Second Wind
Over 60 turns into over 70. Life changes fast.
This was our last show that we did together. It was about aging, downsizing and family relations. We performed it for the program classes, and did a reading at the Sarasvati Theatre Festival. I met a woman from the audience the next day and she said she was still laughing. We even toured to Brandon and presented a reading to an appreciative audience.
The problem with a reading is that I could never stick to a script. The character would take over and the others would jump in with me. The Divas aged out, we gradually stopped performing. Our last date was when Louise’s husband asked us to perform for her 75th Birthday. Wanda and I did a skit with her grandson. Performing mime to Harry Chapin’s “All My Life’s a Circle” was special.
Second Wind
Characters:
Frankie - Kris – approximately 60 years old, owner of the diner.
Stella - Koren – 80 and ready to hand her affairs over to her daughter Rosie.
Rosie - Louise – celebrating her 60th birthday and trying to sort out her mother’s affairs and funeral arrangements. Breaking the news that she’s become a medium.
Edna - Sue – Stella’s sister – 85 but thinks that age is in your mind and that Stella is giving in.
Anna - Wanda – a German immigrant that has stories about how it’s done in the old country.
Joanie - Beverly – a ghost, Frankie’s sister come to ask for forgiveness.
Setting: The Diner. A lunch to celebrate Rosie’s birthday and to help her sort out Stella’s affairs and be given power of attorney.
Play begins. Actors come out to speak to audience.
GOOD EVENING EVERYONE!,,,,,,A warm welcome to our presentation of SECOND WIND performed by the DRAMA DIVAS OF WINNIPEG! The DIVAS have been performing various plays over the last ten years, and SECOND WIND is a kind of a LIFE STORY….A JOURNEY…. that changes as we go along.
Players introduce themselves, then put on their hats and move offstage. Scene opens with FRANKIE straightening things out in the café. Radio is loud in the background. FRANKIE sees EDNA come in and goes to the back.
EDNA: Turn that off please. I’m waiting for my sister and her family. I’m sure I don’t know why we’re meeting here!
EDNA sits at the table, looks around, picks up a magazine off the table and gets out her glasses.
Oh dear, oh dear….(shouting) Can I have a cup of coffee?
FRANKIE: (coming forward) You don’t have to wake the dead, I can hear you. Would you like an expresso? That way you don’t have to linger to long.
EDNA: Well I never. Here come my sister and that woman, they’ll want coffee too. Regular coffee!!
FRANKIE: Yes M’am.
STELLA and ANNA enter. Leans forward to kiss her, EDNA puts her glasses on her head and turns away.
STELLA: Hello Edna. Glad that you could come for Rosie’s birthday. Isn’t it amazing – my baby is 60 years old!
EDNA: Hardly a baby Stella!
STELLA: Do you remember my sister-in-law Anna?
ANNA: Guten tag I mean good day.
EDNA: German, isn’t she?
STELLA: Well, – actually now she’s Canadian citizen!
EDNA: Canadian? Hmph. Oh. Is that Rosie coming? My, she has aged!
ROSIE: Hi everyone. Hi mom (exchange kisses), Anna (exchange kisses), Edna (shakes hands).
ANNA: Isn’t it wonderful that Rosie is sixty. That must mean some big changes for you dear. Are you retiring?
EDNA: Isn’t she still at home with her baby?
ROSIE: No, Aunty. I’ve been working at a daycare and I retired a few years ago. I have some special projects on the go now, so sixty isn’t a very big turning point for me.
STELLA: It was for me. I was so glad to be out of that office, but at first I just didn’t know what to do with myself. Thank goodness I’ve had the choir and the orchestra. Oh that reminds me, I found this old song the other day. Maybe you remember it Edna. (STELLA sings memory song.)
EDNA: That’s from a long time ago. It feels like a dream.
ANNA: I have so many memories from another world, it seems. I knew a woman from Germany who was a hundred years old. She was born in Germany and then moved to England and joined the German community there. Yes! A hundred years old and she still plays the piano every day.
EDNA: Now that’s old.
FRANKIE is in the background listening to the story, making and serving coffee.
STELLA: (to Anna) Well I’m so glad that you’re here in Canada. (to the others) Here we are again. I’m glad that you could come Edna. I want Rosie to be my power of attorney and I wanted to talk things over with you before I make my final decisions.
EDNA: Thank Goodness!
STELLA: You never know what might happen at our age. So we need to make preparations.
EDNA: Hogwash. We’re not old. Nobody is going to tell me what to do – or speak for me. What if Rosie wants to put you in an old folks home?
STELLA: Yes, I’ve decided to go to a senior’s residence. I’m on a waiting list. You should go on the waiting list too – then we could be together.
EDNA: Are you crazy! They keep you in your room and treat you like a child! It’s like furniture storage!
ROSIE: They’re different now Aunty Edna. Some people have good social lives, depending on where they are!
STELLA: I just can’t manage my house anymore Edna, so Rosie’s going to take it over and I’m going into a senior’s residence.
EDNA: What? (to ROSIE) You little vixen. And not even a room for your own mother in her own house?
STELLA: I’d rather be in a senior’s residence Edna. Now for heaven’s sake it’s Rosie’s birthday.
EDNA: You’d rather? Next she’ll be arranging for your burial – dead or not!
ANNA: I went to something called a wake last week and it was a great celebration! The coffin was on the table and people drank and sang. My friend knew her Irish father would like a good send off. But of course we do things differently in our German community.
EDNA: I’m sure that you do.
ANNA: Only last year a group of us got together and planned a lovely funeral. Brian, the son of a widow in our community was badly hurt in a construction accident, was in a coma and we thought he was going to die. We like to be well organized and so got right down to preparations. The pastor quickly cancelled the women’s bible study. Perfect flowers were picked. Women were baking buns and music was selected. And then guess what happened?
ROSIE: What happened?
ANNA: The head of the construction company came and gave the widow a cheque and scholarship for her son saying what a wonderful worker he was.
EDNA: I thought he was dead!
ANNA: That’s what confused us and the head of the construction company was confused when we invited him to stay for Brian’s funeral. Apparently, Brian was not only NOT dead but coming home the next week!
STELLA: Really?
ANNA: All those preparations for nothing!! We were of course happy that the widow’s son was well but it was disappointing to have a perfectly lovely funeral go to waste.
EDNA: Well, well.
STELLA: That sounds like a lovely way to do a funeral Anna. I would like something like that when I die.
EDNA: Over my dead body.
ROSIE: It just might be, Edna. Now, let’s look at the menus? What would you like Mom?
STELLA: The same as you dear.
EDNA: Can’t you even think for yourself?? What has happened to you?? I know what I want. I’ll have a salad, a Ceasar without the croutons and dressing on the side and a small order of poutine without gravy or cheese please. Now, where were we?
ANNA: I’ll have a hotdog with mustard, please. Notice Edna, I do not call it a heisser hund anymore!
EDNA: Well, well.
FRANKIE has been standing by the counter at the side reading her magazine and sometimes following the conversation. ANNA is reading a menu.
ANNA: What is this? Urns? I don’t see hot dogs.
EDNA: Urns of coffee???
ANNA: Coffee??
EDNA: Well, let Me look.
Looks for her glasses on the table in her pockets and in her purse. ROSIE starts to snicker. EDNA opens her glasses case.
EDNA: It’s empty. Someone has taken my glasses!!!
EDNA feels her head and finds them.
EDNA: I suppose you’ve never lost anything. Oh here…Oh. Hmmm. (Looks at menu. Slowly..) Here we are: Urns for cremation? Urns for cremation!!!! What is this? Frankie’s Fine Dying?
STELLA: “Frankie’s Fine Dying” – I thought it was dining!!!
FRANKIE: Just keeping up with the times. Trying to make a dime off of the burying line.
EDNA: She’s going to kill us.
FRANKIE: Not unless you want me to. We can arrange for an assisted suicide.
EDNA: What?!
ROSIE: She’s providing a service.
EDNA: That’s what drug dealers say.
FRANKIE: Dead right! Would you like some medical marijuana?
EDNA: What is this place?
ROSIE: Don’t you know that this is a death and dying café Edna? They’re all over the world now. It’s a place where people can gather and talk about fears that they have about dying. Frankie’s trying to make some money selling urns.
EDNA: What!!!!
ANNA: Yes, I have heard of this in the old country. It’s like Frankie’s working with the underground.
STELLA: (to ROSIE) How do you know so much about this?
ROSIE: Well Mom, I’ve been meaning to tell you. I have discovered that I have a gift as a Medium.
STELLA: A Medium?
EDNA: Not large?
ROSIE: No. Sometimes I communicate with spirits from the other side.
ANNA: Yes, yes, a great comfort to the family.
EDNA: (to STELLA) What did I tell you? Your little girl is after your money. Turn over your affairs to her, sure. You’ll end up on a street corner. She’s talking out of two sides of her face!! She needs to see a psychiatrist.
STELLA: Don’t you talk about my daughter like that! She might be odd but she’s been sweetness and light compared to you. You were always a nasty and mean little girl.
EDNA: Well you were always Mother’s favorite and you liked to flaunt it in my face.
STELLA: When I die, you’ll be sorry for how you treated me.
EDNA: Well I’m not going to die. That’s just weak willed!
FRANKIE: What’s the matter with her?
ANNA: Look, Rosie is going into a trance.
EDNA: Something’s happening. Someone’s coming.
JOANIE enters as a ghost.
JOANIE: Fran … I….
FRANKIE: (shocked) Joanie?? That’s my sister!!! She’s the only one that called me Fran!
JOANIE: Fran, I have a confession to make. I want you to know that I’m sorry. So sorry. I know that you didn’t mean to push me off the horse. I let go so that you would be blamed.
FRANKIE yells and runs to the back of the stage.
FRANKIE: Oh! I thought I killed you!
Silence. ANNA goes to comfort Frankie.
STELLA: Oh dear.
JOANIE: Forgive me Fran, I still love you. I will always be with you. Now I can be at peace…..(slowly backs offstage)
ROSIE: (coming out of the trance) She says she loves you and she is always with you.
EDNA: Oh my. (Silence. Pause.) Well I suppose that I might die one day. I guess if Kings and Queens can pass away, I might also die with the passing of time. I would hate for there to be bitterness between us Stella.
STELLA: Yes, it’s all so silly really, but why have you always been so mean about Rosie?
EDNA: Well….. I suppose I’ve had no Rosie of my own.
ROSIE: Oh Aunty! (hugs her and then goes to talk to FRANKIE)
FRANKIE: Thank you Rosie. You don’t know how much that message from my sister means to me.
ANNA: Yes, you have the gift Rosie!
ROSIE: (to FRANKIE) I don’t suppose you’d need some help here?
FRANKIE: Here?
ROSIE: An added service!?
FRANKIE: (smiling for the first time) A Medium? Here? Yes!!!
EDNA: (to STELLA) Maybe there is room in that senior’s centre for me. You’re the only family that I’ve got.
STELLA: I always knew you were an old softy!
ANNA and ROSIE return to chairs.
ANNA: Softy?
EDNA: (pulling a bottle out of her purse) I don’t know about soft but how about Brandy for the coffee? Let’s celebrate old country style!
ANNA: Yawh!
FRANKIE brings a cup to the table.
FRANKIE: I think I still have some frozen hotdogs! But no sauerkraut.
ANNA: Heiser hund?
EDNA spices up the coffees.
STELLA: (toasts) To dying and living!! And living until you die! Maybe even after!!!!
ALL: To life!!
END
