Quotation for the day ...

Yesterday I offered a Coltrane selection as the theme music for the moment wherein I found myself ... today, I turn to The Bard ... all arguments aside of whether he existed or not, or what he looked like, one has to admit the guy had a way with words ...

Having grown up in the shadow of the Festival in Stratford, and having been forced to attend and watch his plays, it is only now as I sit on the Prairies, that I realize how wonderful that was ... Being able to see world class actors perform world class plays on a world class stage for a pittance of what the tickets cost ... oh, I was so fortunate ... and I didn't see it ...

Today is a day of introspection and continuing to recovery from the mad dash back east from BC, so the words of Jacques ring true:

All the world's a stage,
And all the men and women merely players;
They have their exits and their entrances;
And one man in his time plays many parts,
His acts being seven ages. At first the infant,
Mewling and puking in the nurse's arms;
Then the whining school-boy, with his satchel
And shining morning face, creeping like snail
Unwillingly to school.
And then the lover,
Sighing like furnace, with a woeful ballad
Made to his mistress' eyebrow. Then a soldier,
Full of strange oaths, and bearded like the pard,
Jealous in honour, sudden and quick in quarrel,
Seeking the bubble reputation
Even in the cannon's mouth.
And then the justice,
In fair round belly with good capon lin'd,
With eyes severe and beard of formal cut,
Full of wise saws and modern instances;
And so he plays his part.
The sixth age shifts
Into the lean and slipper'd pantaloon,
With spectacles on nose and pouch on side;
His youthful hose, well sav'd, a world too wide
For his shrunk shank; and his big manly voice,
Turning again toward childish treble, pipes
And whistles in his sound. Last scene of all,
That ends this strange eventful history,
Is second childishness and mere oblivion;
Sans teeth, sans eyes, sans taste, sans everything.

I remember seeing As You Like It with the awesome stage presence that was Nicholas Pennell playing the role of Jacques - he was brilliant, this scene was luminous ... It breathed life into the words of the Bard ...

As one who is somewhere between 4 and 6 ... I would hope closer to 4 then 6 ... but whatever ... I find myself wondering what it is that we are strutting about upon this stage doing ...

Over lunch yesterday a good friend said - that all we can do is the best we can and look after the people around us ... I think he's right, but too often we forget to look after ourselves, and too often we become forgetfully selfish and forget to care for those closest to us ... I think as we strut about the stage of life, our task is to build healthy and caring relationships with those around us ... it's not easy ... but at the end of the day, when we are left sans teeth, sans eyes, ... sans everything, the only thing that will be left is the impressions we've left in the lives of others ...