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Posted by Angela Featherstone on 18:14:41 12/12/04
It is the Hollywood party time.
In the citys of Los Angeles which Hollywood is one of, a lot of the houses and the gardens get dressed up for Christmas and some of them are spectacular.
The first Christmas I spent here was quite a cultural shock. It all seemed so tacky but now it is something I look forward to. This last weekend I went to a fabulous party it was a combination of birthday and Christmas hence it was over two days with a good variety of celebrity in various states of mind in attendance.
Something in particular has remained in my consciousness from that weekend:
When it came time for the birthday boy to open his presents, which he decided to do and share with his more intimate friends, at the end of the first sit down meal of the first evening of the party.
Iain Jones got up and said " I went shopping and looked and looked and could not find a thing I could buy that would capture what I wanted to say to you for your birthday. So I would like to share with you two of my favorite poems. I would like to read you one and if you enjoy it and request me to I will read you the other.
If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you,
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,
But make allowance for their doubting too;
If you can wait and not be tied by waiting,
Or being lied about, don't deal in lies,
Or being hated, don't give way to hating,
And yet don't look too good, nor talk too wise:
If you can dream - and not make dreams your master:
If you can think - and not make thoughts your aim;
If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster
And treat those two impostors just the same.
If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it on one turn of pitch - and - toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings
And never breathe a word about your loss.
If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with Kings - nor lose the common touch,
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you,
If all men count with you, but none too much;
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds' worth of distance run,
Yours is the earth and everything that's in it,
And - which is more - you'll be a Man, my son!
- Rudyard Kipling
Out of the night that covers me,
Black as the Pit from pole to pole,
I thank whatever Gods may be
For my unconquerable soul.
In the fell clutch of circumstance,
I have not winced nor cried aloud:
Under the bludgeonings of chance
My head is bloody, but unbowed.
It matters not how strait the gate,
How charged with punishments the scroll,
I am the master of my fate:
I am the captain of my soul.
- William Earnest Henley."
Iain got an ovation for his brilliant readings. I guess being a seasoned stage actor can spread joy in the most unforseeable ways.
GOOD HOLIDAYS TO YOU ALL!
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