So. We are starting the film festival with two extraordinarily lovely films – Quartet and Hyde Park on the Hudson! Plus we are having such great food – from our dear friends at Twigs, from our other dear friends at Epicurean Delight, and from our new but hopefully soon-to-be dear friends at Be-Life in Clark Summit. So we have all kinds and fashions of great food for you on Gala night, as well as the wonderful wine and beer from Nimble Hill. And all for $35.00 per ticket!!! Food, wine and two movies – far out! Totally best night ever, so do call soon to get your seats reserved. Remember, you can now reserve the seats you want, as long as you call early. And you can choose which theater you wish to see the movie in and therefore, which movie you will see first. Quartet will be in the Evans and Hyde park on the Hudson will be in the Murray for their first showings. And then they switch theaters for the second showing. (The people stay put, the movies change.) You’ll want to call 996-1500 to make those reservations. April 5 is the big night. Come join us. It’s soooo much fun!!!!

     Now I bet you’d like to know some of the other films we’re showing, so here’s the lis. .A Royal Affair (Danish – nominated for Golden Globe and Best Foreign Language Film. Amour – won Best Foreign Film at the Oscars. Run Time – best at Cannes. A Late Quartet (I know, two movies with Quartet in the title, but totally not the same film, I promise.) Searching For Sugarman – best doc at the Oscars – and one of the best docs I’ve ever ever seen. Superb! Leaves you cheering! The House I Live In – about the foolishness of the “war on drugs.” The Impossible – Naomi Watts nominated for Best Actress for her role as a woman who survives the tsunami in Thailand. Happy People, Rust and Bone, Emperor, Barbara, Ginger and Rosa, Lore, Reality and Chasing Ice. Now tell me that isn’t some lineup???? I can hardly wait! 

     And now, for a total change of subject. My neighbor, Barbara place, wife of Alfred, mother of Debbie and Chuck and Eric, grandmother of Ryan and Nathan and Erica, of Adam and Seth and Rebecca and Kristin died last week. Her funeral, held at St. Joaquin’s in Meshoppen, was both incredibly sad and deeply inspiring. Barbara was in her mid eighties, so no one mourned a life cut short. But everyone in that church mourned her passing. Her husband of sixty-five years, Alfred, a rugged, independent dairy farmer who just gave up driving school bus a few years ago, looked as if he was using all the strength he had just to get through the services. Her children carried themselves with great dignity. Her grandchildren wept openly, quite a tribute to a grand woman, that her grandchildren, all grown and with lives of their own, would openly weep for a woman who could never be replaced in their lives. Her grandson Seth, fighting back tears, told the assemblage that his grandmother had taught them all that inside each person lived an ideal, the person they would want to be. Search for that ideal, she told them, and then do whatever you have to do to live it. 

     What an incredible philosophy to pass on! She encouraged her children and grandchildren to take on life with gusto and optimism, to challenge themselves and others to be the best they could possibly be, and she loved them all without reservation, understanding that as humans we are imperfect and can only strive for ideals, and that striving might not get us there, but that’s okay, too. She loved her big, sprawling, talented, brilliant, individual, stubborn, gorgeous family with all her heart and they loved her back with all of theirs.

     I wish I’d known her better, but the times I sat and talked with her I always came away awed by her intelligence and compassion. She will be sorely missed as a neighbor, and as a friend. Her family will miss her forever. But oh, my, what a life to remember with joy! They were throwing confetti in heaven when she came there to live – she was a grand dame in every sense of the word, and that, if you think about it, is as good as it gets!

     See you at the Dietrich.