‘Disney’s Beauty and the Beast’

Simply put, Disney’s
Beauty and the Beast is the timeless tale of a beautiful girl and the
repentant beast who tries to woo her. It’s a lot like life at my house the day
after Valentine’s Day.

Rochester Children’s Theatre’s production of the musical
continues this weekend. Maybe you’ve seen the animated movie. My nine-year-old
daughter and I have, too. On continuous loop when she was 5.

But knowing each song by heart just enhanced the experience
of watching this first-rate group of performers bring to life our old friends
Belle, the Beast, Lumiรฉre, and Cogsworth.
It reminded me of attending the Rocky
Horror Picture Show in the halcyon days of my misspent youth. Only instead
of Magentas, there were Belles in the audience.

“It was just so
good!” my daughter said. “I loved the costumes, especially Babette
the feather duster. And I liked how kids were forks and spoons in the ‘Be Our
Guest’ song.”

When the Beast sang “If I Can’t Love Her” you could have
heard a rose petal drop in the theater. I was positively teary eyed by the
show’s end. And no, I don’t think it was just menopause kicking in.

Treat your family to Disney’s
Beauty and the Beast at the NazarethCollegeArtsCenter,
continuing Saturday, February 18, at 2 p.m.,
and Sunday, February 19, at 2 p.m.
Tickets are $15 at the box office. www.rochesterchildrenstheatre.org, 385-0510.

— Linda Kostin
(www.junkstorecowgirl.com)

This week for families:

Helmer Nature Center 154 Pinegrove
Ave. Wednesdays through Feb 15: “Everybody’s Somebody’s Lunch,” 4-5:30 p.m. Grades 2-3. $6 per session/$20
series | Register: 336-3035

Find other family events in the Mind, Body, Spirit section of the
calendar, page 22.

New daddy diary, February
12, 2006

On February 1, around 3 a.m.,
my wife Nikki and I were resting impatiently in our delivery room, trying to
sleep but knowing it would only come in twitchy fits and starts. Nik still wasn’t sure if she wanted an epidural to dull the
pain she was scheduled to experience later that day. She was 60/40 yes, and
then 70/30 by the time they hooked up the monitor. Then we heard the woman in
the next room screaming–and not just any old screaming. This was legs first into a wood chipper screaming. The epidural was now a lock.

As we waited for the inducement process to begin, we asked a
thousand nurses a zillion questions. They administered Cervidil,
but that made the baby’s heartbeat intensify to a scary pace. Four hours of
tachycardia later, the docs decided to stop the process with another medicine
that made Nik shake severely from head to toe. A few
minutes later the shaking just stopped, as if a switch had been turned off.
There was nothing about any of this in the books I’d read.

Then came the epidural, followed by
an IV of Pitocin to induce contractions. Sparing you
the sanguinary details, the baby was stuck for a while and the doctors were
visibly frustrated. After three hours of pushing, our doctor gave an ultimatum:
one last try, then it’s off to the operating room for a C-section. Nik gave me a look that said, “No way am I going to get all
the way to this point to have it all count for nothing.”

And thus came the push of all
pushes, my wife’s finest hour. Our daughter went from barely crowning to out in
one moment. And so it was that on February 1st, at 4:53 p.m., our daughter Tess
took her first breath. You know, I’ve heard many sentimental clichรฉs about the
joys of this parent stuff. Until that moment, I had no idea how true they all
are.

— Brandon Heffernan

This article appears in Feb 15-21, 2006.