Passing the Torch

 Today, so many loves passed through me. I struggle with loss, but today I found people I love within me. Let me explain…

In fifth grade, a group of us worked with my mentors, Jerry DeFina and Frank Demonaco, to adapt Lloyd Alexander’s book “The First Two Lives of Lukas Kasha”. It was exciting to read the book and have discussions about what scenes to include and how to make the dialogue flow. Three of us composed songs which our mentors jazzed up with orchestration for Kodaly glockenspiels and lyrics that fit brilliantly. In 1985, we performed Abadon as the school musical.


Years later, I did an independent project with Russell Fritz. We met each day to discuss Jane Austen, the Brontë sisters, Christina Rossetti, Emily Dickinson, and Elizabeth Barrett Browning. He became my guardian angel and to this day, I am still composing songs to poems he had asked me to interpret through song.
This week, a friend of mine asked if I could mentor her through a project she is doing for a class on literary adaptations. We corresponded a lot this week while she was brainstorming. Tonight, we met. She was so energetic and analytical and creative. We felt a real synergy of creative and intellectual minds.
Here I was, working on playwriting with my friend— a skill from Jerry D—, discussing song options and styles (Frank D) and the book is Pride and Prejudice, one I did with Fritz.
I felt the veins of time rush through me. The past brought me a fabulous present moment. What’s even cooler is how much by young friend cares, and how we mutually decided to make it happen this summer— far out of the scope of this courses. And that’s the future— always imagining the next project.

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