Rainbow Connection

The famous "Muppets", Rainbow Connection came to mind as I sat inside the gallery, yet another month gone by, listening to the lovers, the dreamers and the poets share their poemoirs, which bundled all their joys, their sorrows, their mysteries, their dreams and their kind gentle hearts into the sweetest presentations this evening.

"Why are there so many, songs about rainbows? And what's on the other side?..."

I could almost hear Kermit the frog singing as I pondered the setting, the kind, gentle souls, transparent and generous.

"Rainbows are visions, but only illusions, and rainbows have nothing to hide"

I watched as one of the men stood to read his poem. It was then that it hit me. Before reading, he shared a time when he had returned to school and was struck by the contrast between his story and that of a woman he met in school. She had suffered greatly in this life, and it touched his heart so deeply, that he wrote about it. And the phrase started going through my head...

"The lovers, the dreamers and me..."

And there I was, having thought so many times that these gentle men I had met all through my career, and in my life, were somehow different or incomplete because they hadn't grown hardened and they had never learned to put walls around their hearts and they hadn't learned to hide their feelings. But I asked myself this, 'why do you love to be around them so very much? Is it possible they are not less, but, rather, more complete? They are comfortable taking the risk of being vulnerable. They share their tenderness, they are not afraid of what anyone will say. They are completely masculine, while remaining transparent, poetic and tender. They are talented and creative and rich in every sense of the word. Rich. Jim Henson was one. Rich.

"Someday we'll find it, the rainbow connection, the dreamer, the lovers, and me..."

We've been pouring our time and energy into preparing for the Mother Comfort Estate Sale. Over and over again, I find myself pondering the feelings of this amazing woman who absolutely bubbled with ideas and creativity, but forced herself into a mold, allowing her wide range of talent, talent that knew no bounds, to surface as tireless efforts to delight and inspire those in her small circle, those who could not properly cheer her on and mix their inspiration with her on the pallet of living.

All along, I thought, she would have loved a group of dreamers such as those who gathered this night. Her art could hang on the walls, and she would drink in the images shared around the room, transforming them into images of beauty on a china plate.