Everyone that knows me knows that I’m a pretty creative person and when I tell them that I used to be a scenic artist for Cirque du Soleil they always ask why I would ever leave a job like that. Here’s the story:
I had been working at the MGM Grand since I was 16 years old, first in the arcade and then when I turned 18, I transferred to The Grand Garden Arena to be a stage hand. I had been studying theater for years and I had that job my senior year of high school and all through college. In 2004 when I graduated with my bachelor’s degree in Technical Theater with a minor in Tourism and Convention Administration The show KA had started being built. I got called over for two weeks and ended up staying for 6.5 years. The first year was amazing! I spent 16 hours a day being creative and painting, building, designing and creating and usually only had off one day per week. It was hard and very tiring work, but I was beyond happy to be there. When the show finally opened was when that changed. It wasn’t that I wasn’t grateful to be there, but I absolutely was, but I missed the fun and excitement of making new props, instruments, costumes, and set pieces. I was stuck running the same show twice a night 5 nights a week and after a couple years I started to resent it. Don’t get me wrong, I loved the stability of having a full-time job that paid me better than I have ever been paid, but I really needed to do something else where I could be more creative.
In 2009 I help start a non-profit organization called Circus Couture http://circus-couture.com/ and it is still going strong today! This organization raises money forCure for the Kids a pediatric cancer center in Las Vegas. In 2010 we put on a show at The Palms that combine art, fashion, and circus acts all into one amazing night. I was the Director of Event Ascetics for the first CircusCouture and I had to make sure that everything from the center pieces to the cupcake towers to the art displays were step up and looked absolutely amazing.The event raised over $80,000 in its first year and has reached almost a million at this point. This one event changed my life forever. I knew that whatI was doing at Cirque du Soleil wasn’t making a difference or changing anyone’s life for the better. A couple months later I quit and started working in the non-profit industry.
This was a huge struggle to begin with because I had been paid so well at Cirque, I wasn’t used to making pennies compared to that. I was afforded amazing opportunities to do things that I would have never gotten the chance to do, though. For example, I started volunteering for an organization that helped children that were born with congenital heart conditions. This organization gave these children the opportunity to go to summer camp for a week. This is something that they would have never had the chance to do otherwise because their doctors would have never allowed it. This camp had doctors, nurses, and fire fighters/EMTs that were all familiar with the campers and their conditions. The first time I went to camp I was in charge of arts and crafts and got to help the campers and counselors create more fun things than I can even remember. We did macramé bracelets, watercolor paintings, designed t-shirts, pillows & blankets, camp flags & banners, and the list goes on. After camp was over, I was hired by the organization to be their ProgramsManager which meant I became the Camp Director and stayed on for 6 years.
The last year that I was with this organization I decided I wanted to get my master’s degree in Library and Information Science. Normally, this program takes 2 years to complete but I got done with it in a year and a half.Just before I graduated, I got a job at a library in the Youth ServicesDepartment and I love my job! I work mostly with the teen and tweens and get todo things like throw Harry Potter parties, have Percy Jackson book clubs, get to do science experiments, paint cutouts for kids to take their pictures in, create haunted houses, read graphic novels, and so many other fun things. I love my job and even though I have massive amounts of student loan debt now that I’ve never had before I’ve never been happier at a job! Are there things I would change, sure, but since it’s the holidays I’m only going to focus on the positive!