Step 2 :: Begin to drive to your audition 10 minutes later than you wanted to because you simply weren’t sure of the outfit.

Step 3 :: Get around the block, and realize you don’t have the address as to where your audition is. Pull over, and search your phone for the email from the casting director.

Step 4 :: Gasp when you realize there are TWO sides attached to the email…when you only have ONE prepared.

Step 5 :: Careen back home and rush into the house to print off the second side…where you then learn more about the character and have to change. For the 8th time.

Step 6 :: Gasp again as you’re reading through the second side, and realize not only do you have to scream in the audition, but you have to bawl your eyes out, too. (I look forward to the day this is not a problem. But as it stands right now, I’m still new to this, so it’s going to take me longer than 15 minutes to dig deep and find those emotions.)

Step 7 :: Walk into the audition and immediately break out in hives, realizing that you’re about to cry for these folks based on a script you saw for the first time 15 minutes ago.

Step 8 :: Realize you’ve been defeated when they ask you instead, after the audition, to do a cold read for the ‘best friend.’

And that, my friends, is how it’s done. But I’m thankful for this — I laughed the whole way home. Maybe you think that’s me not taking this seriously, but I think it means I’m much more prepared for this world *now* than I would have been a few years ago. So thanks, real world experience, Emma, Nashville and life, for toughening me up so I can see the humor in days like today.

I learned a lot. Like the fact that casting directors or readers will not always give the emotions to help you play off of them. So the acting truly is all on you. Or that if you want to avoid the awkward sitting in a room with all the people you’re auditioning against, get there early and be the first to sign in. Or if you’re auditioning for multiple roles, have your stuff together because there will be *no* time to mentally transition to the next character before you begin reading for it.

Overall, I didn’t do my best. But I didn’t do my worst, either. And the really good news? I don’t think my hives were noticeable on camera. Haaayyyy!

The best part was…when I walking into the audition, a car drove by and sprayed water all. over. me. I was completely water logged from the shins down. So when I walked into the office, my shoes were making that embarrassing sloshing-spongey noise and my jeans were dragging water all over the floor. But I had to laugh. Because it was my first audition. And there I was. Getting my feet wet.

Somewhere in the universe there’s a chorus of dads laughing at that joke.