Oxygen Pitch

When I was really young, my brother told me that an evil goat ate my soul on the day that I was born, rendering me unable to dance or appreciate fine art. That’s a dumb lie, but I was a dumb kid, so I believed them. I used to sit on the side of school discos, staring out glumly at what I would never be able to do. And when we went to the National Gallery in grade 3, I told people that I sadly just saw grey, lumpy shapes. I didn’t, of course. I actually admired some of the paintings, but I told myself I didn’t. I dance like the reincarnation of Michael Jackson, but I TOLD myself I couldn’t. Success and failure: they’re all in your head.

That’s what I need to keep telling myself. All in my head… all in my head. They are going to LOVE this idea…I am going to take the hyperbaric oxygen equipment Melbourne medical practitioners know and love, and revolutionise the whole darned thing with this brilliant idea. At least, that’s what I keep telling myself. Good grief – I know Lizard’s Lair is on television and everything, but no one told me it would be THIS stressful. I’m going in front of the panel tomorrow and I’m convinced that I’m going to mess it up, and oxygen therapy as a science is going to suffer because I wasn’t able to get funding for my invention, and people with asthma are forever going to have to keep using the old ways. 

Anyway, better get to practising my speech, or my pitch, or whatever. Got to check my figures, and make sure the prototype portable hyperbaric chamber is working fine. The last thing I need is for it to suddenly spring a leak while I’m in the middle of charming the panel with my emotional story about my brother’s efforts to dampen my potential.

-KL