March 11, 2008

Hello family & friends!

I hope you are all doing well, taking care of yourselves and each other and enjoying winter!

When last I wrote I was on the train to Rochester, N.Y.

I landed in the lovely, charming picturesque city of Rochester.  It was a snowy dreamland like one of those miniature winter scenes – but big!  Lots of character, big old houses perfectly spaced apart.  It reminded me of “It’s a Wonderful Life” – which apparently is a popular theme there as they have a yearly event inspired by the movie where folks dress up like some character or part of the movie.  This city is highly educated – dressed with universities, art, technology and culture, the home of the founder of Kodak.

I visited with a friend from old Peace Child days, someone I knew from conferences – who’s independent film short and trailer was premiering.  He was very nervous, but the premiere was well attended (300) and his production company got some media coverage as well as some interested investors in their proposed feature film (from the ‘trailer’ tease). 

I heard a wonderful singer, Laura Higgins, who has a myspace page, check her music out! And she’s a lovely person also.

My computer suffered an injury due to my instability and I paid a pretty price to get it rehabilitated, such is life!

I trained back to NY, worked on my screenplay more.

Then flew to Charlotte, North Carolina where I visited briefly with my aunts and a very resolute dog that goes by the name Bailey.  He’s not Irish.

My aunts took me around to see where my Dad and they were born, went to school, the movie theater my grandpa worked in, parks and key buildings in downtown Charlotte.  Charlotte is a charming city.  A big city surrounded by residential boroughs that come right up to the downtown. 

The occasional whistle of passing trains seep into my dreams,

The Mockingbird wakes me in the morning.

Cardinals, chickadees, crows and jays sing a lively set of tunes all through the day.

Bailey, the shaggy dog, dreams of his next opportunity to yelp like a seal and run to pretend to lose the ever important, key to his happy heart, bright yellow ball.

Bacon, again, oh my – I’m not in California.

Lima beans, grits, cornbread and meatloaf – mmm… Carolina.

Staying in these two houses, one built in the 50s and the other in the 20s, with photos from the turn of the century, an organ with candlestick holders that rotate, singing songs & playing them on my Grandmother’s piano, a manual coffee grinder on the wall, history and ancestors – generations and memories abound.

And the ever present mystery of a time before, before you were alive to peek into and wonder.