WINTER TALES in the Final Stretch

I haven't been blogging much about Winter Tales lately, and then all of a sudden I turn around and we've got a show!

Despite the fact that I had decided that we would have all new material this year, the show seems to have come together fairly easily.

I started by asking Philip Baruth if he would be willing to write something new - we've read one of his stories every year since we started, and I've always enjoyed his contributions, so I was hoping he might have one more in him. Indeed he did, and it's a hilarious tale involving VPR weather gurus Steve Maleski and Mark Breen.

My wife, Kathryn Blume, has also been a regular contributor, and since she wasn't going to be able to join us in person (she'll be at the world climate conference in Copenhagen doing her one-woman show, The Boycott), she ended up turning her story into a two-parter about a mysterious stranger who wants to settle in Vermont in time for the holidays. It's clever and funny and has a wonderful twist.

Fairly early on in the process, writer and sometime-VSC-performer Stephen Kiernan offered up a new story, an excerpt of which you can find on an earlier blog entry. It's a lovely, poignant and heartwarming story of a young family dealing with a challenging situation - a classic Winter Tales story.

Also fairly early on, (actually, I think it was right after last year's Winter Tales ), I had an audience member tell me that she couldn't wait for the next installment of the Org story. For those of you unfamiliar with this particular winter tale, the Orgs are a family of cave people who celebrate the very first solstice. They've since become a bit of a tradition, with new adventures each year. I told this audience member (she wishes to remain anonymous) that I didn't have a next installment in mind, but if she wanted to take a shot at it, she should feel free. She did, and it's a hoot!

And then we received, somewhat out of the blue, a story from Bren Alvarez Farrington, about her first winter in Vermont (she's originally from much warmer climes) and her attempts to follow the instructions for keeping warm from her crusty old landlord whose Vermont accent was so thick, she almost needed a translator. It's another very funny piece.

It wasn't until all the stories were finally gathered and I read them in a single sitting that I realized that we had a much more humor-inflected show than usual. Now, I'm always wanting to tug on the heartstrings with this show, and I started to wonder if the heartwarming quotient would be high enough.

But then I thought, what with Stephen's story, and the touches of warmth and heart present in all of the other stories, plus the music from Patti Casey and Pete Sutherland, and some lovely poetry courtesy of the Young Writers Project, not to mention the candlelight and the cookies and cider and all the good cheer that are just naturally a part of the celebration, we've got a really nice mix here, and besides, who couldn't use a good laugh in these darkest days of winter?

So, it is with great pleasure and anticipation that I invite you to join us for Winter Tales 2009 , and all new helping of stories, songs and poetry celebrating the holiday season and winter in Vermont.

November 24th, 2009