Incredible time in the heartland of America - from Tom

Thanks so much to the kind people at Roberts Park United Methodist Church in downtown Indianapolis. Friday, November 11 was a great day to be a local boy returning home. My high school, Lawrence North High, was brave to extend an invitation to talk to students from the theater, journalism, and video production programs there, so I delivered a short talk on my "career" in television and discussed the production of A Gift for the Village. The kids were great, and I admit to getting a little choked up just as I started my talk, and looked up at the crowd of about 200 students in the Little Theater, where I'd done quite a bit of singing and acting as a kid.

It was at that high school where I saw my first video camera: a thing so bulky that you had to wheel a cart around with it to contain the giant recorder and all of the electronics needed to make it work, and the arts teachers there taught me a lot of things I still use every day: how to speak extemporaneously, how to work as a part of a team to produce professional quality work, and how to evaluate your own work to continuously improve. I was honored that my best childhood friend John Klasing came to the talk, and he chimed in a few times with good suggestions of stories to share with the kids.

Then, that night we showed the film to a group of about 120 people, many of whom were old friends from my childhood church and high school pals and people I'd never met who heard about the show. I was honored that two Tibetans we'd met during my visit to Indy showed up to see the movie: they said that they only knew of 6 Tibetans in the whole city, and I hope they enjoyed seeing familiar scenes on the screen. The projection equipment and screen were provided by the people from the Heartland Film Festival, and the film looked great because of it.

Thanks to everyone who came out!
T.

Final Chance To See The Jane Lillian Vance Gallery

On Friday, November 4, the gallery in downtown Roanoke that's been home to Jane's work will end the one year run of being open. In the past year hundreds of people have come through to see almost 100 of Jane's paintings on display, but now it's time to close the doors and take this artwork back into the world.

If you'd like one last chance to view the paintings and to hear Jane talk about them, come to the gallery at 309 First Street (near the intersection of 1st and Church) this Friday during the monthly Art by Night studio/gallery tour. To read more about the gallery, you can see this story about the opening from the Roanoke Times: