Catch a Falling Star...Never Let it Fade Away
Early Morning Sunflowers Far R Heather Heap Far L Jennifer Morrison 2nd L Sugar Bressler
Milkweeds of Autumn Center Front Eileen Sloman imm behind Davidge-Pitts Front R Hillary Jelks
Catch a Falling Star…and Never Let It Fade Away
Last week I introduced you all to Mom’s first play called In Mother Nature’s Garden which she wrote, produced and directed in 1955. I thought I would share with you some of the goings on behind the scenes in my next few blogs.
Mom and Dad had met over the theatre table doing tonsillectomies and although she was no longer nursing she and Dad often worked together over the breakfast table without even realizing it.
Catch a Falling Star…and Never Let It Fade Away
One morning, early, Mom popped down to Teperson’s Bakery to pick up a dozen sugar buns fresh out of the oven for a surprise breakfast treat. It would start everyone’s day off right. The timing was bad. As we all tucked in Dad said, “I’ve had this patient, Mrs. Fox, who scales over three hundred and fifty pounds. It took two scales and a tot up of the combined weights to get an idea.” With that, Dad told us again about the dangers of refined sugar, white flour and fat. We did not enjoy the everyday luxury of bacon, two eggs, each sitting on top of slices of fried toast to soak up the rest of the bacon fat, like all the other families I knew. We had a wedge of paw-paw (papaya) followed by Maltabella (sorghum) porridge most mornings.
“Well,” said Mom, “The buns are only a treat. Let’s enjoy them for what they are: simply delicious!”
“Mrs. Fox died last night,” he went on. Only thirty five. She was a management headache. Renal problems. Circulatory problems. Finally, this massive stroke. At least she didn’t linger and suffer with it. She left behind her precious daughter. I delivered her after a history of 3 miscarriages and three still births. What determination! What courage! I’ve never encountered a couple as determined to have a baby as this one. And what a happy family they have been despite their troubles.”
“Their daughter is such a pudgy little enigmatic thing, the splitting image of her mother,” said Mom. “I can’t think right off the bat where I can find a place for her in Mother Nature’s Garden but let me give it some thought.”
“Like her mother you might be surprised by her aspirations and how determined she is to realize them.”
As we settled down to our routine breakfast the next morning, Mom said, “Guess what?”
“What?” said Dad.
I found a place for Mrs Fox’s daughter, Henrietta. She’s not a dancer obviously, so I can’t have her as a frost fairy in the winter scene, an early morning sunflower or a milkweed in autumn. I offered her a place in the summer orchestra of insects. She turned it down, said she didn’t like creepy crawlies and didn’t want to be one. Perhaps a spot as a falling star? I did so want to find a place for her, somehow.”
“She must have jumped at that.”
“Not exactly!” She was very emphatic. “No, she said I’m not a falling star. I’m a rising star. And so she is. The scripts all changed to accommodate it! Mrs. Hatchuel, she’s such a seamstress, has offered to make her costume.”
“I’ve never thought much about your skits and things but perhaps there’s a place for it after all. Well done. Got to run…”