Reflecting

I am so good at griping about what's bothering me and what's wrong in my world.   Well, I guess it is an outlet for me.  Putting word to my feelings helps me cope- I guess cope is a good word for it.  Seeing what I have written and how I have expressed what I am feeling and experiencing, helps me focus and reflect and live through it all.

So, that's not what I  am going to write about tonight.  My "stuff" that is. 

Last week, Thursday evening, I went to a school play.  My eight year old grandniece was a lamb in a second grade play.  It was a creative variation on The Farmer in the Dell.   It was so sweet seeing her (and the hoards of other second graders) in their costumes, singing their song and saying their well rehearsed lines.

As I sat there watching her, I was taken back almost 30 years ago when I had my own little girl on stage performing.   When Courtney was eight, we were living in Tromsø.  She took ballet lessons in a building right by the bridge to the mainland.   Her teacher was a young British woman who's name I cannot recall.    Anyway, Courtney and her classmates were all dressed up as sunflowers.  The parents were given some yellow fabric and maybe some green fabric as well as the tulle for making the tutu.   I don't think that there were any specific instructions other than " sy en sollsikke drakt" ("sew a sunflower costume").  I think that the sunflowers were a part of a bigger garden theme.  

Unlike the show I went to last week, which was limited to the second grade classes, Courtney's recital involved the whole dance studio.   It want from toddlers to adults.  (Morgan could have been on stage with his age group, but that's another story.)

The show was held in the Tromsø Opera House.   This is a large venue, probably the largest in town when we lived there.  I went with the three kids and as I recall, Nick met us there.  We had balcony seats.  Darcy was under two years old at the time, and the balcony was not a good place to be with the little climber! 

Funny how a present day experience can transport you back to a similar experience.  Remembering your independent, adult children as little ones is, I am sure a common parenting phenomenon.  It's mind blowing.  It is a type of time travel.   It makes no sense, yet it's what happens.

If I ever get around to digging through all of our pictures from our time in Norway, I will have to scan a picture of my little sunflower named Courtney!