The symphony

List and Mauler. It was good but not my favorite pieces. Mauler's concert is thought to be unfinished. It has parts disturbing with gaps in the music, where it seems as if instruments are missing. He wrote it after he found his wife was having an affair, so the music itself is disturbing. List was a piano concerto. Lovely and lyrical with lots of running scales. It evokes tears and smiles with the playing.

Trevor sits sternly, concentrating on the music. Riley is board. He tries to sit still, but with difficulty. Luckily List is a short piece intermission comes quickly. This is because Mauler is 72 minutes long for the second half. Riley puts his head on my shoulder and shuts his eyes. Occasionally lifting his head when the music gets louder or disruptive.

The seat started out behind Margaret. Students are still only $10 at the door. I ask for seats close to Margaret's, not realizing Margaret's seats are down in a corner. At intermission we all move to the middle having scoped out vacant seat more centrally located. Margaret and her group move with us.

We are near the front so we can see the expressions on the musician's faces and follow closely the conductor's baton. The conductor has big hair that flies around as he leaps and gestures. He is entertaining to watch. Mauler is a challenging piece. It hasn't been performed in 20 years by the orchestra in Portland. It is not as popular as other composers. I can understand why having heard it now.

The day began with my warning the boys we would leave at 4:00 to go to dinner with Margaret. She calls to warn us the weather may be turning nasty. Tom tells me to take the jeep. I had planned on it anyway as it has seat warmers for this cold weather. The boys whine about dressing up. I tell them ties and button down shirts. They don't have to wear suit jackets. More whining occurs. I finally settle for just having nice clothes. I had told Trevor dark pants, to which he agreed. He put on a black shirt to go with it. He thought it was kind of goth to be all in black, but he looked pretty handsome. He compared the look with Spider man Three when Spidy turns evil for a while. But he felt comfortable with his clothes and that was what counts.

Riley kept to his Hawaiian shirts. He wore one of the new silk ones I gave him for his birthday. He buttoned it all the way us to look more formal. It made me smile when I noticed. Well, they looked clean and presentable, and definitely, they have their own style.

I make them spend a half hour looking for their wallets for ID so we can get the student discounts. Good thing we started early with the search as it takes the full amount of time. Both boys have no idea where their wallets are. Trevor ends up with his Malibu raceway ID. Riley finally finds his wallet in a kitchen drawer.

We are off. The rain is coming down and my sky light leaks water into the walls of the car. When we bought the car, it had a totalled title for water damage. I am thinking it wasn't immersed at all. I think the car leaks in the rain. It drives, which is all I care about. I have towels to mop up the moisture. The rain doesn't hit us. It slides down the inside of the walls and comes out on the floor in the back seat, or through the central light in the middle of the front area, missing all the passengers.

My old Saturn used to leak through the sky light. It would dump a pool of water right on Tom first thing in the morning when he started the car to back down our driveway. Riley says lets not get a car with a sky light again, they tend to leak.

We arrive early at the restaurant. I take the opportunity to call my sister in New York and say "Hi" to my 3 year old nephew and his brother. We put them on speaker so the boys can talk also. That kills the time quickly.

In the restaurant, Margaret is already waiting with her friends. She has a regular group that attends the symphony with her. Her old friend Martha, My Dad used to work with her husband Bob. Martha and Margaret had their children close together. Jen is good friends with Kim, Martha's daughter. It is a two generational friendship that binds them even closer. Hugh is also there, with his pad of paper to play hang man with the boys.

It has become our game to play hangman while out to dinner. It is great entertainment and keeps the boys occupied until the food arrives. Trevor orders a five meat pizza all for himself and proceeds to eat the whole thing, all by himself. Riley orders a turkey dip, which is something like the roast beef dip au jous, but with turkey. He eats all of his sandwich also. I order a southwest salad, but forget to have them leave off the olives. It is still good, but I prefer no olives. Hugh orders the spinach ravioli which looks delightful. Martha orders the same. Margaret gets a salad with the dressing on the side. A delicious foccacia bread is served soft and hot. The boys wolf it down. Bread is a big part of our diet.

The boys also order Italian sodas. Strawberry vanilla for Trevor and Blackberry Vanilla for Riley. The waitress says she had never thought of combining flavors. Trevor says when you do it at a soda fountain and get all the flavors it's called a "Graveyard". I don't like "Graveyards" but Trevor does make them often when we do fast food.

The time comes for us all to pay our bills and get to the symphony. I need a little more time as I am buying our tickets at the door and need to stand in line. I am not worried as the symphony always has seats available. I just wish I had known exactly where Margaret's seats were. We would have chosen seats to her left instead of behind.

Trevor wants to do the balcony next time. I am glad he wants a next time. January is the next time Margaret is going. I will have to see if Riley wants to go again. Perhaps pick a more popular composer. But over all we all had fun and enjoyed the night. Tom is in bed half asleep watching the news when we get home. The news men are predicting snow at high elevations and slick roads tomorrow. I will drive carefully to work.