Hello Dolly

September 26, 2016

Hello Dolly

I've come to the end of my little "musical" tribute to my dad on his birthday today. A week of reminiscing about some of the most iconic songs we associate with him and that he loved. It would be an incomplete tribute if I didn't mention his love for musicals - letting us wear out our video tapes of the Sound of Music, the King and I, Mary Poppins, Chitty Chitty Bang Bang, Grease, My Fair Lady, Singing in the Rain and countless others. When we were much younger, the more adult themed musicals were not shown to us in their entirety, the door firmly shut and opened every time a song came on ( which was about every five minutes) Liza Minelli strutting about to "Life is a Cabaret Old Chum" or the infectious "beedly-deedly-dee - Two Ladies!". We would watch in wide eyed wonder as these fantastic sets, dancers, singers, actors, costumes would come to life in a dazzling display of musical storytelling. Sometimes if I were sleeping in my parents' room and they were watching one of the movies I wasn't allowed to watch, I would try to sneakily peek by slowly raising myself onto my head and shoulders and look upside down at the screen between my legs! Of course I was far from subtle so I would be pushed back down by my mom and told to go back to sleep

The last 10 years or so had me going to the UK regularly for work and I watched a musical every chance I got at the West End and once at Broadway. I must have watched around 15 shows, telling my parents excitedly about all of them

It's hard to pick a particular one song, since he loved so many. He would dance to "Money Makes the World Go Round" with us, sing "The Rain in Spain" with us or "Shall we Dance - pum pum pum". But both Shaheen and I remember one distinct song he would hum or sing, especially when we came home after a while, or if he peeped in to see if we were awake yet. Always with a slightly exaggerated baritone and a little jig.