When Lisa from Back to Allen agreed to do a Great Expectations post for me, it was before Listen To Your Mother was really on anybody’s radar. I just thought that Lisa was a great writer from the KC area, and after meeting her once, a lovely person that I would totally hang out with again (and again and again). But somehow, her post came the week after we were both chosen for the LTYM-KC show, which feels like an

amazingly awesome coincidence.

She’s an incredible single mom to three kids (whom I’ve also met two of and are awesome themselves), and she, in a way, has her own mom to thank for that.

Lisa, I’m honored to be speaking in your company Mother’s Day weekend, and I am so glad to know you. Thank you for being here!

he announcement came out earlier this week, and I’m still giddy. The thought that I am going to be standing on stage–in front of and in the company of–people who also believe in the power of story and have the courage to share theirs, awes me in a way I can’t even wrap my arms around yet.

I’m talking about the first Kansas City show of Listen to Your Mother. I didn’t even know the show existed until I saw tweets and posts by Erin, who I connected with a year ago on a fun yet disgustingly gross stay at a St. Louis hotel for Bloggy Bootcamp. I dug a bit but if I’m being honest, I was only two or three clicks into YouTube before I decided I had to submit a piece.

Not because I will bring the house down laughing, or because my words are any more important than anyone else’s story. Because the beauty of story is that even if they seem somewhat similar on the surface, each and every one of our stories is unique. I’m just the only one who can tell mine, and I’ve spent a lifetime dancing around it instead of embracing it.

The writing part was easy for me; it’s what I do most days, all day, so the draft was painless but long. It was more like a brain dump/long overdue therapy session/purging exercise that left me exhausted and questioning whether anyone really truly wants to listen to my crap. So I put it away for a bit. I let the feelings settle. As I edited I realized that the printed words on those pages encompassed everything I’ve done, been, aspire to and am afraid of. That’s a lot of work for 1,144 words.

Fast forward. I literally squealed when I got the email that said ‘Congratulations! You’ve been picked to audition.’ The squeal lasted through more redlining, more editing, more purging and more pseudo-therapy until I had it down to 884 words. A two minute difference when I read the piece out loud, to myself, in the cocoon of the little tiny corner space I call my office.

The first few times I read it, I couldn’t finish without crying. Not sobbing, snot-producing cries but just enough that I’d have to stop, breathe and close my eyes in order to go on. But I kept at it, hitting the little red recording button on my webcam, reading until the words came out without so much as a crackle. I did that again. and again. and again. and again. until I was sure that reading it for Erin and Laura would be just like any other speaking gig.

I’ve had no shortage of speaking gigs. Thanks to a teacher in high school who saw past my shyness and inability to squeak out a word without wanting to toss my cookies, I’ve been speaking in front of other people since that first debate tournament my freshman year. I’ve been in front of classes at conventions and training seminars and never once (since high school) can I remember being so nervous I couldn’t see straight.

And I wasn’t nervous as I drove to the audition that night. Sure, I had a few butterflies but I knew that Erin and Laura are kind souls. Women and moms like me who get that this is a big freakin’ deal and somehow, I felt safe going into that school library with them. I felt fine sitting down, waiting for the janitor to finish his vacuuming so I could start and joking about whatever we joked about. I can’t remember now, which is how I know I was more nervous than I realized.

And then I started.

And cried.

Heavy, whole bodied, snot-producing crying.

I don’t think I was two paragraphs in before the tears washed over me, gripped me, wouldn’t let me go. I think I tried to breathe. I don’t remember. I think I closed my eyes. I don’t remember. I think I read the whole damn thing. I don’t remember.

I didn’t expect those emotions, those lessons, those words to rise up and bubble over as I sat in that library. I didn’t expect to feel like I’d just taken a dumpster full of junk and dumped it out, spread it around and flung it far and wide for everyone to see.  I didn’t expect the memories to feel so damn real.

I didn’t expect that 884 words, five minutes and two witnesses could lift the weight I’ve dragged around for 42 years. I didn’t expect to realize, driving home, that it didn’t really matter if I botched that audition and would be an audience member instead of a cast member this May because I’d done what I needed to do.

I shared my story. I told my truth. And the world didn’t stop spinning.

Lisa is amazing. Follow her blog, on Facebook, Twitter and on Google+.