Final Curtain

The news must already be spreading around my hometown like wildfire. The Crown Uptown Dinner Theatre is closing. Long live the Crown.

Thirty-two years ago, the late Ted Morris and his gracious wife Karen opened a dinner theatre in Wichita, Kansas. To my knowledge, not a week has gone by during those three decades without dinner and a show being served at Hillside and Douglas Avenues.

Hundreds? Thousands, perhaps? Actors, directors, designers, technicians - artists who have found work at the Crown, I mean, and who now must gig elsewhere. If you're in "the biz," I don't have to tell you what a very large loss it will be to the creative community in Wichita. If you're a normal person, however, just take my word for it: this is sad, folks.

My first show at the Crown was in 1979, when I played Igor in "Cactus Flower." Early in the run, I stepped on a nail backstage and wound up hospitalized at St. Francis for two days with a foot infection. Troy and Jack came to see me, a gesture above and beyond their call of duty that garnered them the eternal gratitude of a young and starry-eyed actor, but the details of that visit shall not be repeated here. Let's just say they brought me one unforgettable gift hidden inside another, neither of which are discussed in polite company.

During the ensuing decades my life took twisty-turny detours, and I didn't return to the Crown until the 1990s. From then on, I was hired once or twice a year on average, and each time I'd make the long drive home for a two to three-month stint. Each show meant more new friends, more adventures, more memories. More extra paychecks.

My last Crown show was "Fiddler on the Roof" in 2008, my second try as the Rabbi at the same theatre. During "Fiddler" I met Andrea, Meg, Harmony, Rob, Michael...creative and good-hearted people all, and I do believe they will be a part of my life forever. Show-biz people are flawed creatures just like the rest of humanity, but by and large we do one thing very well.

We love. We love creatively and passionately, yet imperfectly and at times rashly, but we can never be justly accused of living on the sidelines. We invest our intestines into every show and every relationship. We are the most fully alive people on God's green earth! We soar to the moon on opening night and we bid fond farewells every closing.

Then we pack up and move on, richer and wiser for the creative and passionate souls we've met.

I have had the good fortune of working and living with so many remarkable and usually loveable performers at the Crown over the years. For that - and for the extra paychecks - I say thanks for the memories, Crown Uptown.

A FREE ebook, no strings attached

No matter who you are, where you are, or what you believe, you can find much in this free ebook to cheer about. I'm probably 80% through the first reading but I've already chewed much food for thought.

I have fought back tears more than once while reading this book, because big boys don't cry even if they want to.

(I'll deal with that last bit of hogwash in another post, but not today.)

There are no strings attached. Not that I can see, anyway. Yes, you can purchase a hard copy of the book if you desire, but all that is required to receive the free download of the book is to give its authors your email address. Wary of that? Simply go to yahoo.com (or any other free email service) and get a free email address and then use that address for your free download and thereby keep your regular email box free from unwanted clutter.

I know many people on my Facebook friends list (224 and counting--wow! I should blog about that, too...but another day) who are already aware of the importance of this ebook's subject matter. They should read it nonetheless, just because it will resonate with them and reinforce truths of which they've already gotten a glimpse somewhere along the way.

Am I making any income from this "plug?" Nope, none whatsoever. Am I affiliated in any way with the authors? Nope, other than being a fan of the book even before having finished it.

Some things in life really are free, so don't be skeptical. In my humble opinion, you'll be glad you went to http://www.givetolivebook.com/ and downloaded "Give to Live."

Meet my friend D, a classy bloke

My friend D is an American by birth who was raised and schooled in England after his eighth year, or thereabouts. He speaks with a manly voice that is deep and calm, and sounds very English indeed. D is highly intelligent and well-educated, though I don't know what his IQ score would be if he were ever tested. He'd surely laugh at the idea of being tested in the first place.

When he grins big, it looks charmingly similar to the one in a certain photograph of his 8-year-old self, but with noticeably more whiskers.

D has traveled the world, hunted the Outback, sat at the feet of literary legends, written books of his own, sailed the seas, given countless interviews, owned very, very cool cars. He has done and seen things of which I've only dreamed. Among other worthy endeavors, he is now working in the film industry on some very impressive projects.

On his one trip to my hometown, when asked his dinner venue preference, his request for a cheeseburger surprised me.

"You can't get a decent cheeseburger in Britain," he explained.

On the surface, it would appear that D and I have little in common. I lost my dad to cancer when I was young, and as a lad he lost his mother to the same disease. Beyond that, the similarities seem sparse indeed.

It has been well over a decade since we met but over those years we have continued to correspond, fairly regularly, via e-mail. He has prayed for me and I for him, and we have shared many an e-laugh. I am receiving an education just by knowing him, although I would gladly give a kidney to zoom around Europe with D in one of his very cool cars, being regaled by his stories and having my vocabulary elevated by assimilation.

The occasion of our meeting was a short-lived creative project and there was really no apparent reason for us to keep in touch afterward. It begs the question: Why should a gentleman with such credentials, and with his fascinating history, bother with a bloke from my side of the tracks whose life accomplishments in comparison seem like child's play?

The fact that he nevertheless does so should tell you something else - something very significant - about my friend D.

Men and women = NOT equal

It is one of my long-held character flaws that I still enjoy from time to time: Making provocative statements to get attention. This time, it could save a life.

I kid you not.

This new blog o' mine is only read by a few friends so far (SO FAR, I say -- my moniker isn't Big Dreamer for nothing), but if even one person takes note and then takes appropriate action, I figure it's well worth the risk of raising a hackle or two, if only temporarily.

Men and women are not equal.

Equally endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights and all that jazz? Certainly. Equally important to the survival of the human race? Assuredly. Equally deserving of comparable pay for comparable work? No question whatsoever.

(Hackles lowering yet?)

Okay, here's the payoff: Alcohol destroys women faster than it destroys men.

Consider: Women metabolize alcohol differently from men and it can result in a higher blood alcohol level for the same amount of alcohol intake.

Consider: It takes more time and more alcohol for a man to develop liver disease than for a woman.

Consider: Women drinkers are more likely to develop alcoholic hepatitis, cirrhosis, and breast cancer than women who don't drink.

Consider: Drinking increases the incidence of women suffering miscarriages.

Consider: Women are more likely to die in alcohol-related car crashes than men. The deadly beat goes on.

If you love a woman who drinks, click this, baby.

The Incredible Lightness of Spirit

"Become sensitive to lightness of spirit." ~ Melody Beattie*

I am in the ballpark, most days. Cheerfulness, lightness, "wearing life like a loose garment" seem to come easier to me now than at any point in my past, including childhood. Chalk it up to a certain maturity, I hope, that frequently comes with passing 50, but also to a definite change of thinking in recent years. For that, I owe much gratitude to a certain subset of friends, and to God as I understand God.

Days like this, a just-right warm June day with a light breeze, blogging from my back yard, the Boyer Babbling Brook singing backup to a windy lead vocal, lightness is stroll-in-the-park easy. But what about those days when the bills are screaming to be paid and the committee in my head are merely screaming for the hell of it?

Ah, there's the challenge. But Ms. Beattie's insights often enlighten me and so I shall endeavor to follow today's advice next time heaviness doesn't just knock but knocks down the door to my mind.

I now have another weapon -- a higher notch on my inner awareness post -- with which to defend my mental castle. I shall let go of the heaviness, listen better to the brook, launch a more fervent prayer for help, and try a little harder to lighten up. It's not that I wasn't aware of the concept before, but good writers/thinkers who speak to me have a marvelous ability to succinctly state what I could only previously grasp as a vague idea.

Any day, every day, can be as good as I allow it to be.


* Melody Beattie, "The Language of Letting Go."

Got happy feet?

My new friend, C, today suggested a blog topic: With death being inevitable, why do we not focus more on the joys of life?

At first I figured I'd save it for a later post, having just covered death, and I wanted to lighten things up. Later I realized (why yes, I can be slow on the uptake), she was right on the money!

C, this one's for you.

*****

"Now is no time to think of what you do not have.
Think of what you can do with what there is."

~ Ernest Hemingway

Okay, perhaps not the most joyful of all quotes but C likes Hemingway, it's the happiest Hemingway quote I could find after a quick search, and I think we can work with this. Ahem...


He's using the glass half-empty/half-full illustration. We all know people in our lives from both camps. Half-empties are always complaining, always raining on our parades, always envisioning how our bright ideas will fail and forever failing in their own endeavors because they've begun with the premise that failure is inevitable. Sad Sacks. Energy evaporators! Who wants to hang with such hangdog homies for one microsecond longer than is absolutely necessary?

On the other, happier hand, we have the half-fullers, who possess the seemingly effortless ability to pierce any cloudy day with self-generated rays of sunshine. They ooze well-being. They don't merely see the bright side of any situation, they are the bright side. It is impossible to remain in the dumps (unless one tries very hard) in the presence of a truly happy person because her positive energy is so powerful, so engaging, so irresistible!

With whom would you rather be stranded on a desert island -- Negative Ned, or Pleasant Pam? Kind of a "duh."

Some cause happiness wherever they go; others, whenever they go. ~ Oscar Wilde

We have our marching orders. Excuse me -- our dancing orders. Let's get out there in the world and dance our happy feet off, whaddya say?

And never the twain shall meet?

Had my eyes deceived me? No, there it was, in black and white. A friend of mine posted an in-your-face Facebook response to the recent murder of the Wichita, Kansas abortionist Dr. George Tiller, placing all of the blame for Tiller's killing squarely on the shoulders of the entire pro-life movement. He quickly added that pro-lifers everywhere are surely "rejoicing" over the crime.

The sheer ferocity of his comments, and of many more comments by others that soon followed, took my breath away. Maybe I've had my head in the sand over the issue of abortion in recent years; maybe I've forgotten the extreme passion that attends every abortion debate, but I was quickly and unceremoniously jerked back to the sad reality that the proponents of the two sides of this issue are worlds apart.

Thing is, I happen to know, or have known, scores (or more) of people on the pro-life side, and I'm hard pressed to think of ONE who is even capable of "rejoicing" over the broad-daylight slaughter of a human being, who at the time of his murder was preparing for Sunday morning church by handing out programs to entering parishioners. I'm certainly not naive enough to doubt their existence, but of all the pro-lifers I have rubbed shoulders with, I personally have never come across anyone twisted enough to proclaim the sanctity of life one day, and blow a man's brains out the next.

This killer acted alone, is way beyond sick, and carries 100% of the blame, leaving exactly zero percent to be shared by anyone else on the planet.

All the major pro-life organizations immediately went to the national press to condemn Tiller's murder, but one of those spokesmen, Randall Terry, made me wince when he declared that he was sorry that Tiller hadn't had a chance to prepare himself to meet God. If Terry had been privy to every single thought that passed through George Tiller's mind right up to the moment of his death, THEN--and ONLY then--perhaps he would have been qualified to make such a statement.

I suppose Terry's unfortunate statement may have seemed appropriate to most pro-lifers, but to me it came across very much like that of a self-righteous judge of men who incongruously claims to be a servant of the One who reserves all rights to judgment for Himself.

No, the two sides do not understand each other. And, for the present, at least, it seems that neither side really has any desire thereto.

Quitting Smoking is Easy Peasy

So says the author of the book I'm reading. For the second time. After the first time, several weeks ago, I managed to quit for about 18 hours, 10 or so of which were waking ones.

The author proclaims that smoking is not a habit, is not continued for want of willpower, nor for want of information about the health and monetary risks associated with smoking. Says it's an addiction coupled with brainwashing. Also says the dreaded "withdrawal pangs" that (supposedly) accompany a quit attempt are a paper tiger. They are predominantly mental, and barely noticeable by the physical body.

Hmm...

Early on, the author informed me that the big reason I haven't yet quit smoking is (drum roll, please)...FEAR.

Ouch.

The man is pushing my hot buttons.

The fact that he has the audacity to proclaim that quitting smoking is easy is what hooked me into buying the book in the first place. I'll admit, I'm always looking for the easy way out. But honestly--who seriously believes quitting smoking is EASY?

Consider: The author was a five-pack-a-day smoker before he quit. That's one hundred cigarettes per day. Next to him, I'm a rank amateur. His credentials are impossible to ignore.

Consider: His worldwide clinics have a success rate of over 90%. He advocates no nicotine gum, no Chantix--NONE of the established methods that are so widely proclaimed.

To be continued...

THE EASY WAY TO STOP SMOKING, by Allen Carr.

Two outstanding quotes

Learn to enjoy every minute of your life. Be happy now. Don't wait for something outside of yourself to make you happy in the future. Think how really precious is the time you have to spend, whether it's at work or with your family. Every minute should be enjoyed and savored. (Earl Nightingale)



Beginning today, treat everyone you meet as if they were going to be dead by midnight. Extend to them all the care, kindness and understanding you can muster, and do it with no thought of any reward. Your life will never be the same again (Og Mandino)

What if dreams really do come true?

There I was, stuck in a dead-end 9-5 job in a Great Plains state famous for wheat. And sunflowers. Now, I admit that wheat and sunflowers are wonderful commodities. You can get bread from wheat and sunflower seeds from sunflowers, both of which have made people rich. But I wanted something more. Or at least different. I wanted a change of scene.

I am a dreamer, and while imprisoned in my 9-5 cubicle, doing work I hated doing, I'd dream. I'd dream of mountains and beaches, a beautiful woman on my arm, good times galore, but mostly I dreamed of doing something I love doing and getting paid for it. I was actually doing that part-time, after my 9-5 shift, right where I was, there in the Land of Wheat and Sunflowers, but I wanted to expand my horizons. I wanted to do what I love doing and get paid for it, but in different places.

But I was stuck, or at least I felt stuck. And then the world of the World Wide Web found me, and I was transformed.

I read of people who were--wonder of wonders--actually DOING the things they wanted to do with their time. I read of other work-a-day schmucks like me who had flung all caution to the wind and become their own bosses. They became entrepreneurs, started their own home businesses. "I don't need to be told what time to start or quit working every day, I can determine that myself," they said. And that is when I first knew my life was about to change.

I would kick my day job to the curb. I would leave the Land of Wheat and Sunflowers and relocate to one of the loveliest areas on the continent, the Blue Ridge Mountains of Virginia. More accurately, the foothills thereof, where I'd had family living for years and years, and whom I only rarely visited.

So I took action. I had help, yes, but first I made my choice and then the help came.

It's not a mansion by any stretch, but my little place in the country has a creek behind it, precious few visible neighbors (but they're cool neighbors), and a big ol' hill behind the creek covered with trees, and there is even what I believe to be mountain laurel up there. It's nice, real nice.

Spring and autumn are just plain miraculous around here. I'm about 30-40 minutes from the Blue Ridge Parkway, where my favorite hiking trails are located.

Oh sure, the master bedroom needs painting and I have floors that you'd swear you've encountered before, in a carnival fun house. The flower beds have too many weeds but lots of the flowers actually survive and thrive! Heck, I'll even have home-grown tomatoes and onions this year, Lord willin'.

Yeah, it's nice.

But what of "doing what I love to do?" I've done some of that, yes. Ironically, I've done it mostly by returning to the Land of Wheat and Sunflowers for gigs, and have enjoyed it tremendously each time. (I still have family and friends there, so I love going back home when I can.) This particular aspect of my dream may or may not proceed as it has, because one thing I'm learning is that dreams can change, a little or a lot, and either way is just fine. It's all about the journey.

I may post photos of my new stomping grounds on this blog. It's a new blog, though, you see, so I've yet to determine how it will go. You can help by leaving comments, sharing your dreams, asking questions, questioning answers. The sky's the limit.

* * *

So here I am now, in my country fixer-upper, in the foothills, and most days I can hear the babbling brook in the back yard by merely opening a window. I'm grateful.

And I've thus proved to myself, with a good deal of help along the way, that dreams can, and do, come true.

Small potatoes, you say? Perhaps. But I figure, you start small and work up to bigger dreams as you gain confidence, and that was my starting place.

And so this blog is born. I want to dream bigger dreams, and see them come true. I want to transform every area of my life that begs to be transformed, and I want you to come along, too, and dream your dreams. I want to see how you are transforming the parts of your life that you want to improve. We can help each other along the way, you and I. Come along and see.

Care to share a dream, big or small?