Where I’m Supposed To Be

If you ask around, you'll hear I'm a lot of things.

To my family, I'm the keeper of the Hulu password and the 2nd best cook (debatable). My friends will tell you I’m always down for a good time and if you ask my boss, I'm the "Queen of Google Docs.” My second grade teacher will say I'm a future author and, according to my my optometrist, it's been a year since my last eye exam.

I'm not saying they're wrong… I'm just saying they missed a few things.

I'm a born and raised Austinite, a washed-up student athlete, and I'm passionate about bringing people together. I'm a firm believer in work hard, play harder, but appreciate when it's hard to tell the difference. I seek out stories and crave knowledge. It makes me sad knowing I'll never listen to every song that's ever been created, but it makes me happy to try. I believe marketing starts with how you represent yourself and teamwork really does make the dream work. I'm grounded and driven, but above anything else, I am unapologetically and authentically myself.

If you know me, you know my two passions above everything else are sports and music, so, like most of my stories, this one will begin with softball. I try not to make being a washed-up student athlete a personality trait, but it’s hard not to when I’ve spent over half of my life covered in sweat and sunscreen. Playing softball was my world. For years, I had dreamed of playing in front of the best coaches in the sport, praying they’d think enough of me to offer a scholarship. My mom and I spent countless hours researching programs, reaching out to coaches and checking YouTube insights to see if the states that were viewing my video lined up with the schools I sent it to. One night, as I was finishing up my last recruiting application, I came across a question I had never seen before: What are your Facebook and Instagram handles? How weird, right? Why would a coach care about my Instagram?

It was then I understood the influence of social media and the importance of how I marketed myself to the world.

As I continued to grow through adolescence, social media grew with me. I was approaching my senior year of high school and still hadn’t committed to play softball in college. I had almost come to terms with hanging up my cleats when I got an email from a school in Mississippi. They found my recruiting video on YouTube and wanted to have me out on an official visit as soon as possible. I spent my first day of senior year in Southern Mississippi touring the college campus that would change my life forever.

Let’s fast forward to the first semester, shall we? When it came time to declare my major, I knew without a doubt I wanted to study psychology. I’ve always been obsessed with the human mind. I needed to understand personalities, behaviors, decision making, all of it. But my dreams of being a psychologist came to an abrupt end when I got an 89 in General Psych. In my mind, a B was unacceptable and if I couldn’t get an A in the intro class, what made me think I could get an A in anything else? I came to the conclusion that marketing was the next closest thing, so I changed my major and never looked back.

Maybe I was too hard on myself, maybe I still am. The fact of the matter is, that little decision is what led me to where I am today. Three colleges and four years later, I graduated with my degree in Public Relations and Event Management.

No one really talks about what it feels like once you graduate, so we’re gonna talk about it now. For 22 years, life revolves around the moment you get a piece of paper, but what comes after that? Once you’ve reached a goal that took 22 years to achieve, where do you go from there? Sure, post-grad life comes a little easier for some of us, but what happens when your plans don’t work out? When you don’t land the job you wanted… When you don’t get into a grad program like you thought you would… When you have to move back home and start from square one… again.

This was me.

I thought my degree was a golden ticket that could land me any marketing job I wanted, so why was it so hard to get even an interview? I don’t want to say I gave up- I just did what I had to. For two years I worked two jobs and spent what little free time I had applying to every marketing position under the sun. Burnt out, depressed and working my third double of the week, I threw my head back and asked God for one more summer vacation so I could get my life together. Not two weeks later, the government shut down.

I went from having two jobs, to having no jobs and COVID.

Hopeless and sleeping on my mom’s couch, I finally caught a break. Since everyone was at home, social media marketing became more important than ever. My mom was overwhelmed with the workload the pandemic had created and her company was willing to hire me on as her marketing assistant. I was hesitant at first. I didn’t want to work for my mom, I wanted to make it on my own, but the situation just made sense. After all, she’d been my boss my whole life, why would this be any different?

Looking back, I’m grateful to have worked with my mom. She taught me everything college couldn’t, gave me the confidence I needed to succeed in the industry and pushed me outside of my comfort zone when I wanted to stay right where I was at. So when I outgrew the company that gave me my start, it was hard to walk away.

The next year was a whirlwind, to say the least. I got engaged, bought a house and landed my dream job as Special Events Director for a kick-ass radio network. I was in charge of all things (and I do mean ALL things) marketing for their annual music festival and spent 8 months planning one weekend. So as the day of the event approached, I could feel weight of the world on my shoulders. Self inflicted? Maybe, but weight nonetheless.

All of the pressure evaporated once I saw 20,000 people having the time of their lives at the festival I had a hand in creating. At that moment, I knew I was exactly where I was supposed to be, doing exactly what I was supposed to be doing. To me, there is no better feeling in the world than bringing people together and watching your vision come to life.

If you’ve made it this far, congratulations, you’ve made it to current-day Kay. I know your interest may be running as low as my remaining character count, so I’ll leave you with this: The dynamic duo (A & Kay) are back and better than ever. The stakes are high, but our confidence is higher and we’re hungry to help businesses, venues and artists alike share their stories with the world. So… what are you waiting for? Let’s get it.

Peace and blessings,
Kay