Blue Roses

On Sunday I when to see the Glass Menagerie as it was playing over in Coronado. Coronado is so incredibly nice. It is a beautiful little beach town and yet although in SoCal it is very New Englandy - so quaint and cute and littered with Victorian houses. The production was excellent. The theatre group there always does a fantastic job. I have seen this play many times as it is just one of my all time favorites. The intensity and desperation of Tom and Amanda and the quiet simplicity of Laura. So moving that it just wrenches my heart each and every time. Funny thing though, for as many times as I have seen it something new dawned on me. When the the Gentleman Caller breaks Laura's favorite glass piece, a unicorn, she says that it is ok because now he is just like all the other horses in her collection and not the only different one. I always understood the metaphor that Laura is for a fleeting moment just like all the other girls as she has her heart touched for the first time by love in this moment with this man. But now I see that it is more than that. As soon as she falls in love her delicate heart is shattered just a moment later. A piece of her innocence is so promptly chipped out of her heart. Much like the unicorn is like the other horses now she too is like so many other people now because she has had her heart broken. I guess it is perspective and I find it interesting that this basic perception has eluded me all these years. My rose tinted view always stopped at the fact the she loved for the first time and yet now the power of being heartbroken comes into my view as well. Perhaps experience brings understanding. Well nonetheless I cried as I always do during this play. Surley tears of a slightly different ilk this time but they are still mine and I would not trade them for anything.