Things catch you off guard

I was looking through some old papers, sorting more or less, when I felt something slip to the table in front of me. It was an envelope and when I turned it over, the handwriting reached out with instant recognition and a catch of breath. In various trips and movings, it had slipped from drawer to box to shelf to stack to drawer and so on. And here it was, not two days after I had been thinking of Sydney as a link to the past. My father’s handwriting; my son’s then address. So many times I watched that writing appear on paper flowing from a pen – for as long as I can remember.

There’s a letter inside, but it’s not mine; it belongs to someone else. But I’m going to keep it here with me until I can pass it from my hand to his.

rpg-letter

Sydney and this morning

Sydney knows me. He is here on the sofa with me, thinking, “You’re in a rant mode, aren’t you? You’re going to bitch because you were all set to take pictures of a soft sun at the fairgrounds when Cameron reminded you it was Wednesday and the former high school principal had pushed Wednesday starting times back half an hour so teachers could meet to discuss students, but everyone else’s schedule is goofed up. You’re going to do that, aren’t you?”

Okay, maybe. It drives me CRAZY. Instead of stop at the high school, stop at the middle school, it’s go to the middle school, come home, wait and then go to the high school. REALLY CRAZY.

Well, he pretty much covered it so I’m going to take the time now to post the pictures I did get at the fairgrounds – too late to catch the soft light.

sun-on-fairgrounds-trees

The trees looking to the west.

sydney-one

Well, I’m here but I don’t know if I want to get in the car.

sydney-two

Okay, here’s a bit more face, but I don’t think I’ll get in the car now.

sydney-three

Sighing and thinking

a

I’m up, but I don’t think I’m pleased.

cut-off-nose

HA! You cut off my nose, AmeliaJake . . . Wait, are you trying to spite my face? Huh? Well, all the better for people to see my eyes displaying the ache for more attention, more belly rubs, more special cookies, more FG trips, more visits to Grandma Sarah’s and that dastardly cat.

I thought it was an old movie, redone

Last night I saw that a movie named “A House on Carroll Street” was on a cable channel and I turned it on, because, for some reason, I thought it was a re-make of a spy movie. I thought I remembered liking the original. Jessica Tandy was in this re-make. The representation of the early fifties was good, so good that as I absorbed the visual effects, I found my memory from that time being nudged. The dresses, the cars, the suits . . . I started thinking of the actors as “grown-ups” – yes, I did.

Not too far into the movie I got the idea that I was not really sure what was going on in the plot. I knew the lady was in trouble with the government and there were two sets of official agents running around, plus the police. And there was the Un-American Activities Committee. But, hey, the background scenery was good.

“Who is this actress?” I kept wondering that. Having it in my head the re-make was about ten years ago, I am trying to think of names. Quentin called about then and I told him what I’d written here. I suggested the name of a “new” actress and he responded, “Is she still alive?”  I was still having trouble with the plot; its Hitchcockian echoes were dimming – maybe they were being absorbed by that great background. I don’t know.

After a while, it ended. I told Quentin the bad guy was splatted on the floor of a major New York landmark.

So we talked of some other stuff, and after we hung up, I looked up information on the movie. HA, the joke’s on me. Wait while I scrape it off. Oh, no. It’s sticking.

It wasn’t a re-make, according to info on the internet. There was only one little reference to a previous movie with a similar plot but with another name – and that name wasn’t mentioned. Most reviewers panned it . . . but liked the scenery. It wasn’t too old of a re-make . . . for me; it was filmed in 1886 and released to theaters in 1988. It is “a little seen film”.

The actress? Kelly McGillis. Heavens to Betsey! That would be an expression appropriate to my time period. Rats and Ack!

Kelly McGillis was born in 1957; she is only 9 years younger than I am. I have lost sight of the mainstream current and am floating on a bayou.