Monthly Archives: January 2013

The African Queen at the Elsinore

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Most Wednesday nights at the Elsinore Theatre down town, they show old movies.  It’s a beautiful old place.

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View of mural on back:

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View of interior:images-2My favorite place to sit is in the mezzanine. This is not to be confused with the balcony above it.  We sat in the mezzanine last night with a good crowd for a viewing of The African Queen on the big square screen, just as originally intended.

I was recently given a DVD of The African Queen and I watch it often on my lap.  Seeing it on the big screen with a congenial audience is a totally different experience.  There was lots of laughing and clapping.  There was both when Miss Rose Sayer, after navigating the rapids says to Mr. Alnutt, “I never knew that a mere physical experience could be so exhilarating.”  And at the end, there was an enthusiastic round of applause.

Neither Susan, Valerie or Bruce had seen it before.  It came out in 1951 and I went with my mother and my aunt to see it.  I was eight then.  I liked seeing all the animals. About forty years later, I saw it on video and laughed my head off when I remembered that at the age of eight, I had been mystified why, after disliking each other so much, Rosie and Charlie woke up one morning and suddenly seemed to be great friends.  Film directors used to leave so much to the imagination in those days.  Lots of fading to black or panning to the sky.  I even remember that I couldn’t figure out why they wanted to get married before being hanged.

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Nowadays, when kayaking un-scouted areas and finding that our passage requires a little portaging or hacking through some reeds,  I like to say, “It’s the Ulanga.”  I like to paddle with people who get that.

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What a nice day!

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And what a nice young man!  It doesn’t take much to make an old woman happy.  I wanted to get some base-line pictures of my hips and have an orthopedist take a look at them.  One of the things on my to-do list as I turn seventy.  And, if I ever need an orthopedist, I want to be an “established patient.”  It can take forever around here to get in to see an orthopedist if you aren’t already on his patient list.  So, I had the x-rays taken this morning and met with the doctor.  I liked him right away, and that was before he paid me just about the nicest compliment I have ever received.  He and I were standing front of the computer monitor studying my x-rays. He pointed to the socket and said, “Those are just about the most beautiful hips I have ever seen.”  I burst out laughing and said,”No one has ever said anything nice about my hips before.  And without missing a beat he said, “Well, some poor fool definitely missed his opportunity.”

But seriously folks, it is good to know I have good-looking  bones and joints.

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And it’s good to know how the one-way streets work in this town!

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Got out of the orthopedist’s just in time to dash back to the Hallie Ford to hear my friend and neighbor, the glass artist Janet Neuburg, a docent there, lead a gallery tour and talk, again on the Izquierdo works.

A piece of Janet’s Glass

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I loved learning more about Izquierdo.

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But even more, I loved that I knew a number of people in the group, from lots of different places — the neighborhood, The Courthouse, Chemawa, my literary discussion group, church, my lunch bunch.  It takes a long time to feel connected in a community.  I have lived here now for over sixteen years.  I feel connected.  It’s a really good feeling. Right up there with being told you have beautiful bones.

Letters to the Editor

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I surprise myself that, in my dotage, I have taken to writing letters to the editor of my home-town newspaper on a fairly regular basis.  They permit you to submit one every two months.  I pretty much do and they pretty much publish them.  It might be because I remember how to use semicolons as much as for what I have to say.  I don’t delude myself.  And I don’t follow up online to read the comments people make about my letters.  As I tell folks in my workout class when they notice me inserting my earplugs, I don’t like to be yelled out, either literally or figuratively.  Here is today’s letter.

WE ARE NOT ALL CREATED EQUAL.

We are not all created equal, and because of that, we all have different needs and different responsibilities. If we were, indeed, all equal, twelve-year-olds would drive cars; ninety-year-olds would have to go to work; parents would not have to support their children; handicapped people would not have preferred parking places reserved for them; dangerous people could stockpile dangerous weapons; women could lose their jobs if they took time off when giving birth. Just use your imaginations. The list is infinite. But we all need to have our needs met, and we all need to meet our responsibilities, according to our unique requirements and abilities. I think that is not rightly called equality. It should be called justice — as in liberty and justice for all.

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