PeaceBang

When Is It Creedal?

I discovered a very old conversation over at belief.net featuring some of my favorite UU bloggers. They were debating whether or not UUA President Bill Sinkford’s statement on choice constitutes a creed or not.
It’s from 2004 and it’s here: http://tinyurl.com/q66bj
(not to open old wounds or anything)

It’s actually a great conversation, and given that the public conversation on choice is heating up a lot lately, look to the Reverend Mr. Sinkford to be making a lot more announcements, pronouncements and issuing statements that begin, “we believe.”

My personal take is that unless a statement is being used in a congregational setting as a theological test for membership, it’s not a creed. Even if it begins, “We believe,” it’s not strictly a creed (although I’m hip to the Latin thing with “credo”). That’s not to say that I discount Chalice Chick and others’ objections, I just don’t think they’re quite on the mark, although close to it.

All I can say is, when I’m President of the UUA I’m hiring Fausto to be my official statement checker. Day-ang.

UU Worship: Legendary Moments

A legendary thing happened in church today. Well, I thought it was legendary.

The setting: a Union Service in a beautiful, historic New England church attended by five UU congregations and choirs and led by four of their ministers.
The theme: Justice Sunday. The Unitarian Universalist Service Committee’s focus this year is on Worker’s Rights, and the Living Wage Campaign.

The time: Three-quarters of the way through the service.

Three of the ministers have given homilies highlighting some aspect of the worth and dignity of workers. One colleague speaks about sanitation workers at Ground Zero in New York. Another speaks of the story of Lazarus and the Rich Man, using Martin Luther King, Jr.’s interpretation of the story to emphasize that the Rich Man didn’t go to hell because he did the wrong thing, but because he did nothing– because he walked by Lazarus every day and treated him as though he was invisible. The third colleague tells a story of laborers in India. He winds his compelling, morally complex story into an exhortation that we make our every day choices reflect our religious values. He uses Free Trade Coffee as an example.
A fourth colleague leads a prayer. The choir sings. The congregation sings. It is energetic and positive. People feel chagrined in a good way. They have been woven together.

The service has been designed to culminate in an Offering for the Unitarian Universalist Service Committee.
The eldest of the colleagues gets up. He is retired and serving as an Interim Minister for one of the participating congregations. He is an eminence gris, with hearing aids in both ears and a gray beard. His reputation as a lion of social justice is well known. He is a fierce grandfather elder of our tribe.

Whereas all of the other ministers have spoken from the pulpit, he takes the microphone off its stand and walks directly in front of the first pews, speaking without notes. Every phrase is eloquent; every pause is dramatic without being contrived. His heart and soul are truly in every phrase. He is the real deal.

He begins by talking about Unitarians 150 years ago, “when giants walked on Beacon Hill.” He talks about the Unitarian minister Samuel J. May, who met the abolitionist William Lloyd Garrison and said, “Sir, you’re on fire!” To which Garrison replied, “I must be on fire. I have icebergs of indifference to melt” (Or maybe it was Garrison who said it to May. But that punch line is what matters).

“Fast forward,” says the elder minister. He talks about “our great state senator, Ted Kennedy” who spoke at a prominent local UU church just two months ago about another kind of slavery: slavery to debt, slavery to poverty. Wage slavery.
People are sitting up in their pews. You can hear a pin drop.

The minister says, “Unitarian Universalists believe that in every human being there is a spark of the divine.” He is really getting hot. “We ought to be in the business of fanning that flame. We are playing with fire. Yes we are. We are playing with fire!” He points to the chalice. He says it is our symbol because we believe that within every man, woman and child there is a spark of God. “And when any man, woman or child is oppressed, God is in chains. God is in chains.” He says this, and his voice breaks.

People are really sitting up now. Eyes are misting.

The minister continues. “You’ve heard the stories. You’ve sung the songs,” he says. “Now it’s time to give the money.” There are nervous titters around the church. The minister pauses and looks out over the congregation with fierce expectation and affection. “I want to know which one of you will be the first one to write a thousand dollar check to the Unitarian Universalist Association.”

Nervous laughter breaks out.
The minster says, dead serious but not condemnatory, “What’s funny about that? Why are you laughing? There isn’t anything funny about it. I know that here in this room, within hearing of my voice, there are people who can write a thousand dollar check. There are those who could write a five thousand dollar check. Which one of you will be the first to write a thousand dollar check?”

Silence. Whispering. Some angry faces, some in awe. Whispered consultations between couples.

The minister props his elbow on the pulpit. He has all day. He is totally comfortable with the silence. He waits. We all wait.

Then a man stands.
“BLESS YOUR HEART!” says the elder minister, and the man comes forward out of his pew to a burst of applause. He stands at the front of the church and the minister puts his arm around him. “I don’t know this man,” he says. “I don’t know his name, and believe me, he isn’t a plant. But I know he believes in justice. He believes in justice and mercy.”

The minister goes and gets the flaming chalice and puts it in the man’s hands. He says, “I want you to hold this.” And the minister asks for another thousand dollar check, and damned if a woman doesn’t come forward to applause, and yet another.

Then the minister calls up the ushers and says that they are going to “graciously and lovingly” collect the other offerings to the UU Service Committee. The choir sings a beautiful (believe it, it’s true) version of “Kumbaya” and the four ministers in the pews are practically high fiving each other. They are saying, “I have NEVER seen anything like that before” and “People are going to be talking about this for YEARS!” They are wiping away tears and cracking up at the same time. They feel awful that they have left their checkbooks in the robing room back in the parish house.

After the service, there is a mighty buzz. When I find out how much money was raised for the UUSC I’ll let you know.

****

So, what do you think?
I am guessing that some of you may be thinking that the elder minister was offensive for these reasons, all of which reflect Unitarian Universalist egalitarianism:
(1) Ministers should never tell people what to do.
(2) You never single out someone for special treatment, especially on the basis of financial generosity.
(3) You never coerce a group of people into giving money by holding them hostage and waiting until someone meets your demands.
(4) You never guilt people into doing things, especially when some of them may have already made contributions to the very organization you are touting, and others just as worthy.

I agree with you on every point.

Now, why was this a totally fantastic and thrilling moment?
For me,
(1) It’s never a bad idea to speak from your passionate convictions and invite people to come along.
(2) Ministers are leaders and they need to lead, not always “invite” (P.S. I am relatively sure that this minister gives very generously to the UUSC, as he used to hold a very important leadership position in that organization).
(3) It’s always powerful to state simply and clearly our ultimate commitments, and then to ask people to act on them. We DO believe that a spark of the divine resides in every human being. Why not put our money where our mouths are?
(4) A little tiny bit of shame isn’t going to kill any of us. The first guy to stand and offer $1,000 is special, and he gets to hold the chalice. I don’t. Too bad.
(5) Because it just was. It was AWE. SOME.

Tip to dear and reverend sirs and ma’ams who are thinking of trying this at home: I wouldn’t unless you’re the most sincere person in the world, unless you have not even one ounce of show-bizzy glad-handing persona about you, and until you have the years and experience to give you total street cred. Otherwise, you’re just asking for a ride out of town on a rail, and don’t say I didn’t warn you.

Make-Up For Ministers 101

Oh wow!
PeaceBang is ecstatic!

I’ve had several e-mails off line asking for make-up tips for those women who never ever wear the stuff. I clap my hands with glee! I’m still waiting for the hate mail from women who will accuse me of being in league with the patriarchy, or at worst, with the ghost of Estee Lauder. But really, you have to understand that on rainy days when I was little, Mother of PeaceBang put out big shoeboxes of her old make-up (I shudder to think of the bacterial festival contained therein) and set up a little Hollywood-lit make-up table for my sister and me. We carefully made up our wee little faces and the glamour was thrilling! How could we go back to fresh-scrubbedness? (Although Sister of PeaceBang can get by to this day with a tiny brushing of bronzer, a light lick of black eyeliner and her favorite Clinique lipstick in something like Ballerina Pink. She is ageless, and although we argue about over-plucking eyebrows, she hasn’t cut her own bangs since third grade and has looked smashing ever since. Even during the Perm Era). But I digress. You asked about make-up.

1. Start with the cheap stuff, but take your time choosing shades. Shop at a store with a good return policy, like Rite-Aid or CVS.

2. Listen up. These products are wonderful:

> Maybelline Express Make-up 3 In 1. It’s less than $5, and it’s a handy, blendable make-up stick that you can use to blend away ruddy spots and other blotchy skins sections, or use it lightly all over your face. Blend, blend, blend. It’s very lightweight so you won’t feel like you’re wearing make-up at all.

> Covergirl Remarkable Washable Waterproof Mascara. In black. It washes off but it’s waterproof! How genius is that? Safe for contact wearers. Also under $5. Best with an eyelash curler, which I have been using for 25 years with no mishaps, but I don’t want to push you too far. Let me just say this: they totally open up the eye.

> Revlon Skinlights Face Illuminator. This is a light powder that is gorgeous and shimmery. You don’t want to use it all over your face: get a basic pressed powder compact to blot away shine (for heaven’s sake, you at LEAST have a powder compact, don’t you?) and use this on your cheekbones and eyelids to create a dewy look. Good for those who don’t want to graduate into eye shadow just yet. Makes you look rested and radiant, especially if you haven’t exfoliated recently (which you should have, with something gentle. Throw away that nasty apricot scrub by St. Ives immediately, girlfriend, it’s just like using sandpaper!).
Use a light touch with this product. You don’t want to look like Reverend Disco Fever.

> I cannot LIVE without CoverGirl Outlast All-Day Lipcolor in Blush Pearl. It’s a neutral color that I think would look great on any skin tone no matter how light or dark (but you’ll have to write and tell me). You paint your lips with it, let it dry, and you’re gorgeous for hours and hours and hours. It comes with a moisturizing topcoat that keeps things shiny and comfortable. It doesn’t come off on your coffee cup, it doesn’t come off on your lover, it doesn’t come off through a morning of preaching and meetings although if you’re like me, you have seventeen or eighteen lip glosses on your person and in your car that you layer over anyway. And speaking of which, Rimmel makes a FABULOUS $4 gloss that actually has a bit of lasting power (by which I mean maybe an hour, which is a long time for lip gloss). But the CoverGirl is a lip color that doesn’t make you look like you’re wearing lipstick. If you want to look like you’re wearing lipstick, there are thousands of choices. But keep in mind that anything too purply will age you and bring attention to jowliness, and too waxy is very out of fashion. Sheer is a good bet, and save the bright bright red for either a very tailored suit look, or keep it away from church altogether unless you’re a fairly dramatic type (and even then, you don’t want anything too drippy and vampy).
Men should have a lip balm, too. Chapped kissers don’t look nice on anyone.

3. When it comes to applying make-up, blend, blend, blend. Do invest in a nice powder brush, again available at the drugstore. When you buy blush, don’t imagine that the cheap little brush in the package will be appropriate. And you should buy blush. Consider a creme blush that you dab on with your fingers, and blend, blend, blend. All of which does not mean that you should use so little that we can’t even tell the difference. Play at home! Find your look!

4. You asked about eyebrow pencil. I admit that I spend $25 for a Lancome item called poudre something, which just means that it’s powdery. It lasts for about five months, so at $5 a month or 16 cents a day, I’m willing to pay. The color matches my natural eyebrows perfectly, and to me it’s worth it. The trick to eyebrow pencil is to get a good grip on the pencil, and with a LIGHT TOUCH, fill in your brows with feathery strokes. No drawing big, strong lines unless you want to look like an ancient eccentric drama teacher. You’re just filling in, you’re not trying to look like Nelson Eddy in one of those operettas with Jeanette McDonald.

5. Skin care is for everyone, boys and girls. Use SPF, for God’s sake, or you’ll look like my colleague with the bright pink honker and cheeks whose sunburnt skin comes off in big patches during the summer and makes you want to choke into your gin and tonic. Dandruff care is part of skin care: your scalp is skin. Take care of it.
Exfoliate, gently. Moisturize, moisturize, moisturize. Kiehl’s makes a fabulous undereye gel with SPF. Pat it on gently and it will give you a dewy glow after it dries (but it will smear your eyeliner if you’re wearing it on your lower lid, which I mostly don’t). Don’t be afraid of bronzer, white people, which can warm up your whole face in the dead of winter and spare you from overdoing it with the blush. Bronzer is the new lipstick, and they make it even for the fairest of skin. I had my doubts but I now own a beautiful bronzer by Laura Mercier and it’s wonderful stuff; you can hardly tell it’s there but I don’t look pasty anymore. Dust lightly over the cheeks, forehead and nose - everywhere the sun hits. And if you’re a chubby and have two chins, I’ll teach you a little shading trick I learned from Pam.

6. And this is very important: Have a Booger Patrol. When I was installed, I gathered my Search Committee around me and said, “Your job is over, but I have a sacred trust to extend to you now. You were the Search Committee that got me here to this church, and from now on, I need you to be my Booger Patrol. If I have sand in my eyes or toilet paper sticking on my shoe or my skirt tucked into my pantyhose or my perfume is too strong or I have something crusty in my nose or spinach on my tooth, you’ve got to tell me.”
They solemnly agreed. Everyone in public leadership needs a Booger Patrol. Mine has told me more than once that my slip is showing or I have a glob of hair product in the back of my head that didn’t get worked in enough. They are the ones who will tell me honestly if I have garlic breath.

Don’t read this and groan, “how much time does she think I HAVE in the morning?” Once you get the hang of it, this is a five minute operation. I, of course, take about 25 minutes to do it all (including hair) on Sundays because it’s a form of meditation and preparation for me. On other days, it’s a quick brush and curl and paint and I’m done.

Embrace the possibilities! Go forth and make-up!

Ministerial Attire

I had occasion to talk about dressing for the ministry with a group of seminarians recently, which was a kind of fulfillment of my secret desire to host a show like “What Not To Wear.” You’ve seen it, right? You trust and love Stacy and Clinton, right?

I was a bit nervous about leading this session because I did not want to come across as hopelessly shallow and/or judgmental, because who am I? Just a little fat chick with a penchant for Franco Sarto shoes and liquid black eyeliner.

But they LOVED it, and we had such fun analyzing outfits, talking about the necessity of a good tailor, the comfort in having some classic, timeless pieces in the closet, why not to wear casual sandals while officiating weddings or funerals, and why not to preach in drippy sleeves (you might set yourself on fire during some chalice ritual). We talked about hair and make-up and panty hose and the Norelco nose hair trimmer, which is your friend.

We determined the following truths:

1. If you insist on wearing sandals, have a pedicure. Men, too. Feet are intimate. We do not want your hairy fungus toes near us at a meeting, and we do not want to see them peeking out of the bottom of your vestments. We know Jesus wore sandals. He probably also bathed once a month, and you wouldn’t do that to us, would you? Also, he is Jesus. You are not.
P.S. This does not give you permission to simply add socks to your sandals.

2. Don’t be afraid to accessorize!
P.S. Don’t over-accessorize. And don’t get too matchy-matchy. Your necklace does not need to match your earrings and shoes. Gentlemen, what do I have to do to make you stop wearing bolero ties? Nothing says “Hey, what’s your sign?” like a bolero tie. If you don’t live in the Southwest, we should not be seeing any bolero ties on you, unless you’re wearing them ironically with an otherwise very spiffy outfit from the 21st century. [They’re called bolo ties. Sorry. - P.B.]

3. We are living in an extremely beauty and body-conscious culture. You do not need to dress like a sexless, shapeless being. You can be a human being with a body and not go overboard into “sexy.” Ladies, it’s high time to lose the long, shapeless A-line skirts. They’ve been OUT since 1985. Anything above the knee, however, is too short.

4. Church going is an entirely voluntary option in today’s society. In most parts of the country, no one will look askance at you if you do not attend church. So clergy can no longer slide by assuming their and their congregation’s relevance to today’s world. If clergypeople believe their ministries are hip and relevant to today’s world, they should look hip and relevant. Even if you wear a collar, you should have a hair style of some kind, and there’s no need to persist with those aviator frames you bought in 1972 because they looked so good on Lee Majors or the guy on “Welcome Back, Kotter.”

5. If you wear a chalice necklace, there’s no need to wear chalice earrings. And vice versa.
P.S. Sticking a chalice around your neck does not mean you’re “dressed.” Did you shine your shoes? Are your pants appropriately hemmed? Did you check that your blouse isn’t gaping at the bosom? Are there sweat stains at your armpits? Have you asked anyone you trust if your perfume is too strong? Have you trimmed your beard and if necessary, your eyebrows? (Milo O’Shea can get away with crazy stickin’ out eyebrows. It just makes you look eccentric and distracts from your eyes). Have you cleaned your spectacles and gotten off the smudges? You know you were up ’til 3:00 a.m. working on your sermon. Your congregation shouldn’t be able to tell. That’s why God made ice packs and concealer (which works just as well on male skin as on female).

6. Just because you’re on your feet a lot does not mean you need to move into Cobbie Cuddlers. Women, heels are not just a torture implement designed by the patriarchy. They are also elegant as hell and very much in fashion. A little 1″ heel won’t kill you. I can stand around all day and run for the bus in my 2″ pointy-toed Franco Sarto cowboy boots. They look smokin’ and they’re comfortable. My personal rule is: I don’t get into orthopedic shoes (or the rough facsimile thereof) until I’m eligible for Medicare.

7. Eyebrows! According to my very small sampling, 50% of female ministers over 40 have invisible eyebrows due to gray or just fading. Eyebrows frame the face. Invest in a $1.99 Maybelline eye pencil and experiment. You’ll be glad you did. Men, see my above point about Milo O’Shea.

8. I know we’re feminists who believe everyone is beautiful without make-up and facials. I agree wholeheartedly. However, without make-up, my beauty resembles that of Ernest Borgnine. As Sister of PeaceBang says, “You don’t have to wear your political convictions.” If you look fresh, vibrant and camera-ready from the pulpit with nothing on your face but Ivory soap, God bless you. I require a bit of concealer, a luminizing powder from Revlon on the cheekbones and eyelids, blush, lipstick/gloss, mascara and eyeliner. I also pencil in my brows (see #7). You know why? I am a PUBLIC leader. Which means that PEOPLE need to look at me. If only *I* (or my mother) have to look at me, I’m gorgeous with a freshly scrubbed face.
Wait, scratch that. Even my mother would say, “Sweetie, you need a little lipstick.”

9. T-shirts are OUT. Again, you don’t need to wear your political convictions. If you’re 22 and have a great figure, maybe you can rock that “Free Leonard Peltier” shirt under a fitted blazer with a pair of bootcut black trousers, but if not, then not. Unless you’re meeting with the youth group, in which case they don’t know who Leonard Peltier is. Get with it.

10. If you’re clothes-phobic and you have no idea what looks good on you, or what basics to shop for, take a friend. Take PeaceBang. That’s what she’s here for.

11. So, would it kill you to look at a fashion magazine once in awhile?

"Original Sin"

I came home last night after class and a sushi dinner and bombed out on the couch. Too tired to even read.

So I watched about ten minutes of “Will and Grace” (lame, and what happened to Deborah Messing’s looks? They’re coasting by on famous guest stars but listen, they could have Jesus of Nazareth on as Jack’s new boyfriend and I still wouldn’t watch) and then happened upon the most wonderful, trashy, stupid, gorgeous movie I’ve seen in a long time: “Original Sin” with Antonio Banderas and Angelina Jolie. It’s a 2001 production set in 19th century Cuba and was billed, when it came out, as one of the biggest turkeys ever made.

Having seen it on the WE channel, I can’t attest to the hotness of the reportedly “semi-pornographic” sex scene (I also missed the first twenty minutes of the film, and the biggest romp apparently comes within the first ten minutes. Damn my eyes!), but I can attest to the entertainment factor, which is high. This film took me back to about 8th grade when I used to adore bodice-ripping novels like “The Thorn Birds” and all of the Judith Krantz and Sidney Sheldon ouevre (I can’t spell it and it’s not in the dictionary, sorry). Great fun, insipid dialogue you can’t help but love, and Angelina Jolie’s lips get bigger with every scene, I swear. The director doesn’t even try to get her to act anything remotely like a 19th century woman and she flips in and out of a kind of British-ish accent but she does smolder and she does do justice to a great big dark brown wig, so all is forgiven. Antonio Banderas is so cute he can just stand there and I’m happy.

It’s great. You gotta see it, but when you do, lower the blinds so no one knows what you’re watching.

Messing With My Cat’s Mind

I have done something terrible to my cat.

Yesterday we were in the kitchen and I brought out her carrying case in preparation for a trip to the vet. I know she hates being in it and makes the most terrible noises when I put her in it, as though I’m poking her with hot pincers and cutting off her tail in little slices. So I said this to her and started imitating her terrible Tortured Kitty noises.

I didn’t know I was so good at imitating cat noises.

Her tail puffed up and she hissed at me.

I thought this was hilarious so I let her calm down and then I quietly made the noise again. Again, her tail puffed up.

So call me a terrible, cruel sadist, but I thought this was so outrageously funny that I kept testing her. I’d talk to her in a normal voice and then switch into “cat” to see if she would finally get that it was Human Lady making those noises and there was not, in fact, another feline in the house.

She finally got it, and I thought we had made up. Even if she did come up behind me as I was washing dishes and wap me with her paw, I still thought it was all peace, love and understanding in the parsonage.

But her behavior seems to have changed. She is nervous when I pet her belly, clasping my hand in her paws, gnawing on my hand and kicking with her hind thumpers. She brought me a (toy) mouse with much fanfare in the middle of the night. She wrapped herself around my head in bed this morning and bit my hair (very unusual for her), and she keeps flinging her entire body at me for full contact cuddling. She’s sticking her butt in my face a lot, as though she thinks I’m a boy kitty. I said to her “NO, Ermengarde, I am not going to have incestuous lesbian inter-species sex with you. We’re not THAT liberal around here.”

Cat behavioralists, have I messed up my cat’s mind in some permanent way? How can I tame this striped menace and get my sweet little buddy back?

New Orleans Only Need Apply

Once again, like I sez,
a respected outlet of the American media does a story on Hurricane Katrina and acts like New Orleans is the only place affected:

http://tinyurl.com/rhjkh

Let me analyze this a minute. The media, often accused of having the attention span of a first grader, is showing us that it’s not gonna let this one go. It’s gonna keep writing articles and keeping the issues before the people. Sounds like a mighty heap of integrity, until you realize that what really happened is that the media went down to New Orleans right after Katrina, produced a bushel of shocking images, pumped us full of hurt and horror, and is now capitalizing on that hurt and horror every time they stick the words “New” and “Orleans” in a headline. I read every single thing about New Orleans, don’t you? I mean, how can we not?

Meanwhile, they’re ignoring 60% of the real story. So it’s not really responsible journalism so much as keeping a very profitable (for them) national wound open.

Hey New York Times, what the hell about Alabama and Mississippi? How about Biloxi and Gulfport and Slidell?? For God’s sake!!?
Or maybe the fault lies with MSN.com, which picks the tastiest headlines from the news media to feature on my home page. Either way, if I was from Biloxi I’d be fuming. That is, if I had time to fume in between trying to pick up the pieces of my life.

Courtney Loves Lips (A Lot)

courtneylipslove
Originally uploaded by Peacebang.

An addict is an addict is an addict.
It could be booze. It could be crack cocaine. It could be attention or love or sex or buffalo wings.

Or it could be lip collagen.

Another casualty in the great Hollywood lip dysmorphia pandemic.

Courtesy of the Go Fug Yourself girls.

Stop With the Musical Instruments, Already

Oh, come on. It was cool and inventive when director John Doyle staged a production of “Sweeney Todd” that involved all the major players doubling as orchestra members, but this is getting a little bit precious, don’t you think?

http://tinyurl.com/qdm7x
It’s a Cincinnati production of Sondheim’s “Company” using the same gimmick.

The Times reviewer, Charles Isherwood, seems to think this contrivance works on behalf of the musical’s power, but this fish ain’t bitin’. I’m sorry, you can wax poetic about how all married couples communicate in modalities other than speech, and that’s groovy and everything and I believe you, and you can tell me that watching the couples in “Company” play their tubas and clarinets at each other is deeply symbolic of marriage and everything, but I think it’s just cheap.

Hire an orchestra and let them play the score. Let the actors act, sing and dance. For pity’s sake, they’ve got enough to do, and musicians have a hard enough time keeping bread on their tables. Hey Mr. Reviewer, when you off-handedly mention that none of the actors manage to find really memorable specificity in their characters, ya wanna know why? Because they’re blowing a freaking trumpet or banging a drum through the show, and it’s hard to create a memorable character when you’re playing in the pit at the same time.

“Company” is a beautiful show. Everyone should see it. Single people should see it. Married people should especially see it. Everyone should have heard Bernadette Peters singing “Being Alive” off of her Carnegie Hall album (not the bombastic, mushmouthed Patti LuPone version off the “Sondheim at Carnegie Hall” album, and there’s a difference). Everyone should have had the chance to see a corps of goofy adults sing “Side By Side” and find themselves cheering with total abandon because it’s so wonderful. And everyone, everyone should know all the lyrics to “The Ladies Who Lunch.” Everyone, everyone should have had the chance to see Elaine Stritch perform this number with a glass in her hand.

And no one should have to see April the stewardess leave for Barcelona with a tuba over her shoulder, no matter what Charles Isherwood says.

Man, I have so many dream roles I want to play yet. Now I live in fear that I’ll finally get cast as the Old Lady in “Candide” and I’ll have to drag a bassoon around the whole time. Stop the madness.

P.S. If anyone owns the DVD of the documentary that was made of the recording of the “Company” Original Cast Album, please oh please loan it to me. I will make you dinner.

Banjo Fantasy Fulfilled

Today was my day off and after wasting most of it at the Superior Court (believe me, it was hardly even good, let alone superior) on jury duty I drove past the music store where I had been told they sell BANJOS.

I decided to stop in.

I asked to see their BANJOS. The guy brought out the one they had left from the back, a simple Washburn model. He opened the box for me and I touched it and plucked it a little bit. Then I asked to see dobros and ukeleles and Spanish guitars (which I thought were different than regular acoustic guitars, but they ain’t) to compare them, and to make sure I wasn’t somehow called to learn the ukelele (which I think is downright adorable).

But I just knew the first time I touched that BANJO that this was going to be my new buddy. It’s the prettiest thing you ever saw, and just broadcasts a spirit of fun. I signed up for BANJO lessons, too, so please don’t think I can meet you on Saturday afternoon at 4:30 p.m. I can’t. I have BANJO!! I’ll meet you after BANJO!

The best part was that the owner of the store sometimes goes to my church (which has so many new people that I didn’t know that — I thought he looked familiar but from somewhere else) and he just quietly gave me a really nice discount.

The store was all filled with cute men: young men checking out guitars, older guys buying guitar stuff for themselves. I thought, “GEEZ, I guess this is the place to meet men!” Because a couple of them were very sweet and had advice and were very encouraging.

Now the BANJO is home and I’m going to sit with it a little bit tonight just to see how it feels. It came with something called a gig bag, which is one of those little knapsacks you put it in so you can go to gigs, which just made me so happy I couldn’t believe it. I get a free GIG BAG, too!!??

Also entirely fabulous is the fact that my group, Sweet the Sound, cut a CD and it sounds lovely and the cover design is delicious and I’m really proud of it, and we have many gigs coming up.

So all is pretty well in PeaceBang land, as soon as I take one more night off to relax, as I burned the candle at both ends so bad last week I was truly dragging in my soul.

Love, BANJOBang