On Saturday I saw Jules Massenet’s ‘Werther’ live from the
Met at the Vernon cinema. I think
there might have been a time when I would have scorned the emoting and the
extreme romanticism of the story, but not last Saturday. I don’t know what to blame: the
approach of spring; the absence of romance in my life; the fact that the tenor,
Jonas Kaufmann, who played Werther was gorgeous; but I willingly suspended all
disbelief and left the theatre an emotional wreck. This in spite of the fact that the last scene as Werther
dies in the arms of Charlotte exceeds in length any of Shakespeare’s tragic
death scenes. And their parting words are not merely uttered, they’re sung in
full voice.
I have recovered with only a mild spring fever that lingers
in the form of a restlessness to organize my future holidays. Jay and I talked this morning about a
change in plans for my visit to Korea.
I’m still going to go from about the middle of September until mid
October, but for our family trip we might go to Osaka, Japan for a few days, instead
of to Jeju Island. That will be
something new for all of us. I’m
almost ready to book the tickets for my summer holiday ‘back east’. It will be mid July to early
August. And very soon, probably
April 2nd to 16th, I hope to drive to Victoria to visit
mom and dad and Barbara and Terry. The mountain passes and highways in BC have been and continue
to be dangerous avalanche areas this late winter and spring, but I’m counting
on their clearing up soon. All
that planning and traveling should settle my restless soul.
Today I walked a bit around Vernon, a tourist in my own town, and looked closely at an old log house by a stream that I pass often but had never looked closely at. The pictures are from the walls of the house and the bench and ducks were beside it.
If you click on the picture it will enlarge and you can read about this eccentric first settler in Vernon.
Vernon by many other names.
Two of the ubiquitous local mallards
A memorial bench to a local doctor who fed them.
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