A self-proclaimed quiet perfectionist, Stephanie Argamaso created a career in the film industry that has kept her literally behind the scenes for years. But her decision to use all the other hours of the day to explore just about everything has put her out there in ways unimaginable. Find out how saying yes and embracing the beginner's mind can make for an exciting life.
Guest Stephanie Argamaso knew exactly who she was when she entered college: a quiet perfectionist—to the point of having to write a script for her pizza order to place next to the phone. She majored in environmental science and minored in religion but didn’t see herself using those fields after graduation. In order not to have to go home to New York, she stuck around Hanover for a couple extra years and had the fortune to audit a filmmaking class, which sparked her interest. She ended up taking a film bootcamp and getting experience—and an IMDb editing credit—on a feature film. After a little more production work, she realized she would be happier watching and appreciating films than working on them so went back to school for a master’s in film studies. She found ways to stay in the industry, though, with various 9 to 5s.
Treating her job as just that, however, she has had free time to devote to various pursuits, just for the sake of learning something new. In treating the new experiences—from the mundane to the extraordinary—as learning adventures, she used her beginner’s mind to start chipping away at her earlier need at perfectionism.
In this episode, find out from Stephanie how saying yes and embracing the beginner's mind can make for an exciting life…on today’s Roads Taken with Leslie Jennings Rowley.
About This Episode's Guest
Stephanie Argamaso works, by day, in the Office of Film, Theatre and Broadcasting within the Mayor's Office of Media and Entertainment, approving film shoots in the five boroughs. At all other hours, you can find her taking advantage of a new learning opportunity--from sword fighting to pole dancing to being in an all-women's drum line.
Executive Producer/Host: Leslie Jennings Rowley
Music: Brian Burrows
Find more episodes at https://roadstakenshow.com
Email the show at RoadsTakenShow@gmail.com
Stephanie Argamaso: One of the highest compliments I actually got was from my sensei. He was talking to a very large class at the time about how you don't have to be talented at things. And then he pointed at me and he was like, no, but you kept at it. He's like you learned from all your mistakes. You didn't quit. You didn't give up. You just kept going. Like I thought it was the best compliment.
Leslie Jennings Rowley: A self-proclaimed quiet perfectionist, Stephanie Argamaso created a career in the film industry that has kept her literally behind the scenes for years. But her decision to use all the other hours of the day to explore just about everything has put her out there in ways unimaginable. Find out how saying yes and embracing the beginner's mind can make for an exciting life....on today's Roads Taken, with me Leslie Jennings Rowley.
I’m here today with Stephanie Argamaso and we are going to talk about the joys of taking leaps and trying things and trying different things and seeing where it goes. So, Stephanie, thanks so much for being here.
SA: Oh, thanks for having me.
LJR: So I ask the same questions each time that we start this show and they are these: when we were in college, who are you? And when we were getting ready to leave, who did you think you would become?
SA: Well, I definitely knew who I was going into Dartmouth, which was a very quiet, shy perfectionist type of individual. Once you were my friend, I could open up. But until we got past that breaking from, to meeting you to acquaintance to, I can giggle in front of you without being feeling embarrassed, I was very, very quiet and shy. My college roommate can attest that it was so bad that I would have a script taped to our answering machine in the dorm of what our exact order would be when we called EBAs because I would get so nervous, just picking up the phone and placing an order. I invariably would forget something like say where to deliver the pizza to, before hanging up. So I actually had to have a script to use. I dealt with all of that through college. I think at one point I did learn how to raise my hand and answer a question on my own in class without having to be called upon. And by the time I finished Dartmouth, I was still pretty shy, but excited to kind of move on. And even though I didn't really move on because I stayed in Hanover after we graduated and I spent. Two years afterwards working up at Dartmouth. And one of the best things that came out of that was these are really nice perk is you can audit any class at Dartmouth for free as an alum. So I actually stayed in, took a film class and fell in love with it because by the time we graduated, I learned how to learn and I learned to love it. So it was a really great experience. And it's actually one of the reasons why I ended up leaving New Hampshire and moved back to New York city.
LJR: So just to put that in context, film had not been your concentration. You were environmental studies and religion?
SA: Yes, environmental and evolutionary biology with a minor in religion. And then I got a certificate environmentalist studies because clearly I wasn't quite sure what I wanted to be when I grew up.
LJR: Got it.
And then when I first was working after college, I was actually a Dartmouth-Hitchcock medical center. I started out as a secretary there and then moved into the family practice residency program as a part-time coordinator. And that's when I took the class at Dartmouth. And I was like, oh, maybe film would be a career. And then I’d get back to New York.
LJR: Okay. So that, that gave you a next step. What was it that made you think? Oh, I think I'll stay here?
SA: One was, I think the refusal to want to go back to live with my parents.
LJR: Fair enough.
SA: And I mean, I also dating someone at the time who was also saying after we graduated. So I wanted to kind of see how that would go, which did not go very far. But I really liked the area. I liked that kind of small town feel outside of the college setting because I had grown up in Mount Vernon, New York, which is a suburb of New York City, but it's still pretty crowded. And I liked that small town feeling just loved Dartmouth. Autumns. So I just wanted a little bit more time up there before. Going back out into the physical world.
LJR: Yeah. Understandable. And then you're like, oh, but I'll go to the city now because that's what film is about.
SA: Well, yeah, after, after Dartmouth and having normal life for two years up there, I kind of discovered that that type of area is really great for families or if you're already settled in your life. But when you're still trying to find your way, I wanted more opportunities. So that's why after that phone class, I was like, okay, let's see what that's about. And New York's a really great place to do that. And then I was like, all right, I'll bite the bullet and go home and live with my parents.
LJR: And then how was the pursuit of what film might look like in your life?
SA: Well, I took film bootcamp classes and worked on like 12 short films in that little eight week period of just doing bootcamp. Really fell in love with the editing process. So even though I had ended up getting some work as a PA on certain things, I decided to then take another class, which sent me out to Portland, Oregon to learn the Avid. And part of that experience was actually being an editor on a feature film. So a first time or a newish director would actually allow this program to have the students work and edit their feature film. They got it done for free. We had the opportunity to then actually edit and then our work went out there and we would get a credit. So it was a lot of fun and I really enjoyed it, but I also am not mechanically hardware inclined. And as an editor, you have to have those skills of being able to partition drives and all of those things that just completely go over my head. So while I enjoyed this experience, I knew it wasn't going to be something that I enjoyed long-term. But I loved the experience because when I did, I moved back to New York after, and then a friend of mine who had a friend who was directing, needed an editor really quickly. So I was like, okay. And I tried it and there was a lot of micromanagement happening and I was like, Ooh, if this is something that's widespread in this industry, I definitely don't think this is the best fit for me. So I had a wonderful time doing that. I interned actually for the mayor's film office and there, I got a job and ended up on an indie film, first is a PA, but then they actually…It was so understaffed. I ended up being the S the second AD on it. [LJR: Wow.] Yeah. So it's a little bit nutty. Because it's very hard to go from a PA to a second day D after just a few days and not having had specific training from like years of film school to understand what the second AD does. So…
LJR: But nobody knows that when they see her, I am IMDb credit or resume.
SA: It's funny. When you asked me about my IMDb page, I was like, oh, that's not really. I know, I didn't put that up there. It's incredible. It's incredible what they do. Yeah. But after that second day, you experience…it was a six day work week. Because it was a non-union job. It was a 21 hour day of being able to commute to where they were filming on long island. I was commuting from Westchester huge long 18 hour day. Then there weren't enough drivers. So I would take a 15-pass van, drive it home to my parents' house, take a two hour nap and then drive back out again. So after that experience, I realized that life in the film industry is amazing. You make wonderful friends and connections. It's an amazing process, but it's not, it's not what I want to do. Cause you just spend most of your time creating and making and very little time seeing it and appreciating it. So that's when I went to grad school and I got my masters in cinema studies, which is different than production because you spend most of your time just talking about films and writing about it. But then after that, I wanted to do something different. While I was ther,. I interned at the Film Society of Lincoln Center and then actually did a lot of contract work with them. So I wasn't an actual employee, but I would work on their festivals, the New York Film Festival, new directors and their films. And I really enjoyed that. It's really funny as I'm sitting here is because so many of these jobs, I was talking to a lot of people and after having been so shy, I was like, you know, every once in a while I look up, I'm like, why am I in so many customer service jobs? I find myself doing so much interaction with people.
But I really, I really enjoyed it. And I got myself into so many interesting situations and [was] able to meet so many great people that I really started to think that I really needed to push myself more so that every time I went out, I was like my new year's resolution for one year. It was, I'm going to meet three people everywhere I go in any social situation and just learn to learn about these people. I need to get out of my skin. And I actually went out. I could have just stayed home the whole year. I made my resolution.
LJR: That's a tall order, three people in every situation?
SA: Yeah. And what ended up happening is I would never ask them, what do you do for a living? I would always ask them a strange question. And it's really amazing how people take off with his strange question. Like I'll usually, I usually ask them, you know, after I introduced myself, have you traveled anywhere fun lately or [LJR: That's a good one.] So really strange thing. Like what's the one thing in the world that really makes you tick, like what’s your best passion. And then the next 20 minutes, I wouldn't even have to say anything.
LJR: Right. That is an introvert's like covert key to life. Just let people talk about themselves, then you just listen.
SA: Yeah. So it, it actually became a comfortable way for me to push myself to just try something new because you meet new people, try new things. As you can clearly see, I wasn't getting very far in my career because I kept changing and it's still even afterwards, like I was at the New York Film Festival for a couple of years. I then tried teaching with the New York City Teaching Fellows program. Learned very quickly I am a teacher's advocate and will always. Make sure that they are as well, staffed and funded as possible. But if that is something that I cannot do at all. But it was an amazing experience to kind of be in a classroom to totally understand how difficult it is for teachers. But yeah, I lasted one marking period, and then I was like,
LJR: Oh wow. What grade level are you doing?
SA: Well, the interesting thing that happened was, but that was the first year you had to teach what you majored in, in college. So
LJR: Oh, you hadn't done that for awhile.
SA: It was a school that had recently been broken down. It was like a large school and they made four tiny schools inside of it. It was the second year that the school was in existence. So I had ninth grader, general science, and then 10th grade biology. But what had happened was the first year, in order to prevent the school from getting on the sur list, which is where schools that were failing, the principal did not have any of the students sit for the Regents. So all my 10th graders, this was the second time they were taking biology. So I was having to deal with kids that the system kind of failed because they should have been given the confidence and the outward support…think, you know, we know you can pass this test, sit for the regions, but they were so worried that they then were all very bored sitting through the same class again. So that might've been part of my issue was just not having had the skillset because with the teaching fellows program, you actually get your master's degree while you're teaching. So it's not like you do the bulk of the work and then start student teaching. You got the summer semester of classes, just one semester’s worth. And then you were a full-time teacher and then did the rest of the masters in that. So I have so much admiration for everybody who goes through that program.
So eventually afterwards I've actually since settled down because I think what works best for me is to not have my career be the center focus of my life. I love what I do now. I’m at the mayor's film office. 35 hour a week job. It starts. That's one of the great nine to five, Monday through Fridays work, stays out the office and I have the rest of my time to kind of do what I want, which is really just take classes.
LJR: That's awesome.
SA: Yeah. There's humanity has created so much in arts, culture, progress in science. And there's so much out there that I just want to be able to expose myself to as much as possible.
LJR: That's so cool. And I want to talk about all of it. But let me, I am intrigued by the mayor's film office. And just to clarify, the mayor's film office is the office that a production company would come and say, I want to shoot this thing in Times Square at night and I want to have all these extras and I wanted a this and I want a that. And you're the one or that office is the one to say, do we want to take that on? Is the benefit of that worth all the hassle that it’s going to take, right?
SA: Correct. Yes. So my job is to actually review the applications for the shooting, permits and try and figure out how to get filmmakers their vision accomplished with minimal impact on the neighborhoods that they film in, which is it's an interesting tight rope walk and it's kind of a lot of fun. And it's my ability to still work in film, but have normal hours. So you don't have to be on set when they're blowing things up at two in the morning,
SA: No. No, no, no.
LJR: But you also have to know the neighborhoods well enough or the logistics or do you get a script and you have to go out and walk and be like, would that be possible? Could we do that? Or are you just, you know, this now so well that it is really in the office?
SA: Yes. I've always joked and told friends that my superhero name would be The Human Map. Because [LJR: It’s handy], every time the tourists stop and ask, excuse me, where is this? I'll just rattle off like the directions this way.
LJR: Seven blocks this way, take the underpass.
SA: Yes. Like a scared maps all day long. But yeah, it's, it's an interesting job. It sounds way more exciting than it is because it's pretty much paperwork and it's not even paperwork anymore because nobody really uses paper anymore. It's all online. So I used to say I was just a paper pusher. Now I'm just kind of a button clicker. But it's amazing. I have to kind of figure out how to distill the magic of movies and television into a contract between the company and the City of New York.
LJR: And so every film that you watched with New York in it, are you like I did that or, oh, I'm so glad we let that one through.
SA: I actually don't watch a lot of thing that shoot here, becuase I was watching one field that shall remain nameless. And there's this scene where all at least balloons get released into this guy. And I’m pretty sure I specifically said that because we don't want those balloons just going everywhere. It's falling into the ocean and then have dolphins choke on them. So I get a certain type of weight every time I see it. I'm like, that's not how I remember it's supposed to happen.
LJR: Ignorance is bliss. All right. So day job. It's still cool day job. But you want to, you've always been this I want to try things, even though it might be outside of my nature and I push myself to do it.
SA: It's all been outside my comfort zone. Yes. I have at least learned how to order food, but yeah, no, I've really tried to not say no to something. So I just done. Run the gamut. Cause you know, at Dartmouth I didn't take advantage of what Dartmouth offered all the time. I think I got so involved with my one extracurricular activity there, which was, it came out of my gym class because you had, you know, we had to sign up three semester, three terms of gym. And the first one I signed up for was IQ and jujitsu, which I'd never done any sports. Before I grew up the standard: I played piano. I played violin. I played cello. I was in the chorus-kind of a kid. So my parents were like, don't play sports. You might enter your hands. Don't play anything. So I hung out doing, and mostly just did that. But then now that I had all this free time and I just wanted to learn. So finally, like I never used the jewelry studio at Dartmouth. So I took a bunch of metal smithing classes, and then I was like, oh, this is kind of cool. And then I took welding classes, but never, never as a, I want to change my career and become a welder. It was just kind of like, oh, this is really cool. How would it work with, you know, larger pieces of metal?
LJR: Well, speaking of pieces of metal, you've shared one of the..myy favorites, very tall slender piece of metal: pole dancing.
SA: That was actually fine. And what I loved about pole dancing, I mean, it's serious athletic work. Well pole-dancing. You don't realize it until you actually have to climb on a pole yourself.
LJR: How does this, okay, so you never say no. Does this mean that somebody was like, oh, you're on this kick of doing something outside of your comfort zone, let's take a pole dancing? Or did you seek that out?
SA: Yeah, my coworkers and I were just kinda like, you know, you talk about everything under the sun at work, and then were talking about pole dancing one day. And one of my coworkers was like I've always wanted to take a class and I was like, well, if you go, I will go with you because she didn't want to do it by herself. So a bunch of us ended up going. And honestly, it was exciting because like, by the end of the class, I could actually stay up on the pole.
LJR: Brava.
SA: It's actually lower body strength. You have to hold up yourself by your legs. And it's a really transferable skill because in the subway car, if you're trapped with one that might have a rat running inside, I’ll be fine because I’ll just be up the pole.
LJR: AHH! What are the other things that you've not thought I could see myself doing this one day, but there you are doing it?
SA: Well, aside from pole dancing, I did belly dancing. And then one of my favorites activities, which I did for about five years was…at the time my partner was always working at night. So he worked nights. I have the day job. So we never saw each other. So I ended up, you know, having this slump of, okay, he's working, I'll just read a book. And that coupled with my office, having moved from being on paper, to being online. So instead of getting up, running to talk to the person that was filing the permit in the office, running around, making copies, doing this, doing that, it all suddenly became sitting in my desk all day. So I started noticing that my body was changing in a not good way. And then one day in my email box, I got a Learn sword fighting. Here's a three class coupon, you know, sword fighting actually helps your posture. And I'm like, okay. So I can get exercise and fix my posture. And I've kind of always wanted to swing a sword. So this seems cool.
LJR: Not fencing, sword fighting.
SA: Sword fighting. Yeah. So the school that I went to, there were actually three types of short training one, which is Kendo, which is Japanese martial art of fighting with bamboos swords. It's like medieval Japanese fencing. There are rules and it's competitive. So there was that. And then I learned a Korean sword training. We should use a metal sword with. You don't pair off with other people. But you learn all of these different ways of slicing, correct…Like correct sword fighting and how to make the perfect cut. Because in reality, a sword fight is only [LJR: one] one sword, one sword cut, and then your opponent is done. And then there was also German long sword, which also uses metal swords. Also does pair work with metal swords and it's a two handed sword. But it's definitely more high impact and contact.
LJR: Clanging.
SA: Yes, people would take pride in all the bruises. They were collecting on themselves after their matches. But I fell in love with all three of them. Tried to keep up with all three. I ended up settling on Kendo and I did that for about five years. And it was amazing. It improved my posture. It was like the first time I kind of zoned in on a class and I was like, okay, I can keep going with this because it's incredible because there's only four ways you can kill a person in Kendo
LJR: Only.
SA: Or, or when your match, I guess, is a better way to phrase it. The two rules in Kendo are first kill the other person to don't die.
LJR: In that order.
SA: Yes. But it takes years to figure out how to do it. And it was, it was one of those things where I would fail and fail and fail. And I just kept going because it was just indescribable how rewarding it was when you finally got something right. And you don't know how you did it and your sensei’s like, that's great; just do it like that. And I have no idea what just happned. So it was great.
And the, one of the highest compliments I actually got was from my sensei. He was talking to a very large class at the time. And he was talking about how, you don't have to be talented at something, and then he pointed at me. And he said, Stephanie, do you think you have a natural talent for Kendo? And I said, absolutely not. Any mistake that you could make in this martial art I have made and my sensei has walked me through each one as to why it was mistake. But it's just, he's like, yes, you don't, it doesn't come naturally to you. I wasn’t an athlete. I started Kendo at 42, 42, I think 41 or 42. So there was not much athleticism, you know, in a 41 year old body just start this. But by the time I got to right before the pandemic, I was about to test for my third dong. Which is the equivalent of your third black belt. And he's like, no, he's like, but you kept at it. He's like you learned from all your mistakes. You just, you didn't quit. You didn't give up. He just kept going. To me, it was more rewarding. And I was like, I thought it was the best compliment because I am not a natural talent. And, you know, I earned it along the way and just didn't give up. And like looked at every failure is more of an opportunity to learn than something that's like a mark against my character. And I shouldn't do this because I'm not that good at it.
LJR: So this is really interesting though, Stephanie, because you said you came to college knowing exactly who you were and it was a quiet perfectionist. So when did you let the perfectionism go?
SA: Oh, It kind of happened over quite a few instances. Dean Koontz wrote the Odd Thomas novels and there was always one sentence that leapt out at me and I actually wrote him. And I said, you know what? This quote is so close to my heart. And Odd Thomas says, Life is a parade of fools and I am at the front of it, twirling my baton. And I was like this is me in every single awkward situation I have found myself in. And I've just kind of learned that, yes, we get stuck in these crazy situations. They're awkward. And that's when your true character shows because you're faced you're in this incredibly uncomfortable situation. And it's how you decide to handle it. Part of the work that I used to do at the film society involved wrangling celebrities. So as an introvert, I was like, I don't want to talk to anybody anyway, but. You know, the advance team have said celebrity would come: He doesn't want to be talked to you. Don't look at him, don't address him. You know? My job was literally to make sure he got from the limo to the green room. And when he finally showed up, said celebrity got into the elevator, he looked at me and said, hello, how are you this evening? And I was like, awkward. I've just been told, look at you. So, you know, and then I come off as this horrible, awkward person, angrily pushing the elevator button to somehow magically make it go faster. So it's just those situations. And kind of, because I'm putting myself out there doing all these crazy things and completely failing all the time, I just kind of learned. I was like, okay, I'm, I'm not a master of this. I will never become proficient at this. But I've glad I've had the opportunity because you just never know what you're going to fall in love with. It could happen when you're 65, if you're lucky it happened early that you found something you really love to do. And you just got a revel in it. So I just learned after so many situations, just learning to be okay with not having the perfect response or the perfect experience. I actually kind of don't trust, perfect experience and smooth sailing things anymore. I kind of enjoy things going wrong because then I can just problem solve and figure out how to fix it.
LJR: Because that's where the learning is.
SA: Yes. And I love the fact that, like looking back on who I used to be, which was like whisper of a don't do that, like…to suddenly, okay. I'll throw my hat in the ring and try and figure out this and, you know, jump off a waterfall, even though I don't know how to swim. I mean..
LJR: Have you done that?
SA: I did. I mean, it sounds hard, more worse than it was. I'm probably one of the very few Dartmouth grads that almost didn't graduate
LJR: Because of the swim test.
SA: I kept failing. 'cause I was afraid of water. So one of the reasons actually I picked Dartmouth, it was because of the swim test and it was kind of like, well, finally it’ll make me learn. But the men's swim team coach kind of was very puzzled with me cause I kept failing. So I ended up just floating down the pool.
LJR: It was a very long test.
SA: Yeah. So you know, when I jumped off the waterfall was maybe like 10 feet high in Jamaica and decided to do it and will never do it again. I almost drowned. But Hey, I did it and I faced a fear. I'm like, all right, you're going to go, I'll go with you. I said I would.
LJR: You’re a good friend, Stephanie. So I think you've come a long way. And it sure sounds like you've had a lot of fun. You're the epitome of the lifelong learner. And I wish we could all be as forgiving of ourselves for the foibles and the awkwardness, because you seem so much richer for it. So thank you so much for sharing all these stories. It's been a blast. I cannot wait to hear the things you take up next.
SA: Oh, well, thank you so much. I appreciate it.
LJR: That was Stephanie Argamaso who, by day works in the Office of Film, Theatre and Broadcasting within the Mayor's Office of Media and Entertainment in New York City, approving film shoots in the five boroughs. At all other hours, you can find her taking advantage of new learning opportunities—from sword fighting to pole dancing to being in an all-women's drum line. Like Stephanie's adventures, we think our podcast provides great variety each week. Be sure to rate and review the show so that others can find us, and follow or subscribe so you don't miss anything coming your way with me, Leslie Jennings Rowley, on the next episodes of Roads Taken.