Days of Yesteryear

This has been a tiring week. Came down with pneumonia so my time has been spent doing a LOT of laying around. I'll worry about the financial consequences of missing so much work later. Rest is really the only way to get over it. That and a nice homemade chicken soup simmering with overdose amounts of garlic and every vegetable imaginable. And I even bought orange juice. (Not for the soup)

Certainly not crazy about the doctors' lecture about not smoking but am putting out a good effort on my part about that since I know how right he is. Blah..blah..blah..is about the most I remember of the conversation, though :)~

Enough about me.. this picture was brought to mind after laying around, watching old tv shows forgotten about but the episodes are so familiar! Wondering if the last time I saw them was from one of the many days staying home from school from being sick. Quite the dejevu moment here and there!

Anyway...it brought to mind a memory of a little old lady I used to clean house for. She was quite the character and lived alone. I cleaned house for her and she never minded a bit when one of the kids had to come with me (usually from staying home from school sick). She really enjoyed the company and eventually she opened up story after story of her past that one would never know by looking at her.

She had been engaged to a leader of a band, this being the "big band era," and the nightclub he played at was a very popular club in San Francisco that many stars from Hollywood would escape to on the weekends. She was quite the "hottie" back then and by her pictures fit in very well on the scene. While her fiance played, she would dine in the kitchen with Jimmy Durante, Phyllis Diller, and regularly hung out with Lucille Ball and Dezi Arnaz. She rattled off so many names that sounded familiar, though I can't remember the rest, it was a hot spot to be during the height of that era. Her eyes would light up as she talked about that time in her life, but still in a nonchallant kind of way like it was nothing at the time.

The band leader later became abusive. One night he came after her drunk and escaping up a flight of stairs she fought him off with the only weapon she had, her high heel shoe! Now heels in those days were pretty wicked and she used her good sense to resort to the only thing she had on hand. Very quick and smart thinking on her part! But that was only a small part in her stories, they weren't all bad and most were looked back in fondness.

She was a wonderful little lady and I always wondered what happened to her. So many like her out there ready to tell a story..if only someone would ask. Black and white photos are so fascinating to me, people...places..whatever. It's up to the viewer to fill in the color with their own imaginations, versions of interpretation, whether colored by an interpretor or your own imaginations.

Well, that's my thoughts for the day. I have some old Alfred Hitchcock movies and Twilight Zone episodes I haven't seen in a while. First...finish up that soup..then back on the couch.

Have a great day!
Sandy