Have you ever been given something
from your past, something that you don’t even remember?
Through the magic of Facebook, I
reconnected with an old friend from Knoxville, Jeff W. He and his family lived
down the street from us for many years and our two families were friends.
Jeff’s Mother Dot and my mother reconnected, after being out of touch for some
years. My parents left Knoxville in 1991, and moved back to Augusta, where I
was born and lived the first 8 years of my life.
Dot sent us a package which we just
got today, of some piano sheet music which she had borrowed sometime in the
late 1970’s, and just forgot about. Going through the stack of music was a
revelation. There were gems like Mairzy Doats, I Love You Truly [which Mother
used to sing at weddings], and some music by a group from the 50’s called The
Four Lads. There were several songs from Sammy Kaye – Swing and sway with
Sammy Kaye. Maybe tomorrow I will attempt to play through some of them.
Those old sheet music covers have photos of young Dinah Shore, Frankie Laine,
etc. There is a small book of Stephen Foster songs that belonged to my
grandmother and was published in 1940. It’s pristine.
Holding that old music, listening to
my mother start singing each new song as I handed it to her, was like being in
a time capsule. Mother used to sing professionally, in USO shows, weddings,
etc. and some of it was her soloist music. That’s part of the magic of history
for me, connecting to the past through antiques, stories, music. It’s on reason
I love time travel novels. I want to believe in it.
Just for fun, I scanned in the cover
of my copy of Scarborough Fair. [Ignore the yellow line on the right, it's from my crappy scanner]
Obviously they were capitalizing on the Simon
& Garfunkel song, but they were aiming at a non-hippie audience, too. Note
the liplock on those two. He was just kissing half of her mouth. What the...? Classic of kitschy?! What do you think?
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The kids and I saw a new movie this
afternoon called The Ugly Truth, with
Gerard Butler and Katherine Heigl. If I have time, I will do a review on my
movie site. It was very funny in places, and touching. It just wasn’t as well
crafted as I would’ve liked. It lacked something indefinable that a great RomCom has..
However, on thing it has is Scottish actor Gerard Butler. He makes my heart flutter.. I just wish he would be clean shaven more often! I hate beard stubble! [It’s that sort of brilliant observation that makes my movie reviews must-reads, for dozens of people a month…]
I haven't published a Hunk Photo in a while, so here's Gerry. Isn't he hunkalicious?!!
