Writng the title above caused me to flash back to seeing my older brother for the first time in a college play in Aberdeen, SD. I don't think I'd ever been to a live play on stage apart from some high school silliness. It was the Fantasticks, with the song "Try to Remember."
I'm reminded too because I've been purging stuff that I've hung on to for long enough--time to let it go. Among that stuff is a small batch of letters from my grandfather, old friends, and other family members, including from brother Joe, who wrote from Wisconsin and Ohio when he was in the theater.
I also found a copy of a play that I didn't remember I had, one I helped write with him and the members of Dakota Theater Caravan. I read it last night, maybe for the first time. I'm not sure it was finished yet when this copy was printed on a dot-matrix printer (remember those?). Set in the Black Hills, the play centers on controversial plans for mining in this beautiful area.
Anyway, looking through that material last night made me look back over a long life, professional and otherwise, and people and projects long gone. I never saw that play performed, though it was, but I could see my mark on it, and that's something.
