Of Shakespeare and pavlova

Call it nostalgia. Yesterday, Mike, Tim and I went to Stratford, Ontario, to the celebrated annual summer theatre, the Shakespeare Festival. We didn’t see a Shakespearean play this time. We saw the musical 42^nd Street, a joyful escape, great choreography, good tap dancing, peppy music. Afterwards, we headed to the English Parlour for dinner and my favourite pavlova. Been saving up those calories all week to spend on that meringue dessert, named in honour of the Russian ballerina Anna Pavlova. Time to indulge….

The sweet and decadent pavlova at the English Parlour

The pavlova has been a constant on every trip to Stratford, ever since I started going some twenty years ago with a few buddy colleagues at the Agincourt Public Library to that theatre town named after the famous one in England. We’d go after work to a show, carpooling a hundred and thirty kilometres from Toronto to Stratford at five in the afternoon, braving the rush-hour traffic on the 401 to make the eight o’clock curtain. Sometimes, when the traffic was light, we arrived with an hour to spare, and we’d sit at a picnic table on the bank of the Avon, also named after the one in England, and eat the sandwiches we had packed, watching the swans glide by, a peaceful, dreamy existence. After the show, we’d go to the English Parlour in town, and treat ourselves each to a pavlova, before driving the hundred and thirty kilometres home.

The swans on the Avon at Stratford, Ontario

In the beginning, there were four of us, Betty, Jane, Louise and me. Then more colleagues at the library joined in. It was more or less a girls’ night out. Betty died in 1997, ever gracious and lovely Betty, and the rest of us have retired over the years, each turning to our own after-retirement interests, fulfilling our family commitments, and some experiencing the joys of grandparenthood. And gradually, the enthusiasm for the Stratford group outings dwindled. Today, they have become just a treasured memory.

Mike and I are going back to Stratford again in two weeks, this time to see and hear Christopher Plummer at his one-man show. And I will have another pavlova, and reminisce the times with my library colleagues there, and think of Betty. 

Stratford, Ontario   August 4, 2012