First of all, Happy Birthday to Angeles! She turned 25 on Thursday. Wish we could have been there. Hope you had a wonderful day!
Thursday was also the day that Glen and I took some of his theatre students to see a play based on a true story. It was put on by Damonte Ranch High School in Reno. The play was called
Men on Boats, only there are no men (per playwright's instructions) and no boats (minimal set and few props--mostly pantomimed). Fascinating play and the girls did a fantastic job, I thought. Lake Powell was named after the leader of the expedition that the play chronicles.
Here are 2 summaries of the story:
Backhaus’ play dramatizes the 1869 expedition of the Colorado River and the Grand Canyon, following Major John Wesley Powell and a crew of volunteers who journey to chart the Colorado River. Backhaus uses Powell’s journal to dramatize the (mostly) accurate chronicle of the expedition.
In 1869, ten explorers set off to chart the Green and Colorado Rivers, under the guidance of John Wesley Powell, a one-armed Civil War Veteran and personal friend of President Grant, a government-sanctioned journey following in the footsteps of the deserters, lone adventurers, and countless indigenous people who have previously braved the wild rapids leading through Colorado, Utah, and New Mexico, and through the most dangerous waterway of all: the Grand Canyon. Along the way they make friends, they get on each other’s nerves, they suffer loss of boat and supplies, they doubt, struggle, and name mountains after themselves, they posture and pretend, they quit while they’re ahead, and they repeatedly brave dangerous rapids to reach the other side. As boats capsize and supplies are lost, as belts tighten and nerves fray, the company draws together as a band of brothers, even as three members fear the outcome of the final waterfalls and make the fateful decision to leave before the end. In Men On Boats, Jacklyn Backhaus’ original, hilarious, and delightful adventure dramedy, the conquering men out to chronicle the land in service of America, God, and Manifest destiny, are given voice and movement by actors who are anything and everything but white and male, and the bravery, determination, foolishness, humanity, and true grit of the historical explorers is memorialized, while the historical moment of their journey is viewed with a critical lens.
It was homecoming week at school. Friday night, Glen and I went to see the football game, but took a detour into the gym and watched a very exciting volleyball game--it was much more exciting than the football game since we won the football game 56-0.
Turns out when you play volleyball it's the best 3 out of 5. When we arrived at the volleyball game, each team had already won one game. The third game was in progress and we were way behind, but the girls rallied hard at the end and won...and then they were creamed in the 4th game.
So it was tied, 2 games each. We were behind in the 5th game by a lot...and then the girls rallied again and managed to pull out a win. It was, as I said before, very exciting. Glen and I then went out and watched the last few minutes of the football game where the other team almost scored...but didn't.
Another big week for Alex. Yesterday he received his own endowments at the Reno temple. Besides the four of us, Dad Perazzo, David, Alan, Kathy, Gary, and Michael were also able to be there. We were so glad that they were able to come and support Alex.
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| it was chilly and very windy as you can tell--and it snowed a bit after we left Reno |
