A special gathering

You hear, all the time, about how our younger generation is going to you know where in a hand basket. And then you go to an affair where groups of young people like our Boy and Girl Scouts are presenting our flag and you know all is certainly not lost.

Such was the case at the Lincoln Day Dinner recently. How bad can things be when you see such a fine group of young people perform so professionally? Also attending were a group of young Republicans who behaved with polite decorum and certainly could not be called “kids.”

Now we come to a second affair my son, Doug, and I attended recently, Rising Sun Gallery & Art Studio’s second annual gourmet Italian dinner. Don’t miss this one next year; we had a fine time.

The food was excellent and served by a group of our local ROTC-young members. Now let me explain why I thought they did such a wonderful job. Each seat, at each table, was assigned to each attendee. At each seat a card had been placed explaining the menu – I think we had six different types of sauce for our pasta — and each person marked which of the six they would like to enjoy.

As we began our meal we were served an Italian salad and an older person poured our choice of red or white wine. Then each of us was served with out entrée of choice. There wasn’t a hitch the whole time, and nobody had to wait too long for his or her food.

Think about that — about 200 people making a choice of six sauces and no one receiving the wrong one. Then we enjoyed desert and coffee. All of this served by those very grown up and responsible young men and women from our community.

While I’m talking about that special evening, my hat is off to the Elks Club who furnished a beer and wine bar for the occasion. Those nice men are always so efficient and pleasant and I am always glad to see their smiling faces when we attend functions of this kind.

Now I’m about to make a confession. I have been showing my Crewel Designs at the Gallery for over two years, and I had absolutely no idea of the complexity of what goes on inside of those doors. I thought Patricia handled artwork. I had no idea of what went on in the “back room.” There, at the dinner were brochures explaining the many, workshops available for just about everybody.

There are Winter/Spring classes that include “An Adventure in Literature Art,” An “Early Childhood Art” class, ”Young Artists” this one is for those children who have shown skills or interest above the norm Also included in classes is “Breaking Open Art Exploration,” ”Dive Into Watercolor,” ”Beginning & Intermediate Art,” ”Introduction to Drawing,” “Developing Artist Refining” “Artwork, Fun Stuff: Art in Everyday Life,” “Beginning Sculpture,” “Art in 3 Dimensions,” “Evolve with Oil,” and lastly “Beginning & Intermediate Oil Painting.”

Their workshops and seminars include “Beginning & Intermediate Guitar Workshop,” The Ancient Art of Quilting Workshop, Pottery Workshop,” Community Theater” and “Children’s Community Theatre.” Patricia has included many items that are not just “hang this up on the wall” artwork. She has included jewelry that is breathtakingly gorgeous, the kind every woman in town would enjoy wearing; trays and other ornamental items for the home. I could go on, but you get the idea.

Folks, if you haven’t been down town lately, we have a lot of fine businesses that go unnoticed and that’s a shame. OK, so the next time you’re down there on Maine, Taylor, or Center streets to enjoy a fine meal, why don’t you just drop in to the Gallery and look at what our wonderful local artists can do?

Patricia rotates different local artists and once had a showing artwork done by a grandfather and believe it or not, his 5-year-old grandson. I stood there aghast at the absolute beauty of what those two had created. You would have been amazed. Please don’t miss the Gallery. I’d like to take this time to say a heart felt “thank you” to those fine young people at both of the above occasions I’ve mentioned. This old lady isn’t going to lose sleep worrying about the future of this country when we have such fine young people growing up in our community. Keep up the good work!

Edna Van Leuven is a Churchill County writer and LVN columnist.