AN EVENING WITH AN AWARD WINNING ACTRESS

Our Workshop Theater Company in Columbia hosted a weekend regional conference for other theaters within our state. On the final day, there was a dinner and our guest speaker was a young Tony Award winning actress. Don’t ask me her name, because I can’t remember it. What I do remember is that after the festivities, about three women and I spent a wonderful time with her seated at a round table.  It was late and she would be returning to her lonely hotel room, so we sat and just talked about many things besides acting.

She was single and we expressed sorrow for her being alone in the big city, so she sheepishly said she had an arrangement. This was about thirty years ago when it was not the norm to have live-in relationships. She was so charming and open we all laughed when she told us. She never became really famous or I would have remembered her name. I’ve often wondered if she ever appeared on Broadway again.

One thing I do remember is her telling about her best friend, the niece of Katherine Hepburn. The two of them spent a great deal of time at Ms. Hepburn’s home, which they loved. There was only one rule. When Spenser Tracey was in residence, they were told they had to disappear.

It’s always fascinating to hear those little tidbits about famous people.

WRITERS OF THE SOUTH

When we moved to Columbia, South Carolina we found it was truly a wonderful place in which to live. Columbia is the state capital as well as the site of the University. The Capital and main campus of the school are virtually side by side at the end of Main Street where everything is within walking distance, including department stores, shops, restaurants and hotels. I felt we were living in a small town atmosphere complete with diagonal parking.

On the local PBS station there was a show produced by the University called “The Writers Workshop”. The journalism department invited known writers to conduct classes with students, which were televised. The host for the series was George Plimpton and also featured authors who were professors on the staff. James Dickey the poet was one.  Another was William Priced Fox, a truly southern fiction writer. The hit movie “Nashville” was based on one of his many novels.

Our son had just started his first year at Berry College in Georgia when we moved to South Carolina. Every student at that small liberal arts school is guaranteed a paying job on campus, which we were grateful for. It’s a beautiful school and our son loved being there, but unfortunately classes in his major were not available and by January he was on academic probation.

In the meantime, in Columbia at a local high school we saw that William Price Fox was holding a seminar on writing which was open to the public. My husband and I attended and were able to talk to Bill about our son. He told us to have Chuck monitor his classes when he came home on spring break, which he did.

After transferring to USC, Chuck was mentored by Bill Fox and Franklin Ashley, another author.  He graduated with a degree in journalism and worked as a writer for “The State” newspaper before moving to Florida, where he now lives with his wife and three children. He also has a very successful public relations/marketing firm.

The three years we lived in South Carolina I consider it to be the experience of a lifetime for all of us. Besides enabling our son to realize his dreams, if you've read my earlier blogs, you would know what an exciting time it was for me, too.

MY OH MY

I spent several days writing a piece titled “A Really Nice Guy” about my uncle and when I tried to post it, I had a problem and ended up deleting the whole thing by mistake.  So I’ll give you something totally different instead, something which has been annoying me a great deal.

As you know I’m not happy with all the rotten things going on in Republican politics in the State of Florida. But my latest tirade is on the Pasco County’s Sheriff’s election. Our long time Republican sheriff won re-election and shortly thereafter quit to “spend more time with his children”. Then guess what? The governor of the State of Florida appointed a young replacement sheriff for our county who had worked security for Marco Rubio.  Surprisingly the sheriff’s wife also holds a high position in Governor Rick Scott’s administration. That’s how you get top paying jobs in Florida.

Now on every street and major road that appointed sheriff, who had never lived in our district or been heard of before, has erected huge costly campaign election signs, twice as big as any other local politician’s signs. There is apparently big money behind getting him really elected, possibly the gun lobby?

Here's how things are done in our state. When you get reelected to an office you’ve held for many years, you can then quit with a large pension and benefits and are unabashibly able to say you want to spend time with your family and a new hack will then get appointed to the job rather than going through that big problem of being elected to the office. Then when the time comes for you to run for the office you were appointed to, you’re already firmly entrenched in the position.  So on and on it goes and where it stops nobody knows.

PS. In this morning’s newspaper there is a list of the scheduled appearances by our appointed sheriff announcing the meetings he will attend to speak about his running for re-election. That’s how you do it. Let people think you had already been elected. The voters have such short memories.

THE WRITER

Many years ago I attended a women’s luncheon where the guest of honor was an unknown author who was scheduled to speak on his experiences as a writer. He had a reputation for writing magazine articles although none of the audience had ever heard of him. He started telling us about a book he had written which would be published sometime in the near future.

The author proceeded to tell us the story of his family. Everything he related was how the original male member of his family had come years ago to America. The story had been told orally by the females of the family. By rote they told how so and so begat so and so as the generations grew. The older story tellers of the last century could neither read nor write, so they would impart the tales of each family member descended from that time to keep their family history alive.

We were spellbound hearing the author relate how he had traced his ancestor who was kidnapped in Africa and brought to America by slave traders. The author was Alex Haley, his ancestor’s name was Kunta Kinte and the book published in 1976 was titled “Roots”.

I still feel privileged to have heard in great detail how he had come to write this great book after listening to the stories told by the elderly women of his family.

YESTERDAY, TODAY AND TOMORROW

I’ve been wondering recently whether I’ve been dwelling too much about the past in my thoughts. When I wake in the middle of the night, I start remembering a lot of things that occurred in my early years, but they’re not usually very important memories.

As you’ve probably noticed, I’m not a deep thinker, but that doesn’t mean stupidity, I’d just rather look at the light side of things. I’ve always enjoyed humor and would rather laugh instead of cry. However, real life gets in the way sometimes and makes you stop and think, so the many nocturnal musings keep coming.

It’s been said that the years spent in high school are the ones you’ll remember most. I can still recall those mean girls, which I laugh about today. Also, the basic things I learned in my English classes are really an asset to me in my writing.

So I guess you could say my yesterdays are rather important to me today in many ways. With regard to my tomorrows, I’ll still read my horoscope, hope to win the lottery and be able to say goodbye to my children in a more enlightened manner.

By the way, I’m still not sure about heaven in case you’re interested.