Mike is skiing out west again this Jan - Mar.  While he is out of town, I decided to audition for a small group of CSO singers who are going to comprise the Opera Chorus for an Opera Columbus performance of Tchaikovsky's Eugene Onegin slated for March 1 & 2, 2024.  It is based on a novel written by Alexander Pushkin.  The text is in Russian, which has to be memorized, and we have movement on stage, and costumes.  This is going to be a great challenge for me, but I decided this will be an excellent use of my free time and I even anticipate that it will exercise my brain (greatly needed by older people!)  I am looking forward to this performance.  The music is so lovely, and the story line is actually empowering for women.  A young woman falls in love with a man, and she writes him a letter to tell him her feelings.  He (a bit of a scoundrel!) rejects her, but later in their lives, he encounters her again and finds her composed and regal.  Imagine that . . . she flourished without him!  He decides that he loves this new and improved version and tells her so.  She is married to someone else and quite wisely tells him to kick rocks.  I love that she did not fall for his crap and uproot her happy life for some fool who dismissed her at one point.  So many theater pieces are tragic and/or patriarchal.  Anyone close to the Ohio Theatre on Mar 1 or Mar 2, come check it out!!