Pecos Bill~The Premier

  Posted on March 7, 2012 By George Weaver

 26 Comments

Warning Bell

Can’t see the numbers?  They’re at least three inches tall.  I couldn’t see them either…at eight o’clock this morning…with my eyes shut tight while I banged around on the damn thing trying to shut off the warning siren.  Sometime before daylight, I heard Boy opening the garage door.  That part was not unusual.  He forgets stuff and comes in the mornings to fetch it.  I wondered if he’d remember to close the garage door.  Then it happened.  I vaguely recognized the voice somewhere near my bed ordering me to be at a school play at ten o’clock.  Ten o’clock?  That’s past any kid’s bedtime.  I went back to sleep.

 

Saint Coffee

Know what a Coffee Saint looks like?  This one saved me from daylight shock on my trip to the premier of Pecos Bill.  She’s one of my McDonald’s girls.  I worry about her thumb.  This morning, I worried about my ability to get from her to the Way-Off-Broadway production.  I’ll worry about the thumb later.  We already discussed it three times.  She does not follow my instructions.  She says she needs the money.  The swollen thumb is the price she pays to get it.  She has two children under five years old.  And she smiles anyway.

 

Pecos Bill~The Premier

By the time I staggered into the church school cafeteria and fell into a folding chair, I cursed Apple for the magnitude of their discrimination.  Against Old People.  No VR on an iPhone that costs an arm and a leg?  S.H.I.T. as my mother used to spell in a little whisper under her breath.  I forgot the camera.  This would have to do.  I clicked about fifty times praying (it is a church) to accidentally get one photograph I could make out the characters in.  This one is the best of the lot.  Maybe it was the coffee.

Boy is the tall chuck wagon cook in the long apron and neck kerchief.  The one trying to hide behind the curtain despite my frantic arm motions for him to move over for the photo op.  After all, he was the one who ordered me to be there in the first place.  Basically, the story line includes a really humorous scene in which Boy and his co-chef (who wore Boy’s hat for some reason) tell the cowhands and the cowgirls what’s on the menu.  Beans and more Beans.  The disgruntled cow hands lament long and loudly.  The cooks tell them if they don’t want Beans for supper, it’s okay.  They can have Beans for breakfast.  Another round of loud wailing.  Finally, it’s decided that some lovely cowgirl will go for pizza.  All ends well.

I could never figure out how the character who kept peeking out of the folds in the stage curtains fit into the story.  I forgot to adjust my hearing aids so I won’t blame the director for this seeming incongruity.  At any rate, he looked remarkably like Groucho Marx.  Not a bad touch for any play.  And the kids had the vernacular and the phonology down pat!  I was astounded.  They could teach professional actors how to sound like real cowboys.

Director’s Note:   “This little play is an exercise in oral reading.  The books are supposed to be there.”

The reward for all the suffering came at the very end.  As the kids filed out, Boy stopped and put his arms around me.  He looked up into my eyes and said simply, “I love you, Granny!”

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