I have been a silent business partner to my wife and her love of children’s theater for over fifteen years. Well, just to be clear, sometimes I’m not all that silent. Anyway, this last weekend was a “theatre trip” to remember. She and I met up with her business partner, Karli, in Klamath Falls, Oregon to gather up the last of the theatre props she had in storage. Karli and I think a lot alike, very left brained and we talked about and planned this trip during several discussions and we both agreed that it wouldn’t take more than four hours to unpack, sort, clean, repack and load the entire disarray into our cars. Happy with that thought the 10 hour round trip drive to Kfalls didn’t appear to be that bad to me.
When we arrived at the location where the myriad of plastic buckets were stored it seemed overwhelming to each of us. There were 40 LARGE buckets and two LARGE bags of props and costumes to dig through.
So, as we dove into the project, the ambiance began to change very subtly. First, Karli, who I always attributed a great deal of focus to, seemed carried away into another land. It’s that same place Lois goes on many occasions. It’s the land of many colors, with Alice in wonderland, Mickey Mouse, Fenda Maria (ask me about her later) snakes, birds, jungle bushes and assorted noise makers. When she leaves this plane of existence for that weird and wonderful territory I am left, a lone man in the wilderness. I find myself completely alone, to fend for myself. Even conversation seemed beyond my power to bring her back. Several times I tried to engage in dialogue and each time it was as if she and Karli were the only two in the room. I decided not to take it all too personally, after all I was there just to, come to think of it, why was I there? Moral support, right.
The photos I have included were taken about half way through the process, when there was still much levity going on. As you can see from the photographic evidence, both Lois and Karli were steeped in the fantasy of it all and became fully adorned with props and in several stages of silliness. I have to say, it gives me much happiness to see my wife and her good friend have so much joy. The children they teach directly benefit from this over abundance of exuberance and should count themselves very lucky to be associated with Northwest Youth Theater, Lois and Karli. I know I do, just don’t make me wear those stupid elephant ears.
