Good morning everyone and welcome to Wednesday’s Morning Open Thread.
Morning Open Thread is a daily, copyrighted post from a host of editors and guest writers. We support our community, invite and share ideas, and encourage thoughtful, respectful dialogue in an open forum.
I’ve come to think of this post as one where you come for the music and stay for the conversation—so feel free to drop a note. The diarist gets to sleep in if she so desires and can show up long after the post is published. So you know, it's a feature, not a bug.
Join us, please.
This morning I will indulge in my love of musicals. So here are a few numbers from Jonathan Larson’s Rent, the Broadway sensation which transplants the Parisian bohemians of Puccini's La Boheme to the grime of 1989 New York. Whether you are in the camp that still views Rent as a masterful work or the one that sees it as a dated and romanticized version of New York in the 1990s (or at least the Lower East Side), it remains an important cultural artifact and statement about the AIDS epidemic. While this particular musical does evoke memories of a time of fear and hopelessness and the recollection of so many friends I lost during that time, it also offers an opportunity to reflect and ponder, to remember the joy of those days and to give thanks to all those who taught me so much and put up with me along the way.
I hope you take a listen to some of the tunes and do your own remembering. Have a wonderful day and please feel free to drop a note below—this is an open thread, after all.
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Be well, be kind, and appreciate the love you have in your life.
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Grab your coffee or tea and join us, please.
What's on your mind this morning?