Synthesis

Today I write from Twin Falls, ID, a surprising town tucked away in a "magic" valley. We crossed a bridge to get here, over what could have been the Grand Canyon's beautiful, green little sister. Expecting to see the great Snake River below, we peered out the van windows and saw - a golf course, sprawled along the bottom of the canyon. Oh, the river was there too. Still it was green, and green is beautiful.

We also welcomed Mikel, our first and regular Atticus, back into the fold yesterday. I'm not sure why I was expecting a rougher time than we had when he rejoined us. We ran the show once before go time last night, and he stepped right back into Maycomb as if he'd never left. Again, I don't know what I was expecting. There is still a little gel-ing work to be done with his rhythms and the new people..for the few minutes I felt as if I was watching a cutout of Mikel walking around onstage; it seemed so odd to see him again without having had the re-familiarization that the rest of the cast got... but if you'd never seen Kelly onstage, you wouldn't know the difference. Twin Falls certainly didn't.

That is, we had an excellent response in this city. People took in the story with open arms and hopped to their feet at the end to cheer.

So cheers again to the consummate professionals...it certainly makes my job easier.

Note to anyone else: Run everything. Of a flawless show, certain call was the one thing I was confident we didn't need to run and, of course, the only hiccup. Ah well.

We need the occasional bumps to appreciate the smoothness.