotion and beauty. But this incident hovered over me well into the next week.

What was it that so annoyed me?

Obviously there was the young woman’s utter disregard for the performers on stage (I wanted to say: think about it–  if you can hear them singing– guess what– they can hear you whispering) and there was the rudeness to everyone in a ten-foot radius trying their best to ignore her.

But there was something else that bothered me. It was her deliberate choice of not being in the moment.

She was not present to the gift of that performance. A ‘crime’ of mindlessness.

And the victim?

The beauty and the creation of every artist who offered her that evening’s performance.

Then it hit me. I was guilty of the same crime.

Here I was in Paris. I had come to work, and yes, Mark and I would take a little time off to play, but I crammed my computer and calendar with things I absolutely  ‘had’ to do while I was there– blogs to write, scripts to flesh-out, a desktop that needed to be weeded.

But I was in Paris. With my dearest Mark!

I made a decision right then and there that I would choose to be fully present to the now.

I didn’t finish any scripts in Paris. (No one died.)

My computer desktop got cleaned when I returned home. (No one cared.)

And as you may have noticed, I am finally writing a blog.

But I didn’t miss a single croissant in Paris. Or any opportunities to huddle with Mark in cafés over lattes watching skies grow dark and awnings gush and sag from heavy rains.

And I remember thinking to myself as we squeaked back to our room dripping wet and laughing, “Yes… I am here.”

Nancy