Public Speaking

The fear of Public Speaking has been with me always but never like it was on that June evening so many years ago. I still get gut wrenching panic when I think about that time, it really seems like only yesterday.... A late bloomer, extremely shy, it was a horror to be selected as Valedictorian of my high school class. For weeks I had trouble sleeping and could barely eat. I knew disaster was close at hand.. . The day of graduation I prayed for a quick death, thought seriously of faking a terminal illness, and cried all afternoon. And you know what? It was just a bad as I thought it would be..... My throat closed, I whispered and croaked and didn't say one coherent thing. Dead silence. Then clapping, led by my frantic parents. No one ever mentioned the debacle.. but at our ten year reunion I was nominated as the girl who had changed the most. Oh, that little victory was sweet. but, dear God, I still remember...... For John Heck's contest..