Supporting ?Our Town? in Our Town
I wanted to write to commend Peter Green and the RHS Parsons Street Players for their moving and powerful performances of ?Our Town? in October.
As a parent of two performers in the Rye City School District, and as a teacher of the arts, I was disappointed at how few members of the community attended the three performances. Granted, there were unplanned-for playoffs on opening night (Go Garnets!), but the matinee was poorly attended, and closing night was not at capacity either. The students worked so hard on this beautiful show, and Mr. Green stepped in at the eleventh hour to lead them in a compressed timeline to a collaboration well worth sharing with the entire community. All of the students and teachers involved were committed, professional, and artful.
With more and more encouraging conversations in our community about helping our students/children to be less stressed these days, we seem to keep overlooking the arts, which can be energizing, therapeutic, and sources of connection and empathy for all involved.
When you engage in any element of creating art, be it onstage, backstage, on a canvas, on a dance floor, or in a pottery studio, you are expressing yourself. When you express yourself to or with others, you make connections. When you make connections, you open hearts and minds. And when you do that, you begin to heal yourselves, and the world. Isn?t that what we all want?
Please support the arts whenever you can and know that in doing so you are encouraging our youth, and all of us, to reach out and hold one another?s hands in support. We all need each other?s understanding now more than ever. Connecting with one another through the arts can help us move forward peacefully and with open hearts and minds.
- Emi Meulbroek
