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Community Corner

Senior Potluck Carries On The Legend Of "Stone Soup"

The Hollin Hall Senior Center based its December potluck on the legend of "Stone Soup" but added a little holiday flair of their own.

About two dozen seniors gathered at the Hollin Hall Center for Creative Retirement yesterday for its December Potluck, which was based on the folk story of "Stone Soup."

"Julie started it last year or the year before," said Assistant Director Patti Bruch.  "It's based on the Grimm's fairy tale concept of the villagers that all brought a contribution."

In the folk story of "Stone Soup" a group of hungry travelers have nothing, but a pot of water and stone of which to make soup. So the travelers convince a local village that they were making "stone soup," which was delicious but could use a few more ingreedients to reach its full potential.  One by one, the villagers donate a single ingreedient like a carrot or a potato until a real soup was cooking over the fire.

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At the Senior Center, potluck attendees all brought an ingredient for the soup at the beginning of the week and enjoyed the final product together on Wednesday.

"It's been simmering since Monday," said Bruch.  "Everything was thrown in plus a ham-bone leftover from Thanksgiving." Besides bringing a soup ingredient, attendees were also encouraged to bring a dessert.

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Though a handful of people had to cancel their reservation this time around because of the weather, Bruch said the seniors potluck the third Wednesday of each month.

The dining room was festooned with a Christmas tree and stockings, but it was the center's Hawaiian Dancers that stole the show. 

The six dancers performed several numbers at Wednesday's lunch, including the standard "White Christmas."  Each dance was performed in honor of a fellow dancer, Pat Pearson, who passed away unexpectedly a few weeks ago.

"My wife has been dancing hula for years and years and years and she decided that she would like to teach it here at the center," said Bob Conley.  "So she got a group of ladies together and taught them Hawaiian dances."

Conley said the dancers captured the spirit of the Hollin Hall Center for Creative Retirement.

"[You can do] anything from genealogy to model trains to art to dance to exercise classes," Conley said.  "When I first retired my wife said, 'let's join the senior center,' and I said 'I'm not going over there to watch television and play checkers.' Well, it was anything but that."

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