Just a body made of glass

[sovay]

selkie sent me a T-shirt for my birthday. (Mine is in royal blue.) I wore it to this morning's doctor's appointment; it seemed appropriate. It is gratifying and probably a little sad that the nurse practitioner who wore a pride flag pin on his lanyard agreed with me.

The contractors have not only demolished our front porch except for the steps, which are currently floating in a sort of diagonal void of wrought iron, they have uprooted almost our entire front yard. I had just been feeling affectionate about the lamb's ears at the bottom of the walk. It's really not the same thing to pet in passing the chunks of cement which used to be our porch's foundations. Nothing had better happen to the two tall yew trees which used to flank the porch and still shade our front windows. Autolycus is currently peering over one of them, sitting on a stack of boxes to observe the concrete-pouring action outside my office windows. Brave cat. I am living in earplugs.

Further adventures in radio theater include Oscar Wilde's A Woman of No Importance (1893), recorded by L.A. Theatre Works in 1995. It was one of the plays I had known on the page for decades and never seen or heard performed—see also most of the works of George Bernard Shaw—and man, that double standard remains demoralizingly topical. thisbluespirit has just hooked me up with a collection of Terence Rattigan per BBC Radio and I am looking forward very much to finally hearing the alternative version of Separate Tables.

First, I must move more boxes.

Comments

[ethelmay]

Have I told you about my dad meeting Terence Rattigan?

[sovay]

Have I told you about my dad meeting Terence Rattigan?

Never, but I'd love it if you did.

[ethelmay]

It was during WWII, when Dad was in the RAF. He and Rattigan were among a group who were sent across the Atlantic (that is, back to North America) to fetch six Catalina flying boats. The ship they got passage on turned out to be the Queen Mary, so they had a relatively luxurious vacation before a rather hazardous flight back. "On the trip I played many games of chess with a commissioned gunner (most were sergeants) in our squadron, Terence Rattigan. He was an English playwright who wrote “French Without Tears” before the war, and “Flare Path” after it had started. I had seen and greatly enjoyed the latter, in London. I knew him only as Terry until I learned, halfway through our voyage, that he was the well-known playwright. Before then I was able to win about a third of our chess games. After learning of his celebrity I never beat him again. After the war he had about a dozen plays produced on Broadway, the most famous being “O Mistress Mine.”"

[sovay]

It was during WWII, when Dad was in the RAF.

I now assume your dad is one of the peripheral characters of The Way to the Stars. (Would have been Flare Path if its production hadn't predated their meeting.)

Before then I was able to win about a third of our chess games. After learning of his celebrity I never beat him again.

Aw.

Thank you for the story!

[ethelmay]

I believe I remember him telling me - I expect it would have been when he saw an obituary in 1977 - that it had never occurred to him that Rattigan was gay, but that it was certainly not surprising that he had concealed the fact under the circumstances.