My Son Is Rumplestilakin

Happy May Day!! This morning my son needed to be at school by 6:45 a.m. for the dress rehearsal of the school play. At 7:00 a.m., he phoned home to say he had forgotten his shoes and knee socks, necessary parts of his costume.

So, off I skedaddled down the road to the high school, eleven miles from where we live. My camera wasn't with me, meaning I missed a golden opportunity to photograph a sandhill crane, which was wading in water near the high school road, which passes through a wetland preserve. Darn.

But, when I got home, this morning sky scene was in view:

My son is playing the part of Rumplestilakin (yes, that's how its spelled in the playbook), in this fairy fale parody, "Happily Ever Once Upon". Other characters in the cast include: Rapunzel, Cinderella, Prince Charming, Jason, Goldilocks, Red Riding Hood, The Pied Piper, and Three Princesses.
I can't wait to see this play! I love parodies; they flip the familiar upside-down into something laughable and silly. That's alright by me. We all need to laugh more, and take things less seriously.

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Below, is a random, unedited sunset scene being thrown into this post for good measure. While fixing supper the other night, I suddenly caught sight of it through the window above the kitchen sink, and dashed out the door with the camera. Husband was trudging up from the barn and said, "What on earth are you doing?", and shook his head when he saw the camera in my hand.

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Last evening found me also at the high school, for a band and chorus concert. They were performing their songs for Large Group Music Contest which will be held on Saturday. Ah, the memories.

As I have 99 % of the time for the past 25 years, I attended this school event alone. Husband milks cows in the evenings. Deep down, it bothers me alot, but then again, because I've gone to everything alone for so long, I hardly know how to act on the rare occasions when he IS along.

Following last night's concert, the Music Boosters served an ice cream social. After picking up my bowl of ice cream, I wandered amongst the tables, looking for a place to sit. Over in the corner sat the "weird" guy that nobody talks to, so I took a seat next to him.........mainly because I'm "weird", too, and we "weird" ones need to stick together. The man is a college Humanities professor, and my daughter is in one of his classes this semester, so I asked him how she's doing. He said, "Your daughter is working very hard." Well.......its difficult to say what that really means, or what kind of grade she may get, but he could have said worse things.

I asked him if he thought we as a society are becoming "dumbed down", because I've read concerns about that lately. He perked up and a floodgate opened. He said right now he's in the midst of grading term papers and some papers written by SENIOR students appear to be the first papers they've ever written!

He said he feels many professors are very lax in the classroom, and one reason is that when a college moves its focus from being a teaching school to being a comprehensive university, then research takes precedence, and faculty members are directed to focus on publishing instead of teaching. He told me that to gain tenure, he had to write books, not be a worthy teacher. Isn't that interesting??!