As we all take a well-deserved break for the month of January to reflect on the future of Retrospect, thanks to all who read and commented as I responded every week to the question, “What’s Your Story?”
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The movie Marathon Man was released in 1976 and Laurence Olivier played the part of Szell a former WWII Nazi German enroute to New York City from South America to recover some stolen and previously hidden diamonds. Dustin Hoffman plays the part of Thomas Babington brother to a US secret agent and who unwittingly gets Thomas involved in the plot before he died. Quite a good movie – I recommend it. However …

My dental trauma comes from a scene in the movie where Szell uses dental tools including a drill, all without novacaine on poor Thomas. Ouch. I stopped going to a dentist for three years .

…and they want their stuff back! Oh, the clunkyness of it all.

This photo is easily worth one thousand words, but instead: my favorite screen saver: On Mighty Toaster Wings!

West Side Story

One wintry afternoon feeling chilled I stopped at an upper-westside cafe.  I asked for a cup of tea and drinking it I overheard an attractive older woman at the next table tell the waiter someone was meeting her.

She was looking toward the door when a handsome gray-haired man entered,  glanced around the room,  and approached her table.  She rose and there in the middle of that small cafe they embraced and kissed,  and for those brief moments seemed oblivious to all around them.

Then they sat,  their hands touching on the small table as they talked,  and then ordered food and ate.  But seemingly pressed for time,  the man soon called for the bill,  paid the waiter,  and then rose to go.  The woman stood and they embraced once more,  and the man walked towards the door.

She watched him go and then put on her coat,  and I saw her gently touch the back of his empty chair before she too left the restaurant.

Through the window I watched her hurry down the street and disappear into the late afternoon,  upper Broadway crowd – leaving me to wonder how their star-crossed story would end.

– Dana Susan Lehrman