Drama!

I'm still reading the new Stephen King book and so many things in it remind me of my youth. I finished reading a story about a High School Junior-Senior Play, and could only think of my experience. It was 1965 in Haskell, America and I decided to try out for a part in the play. My Junior year I was not interested, but my last year in school everything changed. The play was a comedy called "Everyone's Crazy" and all my friends were trying out. I did as well. I did not get the lead (thank goodness!) but i got a great role of a crazy guys who had the "delirium tremors"!

It was great fun and a good experience except for two incidents.

At home one night my Mother picked up my play book and was shocked that I was going to say words like "dad gum", "gol-darned", and such. These were substitutes for cuss words and she took the time to cross out all such words and replace them with "Oh My" or "Goodness me"! We had a long discussion about that and she would not no my decision until the play.

But wait there's more:

Seems our church had planned the Spring Gospel Meeting the same week as the play. Melba, a fellow classmate and I as members would miss. I came home from school the week before the play and our Minister was paying a visit. He had what he thought was a great idea. Here was his proposal:

The church would take out a large add in the town paper stating that Mike Martin and Melba C. had decided to fore go the Junior-Senior Play and instead would be attending the Spring Gospel Meeting like all "faithful church members"."

I barely let him finish before I, with tears in my eyes, told him in NO UNCERTAIN TERMS that I would not let my classmates down and ruin the school play. Melba had the girl lead and my part was in many scenes. This was in a small school and the idea of "stand-ins" or "understudies" had not been invented yet. I stormed out of the room and would not discuss it again. I was grateful that my dad did not bring it up when he came home (he was a church elder).

I think about that every time school play is mentioned. For some this is a moral dilemma. For me, I thought of how that newspaper add would have been received by the town, my school and my friends.

Many "Moral Stands" or "Faith Stands" have been misapplied in my life. Your audience needs to possess enough knowledge or insight to even understand that you are actually taking a stand and not simply just trying to "hack" (mom approved) everyone off.

FYI: I went to the play and my parents went to the gospel meeting so my Mother never knew which words I used! Gol-darn-it!

Drama!