Oh, yeah, I don't dust--at least not as often as I should obviously. But these cobwebs are never where you usually dust--on furniture or mirrors or pictures. I am certain that they take pride in hiding until the company arrives and everyone is sitting at the dinner table. Then for some reason they demand your attention to be turned upwards and there it is. A delicate and kinda pretty piece of art hanging gingerly on the chandelier. Usually the spider has sense enough not to remain there and get caught.
I can never keep my mouth shut when I see such an "art piece"--thinking that everyone has probably noticed it already. So I bring it to every one's attention and laugh.
Well, this weekend some cobwebs in my head have been dusted off.
Here is how it happened. After the birthday dinner for Nanny, aka Mom and Bobbie, my sister-in-law brought out a DVD full of home movies from the fifties. Oh, but you may say, "Borrring," but absolutely not--at least to most of us. Poor Ritchie, Meredith's cute husband, got a good nap during the showing.
But this was not your typical home movie from the archives of your in-laws. This was also MY documentation from those same archives. The Jones's and the Strother's have been great family friends since 1956 so many of the events filmed included our family.
Some of the images still lingering in my head are of Keith--one of him with a bright red beret jauntily placed on his head. He has always sported caps quite well.
There were movies of our beautiful sisters wearing formals for the GA Coronation ceremony. I'm sure Mom had made those frilly dresses for Lynda, Lana, and me. I, too, was in the ceremony having completed the "Maiden" level. Now stunning auburn-haired Janice was "Queen Regent" with cape, scepter, and crown. Wow! I am still impressed with that.
Reaching each step in GA's was quite a feat. In the 50s, GA's was a big deal. Completing your "steps" was most important and very time-consuming. There were many, many scriptures to memorize, many officers in the Baptist Convention to memorize, many missionaries to be familiar with and what countries they lived and worked in. Learning all that was one thing, but then there was a oral test given by the leaders of the GA's. Talking about intimidating. But all of us girls reached at least Queen or Queen with Scepter. Janice reached the top!
So the coronation was filmed with all of us reverently participating, even Keith--I think he was the crown bearer or something. But he was dressed to the nines as well in his little white sports coat and curly hair barely tamed.
Nevertheless, there were lots of those special events filmed but also many of the everyday lives of the two families. There were the going-off-to-school movies on the first day of school of Janice and Keith. There was a segment of the Levy Dads' Club from Levy Elementary School painting the flagpole and doing some maintenance on the rocky, grass-free playground with the steep metal slide, the monkey bars, a few swings and a baseball diamond of sorts. In the background were the iconic cars of the fifties. Back then they were just are cars. Now? Wow!
Then we saw that Raymond had filmed our first grade classroom with Keith holding the flag with great purpose and seriousness. I was filmed reading aloud to the class. I'm sure I was quaking in my party shoes doing this because I was quite shy back then, but I looked good doing it. I had on my pearls (obviously, accessories were important to me even then), a cute little white bolero and my curly hair was coiffed perfectly. I'm sure my mother saw to that.
We even recognized through the cobwebs in our heads some familiar faces--some we could recall their names like Becky Page, Larry Robertson, and Lonna. Some we almost could! You know what I mean.
We saw our most favorite teacher ever, Mrs. Butts. She looked so young in that movie; I had always thought of her as an old but terribly sweet lady; she was probably in her thirties.
We saw Keith playing in his red firetruck. We saw Lane handsomely looking on as his younger siblings played with those Jones' kids. We saw Lana, so pretty and out-going, and me hamming it up--or shall I say "the little girls" which was how we were referred to back then. We saw cute little Lisa, the baby to us all, toddling around dressed in her pretty bonnet and short fancy dress. We admired Lynda so grown-up and eloquent. We saw Lynda's and Lana's ponytails. (Why didn't I ever have a ponytail? So jealous!)
We saw the trips to Bald Knob and Searcy in which they would visit their beloved relatives.
We saw on one such trip Bobbie with a pistol in her hand taking target practice. Now, that was something I never knew about her. She looked pretty comfortable there too. Hmmmm. But what a steady arm and beautiful face! Wow!
I wish you could see all the movies. No doubt you may have the same reaction as Ritchie. But I must say they are life in the 50s. They are our memories of a simpler time.
Oh, how great the memories. Bobbie said it all when she said, "Those were the good old days." Surely they were. There was such an innocence and freedom seen in those movies. There was such camaraderie and love between those families. Little did we know that the threads being woven during that era would be there for generations. Those delicate but strong threads have surely spun a loving and long-lasting web.
I think I shall forevermore have a greater respect for those cobwebs supervising any of our dinner parties. I shall know that they represent the cobwebs in our minds and with luck we can dust them away and find more treasured memories. Oh...I so hope!
