Book Club & Stinky Theater #SOL18

Yesterday was a good day, but long.

First, I had book club, which was a delight as always. I was late because of traffic and also because, even though I turned it off, my Google maps was somehow set to avoid highways. By the time I figured it out, I had already lost about ten minutes of driving time. 🙄 I mean, I still would have been late, but I would have been less late. Because, let’s be real, I was eating lunch and fooling around online.

The discussion was about Queen Sugar by Natalie Baszile, which most of us did not like. (You can see my review of it here.) Those who have seen the TV show much prefer that to the book.

One of the cool things we did was check in on our New Year’s resolutions and goals, and it was nice to see how many people had made (sometimes surprisingly fast) progress on theirs.

While I was out running errands before book club, a friend invited me to go see a theater production of A Raisin in the Sun. So I got home from book club and then tried to prep dinner. But I ran out of time so have to finish cooking the ribs today.

Me, to my friend: I would have been chopped for serving the judges undercooked meat.

She had no idea what I was talking about because she’s never seen Chopped. Where do I find these people?

Right, so off to the theater we went. We met up with another coworker and talked a little bit of shop (we’re teachers; we can’t help it). Then, it was time for the show!

Although I have seen at least two of the movie versions, I have never seen the play staged, so that was pretty exciting. Also, I finally read the play over winter break (review here), which means I was pretty primed to watch it.

While reading the play was great, it really doesn’t compare to seeing it live. I loved seeing all the moments of humor injected and the way different scenes were played. My favorite scenes in the manuscript were Walter and Beneatha dancing to the African music and Beneatha’s conversation with Asagai at the end. They were still my faves in the production.

The whole cast was pretty spectacular, but I was really impressed with Toya Turner who played Ruth. She was phenomenal.

Anyway, the real highlight of the night was during intermission when my friend and I streamed into the crowd going upstairs and there was a distinctly unpleasant odor, sort of like sulfur or, as she identified, long held in farts.

It wasn’t just us that noticed, though. A very nicely dressed woman next to us heard us giggling and said, “I know what you’re laughing at” and then when we got upstairs into the fresh air, she said, “See? The air is way better up here.”

My friend pointed out that everybody who had been in the show trying not to fart waited until they were headed out of the theater to do some light crop dusting. Or not so light as the case may be. Like all gas, though, it eventually passed, and the sitting in the theater experience was perfectly pleasant upon the end of intermission.

The title of the play is taken from a Langston Hughes poem, so I thought that ending with another one of his poems (and another one of my faves of his was a nice touch). I thought about this poem a lot the first time Obama was elected, so I’ll post it here now.

I, Too by Langston Hughes

I, too, sing America.

I am the darker brother.
They send me to eat in the kitchen
When company comes,
But I laugh,
And eat well,
And grow strong.

Tomorrow,
I’ll be at the table
When company comes.
Nobody’ll dare
Say to me,
“Eat in the kitchen,”
Then.

Besides,
They’ll see how beautiful I am
And be ashamed—

I, too, am America.