Palmer Events Center
Hymn to Our Own
RECEIVED Wed., March 25, 2009
Dear Louis,
A personal thank you note for your piece in last week’s Chronicle, “Hymn to My Own” [“Page Two,” March 20]. I’m a 42-year-old writer and camera operator who moved to Austin seven weeks ago to do exactly what you discussed in the piece – move forward, live dreams. Of course, it’s been a tough ride, but after 26 years of not ever getting what I was promised from my three degrees in the corporate world and with no one relying on me currently for economic salvation, now is actually the right time to make it happen. But in the days when I'm pushing it 18 hours and sitting questioning every possible way of earning a living and making my life finally what I want it to be, your piece was a clarion call for me to hold tough, “rope-a-dope,” and it reminded me specifically of the 14 years of small steps that have led me to this place. Your cry of “forward” is what’s kept me getting incrementally closer year by year and helped me to overcome every bruise and setback, but it’s easy to forget when the sticks are bigger than the carrots.
I hope to be a part of the positive change coming to your city. To throw my shoulder to the wheel and make something new, to help to create a place for others to create. I trust now that the answers and way to earn my living will come.
Your editorial is now pasted on the dashboard of my car, and a copy will be on the mirror of every house I stay in.
Thank you for articulating that when I really needed it.
A personal thank you note for your piece in last week’s Chronicle, “Hymn to My Own” [“Page Two,” March 20]. I’m a 42-year-old writer and camera operator who moved to Austin seven weeks ago to do exactly what you discussed in the piece – move forward, live dreams. Of course, it’s been a tough ride, but after 26 years of not ever getting what I was promised from my three degrees in the corporate world and with no one relying on me currently for economic salvation, now is actually the right time to make it happen. But in the days when I'm pushing it 18 hours and sitting questioning every possible way of earning a living and making my life finally what I want it to be, your piece was a clarion call for me to hold tough, “rope-a-dope,” and it reminded me specifically of the 14 years of small steps that have led me to this place. Your cry of “forward” is what’s kept me getting incrementally closer year by year and helped me to overcome every bruise and setback, but it’s easy to forget when the sticks are bigger than the carrots.
I hope to be a part of the positive change coming to your city. To throw my shoulder to the wheel and make something new, to help to create a place for others to create. I trust now that the answers and way to earn my living will come.
Your editorial is now pasted on the dashboard of my car, and a copy will be on the mirror of every house I stay in.
Thank you for articulating that when I really needed it.
Most sincerely,
Gabrielle Bouliane
Gabrielle Bouliane