Batavia music lovers enjoy Phantasmagorical Quartet

The aftermath of graduation has left me with a clean house, frozen leftovers, and a group of stories that need to be told.

I played the viola for 10 years. I took private lessons from Paul Peebles for five of those years. I paid $5 a lesson and after each lesson I would hand my money to Mr. Peebles and he would talk about my singing. Even though I was a pretty smart kid, it took years for me to realize that his comments about my singing were really a critique of my viola playing.

One thing he did teach me was an appreciation for good string ensembles.

Batavia music lovers recently had the opportunity to hear some of the finest string players in the area when Rebecca Rudy put together a recital that included her students and the various musicians from the area. It was a thrill to begin with the young players and end with the Phantasmagorical Quartet, a group of area musicians who could rival any professional group.

Rebecca will be studying Viola Performance at DePaul University, so, hopefully, we will have the opportunity to hear her play again in Batavia in the future.

Traveling with kids: Batavian Kathy Morgan is in the news. Morgan recently had a story published in an anthology about traveling with kids called "How To Fit a Car Seat On A Camel."

The story that Morgan wrote is titled, "To Grandmother's House We Go" and chronicles the family's trip across country to see grandparents in New Hampshire.

"I guess it's written at Matt's expense since most of the story is about him," said Morgan. I'm sure Matt, who is a junior at Taylor University, is proud to see his mom in print.

The book is available both at Borders and at Amazon.com.

Writing groups: One of the pluses of my job as a writer is having the opportunity to go out and give presentations about writing to various groups in the valley.

A presentation at the Holmstad led to the creation of a writing club at the retirement center. I agreed to serve as a facilitator for the group and to help them tell their life stories.

As is often the case, it was the teacher who benefited the most. It was a privilege to share the writers' table with so many gifted writers who had such amazing stories to tell.

A friend to miss: Sadly we had to say goodbye to John Rusek, a friend of this column.

Years ago I wrote about all of the Batavia's in the world and John called and told me that I had missed Batavia in Indonesia. He told me Jakarta had been known as Batavia from 1619 to 1942.

I ended up doing a story on John and his quest to visit all of the cities named Batavia in this country on his motorcycle. Perhaps he valued our community more than the average Batavian since he came here in the 1950s with his mother and sister as refugees.

Not only did he point out my mistake, he often would let me know of an interesting story idea.