A is For...

I'm going to try to take on te challenge given by Goofyj and go throught the alphabet letter by letter to have different topics for writing. I don't know how well I'll stick to the original directions, but I'll give it a try, tho undoubtedly not daily! So:

A is for...All My Children. Those in theatrical circles may recognize the title of an Arthur Miller play, my favorite. At the end, we realize that everyone in the next generation is also "my" child. It is the way I feel about my kids and their friends...my friends' kids... all the kids at church...or at school where I am involved...

I credit this feeling to my parents, who were always involved in what we did as kids. My mom never went to an opening night or closing night of our plays [our school did 2 weekends regularly, sometimes with additional performances.] Why not? Because she was busy making sandwiches for cast parties held regularly at our house because 1] there was room and 2] we didn't have close enough neighbors to have to worry about noise and 3] because my parents were willing. Once I mentioned this to my Dad and he rather wistfully said, I did my part by earning the money to pay for all those sanwiches." He was feeling a bit left out as I praised my Mom. And he was right. He did pay for not only the volumes of food consumed by hungry teens at many castand/or pool parties for years on end, but he also copied scripts [that we could write on] with the fairly new technology of the xerox machine below cost, and had particularly difficult set pieces made for shows in his cabinet shop at work--thus paying not only for materials, but for the expert carpenter to make it.

I have tried, and I think with some success, to treat those in my path as All My Children as well. And even All My Grandchildren. But it is because I was taught by goodly parents who always made time for All Their Children. Thank you, Mom and Dad, you taught us well.