Sounds like a true performer to me !

I'm glad you're on the Café, Mary.
Your posts are always genuine.

The "best" stories about Mary's magic are the ones she cannot tell -- those told by others of the inspiration she has been -- and is

My Best and Worst moments with performing magic are the same!

The evening when Arnold Furst told me that I had the skills and dedication to be a great magician as a career if I chose ..

and then said that my empathy and understanding of fear might destroy me in the process.

and in his eyes I saw a very lonely man. I was 14 years old.

.........................................

since that day I have performed tens of thousands of conjury and mentalism effects -- and have never accepted any fee.

for he also told me, "Because you can you must!" -- another path in the magic forest ...

Great stories!

My worse:

I was doing a silk act; I was in the middle of doing Pavel's silks from newspaper. In the set up there is some gluing involved. While I was performing the routine, I roll up the paper then tear a small piece at the bottom to reveal the silks are now tied together. While in the process of pulling out the silks, I got some of the glue on the silks, when it came time to pull the silks out, they were stuck to the paper and as much as I tried I wasn’t able to free them. I needed the silks to continue into the next phase of the act. I should have stopped and ended it there but since it was my opening act and needed the silks to go on, I kept trying to free them. I got flustered and just threw the whole thing behind me. The audience felt my frustration and I lost them very early in the show and I was never able to win them back. I learned the hard way that the opening act is what sets the tone for the show.

My best:

I’ve had many but the one that stands out is when a Mother called me to thank me for the pleasure that I brought her family the day of her son’s birthday party. She said that everyone enjoyed it and just wanted to call to say thank you.

I don’t know of many other jobs where people pay me to perform, then they offer me food and drink and then afterwards call me to thank me for being there! I love my job!

Best: I had given a friend a 20 and told him to walk up and tip me while I was performing at a table that seem like the crowd was giving me a great response. Before he came up and did that the guy I did the sponge rabbits to tipped me a 100. After my buddy came and said here is 20 for the show at our table. The guy that tipped me 100 tipped me another 100.

Worst: I was doing the floating rose. When I lit the flash paper rose it fell into my magic case and caught my giant sponge ball on fire. It looks pretty funny on tape.