Oscar 2014 (part 2)

Boasting, Bragging, Egomania?

I Love it All!

We here at SconeTherapy are in a whirlwind of anticipation for our Sunday night couch. We can hardly wait for the opening strains of the orchestra as it welcomes members of the Academy - and all who live vicariously through our televisions. And even before that, there is the spectacle of the Red Carpet! Are you as excited as we are?

(I am providing a dinner for the evening and wonder what appropriate thing I can make. Perhaps a meat loaf..? Mmm, no, too humble..)

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The interviews, the opportunities for everyone to preen, the sheer Narcissism of this event boggles the mind, does it not? But the SconeLady cannot help herself and she will not miss even one minute of all this blatant self-absorption.

It might be the dazzling beauty and color of it all. There is of course the perfect hair and makeup. Not to mention the all the TEETH. And we like to watch for Ryan Seacrest who seems to spotlight all this ego without turning a hair. It looks like just one more day at the office for him (except perhaps when he has an urn of cremation ashes thrown at him. That might have surprised him a bit).

There could be a moment or two when the SconeLady's happy smile might freeze just a little. The acceptance speeches. Depending on who is thanking their hoards, I think it is an opportunity to run for the restroom. They won't miss me.

For the rest....

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• we wanted Saving Mr. Banks to win something and wonder why it won't
• we hope Meryl Streep will deliver a better acceptance speech than she did last year and not be so sad she won
• we favored Sandra Bullock in Gravity and Chiwetel Ejiofor in 12 Years A Slave
• we liked Judi Dench in Philomena but are not as sure we liked Philomena
• we don't care anything about wolves, hustlers, or love affairs with an App
• we liked Leonardo DiCaprio better in Titanic

So let me know, dear Readers, what you think of the Biggest Night In Hollywood. I wonder if you will be watching too. I wonder what you will be eating. 

(I wonder if Judi Dench ever eats meat loaf..?)

See you along the way!

the SconeLady

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Oscar 2014

All This For A Golden Statue

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What will you be doing this Sunday evening? With no Downton Abbey, shall we be bereft? Those of us who still grieve for Matthew Crawley certainly know the feeling.

But there is a solution! At least for this one Sunday evening you will find me on a couch in front of my kind sister's large flat screen. Glued to the Oscars. There I shall perch until the whole thing is over and Ellen collapses from exhaustion and everyone else heaves a huge sigh of relief.

My husband has never shared this Oscar anticipation with me. It baffles him. To forcibly endure the cacophony of voices along the Red Carpet, or the clever Monologue of the host, or the parade of presenters (a.k.a. readers) in strange looking gowns would, for him, constitute torture. Perhaps the very last Oscar ceremony he had a glimpse of was in 1974 when a Streaker ran across the stage in front of David Niven. It was enough.

But I have always been fascinated (though not in the Streaker of course). It would be such fun to walk down that red carpet in a golden dress and high heeled shoes. But for now I shall be content just to watch and be impressed by the gowns, and seeing George Clooney smiling politely at inane questions, and Julia Roberts enjoying another moment in the sun.

Of the 9 movies in the Best Picture category, I have seen only three. I'm sorry, but I could not bring myself to watch a lot of wolves or hustlers, or even a love affair with an App. However, the three I saw were interesting:

• Gravity
• Philomena
• 12 Years A Slave

We went from stunning outer space where an astronaut grieves for her little girl, to the beauty of Ireland, where a woman loses her little boy, to the wilds of the southern United States where a man has been abducted and torn from his wife and children. Each of these stories reminds us that our children, and the ability to be with them, is priceless. 

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I do not seem to be invested heavily in a whole lot else this go around, but I did think Frozen was a fantastic Animated Film. Anything my grandchildren adore is OK by me (I loved how the Moose stuck his tongue to the frozen pipe!), and 'For The First Time In Forever' is being constantly sung in our daughter's house. They always know when something is great.

And so, even though we won't be seeing Lady Mary or Mr. Molesley this Sunday, an awful lot of effort and work and intensity will be going into this awards ceremony. Things are working up to a fever pitch even as we speak. Just think of it! - the women are still being fitted for immense numbers of gowns, the men are feverishly applying their teeth-whiteners, and each are dearly hoping to look better than the next.

But none of them will ever hold a candle to Matthew Crawley.

See you along the way!

the SconeLady

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Alone, at the Bottom of the World (part 30)

Watergate and Other Uglies

I had departed for New Zealand just two days after the massacre at the Munich Olympics in 1972. This terrible act seemed to usher in a time of frightening change. One of my sisters was watching the Olympics in the family room and called out, saying, "Oh no! Some people just got shot at Munich!"

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We were all horrified, and kept the TV at full volume as masked gunmen lurked in the shadows of the Olympic Village. We saw that over a span of time the Israeli team were taken hostage, some being shot, and all eventually killed. It was a bleak time for everyone, our first real experience with Terrorism. It certainly would not be our last.

There followed for me that significant year at the bottom of the World. It was an utter contrast from the chaos of those shattered Games witnessed by so many through television.Throughout the year, we studied and served and heard very little news of events elsewhere in the world. I do not remember even seeing a television.

Therefore, upon my return home I knew of virtually nothing after the massacre at the Munich Games. U.S. involvement in Viet Nam had just recently ended. Former president Johnson had died. And what had been thought of as a minor break-in at the Watergate Hotel began to get increasing airplay. I came home to an alarming barrage of pessimism unknown just a year before.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/tonynetone/2623748139/

Someone asked me what I thought about 'Watergate'. I didn't know and had to ask what she was talking about. After she told me, I wished that I could forget about it.

But no one could forget about it.

The situation was remarkable for its slow moving drama. First there was the break in, then the newspaper articles, then the resignations of top White House aides, followed by Senate hearings. Everything was drawn out over the following year in excruciating detail, ending in the calamity of a presidential resignation. 

So, coming home was terrific and lovely, but also confusing in its sadder misadventures. In 1969 I had witnessed a year of college campus rebellions and Moratoriums and sit-ins; but this time, no one seemed to be marching. No speeches were made with angry signs waving in the breeze. Students simply stood watching it all on the M.U. screens and looked worried.

We've been through strange and hard times before because we stuck together. We figured it could only get better.

After all, we still had Jimmy Carter to look forward to.

See you along the way!

the SconeLady

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My Favorite British etceteras

Today I add to my list of Favorite British Television Series for you (please see TV Whip Lash, February 22 post):

• Wives and Daughters (a must see and let me know what you think)

• Foyle's War (War/Detective/Murder/Police series)

• Middlemarch (a George Eliot novel of intricate plot lines and love interests)

• Mansfield Park (not the 2007. Jane Austen would have hated it)

• The Forsyte Saga (the 1967 is amazing!)

• The Barchester Chronicles (friend Rosie shared this gem with me - fabulous)

• Upstairs, Downstairs (love.this.series! both the new and the old)

• Endeavour (new Masterpiece prequel for Inspector Morse, and stupendous)

• All Creatures Great and Small

Of course, I am very likely forgetting others again. If so, the forgotten ones will float back to these pages and make themselves known. Eventually.

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One of the things I like about British series is that one sees one's favorite actors floating around from series to series. For instance, Lady Mary in Downton Abbey shows up in Return To Cranford as Erminia Whyte, and the young doctor in Cranford (who marries the Vicar's lovely daughter) makes his appearance as Mr. Bingly in the 2005 fabulous Pride and Prejudice with Kiera Knightly. He was splendid in both.

And, Hyacinth Gibson (who marries the doctor in Wives and Daughters and makes him sorry he married her) plays Lady Ludlow in Cranford (nobody marries her). Robert Hardy, who plays Sigfried in All Creatures Great and Small, plays the childless but wealthy dolt Robert Brooke in Middlemarch.  Oh! And the police lieutenant in Foyle's War (Paul Milner, who lost his leg in the war) turns up as Roger Hamley in Wives and Daughters.

I'm sorry, but I could go on and on!

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But to end, I focus momentarily upon George Eliot's Middlemarch. I have not yet read the book, but look forward to it. 

The person I think of here is Dorothea Brooke, who is wooed by the wealthy Sir James. But instead of marrying him for his wealth, Dorothea is intrigued by an older man (the Rev. Edward Casaubon), a book writer. The Reverend wants to marry her and makes a nominal effort to attract her. Fancying herself in love and having found The One, she marries only to learn that he has no love for her after all. 

You will have to watch, or read, to get the whole story. But while it is sad in some ways, you will appreciate both her faithfulness and her strength. At the end of her life (and George Eliot's book), he states the following:

"Her full nature spent itself in deeds which left no great name on the earth, but the effect of her Being on those around her was incalculable. For the growing good of the world is partly dependent on unhistoric acts, and on all those who live faithfully their lives and rest in unvisited tombs."
                                                                       -George Eliot, Middlemarch, 1874

Excellently said. 

Shall we 'live faithfully' our lives? And is the effect of our Being on those around us 'incalculable'? To have such words said of us would be to know we had ended well.

Let's do that.

See you along the way!

the SconeLady

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Downton Abbey Ep8

Finale

(It is over! We here at SconeTherapy are devastated.)

The episode was so very complicated (and perhaps long?) that I am still befuddled and trying to make sense of it. But I think Lady Edith's baby has arrived but is no longer Lady Edith's baby even though Edith wishes it were.

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It took us a while to figure out that this episode took place at least 8 months after the last one. We all felt gently confused by this.

Lady Mary continues to be pursued by a bevy of supposedly dark and handsome suitors, but so far none has prevailed (the Scone Lady acknowledges that Lord Gillingham is dark, but not handsome).

And Lady Rose was presented to the King. 

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At first I was very interested in the arrival of the Americans.  But when the Americans began to speak, my smile stiffened just slightly because they were made to sound ridiculous. All of them! Mother Levinson. Her son Harold Levinson. The naive and wide-eyed American Valet with them. I had been waiting for Paul Giamatti (Harold) to appear for ages and I liked Shirley McLean (mother) in earlier episodes. But their arrival did not match the anticipation. 

I have found myself rooting for Blake more and more - have you? - and quite a lot for Daisy, for Tom Branson, and for (of course) Molesley. I shall miss them all during the hiatus. 

For the rest....

• I don't care about the missing letter and care even less about who stole it.

• I am creeped out by the way Thomas creepily stands behind Branson at breakfast, and the way he is being a creep toward him in general.

• Branson should have said no when Sarah Bunting wanted to look around Downton Abbey while the family were away.

• I don't know what Harold sees in Madeline.

• I am not at all interested in Lord Merton who is interested in Isobel.

• I am very interested in Carson walking through the waves holding hands with Mrs. Hughes. My favorite moment!

And there you have it from the Scone Lady and her loyal therapists, who are already missing Mr. Molesley and the rest.

What on earth will we all do without them? (I ask you).  


See you along the way!
the SconeLady

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Lennon and Maisy - on "Nashville"

Sisters.  Dishes.

In my list of favorite British series I cannot believe I forgot Wives and Daughters and Foyle's War! Honestly. But I did promise to remember them and I have. 

However, today I am not thinking of British series but of the afore-mentioned American series, "Nashville". Because of the Stella Sisters.

This was again a traveling day. We are heading back to our sweet woodland home in the (probable) snow. After spending a warm week with family both small and grown, we felt sad to leave so soon. So to comfort myself as we rocketed up the freeway, I listened to Lennon and Maisy, the Stella Sisters from Nashville.

These two very nice and grounded young girls sing absolutely like two angels. I love their harmonies! Listening, one finds oneself drawn in, and sweetly touched. I can't overemphasize how sensational these two are (check out two of their songs at communityvoices.post-gazette.com).

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Their harmonies reminded me of growing up in a musical family. Ours was headed by a father who simply could not bear for anything to be out of tune. We were sensitive to this. Very sensitive. Because when we practiced our music, out from his sitting area (sometimes we didn't even know he was there) would come this booming voice, "It's supposed to be a B flat!!!!" 

This made us sensitive little musicians. Musicians who worked hard to play that B flat correctly and maybe get through a practice session unscathed. 

The Stella Sisters also reminded me of the way my sister and I developed our own vocal harmonies. Simply because we loathed doing the dinner dishes. That's right. We were so crabby at having to do them that we fought and argued and got ourselves into hot water. So my sister suggested it might help if we tried to sing instead of fight. A brilliant stroke! 

This singing-rather-than-fighting over the years developed duet harmonies in us that sound almost like one voice with two notes. Pure joy.

I wonder if the Stella sisters have to do the dinner dishes. I really do. Because if they do, then we feel their pain. And appreciate their harmonies even more.

If they don't, there will be something or someone else who has urged them on and made that difference.

In the meantime, I still get shaky when it comes to practicing, or doing the dinner dishes. I almost feel that presence of someone in a sitting area, just around the corner, listening..


http://www.flickr.com/photos/zen/119293446/
See you along the way!
the SconeLady





















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TV Whip Lash

Some Changes Come Too Quickly

I have a confession to make. I like to binge-watch television series, when I find good ones. The absolute successes are almost always from the BBC or ITV. Some you will already love and watch:

• Cranford (and Return To Cranford)
• Call The Midwife
• Downton Abbey (of course!)
• Sherlock
• A Touch of Frost (detective series)
• Waking The Dead (unique detective series)
• Vera (lady detective series)
• Pride and Prejudice (all versions, but mostly the 2005)
• any other Jane Austen
• any other British author series
• Midsomer Murders
• Silk (amazing and fabulous and you must see)

There are more. I will remember them later.

Some great television series do, of course, originate in the USA and I will remember them later too. But right now I am thinking of something I caught on a Virgin Airlines flight to the UK: Nashville. It is a series that focuses on that Tennessee city and the (mostly) country music to be found there. Virgin Airlines offered the first two episodes of the first season, and I found them really interesting and the music fantastic.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/brent_nashville/375664746/

Which led me to try and find the series once I returned home a month later. At first I couldn't. But last week, I suddenly found free access - or at least, the first 4 episodes. They weren't maybe quite so fascinating this time around, but I soldiered through it and still thought the music was great (important News Flash: the real life Stella Sisters on the show are AMAZING, and a must listen!).

But ABC tv skipped me from Season One to somewhere mid-Season Two, just when I was getting interested (I'm too cheap to purchase Hulu+). It was an adjustment, but the whip lash between seasons wasn't too terrible.

And then I noticed something. The people who were couples during season one? They were NO LONGER COUPLES during season two. The characters were all still in the show, but they were all WITH SOMEONE ELSE.

The Mayor and his wife Rayna had undergone a D.I.V.O.R.C.E. Rayna's father (it was revealed) had probably killed Rayna's mother. Scarlett was no longer with Avery, who was with Juliette Barnes, who had apparently split with Deacon. The Mayor had gotten married to the girl who played the bride in Father of the Bride, and Gunnar liked Scarlett but got with a brunette singer instead. I can't remember her name.

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It was all becoming too confusing. How many partners would be considered acceptable? If the series goes on for too long, heaven only knows the numbers of children there might be who have multiple step-fathers, step-mothers, step-brothers, step-sisters, step-grandparents, step-aunts, and step-uncles. And that is only if all the Significant Others actually get married. Surely these children will develop multiple personalities. Or something.

Talk about whip lash. I'm exhausted just thinking about it.

See you along the way!

the SconeLady

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End of One, Beginning of Another (part 3)

No One Was Quite Like Her

Grandma Ida. Those two words always carried happiness with them, as did she wherever she went. A gentler personality I do not think existed. Each year, she would find a way to travel the hours and miles from her state to ours, and how we looked forward to this! The small treats, and the gift of her sweet temperament seemed to have a calming effect on us all. No one could ever be churlish or gloomy around Grandma Ida, and I am sure our parents breathed a sigh of relief whenever she arrived.

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And a much-favored tradition had been established. She would walk downtown with us and let us each pick out a cake mix for her to bake with us. Nothing could have been as exciting as that walk and that baking, and we looked forward to it all year. My choice was always 'chocolate pudding cake', and my slightly older sister leaned toward chocolate. It made the whole world feel like a party.

And to top this off, every year she sent us each a $1 bill on our birthdays. An embarrassment of riches!

Although I had grown beyond pudding cakes and dollar bills, I was next to Grandma once again as we headed companionably toward a new destination. We talked, and laid out plans, and dreamed of success. Surely this time, college and studies would suit me well. Surely there would be no failure. It was the Moment I had been waiting for.

Grandma and I drove slowly toward my brother's street, our eyes peeled for the tiny girl who had been born while I was in New Zealand. At long last we pulled up to the house, and suddenly out the door came my big brother, holding the most adorable 5 month old baby girl ever! Light auburn hair, the biggest green eyes, and - most surprisingly - she looked like me!  

It was a new little Life, and a new beginning all rolled sweetly into one. 

An embarrassment of riches.


See you along the way!
the SconeLady

Corvallis, Oregon

http://www.flickr.com/photos/tonythemisfit/3099800070/

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End of One, Beginning of Another (part 2)

Fresh Beginnings

Mother stood next to my bed with a nice cup of tea. She now knew of my affinity for tea, learned in a gentle Commonwealth country; an affection that would last (probably) forever. With milk and sugar.

She had news. Grandmother* would drive me up to college, and I would stay with my brother there while seeking a living arrangement. I was, it must be admitted, a bit of a late bloomer and was going to be a 22 year old mid-Sophomore. But I was on the right road, with no debilitating regrets for those things that had gone before. Do you like the idea of fresh beginnings, my dear scone-lovers? I can vouch for them! and rejoiced that I was given one that blessed fall of 1973.

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But for now, there my wonderful mother stood. Just lying there in bed and looking up at her face seemed a luxury. But! Up I must get. Breakfast I must eat! College would wait for no woman, and I had better be quick if I wanted to be a part of it.

I really don't know how I (she) accomplished everything as quickly as I (she) did. But by week's end I had become an accepted student of Oregon State University, in the school of Education. Throughout, there had been a whirlwind of activity - shopping, sewing, packing, seeing friends I had not seen in a year, and would now not see again for another.

 At last my grandmother's car sat in the drive, ready to bear us away. I piled my things in the back with a bit of heartache, for my little sister would be Here, and I would be There, again. I felt as if I was abandoning her, when we had just gotten back together! 

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Earlier in the week, she’d sat watching as I organized clothes on our mother's big bed. She asked questions and I responded as best I could. Things about Life; about decisions; about hard things we must bear, and what makes them hard.

After a while my little sister had said, "Oh! When you tell me these things, you don't preach. And you make me feel like it's Real, and that it's worth it all."

And now she stood with my mother in the driveway, watching as I said goodbye to the small crowd of family gathered around. 

Then, I turned and hugged her and said I would write; we didn't have to say very much, because we had already said it all. Her small blond head could be seen next to our mother’s soft brown one, peering down the road at our car as we rounded the bend. 

A fresh beginning. It was the end of one, and the beginning of another. 

And I was finally ready.

See you along the way!

the SconeLady

*(please see Post from December 2, 2013: End of One, Beginning of Another) 

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Alone, at the Bottom of the World (part 29)

Feast and Festivity

The sky was bright and the air warm as we approached the final city of my long trek. Carson City, the capital of Nevada and the target of all my travels, lay just before us. The Greyhound bus was so warm that passengers practically gasped for breath but were not allowed to open their windows (what is the purpose of a window if not to open it? I ask you).

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But the driver was relentless and said it was NOT his fault that the air conditioning was NOT working. He said that for safety reasons we would NOT be permitted to open any windows (he had an electric fan blasting away at his head, I noticed). I think if we had had to go very much further like this, there almost certainly would have been a mutiny.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/paulsedra/9272753786/

But I wasn't thinking of mutiny. My mind was filled with visions of the Lady who would be at home waiting for me. She would either be on the front porch step or looking through the picture window so as not to miss the moment of my arrival. 


The bus drew in to the terminal and parked itself under the bus portal roof, and  desperate passengers lined the aisles in order to make their escape. We were still gasping for breath (had I mentioned the 'troublesome' bathrooms one might have encountered along the way?..).

I peered through the window glass as we inched our way to the exit. There on the curb was my friendly and benevolent step-brother who had been dispatched to collect me. I made my way down the steps and practically collapsed into his welcoming arms, croaking out, "Let's get AWAY from here!".

We threw my things into the back, and made a swift getaway. This town, through my eyes, was just about the most beautiful place I'd ever seen. After all the big cities I had passed through, and the bus terminals that had given me such a fright, this one and this little city was a sight for my weary eyes.

We turned down Highland Street and there, a tall and beautiful Lady stood facing our direction. At 49, she appeared even younger; more like a big sister than a mother. She stood there in the sun, a dish towel drying her hands (she had been undergoing a flurry of food preparation!). Everything having to do with food and feeding in that family required flurries of prep, so many were we. But this feast was particularly special, because someone was back in the fold and this would be celebrated. 

My small sister came flying out of the house, barreling down into my arms. We stood locked together and thankful, yet not needing to say very much. Other little sisters and bigger brothers hovered to hug whenever a hug was available. Newer father grinned and said something like, "Well it's about time.."

Finally we all trooped into the house for a meal that was more feast than supper, talking long into the night about everything that had happened, and would happen.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/27190564@N02/10022126456/

For plans needed making! An application required filling! and everything from clothing to housing, travel (again!?) and majors had to be thought through.

And there was not a moment to loose. 

OSU awaited.

See you along the way!

the SconeLady

photo credit: <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/27190564@N02/10022126456/">Kirt Edblom</a> via <a href="http://photopin.com">photopin</a> <a href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0/">cc</a>

photo credit: <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/paulsedra/9272753786/">pds209</a> via <a href="http://photopin.com">photopin</a> <a href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/">cc</a>

photo credit: <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/patrick_nouhailler/8678254842/">Nouhailler</a> via <a href="http://photopin.com">photopin</a> <a href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0/">cc</a>