We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Erin Carere. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Erin below.

Erin, looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. We’d love to hear about the things you feel your parents did right and how those things have impacted your career and life.

My parents are kind, humble, smart, funny and original folks; a city gal and a farm boy who met on my mom’s first day of college at age 17 and who have been together ever since… that’s married over 50 years, folks! Wow.

They did so many things right. But I thought I’d share a few tidbits from the “It Happened to Me” files to demonstrate some of the values they instilled in me through their own examples. Truly I could, and perhaps should, write a book about this! But for now, we’ll start with my mom.

My mother started her career in mid-life. She had been a stay-at-home Mom, a babysitter, and then she sold furniture for a while. But at a certain point, she seemed to realize that she was entrepreneurial and ready for other challenges. She surprised everyone by going into real estate! She started working with a company run by a guy and his brother, I believe, in the city next door to our small town (50,000 people in the city, 7000 in our town.)

Every day she got dressed in her business suit and went into that office and started learning about real estate. She cold-called day after day, rejection after rejection. She knocked on doors. She assisted fellow realtors in the office. And one day, someone said yes to her! And she sold her first house!

She went on to own her own company, and even though she is now retired, she still gets calls from her long-time clients, because she brought wisdom, integrity and care to her work.

She instilled this level of discipline into me from an early age. You see, I begged for piano and voice lessons, and then, once we got a piano, I would complain about having to practice… at least I did in the beginning. But my mother had a rule. She would set a timer and I had to sit at that piano for 20 minutes every day. The first few minutes I would bang on the piano in frustration. I wanted to watch cartoons or go outside and play with friends! But then, time ticking away s-l-o-w-l-y, I would eventually just start practicing.

Those 20 minutes turned into hours, which then turned into a lifelong career in music that has had several reincarnations.

Even now, if I don’t *feel* like doing something… my inner discipline kicks in. It’s easier to just show up now than deal with my discomfort at knowing I’m procrastinating. That tenacity has served me well.

My mother taught me not to give up. To try new methods, and to just keep going for your dream… AND that it was totally fine and indeed beautiful to reinvent yourself at any age, if that’s what was right for you!

***

My father taught me a number of similar values as well. But I thought it might be fun to talk about all my car accidents and what Dad taught me through his response to those.

I had a few incidents with cars as a young woman (all my friends from those years are laughing as they read this, I’m sure!) One of the first really weird things that ever happened was just after I got my license. I was 16 and was driving my first car, my brother’s “vintage” Oldsmobile. Okay, so lemme just describe the car before I tell you about the scene of the cr… accident. :)

Missing a side view mirror, the driver’s side door didn’t actually open from the inside, so you had to roll the window down (old school, the kind where you had the little handle and rolled it backward or forward!) to open the door from the outside. What a beaut!

Now, consider the locale. Central Minnesota, end of February. I dunno how much Southern California knows about snow, but, well, in terms of volume, just imagine that there’s a small mountain of packed hard snow at the edge of the student parking lot at my high school… the very place where my father also happens to be a teacher and athletics coach.

So there I am, driving into a parking space just before school when…

I blink, and…

I’ve not only driven up that mountain of snow, but I’m stuck. I cannot go backwards. Because the car is practically upright.

Yes.

Upright.

I open the door, jump out, and run into the school where my dad is getting ready for his day.

“Dad, dad!” I cry. “I got stuck in the snowbank!” Dad was arranging things at his desk. He chortled a little.

“That’s okay, honey,” he said, grabbing his coat. We walk outside to see a small crowd gathering around my car. “What the heck?” My father saw the car, apparently auditioning for a position in the infamous Carhenge down in Nebraska (in Minnesota, everything other than Canada is “down in.”) He looked at me, looked at the car, looked at me again. “How did you?” He was stunned. So was I.

But then he walked up to the small crowd of students staring in awe at this display of curious driving. “Schultz, Johnson, Kent,” he said, suddenly the football coach, pointing at some of his bigger players. “Help me out here.” And together the three linebackers pushed the car backward and forwards, slowly easing it down off the mountain and into its proper position.

Embarrassing?

Good gravy, YES!

Lessons learned?

1. Pay attention while driving! Especially in the snow.

But more importantly:

2. When things go wrong, and they will, although hopefully not quite like that ever again (I wish I could say that was my only close encounter with a car in a snow drift, but, nooooo)… sure, take a minute to be surprised. But then:

Get present.

Breathe. Stay calm.

Assess.

Take action.

Ask for help if you can.

And then just take the next indicated step.

Trust me! This has served me well in the world of entertainment. Because it’s always harder and weirder than you think. But if my Dad can get my car back on all four wheels without waiting for the snow to melt, I can solve the next problem I’m bound to meet.

Erin, before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?

Think of me as a renaissance woman, someone who does a few different things.

As a screenwriter, I primarily work with my wonderful husband. We have optioned/ sold/produced/ won awards for projects ranging from TV pilots to features to shorts. We work primarily in the thriller and action genres, but often incorporate various other genres into that. For example, our short film, “Near Death,” which is now streaming on over a dozen different platforms, is a blend of horror and crime alongside thrillers. Currently, we’re producing a single-location thriller and writing another contained action-thriller.

Acting-wise, you can think of me as somewhere between Christine Baranski’s niece and Sandra Bullock’s younger sister. I love roles where I surprise people! So, for example, the soccer mom who’s really a corporate spy… A police detective who really wants to be a jazz singer… layers upon layers of surprises, vulnerability and secrets. Most recently, a short/ TV pilot I co-wrote and produced with my husband, “Spy v Spia,” has been doing rounds at festivals and I was honored to win “Best Actress” among a few other awards with that piece in which I play an opera-singing spy in a love-hate relationship with a rival.

Coming out soon, I hope, is a novel I’ve written which was short-listed for the Leap Frog Fiction Prize and the Catalyst Fiction Award. Still unpublished and seeking! :) It’s women’s fiction with a dash of rom-com… Until then, I’m developing a podcast “as” a “character” from that novel. Sort of a promotional tool, sort of a spin-off. Stay tuned for “Joan de la Fleur, The Podcast Experience.” It should start rolling out in June of 2023.

What do you find most rewarding about being a creative?

Sometimes I’m successful. Often, I’m not. But I am so very blessed to live a life of creation and purpose.

And I don’t think only artists get that in life. I think anyone and everyone can discover their purpose, with or without an identity career.

It’s just that my career happens to lend itself to that incredible exploration of what it means to be alive!

We often hear about learning lessons – but just as important is unlearning lessons. Have you ever had to unlearn a lesson?

I mentioned I’m a singer.

At a certain point in my singing life, I had developed a series of bad habits. Undoing those old ways and creating newer, healthier methods was beneficial not just as a vocalist, but…

You know how on “Ted Lasso,” Dani Rojas has the catchphrase, “futbol is life?” Well… singing is life!

My voice teacher always says, “whatever you’re working on in singing is parallel to what you’re working on in life.” And when I think of my crazy bad habits and what they represent, I can’t help but agree.

What happened is, after a decade of touring, and not always venues with great sound, and therefore a decade of pushing my voice this way or that, I had done some damage to my vocal folds. I was so very lucky that the damage was reversible! That’s not always the case… and while we may scoff at the idea of bad singing leading to the end of one’s career, or talent, or joy, or even life, it’s true that singing incorrectly can create nodes which, untreated, could even create major health problems.
So…

Here’s what I had to unlearn… and what it taught me for my life as well:

1. The very first thing I had to relearn was proper voice placement. Knowing “where” to sing “from” helped me be able to belt without suffering, and switch from style to style with ease. It’s just like life, though. It’s better to place yourself in environments that are supportive!

2. I also had to learn to use my own, real voice. A lot of singers learn to sing by copying other singers! But it’s easy to stop singing with your own true sound because you’re mimicking others. I firmly believe it’s much better to be who you really are, all of you, both as a singer and as a human. A rose is not meant to be an oak tree; a giraffe is not meant to be a zebra. You are not meant to be anyone other than you.

3. I also used way too much breath when singing. I hear this a lot. And in terms of vocal health, the problem is that all that air can dry out your vocal folds. But it’s also a metaphor for projects and careers. If you’re giving something way too much air, you’re sending out things that aren’t solidified, and that won’t be sustainable. If you try too hard, it won’t be sustainable. Just let things take the time they need to get going; don’t give too little and don’t give too much. The thing itself will be your guide, just like your own voice.

Contact Info:

• Website: http://www.erincarere.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/erincarerela/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/ErinCarerePerformer/
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/erin-carere-1b30618a/
• Twitter: https://twitter.com/ErinCarere
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/erincarere
• Other: https://www.instagram.com/joandelafleur/

Image Credits
Photos by Stephanie Girard Except photo of Erin and Carlo Carere by unknown/ Erin’s phone at the Awareness Film Festival