Speechwriter Gig

Mama Ruth is receiving an award. It's local, it's from her synagogue and, truth be told, her name probably just floated to the top of list. How many 90+ people do they have kicking around who they can give an award to? Not to demean her contribution to the community - she does do a lot. One of her made-up principles of the Evil Eye is that you shouldn't be awarded or call to attention to your good fortune. So, at first she didn't want to say anything. She was being coy. After that set in for the appropriate amount of time, she decided that she should say something - they were going to the trouble of the award and all. So, because I have a communications degree and won an elementary spelling bee, I was asked to consult as her speech writer. I instruct her to put down a few thoughts. CityBaby and I roll up to the house to find a fruit and coffee cake buffet (leftovers from mah jong, I'm imagining) and 8 pages of handwritten notes on a legal pad. 8 pages! On a legal pad! So, I settle CityBaby down in front of the fruit and we get to work. I cut and cut and cut. She adds and adds and adds. I try to tell her that these people don't care that in 1962 she won the award for Israeli Bonds. Heck, in 1962 Israel was just a fledgling country. I inform her that no one in the audience will know who Hedda Hopper and Bess Meyerson are (I had to google Bess). I plead with her to not tell the story, for the millionth time, about how the Sisterhood did a play about her. And, then out of thin air she comes up with the ending: "If you can make it there, you can make it anywhere." Wait, where? What are you talking about? I succumb and join CityBaby on the floor for fruit and coffee cake. And the two of us sit there and listen, for the millionth time about the play and Hedda Hopper and Bess Meyerson and the Great Israel Bond Drive of 1962. Sigh...........