Theatre Class Addict

Driving in a light snow today – working my way towards Pikes Peak – brought back memory of undergraduate school and my part of the ensemble group See-Saw.  I was with this group for 3 of the 4 years of undergraduate school.  The group was formed to demonstrate Signed English (not the much more popular ASL).  One of the best parts of this ensemble is that we traveled all over the state of Colorado – – often in the blustering snow to play high school auditoriums.  This group produced a bond between actors that is stronger than I have ever known.  We ate, dressed and bunked in together.  It was one of the best times of my life and the perfect place to grow up and experience true agape love.  These memories were triggered by listening to the greatest hits of John Denver.  “Take Me Home Country Roads . . .”

Today in my journey to my past in Colorado, I stopped by the University of North Colorado in Greeley, Colorado.  It was here that I spent my undergraduate years from 1978-1982.  I wasn’t sure what I was actually going to do here on campus today, as so much of it, sadly, is a bit shut down from this COVID craziness, but I wanted to connect with the memories as best I could.  It is a bit spooky to return to the cold, grey skies that always seem to be preparing for a snowstorm of some kind.  I had forgotten how cold and grey Colorado could actually be. Read more →

Thanks to a wonderful high school classmate in my hometown of Brush, I had a small intimate reunion of a few of my high school chums.  The meeting was just so great – – especially since I was unable to attend of the previous reunions that had been held.  The one topic that struck me so intently was the rumination on all of our peers that had passed since graduation – some just a month or so after graduation – some as recent as just a few months ago.  At the most recent reunion, a well-meaning classmate created a “memorial tree” to honor all of them.  I was flabbergasted.  I never knew there was so many.  Nothing hit at my mortality fears then hearing about my peers.  It really hit home.  But a TREE??  Really?  When was it a “memorial sapling”?  How did the tree get so big?

Just today, I toured Brush High School.  It has been 48 years since I stepped into the building.  Of course over the course of those 48 years, there is a brand new building from top to bottom.  The only thing that remained is a bit of the old gym – everything else is brand, spanking new as of just last year.  I was totally impressed.  It was so much nicer, cleaner, hipper and technologically advanced then the school that I just retired from.  Can you imagine that? Read more →

It was so odd and somewhat scary to arrive at the airport today.  I am breaking out of quarantine and making a trip to my childhood home of Brush, Colorado.  New York was just impossibly locked up, and I thought I needed to go somewhere.  I haven’t been to the airport in almost 9 months and it was apocalyptic.  At the parking garage, the guard gave me a card and said that likely no one will be working to pick up people when I return and that I will need to text a number and hope—a giant garage and I was able to park in the very front.  Eerie.  Read more →