Because pg 4 6-13-19
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The director of a movie is the person who basically tells everyone else what and how to do things, during production. Of course he or she already has all of the pieces in place — a cast, a script and a set, which results in the movie director being able to use decisive and clear language to call the shots: “I want you to sit at this specific table and look at this specific camera and say your line this specific way.” I am by no means a movie director, but I do work in the restaurant business, a business which requires a constant rearrangement of “sets” according to customers’ needs and requests, and since I am responsible for these set-ups, I find myself directing all the time.
In addition, these set-ups happen quickly and so I grab whomever is available to help, which often results in a somewhat ambiguous and gesture-filled language of direction on my part; “Put that round table thingy, you know the one over in the other room next to that corner spot, in the back room where the opening is next to the lamp that you have to pull twice.”
And if my hands are full because I am actually carrying the table thingy, I sometimes just use my head as a pointer and say “That goes there!” I don’t use this type of cryptic code language because I want to confuse somebody, I use it because in the heat of the moment of rearranging things, it is simply, what works!
At a rock concert, if there are multiple costume or set changes, you better believe that the director, the one with the plan, is gesturing wildly, speaking quickly and using phrases like “Take this down the blue hallway and hand it to the girl with the pink ponytail next to the broken railing!” Or when you are moving, you can plan all you want, but when the actual moving of the furniture is happening and multiple people, who are holding your heavy stuff, ask you “Where does this go?” You start answering in the same cryptic phrases; “That goes next to the brownish table with a chip near the room with the three little windows next to the vent thingy.” We don’t choose to use this type of directorial language, but it is the language of directing people to put things where they need to go when they need to go there QUICKLY.
A few weeks ago, I found myself responding to a new employee who asked me where he should put the table with this: “It goes around and out back because we need it in a few hours so just roll it on that easy path next to the Bertha closet and tuck it behind the bushes.” It was his first real day and somehow, without taking too long, he managed to put the table exactly where I had directed him to. I knew then, he was a keeper! ACTION! ACTION!
Kathy Naumann, possessor of NATURALLY curly hair and the understanding that you can’t control everything!
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