Posted tagged ‘Perry Mason’

“Do you realize if it weren’t for Edison we’d be watching TV by candlelight? “

September 14, 2014

The morning is again chilly. It is almost officially the fall so I guess I shouldn’t be surprised. All the doors and windows are closed so I’m comfortable here on the couch even with bare feet. The red spawn was at the feeder this morning, but it ran away as soon as I got on the deck. The spawn knew the hose was next.

It was raining last night when I went to bed. It wasn’t a heavy rain but was enough for Gracie to get her business done quickly. She didn’t even go far enough into the yard to trip the sensor lights. She was back in the house almost immediately. I totally understand.

When I was a kid, TV was still bit of magic. I never questioned how Superman flew. I just knew he did, and he always flew to the same music. Glasses were the ultimate disguise. I knew Perry Mason would never lose. That didn’t bother me at all.  Perry Mason was the hero. Poor Hamilton Burger was just hapless. Lieutenant Tragg always wore a fedora out side. I do remember Perry losing one, but he exonerated his client just as she was going to the electric chamber. Of course he did. I didn’t watch all the westerns. I did watch Roy and Dale, the Lone Ranger and Hopalong Cassidy. The whole family watched the Wild, Wild West. I remember Dobie Gillis, Sergeant Bilko and Joe Friday. We watched all the Quinn Martin productions. I remember the voice announcing at the beginning of each show,”A Quinn Martin Production.” The Invaders were one of my favorite shows. David Vincent went all over the country looking for people with weird, stuck out little fingers. By the end of each show, he had convinced another person to believe that aliens on Earth existed, that they were dangerous, and that he needed their help. The Fugitive was another QM production. Dr. Kimball is chased all over the country by Lieutenant Gerard. Kimball is really a good guy trying to find the real killer of his wife. He is hunting the one-armed man. Like David Vincent, Dr. Kimball was usually able to convince someone that he was innocent, and they usually help him getaway just before Gerard shows up. We all wanted him to find the one-armed man.

On Star Trek and Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea, the crew leaned to the left or the right when their ships were fired upon. The camera moved with them. That was an old time special effect. I never made fun of it, never even questioned it, though I do chuckle a bit now.

“Go confidently in the direction of your dreams. Live the life you have imagined.”

September 22, 2012

Yesterday the rain left the day humid and damp. Late last night it rained again. This morning is dark and gray. I have absolutely no inclination to go out and about. I might not even get dressed. My iPad has a few new books, perfect ones to while away a day, books with good guys and bad guys, buried treasure and a few murders. I might even watch a bit of TV. Today is deadly bug day on Syfy with wasps, alien insects set on world domination and monstrous spiders. The bugs are the opening act for tonight’s new movie about spiders from the Middle East called camel spiders who have a taste for humans.

I think the young me would approve of the much older me. Back then I had huge dreams and all sorts of ideas about who I wanted to be and where I wanted to go. I saw myself as a lawyer, maybe even the first female Perry Mason, or a teacher, an inspirer, and I knew I’d travel the world to visit places from the pages of my geography books. Even though I was growing up in the 50’s I never thought of being female as limiting, never even realized that a dress and pearls were de rigueur. I always knew I’d go to college even though no one in my family ever had. My best friends in high school were two guys, and we did all sorts of neat things and pushed the boundaries as far as we dared. My friends and I roamed Cambridge, Harvard Square, when it was the neatest place. We were comfortable just about anywhere. Once we celebrated Mardi Tuesday with a picnic at the library where we sat hidden between the stacks on the third floor. We thought of ourselves as rebels. We saw foreign movies with subtitles and felt worldly. We were daredevils sledding with our toboggan on hills everyone avoided. The bumps sent us airborne.

I learned long ago that life is an adventure to be savored, and in all these years, I have seldom been disappointed.

“The cowgirl faces life head on, lives by her own lights and makes no excuses.”

June 3, 2011

Both Fern and Gracie huddled beside me in bed this morning, one on the left, one on the right. From the opened window I could feel a cool breeze blowing. I nestled deeper, got warmer and slept a little longer. It will be sunny and in the high 60’s for the next few days going down to the low 50’s at night. I love this sort of weather though I could do without the chilly breeze.

I remember being asked what I wanted to be when I grew up. When I was really young, I toyed with cowgirl for a while impressed as I was with Dale Evans, her horse Buttercup and her great wardrobe. I think that was my fringe stage. Later, when I was older, I wanted to be Nellie Bly and travel the world writing as I went. A library book was what inspired that choice, but Nelly Bly went the way of Dale Evans. I was a candy striper for a while and that turned me off nursing. Luckily, though, as I got older, people stopped asking, and I was off the hook for needing to plan my future. I finally figured out the growing up question was merely a way for adults to make conversation with a kid, and nobody really cared though cowgirl did get a few laughs at my expense.

I did wonder what I was going to be. I never gave president a thought because I was a girl, but I figured just about everything else, except a priest, was an option. I decided to be a teacher and planned college around that choice, but I changed my mind. I decided to be Perry Mason, the female version, so I took the lsat, did well and applied to law school. I got in, but I didn’t go.

It seems a bit of Nelly Bly and even some Dale Evans and Happy Trails had stayed around. I went to travel the world. I went to Africa. I rode a camel though I didn’t wear any fringe. I would have liked to though. Fringe would have been just about perfect.