Monday, February 06, 2006

Applause from the cheap seats

Snow!! It's not quite a blizzard, but it'll do. The young men have a two-hour school delay but I'm in the office bright and early ready to face any challenge that may come, despite an eclectically busy weekend that included 10 hours in the car and three hours over a pile of receipts associated with income taxes. Am I the only person on the planet who sorted receipts last night while others were watching the Superbowl?

On Friday I saw the Mikado in my shower curtain--or wait, I wasn't wearing my shower curtain; the Mikado was, or at least he was wearing regal robes of the same fabric as my shower curtain. He was a charming Mikado with a terrific voice, but it was Poohbah who had the audience eating out of his very expressive hands. With his talent for facial contortion and physical humor--well, picture Jim Carrey playing Poohbah.

Of course my eyes were on my daughter, who was the star in my book even if she wasn't listed that way in the program. With her face painted and her curly hair tucked under that big black bun of a wig, she looked like a whole different person, a person I'd love to claim as my daughter but who is becoming not so much my person as her own. I suppose this is one of the reasons we sent her away to college: so she could step off my stage and find her own. At this point I'm happy to applaud from the cheap seats.

Now we've left the land of Gilbert and Sullivan and returned to the land of taxes, classes, and snow. It's time to put my nose to the grindstone...but in my heart, the applause goes on.

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