Painted Ladies

Painted Lady hatpin, earring stands

So the car mechanic (my age) giving me a lift mentions he’s lived in this same town all his life. Not too unusual around here.  “So you must have known my former landlady,” who passed away last year just shy of 100 (see Hell in a Handbasket).  She was the school Principal and from one of the original settler-families to the area.

“Oh, sure,” he replied, leading him into a conversation of the way things were.  I’ve heard these stories before and never tire of them: full of wagons, wild animals and gingham dresses.

But stories like this one I really enjoy:  “I remember going into my grandmother’s house and she says to me, “Come over and meet my (card-playing) friends:  Lucy (Ball) and Ginger (Rogers).”  He had no idea who they were until,

“Look, Grandma, your friend’s on TV.”

I suppose it had something to do with the fact that there were only black and white TV’s at the time which didn’t do Lucy’s hair justice at all.

“Who was your Grandmother?” I asked, expecting to hear Doris Day.

Just someone who “lived here all her life” and grew up with Ginger, who has a theater named after her in Medford and lived in Shady Cove.  Lucy, just a transient, didn’t live here too long, he said.  I guess she knew Ginger.  Never forget that great line:

"Ginger Rogers did everything Fred Astaire did, only backwards and in heels."