Summer vacation

Adam and I had a good day on Friday for our summer vacation!  We went to brunch at Side Car Cafe in Springville.  Then we hit the quilt show at the Springville art museum.  It was amazing!  So much talent!  

Adam took some pictures:

We stopped at a few stores and looked at pretty things and didn't buy anything (it wasn't errands).   We ate a late lunch at JJs in Provo, which is always good. 

We came home and I took a nap and talked to Marianne and then we went to Salt Lake.  We met up with our kids and had dinner and then went to the Eccles theater in downtown Salt Lake to go to Hadestown.  I knew two things about it:  Adam and Emma liked the music and it won the Tony for best musical and best original score.  

It was so good!

It is based on the ancient Greek myth of Orpheus and Eurydice.  The performers and staging were fabulous.  Quilt makers and actors and musicians, there is so much talent in the world!  

In the story, Orpheus goes to the underworld to get Eurydice, his love.  Hades says he can leave and she can leave too, but she must walk behind him, not next to him, and if Orpheus looks back, Eurydice has to stay in the underworld.

The "fates" were there and sang a song of self doubt to Orpheus as he traveled.  He courageously plowed ahead, but at the end, he looked back to see if Eurydice was there and then she was consigned to the underworld forever.

So a sad ending.

But the actors reset like it was the beginning of the play, and Hermes sang these words:

It’s a sad song
It’s a sad tale, it’s a tragedy
It’s a sad song
But we sing it anyway

Cause, here’s the thing:
To know how it ends
And still begin to sing it again
As if it might turn out this time
I learned that from a friend of mine

See, Orpheus was a poor boy
But he had a gift to give:
He could make you see how the world could be,
In spite of the way that it is

I loved the impossibly hopeful message.  It made me think of not giving up hope and not giving up on people and not giving up on God.  It made me think about repentance and trying again.

After the curtain call, Persephone sang these words and they made me teary:

Some birds sing when the sun shines bright
My praise is not for them
But the one who sings in the dead of night
I raise my cup to him

Wherever he is wandering
Alone upon the earth
Let all our singing follow him
And bring him comfort

Some flowers bloom when the green grass grows
My praise is not for them
But the one who blooms in the bitter snow
I raise my cup to him