Artwala Road

Last week my amazing daughter, Anna Portnoy, put on MacBeth with her amazing eleventh grade students. Together they managed to put on a spectacular rendition in modern dress with hints of Boston streets seeping into MacBeth’s Scotland. Shakespeare in Wonderland. The kids loved the play because they saw how MacBeth was corrupted by power and by the violence he perpetrated, how it drove him mad. Many of them have witnessed violence on the Boston streets.

Today an article was published in The Bay State Banner with a full report on the play. You might like to check it out. Marques Latimore gave an outstanding performance as MacBeth. It’s such a large and daunting role and without a student willing to take on the hard work of preparing fr it the play could not have happened. So many other students also pitched in and participated. Lady MacBeth, the witches, Duncan—they were all fantastic. And it took a teacher like Anna, who believes in her students and who put in hours and hours of extra work. Back in my day the arts in school were dismissed as frivolous. It seems like times haven’t changed much. Apart from a few teachers who use the arts to teach curriculum and develop individual expression not much happens.

Teachers are not paid to do this work. There is almost no support for the arts in the Boston public schools. That’s a crime considering the payoff. In putting on this play these kids have learned things that you just can’t learn from books. They’ve overcome fears about performance—most had never been in a play before. They tackled the difficult language of Shakespeare and considered how to present scenes. They constructed sets and made costumes. They made a sound track with music they know and love. Think MacBeth and Michael Jackson’s Thriller. They choreographed a dance that brought the house down. They had disagreements, I’m sure. But when the curtain came down for the last time it came down on on a group of kids who know themselves a little better and who know know what it is to achieve something fantastic.

The fact that a group of kids worked together for three months on this play, staying after school and juggling jobs as well as their homework is testament to the power of artistic expression. Thank you, Shakespeare. It was so moving to see how the kids worked together and to witness theirs and Anna’s creativity.

It sounds hackneyed but I’ll say it anyway—the arts are transforming. They change lives. That’s their purpose. So when are we going to put money towards arts education? If we want kids to graduate with a solid sense of themselves and the spirit they possess then here’s the recipe—fund arts in the schools (hey, fund education, fund good teachers) and we’ll live in a world we all want to live in.

February 28th, 2008 | Category: Dear Reader | Comments (4)

Back again at the old Wordpress site and I’m going to stay put.  I thought I was doing something clever switching over to an iWeb site but I was in well over my head.  No need to go into it—I’m just so glad I could retrieve my old site.  Lesson learned—I am no tech wizard.

In fact there were a good number of lessons learned—

Tech issues can stress a girl out even after years of yoga!

Do not throw things out until you have the next thing working.

etc.  Too boring to continue….

BUT I did discover how much I love my wee blog.  It really is an awesome place to explore various endeavors and see everything in one place, and to communicate with others.  Now it almost feels like I’m starting over.  I was hoping that when I transferred the site I’d actually be able to put more things up in a coherent way but I’ll figure out how to attach a new site to the blog rather that transferring the blog.

Anyway, back again and here to stay.  And soooooooooooo grateful.

February 27th, 2008 | Category: Dear Reader | Comments (6)

I am in the process of changing this site over to the new one. It’s all a bit technical and I confess I don’t understand any of the transfer details. I’m just crossing my fingers that in a couple of days this will look very different. So, my loyal readers, if the site disappears for a bit it will be back, I promise. One way or another!! But most everything here will disappear or be reconfigured. It was fun. That was then. Now, on we go!

February 12th, 2008 | Category: Dear Reader | Comments (2)

Yesterday we held Allan’s book launch party at the Arsenal Center for the Arts in the midst of the oddest weather ever where it went from balmy and warm to freezing blizzard of wee snow balls in a matter of minutes.  This was for his new book, Stories We Need To Know and with dire weather predictions we got a few emails from folks who said they didn’t think they could come with such bad driving conditions.  But we set up the food and drink table as if there’d be a crowd and, happily, there was!  There were at least sixty people and we ran out of chairs so some had to stand while Allan gave his talk.

When we arrived we had difficulty getting the fancy projector that hooks up to the computer to work so there were a few anxious moments of a technical nature.  By great good luck a lovely woman I know stepped in from the theater down the hall and she had the number of Martin, the young man who actually knows how to work the projector, so we were able to give him a call.  Then it looked like we’d forgotten the plastic glasses so I dashed to our local store to buy more only to realize I’d left my wallet at home.  It was one of those moments when the deep yogic three-part breath was put to good use.  No point in rushing, just breath deeply, proceed to house, pick up wallet, breathe deeply, return to store where plastic glasses were exactly where I’d stashed them by the cash, breathe even more deeply  while cashier, an elderly Russian with Sergei on his name tag, took all day to count out the change because he was clearly breathing very deeply or not at all.  Then, after finally getting the said bag of plastic glasses, stepping out from the store into a blast of arctic air and slicing wind that actually took the breath away.

So, I arrived with the glasses to discover that the technical difficulties had been solved by the heroic appearance of Martin and that the glasses we’d thought were lost were actually at the front of the room beside the projector rather than at the back by the drinks table.  But never mind, deep breathing is a very salutary practice and the difficulties we faced—a projector that wouldn’t work, missing cups, Sergei counting pennies as if they were gold, and blizzard conditions—none got in the way of a great time!  So nice to see friends, to meet new people and even to raise some money for the Arts Center.  And to launch Allan’s wonderful book.

This is a long way of saying, that with so much going on, I forgot to take pictures.  Next time.

One final note—I go again today to my tech man at Apple to work on switching this blog to my main website.  It’s possible the whole thing will disappear for a few days this week or next but it will be back.  Same address.  It’s more than possible, indeed a fact, that all the old posts here will disappear.  But we move on—as we must.  A good opportunity, among many, to practice letting go.  C’est la vie.

February 11th, 2008 | Category: Dear Reader | Comments (3)