All will be well, and all will be well....

The Steel Magnolias opening was spectacular. We had a great audience, helped, no doubt, by the wonderful food that Riverfront volunteers had prepared for them, and free champagne. They laughed at everything. They cried. One person said she'd been coming to openings for 30 years, and ours was the BEST (of course she could say that to every cast and we wouldn't know).

Nonetheless, we were pleased. Tonight starts the round of buy-out performances. We'll be doing the play five times a week -- three for the public, two for groups who have paid for private performances. Until June 20. I expect we'll all be sick of the characters by that time. I can't imagine doing a play for years on end.

But I do like Miss Clairee. I rather think there is more of her in me than I'd once thought.

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My brother and sister-in-law celebrate their third anniversary today. I wrote about it here, although not nearly as indepth as it might have been, but I was still reeling from both my mother's and my uncle's deaths and hadn't written much of anything since the previous October.

But it was a lovely day, a blessing in the midst of all that pain. And they've gone through some hard times since, with health issues and concerns over work that are the result of the recession -- just like so many people.

It's not the good times that make us strong, it's the tough ones and how we handle stress, pressure, uncertainty, fear. The good times may give us the knowledge that this, too, shall pass, however, and that there are still good things to come. But it's in the fire that we are shaped and tempered and glazed.

Today's Daily Om has a wonderful meditation on marriage. Among other bits of wisdom and observation are these:

"If your relationship is not secure, marriage will not make it so. Likewise, if your partner is not as attentive, loving, or kind as you would like, your becoming spouses will not change that. Marriage has no power to permanently fill any emotional or spiritual gaps in your life. Before you choose to marry, ask yourself whether you and your partner are adept at resolving conflict, can speak openly to one another, and fully respect one another."

In this day and age, it is common to live together before marriage -- indeed, my mother surprised the heck outta me in her later years when she proclaimed that she thought living together was a good idea! Even a committed relationship is not marriage -- although people stay in them for years and years. It changes things somehow, in addition to the legal matters -- or at least it did for us. It brought the sacred into our commitment, I think, and expanded our relationship.

(Maybe I haven't had enough coffee to wax eloquently this morning! I seem to be struggling for adequate words....)

At any rate, I wish them a happy anniversary and hope that "All will be well, and all will be well, and all manner of things will be well. " -- Julian of Norwich

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Summer is here, no matter the calendar. Triple digits forecast for today; swamp cooler is in full blast mode; north wind is keeping the humidity well below 20 percent. The garden grows measurably each day (as do the grasses in it, blast and damn). Memorial Day always marks summer's grand entrance, and the groceries were full of hot dogs and hamburgers and watermelon. Next is Independence Day. Time goes so quickly.