Forty-six of Quail Ridge Country Club retirement village residents filled the room for Talent Night, some there to sing and most there to listen, and not one of us was quite ready for how much talent had been living quietly down the hall from us all along.
Karen, Ron and June opened with the instrumentals, and from there the evening just kept building. Terry and Pat, Fredi, Mel and Karol, Marilyn, Barrie, Mick, Ernest, Paul, and Jayne and Dave all took a turn at the microphone, and it wasn't long before the audience stopped just listening and started singing along too. That's really the whole point of a night like this: a room full of neighbours becomes a room full of friends somewhere around the second chorus.
Ron Bywater gave us his rendition of “The Lion and Albert,” which if you know the poem, you'll know takes some nerve to perform straight-faced. Leah and Ernest followed with the hilarious “Sad Cat's Diary,” and had the room in stitches by the time they'd finished.
We're doing this again. That much was decided before anyone had even packed up their chairs.
None of it would've happened without Mel, who took on the job of pulling the whole evening together and made it look easy, which anyone who's organised so much as a birthday party knows it never is. Thanks, Mel. You're a star.
