At Home in Mitford

My friend Lauren Yarger gave me this book, the first in a series of novels about an Episcopal priest, Father Tim, in a small North Carolina town. Lauren loves these stories and I can see why. Author Jan Karon has created a world I’d like to visit, peopled with lovable characters living everyday lives. It’s low-keyed, yet that simplicity is what reflects the beauty of the Incarnation. This book is a treasure.

I would love to have Father Tim as a friend or be part of his parish. He’s a man of strong faith who knows his Bible well, but he’s never preachy. As he says, he likes having scripture on hand to rise up and meet any occasion of the day. He mostly keeps these passages to himself, but we have access to his thought and I loved reading his reaction to any situation. It made me wish I knew scripture that well. One of his favorite verses is Philippians 4:13 -- “I can do all things through him who strengthens me.”

While Father Tim, who turns 60 in the book, doesn’t go around spouting Bible verses to the town folks or his parishioners, he is quick to call out a scripture reference to one listener -- his dog, Barnabas, since this is the only way to calm down the frisky hound. “That dog knows more scripture than most people,” said his neighbor, Cynthia.

A confirmed bachelor, Father Tim is drawn to Cynthia, a children’s book author new to Mitford, and she to him, but he’s unsure about how to proceed. “’Lord,’ he prayed. ‘I’m not used to this ‘going out’ business. Some might tell me to follow my instincts but I’ve spent so many years trying to follow yours that I’ve nearly lost the hang of following mine. So, thank you for being in on this and handling it to please yourself.’ There! That put the burden squarely on the Lord, he thought.”

I also loved Father Tim’s homespun wisdom about ordinary life. He was always right on target. Here’s his take on getting down to work: “How could he have considered taking Monday off? Monday was the diving board poised over the rest of the week. One walked out on the board, reviewed the situation, planned one’s strategy, bounced a few times to get the feel of things, and then made a clean dive. Without Monday, one simply bombed into the water, belly first, and hoped for the best.”

Karon says she writes “to give readers an extended family, and to applaud the extraordinary beauty of ordinary lives.” She does this beautifully in At Home in Mitford. It’s nice to know I still have a whole series of these books to explore.

A true test

"Nearly all men can stand adversity, but to test a man's character give him power."
-- Abraham Lincoln

Victoria Clark

Tony Award-winner Victoria Clark has given us a delightful sampling of different genres of music in her first solo CD, "Fifteen Seconds of Grace.” It’s a CD for the spirit.

She starts with the beautiful hymn, “How Can I Keep from Singing?” This is often thought of as a Quaker hymn, but it’s not. It was written in 1860 by Robert Wadsworth Lowry, a Baptist minister. Like Pete Seeger who popularized the song in the 1960s, Clark omits the Christian wording of the original, substituting the word love for Christ, but listening to her sing it is like listening to a prayer. I love the message -- “No storm can shake my inmost calm/While to that rock I’m clinging;/Since love is Lord of Heav’n and earth,/How can I keep from singing?”

Other selections include music I consider inspiring, although from completely different sources. Good movie and Broadway music always lifts my soul, and that’s just what Clark does when she sings “It Might Be You” from “Tootsie,” “Before the Parade Passes By,” from Hello, Dolly and “I Got Lost in His Arms” from Annie Get Your Gun. She’s also introduced me to a new song to cherish, Jane Kelly Williams’ lovely ballad “Thomas.”

Adding to the beauty of this CD is the impressive group of accompanying musicians, including John and Bucky Pizzarelli, under the direction of Ted Sperling.

In the liner notes, Ms. Clark explains why she included the title song, also by Ms. Williams: “Sometimes we experience these little gifts, moments that can be so short, maybe only 15 seconds, that remind us that we are forgiven, or that we are loved, or that we are lovable -- reminders that keep us humble, and pure, and whole.”

Lovable, pure and whole are just how I would describe Fifteen Seconds of Grace, another CD well worth adding to your collection.

God's One Liners

1. When praying, don't give God instructions -- just report for duty.

2. We don't change God's messages . . . God's messages change us.

3. When God ordains, God sustains.

4. Most people want to serve God, but only in an advisory position.

5. Those who anger you control you.

6. Worry is the dark room in which negatives can develop.

7. God doesn't call the qualified . . . God qualifies the called.

-- from America Online

[title of show]

What starts out as a funny, creative show runs out of steam halfway through and devolves into profanity and vulgar attempts at humor. Too bad writers Jeff Bowen and Hunter Bell couldn’t sustain the gimmick because I really thought they had something clever going for awhile.

The gimmick is two guys, Bowen and Bell who play themselves, who want to enter a musical theatre festival, but don’t have a show to submit so they make up one as they go along with the help of their friends Susan Blackwell and Heidi Blickenstaff, who also play themselves. There’s a lot of gay humor, some of which I missed, and a great deal of insider theatre references, of which I may have missed a bit too. The title comes from the first line of the application, which they decide makes as good a name as any. I did like some of the ideas they had for other titles, my favorite being Your Arms Too Short to Write This Show. (If that doesn’t mean anything to you then you’ll probably miss much of the inside humor -- and you might even think I forgot the apostrophe in Arms.)

[title of show] debuted in 2004 at the New York Musical Theatre Festival and enjoyed an extended Off-Broadway run at The Vineyard Theatre in 2006. Now it‘s on Broadway, with that journey worked into the plot. The set is basically four odd chairs and the onstage keyboardist, Larry Pressgrove, who is the show’s musical director.

One of the insider names that popped out at me was Mary Stout, with a line about her getting hit by a hot dog cart. While Mary Stout is a veteran performer, she is not well-known enough that the average person in the audience will recognize her name. I did because she sang for us twice at Broadway Blessing and she lives on my street. I didn’t know she had gotten hit by a hot dog cart, but now many people will know.

Even though the show is only 90 minutes (it felt longer), the writing in the second half, which deals with the possible changes to be made for the Broadway run, sounds like material dreamed up to fill time rather than original writing. I did laugh when they discussed substituting the name Al Roker for Mary Stout because it would have more audience recognition. For reasons unfathomable to me, The Rodgers & Hammerstein Organization has acquired the stock and amateur rights to the show.

Between the Off-Broadway run and the waiting and hoping to move to Broadway, the creators kept the show alive through the internet series, "The [title of show] Show," which is available for viewing by visiting www.titleofshow.com/toscasts.htm.

[title of show] is at the Lyceum Theatre, 149 W. 45th St. For more information visit www.titleofshow.com.

Song of the Builders

On a summer morning
I sat down
on a hillside
to think about God --
a worthy pastime.

Near me, I saw
a single cricket;
it was moving the grains of the hillside
this way and that way.

How great was its energy,
how humble its effort.
Let us hope
it will always be like this,
each of us going on
in our inexplicable ways
building the universe.

-- Mary Oliver

Opportunity

"Opportunity is missed by most people because it is dressed in overalls and looks like work."
-- Thomas Edison