Orelon Sidney's professional life was all about the weather; now it's about herself. A change like that can be daunting.
"I remind myself," she says, "that I'm 47 in Atlanta, not 17 in New York."
Sidney is modeling and acting, and it's working out. She filmed her first commercial last week, and she has a modeling and a talent agent. "It's going slowly, but the jobs I've been given have been really good ones," she says.
Sidney was a TV meteorologist from 1989 to 2009. For the last seven years of that time, she was at CNN. But she felt "adrift," and wanted to find something else.
"I knew it wasn't the future for me," Sidney says, "but I also thought, I must be out of my mind to throw this all away. When you make a jump like that, especially from the level of CNN, you're jumping from security to insecurity."
Sidney wanted to get into music, but, as she says, "I don't play an instrument and I sing like a busted chainsaw." And after a brief stint at a music management company, she realized she wasn't happy behind a desk.
She started taking acting classes. Soon afterward, at an open call, Stewart Talent signed her up on the spot for print and television. "It was very unexpected," says Sidney.
"I'm sure my dad thinks I'm crazy," she says with a laugh. "But my old colleagues think I'm brave. At the end of the day, I'm a scrappy chick."
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