Go to every performance

I just saw St. Mary’s put on Hades Town, what a great show! That school knows how to do musical theater. I’ve spent good money and walked out on worse shows at Keller Auditorium. Sure, it would have been nice if they had transposed some of the deeper parts for the girl’s voices, but I’m glad they didn’t bring in the “rent-a-boys” for this year’s performance. The girls are so talented there and they work so hard, it’s just impressive to be around. Over 100 students were involved, at least 60 or more on the stage during the big scenes. Great stuff. Two and a half hours with a 15 minute intermission and it went by in a flash. Bravo. Immediate standing ovations. 

This will be our last big school performance, at least until maybe grandkids. What a wild trip. I can’t count the number of school recitals I’ve been to in the last 20 years that had me dreaming of the beer I was going to have after. The kids who stop and start over every time they miss a note on a slowly plunked out version of some saccharine Taylor Swift song on the piano. The boys just hitting puberty who clearly never practiced, couldn’t hold a note before, and now are having their vocal range change in real time, and yet still feel compelled to get in front of 40 tired parents in a room and squawk awkwardly at us. Not once, but twice. I remember being thankful that School of Rock organized their events so you could come for 45 minutes of your own kid’s performances without suffering through everyone else’s. I remember the sense of begrudging resignation towards the music teachers that felt the need to remind us all of our manners by spacing out everyone’s performances so you were stuck for 2 hours pinching your leg and staring at the floor to make it through. 

I remember Quinby playing “Imagine” on the piano at 7 or 8 to an emotional audience just to come back to my chair and whisper “I like to make the grownups cry” with a smirk. I remember “The Nut That Cracked” and sitting in the waiting room during long practices and explaining to Pannonica how Michael Knight could have called Kit to come pick him up in the rain instead of us having to walk blocks to the only parking spot I could find downtown after a long day. 

I am going to so deeply miss being asked to do the things I never thought I wanted to do. 

I’m so glad I was taught to say yes and put others before myself. 

When you “suffer” through an experience you didn’t ask for yourself, but is important to a loved one, a special memory is made - for both of you. 

I wish I had done even more. 

I am thankful for every performance I got. 

What a great show to go out on. Nicely done St. Marys. Congratulations Remi and everyone else involved.