afterSonoma

NY Visit

Never enough time, sounds like.
I'm having a rare, meandering kind of day, time to think, to get some miscellaneous tasks accomplished, such as filling out the form to renew my passport. You know that to be admitted through a U.S. airport now, a person needs a passport. And I committed to Boston, May 14. I have an airline credit to use, just enough to get to Boston from Seattle, where David will drive me. Annie's plans to join the microcredit aawareness ride from Canada to Mexico scotched my first thought, of travelling to Halifax from Boston. So now I'm contemplating a Eugene O'Neill pilgrimage. I learned that the Old Vic production of A Moon for the Misbegotten, with Kevin Spacey, is going to be playing the weekend I could be in New York (May 19-22). Not a cheap ticket, but I used to love that play. In fact O'Neill was my favourite playwright for some time when I was younger. So perhaps I'll visit Provincetown, to see the place where he got his first plays into production, then ride the train to Manhattan and watch the play. Theatre was always a love of mine, but in the last several years - since Annie's grown up, actually and I've had the time and money to get out and see a lot of plays - I've become more deeply interested, and curious. I can always use ideas for my own writing, so ...
If you go back to  California that weekend, and return on Monday, maybe we could get together and go over old times in the kind of detail that eludes us in this format, with so many present-day events to report. Also, I'd love to meet Ruth and see your paintings in person. So let's hope that works out.

Back from California

Hyatt Long Beach, originally uploaded by p0psharlow.

Yes, busy. Just back, late last night, from 4 days in L.A. where we put my Dad in an assisted living facility. He is recovering from hip replacement surgery, is doing reasonably well, but is a real brat. Understandable that he doesn't like what's happening to him, especially the loss of control, but since he failed to take suggestions or respond to persuasion in the past couple of years, the reality of being disabled is forced on him. The place he's in is nice - I'd live there.

Ruth was magnificent with handling him and many of the details. I moved furniture with a 13 year-old and my sister helped as she was able. Ruth's daughter, Heather, met up with us for two nights and the one main full day of relocating him. She provided a hotel room for she, Ruth and I, which helped us recover from the stress of it all.

The flight back ended with us joining a large crowd waiting half an hour for a cab in 20F windy cold. But, once we got it, it was a nice ride and some soup and our own bed, we were home.

Thanks for the report on David's play, "Up Island". We enjoyed the fact that the dog got a part and performed well. And your project seems to be a good one, I'll be looking forward to hearing more about it as you go along.

My illustrated book project did not move further to completion -- maybe tonight. Now, I'm heading to the office in the sunny, cold morning.

Theatre, etc

I can just imagine you with hands outstretched, various fingers in various pies. Hope you managed to finish the book illustrations and that you're spending this Sunday happily engaged in your new collaborative project with Ruth. I've spent the morning working on the play I'm being commissioned to write, about the former "school" for developmentally disabled children and young adults. I'm writing research grant proposals, which involve submissions to our College ethics committee, and surveying what I can on the web about the depiction of the dd in theatre. Found a great Youtube piece by a woman who says she doesn't mind being called retarded because to her it means slow and she is slow, but she minds it when people equate retarded with being less of a person. An affecting statement she makes in that video. I'm also scratching out ideas for the play itself. A challenge, but the more I work on it, the more hooked I get on the idea. The story of Woodlands itself is reasonably well known. It was one of those institutions that opened with good intentions, but where systemic abuse of the people who lived there evolved over the years. The place closed about ten years ago and there are "survivor" groups that have formed for mutual support. Now I have to come up with a good idea for dramatizing the story and contextualizing it. I'll keep you posted.
     Meantime, good news to report about the opening of David's play, Up Island. It felt great to sit in a beautiful old theatre with 650 or so other people laughing their heads off. He writes funny lines, and as you might have guessed from meeting him, characters who appeal because of their human-ness. It was especially nice for me to see many of David's old friends and colleagues working together. A great cast, and he even wrote a part for his dog, Flip (who behaved charmingly!). This seems sure to be a success, and he deserves it after sticking with it (in general) so long. I'd say that he'd write you to report on it himself, and maybe he will one day, but he isn't much of a correspondant, as I think I've said before.
     Finally, weather news. Well, it's been beautifully sunny, a little cool. Now it's raining again, so maybe we're finished with the extremes. And yet...seismologists warned of tremor activity that could be the beginning of a big quake within the next few weeks!