Princesses and Pirates in the Historic Theater
I’ve always loved our Historic Theater, but then again, I’m a company girl… At a writers event the other night I was stopped by this young girl who was visiting with her Grandmother and a few of Grandma’s friends. They had driven up from North Carolina to see our author Debbie Macomber, who in addition to writing several very popular fiction series, has also written a couple of children’s books. As a lifelong reader, I was immediately charmed by this little girl who very clearly loved books and was so excited that she got to ask a real life author a question. The only problem was excitement was that the show wasn’t in the “Princess Theater.”
Not wanting her to leave town disappointed, I offered to take the group on a quick tour of the “Princess Theater” (the Historic Theater) the next morning before they headed back down south. Bright and early we started our tour. We toured the Lower Lobby and our famous bathrooms and talked a little about our history before heading upstairs to see actual theater. As I pointed out the chandelier she asked if it took us a long time to be able to afford it, because it looked pretty expensive. I explained that we were very lucky to have a lot of good friends who helped us to which she replied “it’s so pretty that I would gladly give you all the money in my piggy bank to help pay for it.” Knowing that they had a schedule to keep I suggested that we should visit our pirate on our way out. While our chandelier was a huge hit, the pirate is what sealed the deal, as her three very favorite things are princesses, pirates, and ponies followed closely by Taylor Swift, a girl after my own heart.
When I got into the office I mentioned my tour to Patricia, who had moderated the show the night before. Later that morning as I was sitting at my computer trying to write my blog, Patricia came in and mentioned that I should tell this story. Day after day for the last year I pass through the Historic Theater, but today I was reminded just how magic it really is. Now if only we had a pony… and Taylor Swift.