Ladies of a Certain Age ~ for those invisible powerful, dynamic, vital women

Well, I saw mine recently when I was making the turn from west Hamden Avenue to north University Boulevard in my hometown of Denver, Colorado.  I was headed to the King Soopers shopping center.

There she was – Jeannie Kay* – straddling her blue bicycle (actually, her blue roadster in honor or her hero, Nancy Drew) 60 years ago or so around 1955.

I don’t remember if this intersection had been paved yet back then.  Now, of course, it is paved, and “sports” three lanes in all directions and stop lights.  There is new brick wall at the northwest corner of the Southern Hills neighborhood that abuts the intersection.

Jeannie was just stopped there, wondering if she dare venture forward kitty corner across the intersection and ride down the dirt trail of the exclusive Cherry Hills Country Club neighborhood.  She was fearful she would be caught and then have to face the wrath and physical abuse of her father.

It wasn’t Cherry Hills she was interested in.  After all, she had already learned that money does not bring happiness.  No, she wanted to drive by the house of the famous star that had just married a very wealthy man that lived there.  She had never been so close to a legendary actress in her life and might never ever get to be that close again. (She had heard that Ethyl Merman had married Continental Airlines founder Robert Six.)

She did not cross that intersection.

As I remembered my younger self while I was stopped in that intersection, I marveled at the freedom we as women have today, and doubted we would have any inkling that a woman, who had no less been a First Lady (the supreme ranking of a woman in the 50s) would be running for President.

Jeannie, on her bike, knew “all about” the then First Lady Mamie Doud Eisenhower who grew up in Denver.  She knew her mother felt the previous First Lady, Beth Truman, was dowdy and the First Lady before her, Eleanor Roosevelt, “funny looking.”  In a few years, her mother would adore pretty fashionable Jackie Kennedy.

Today – like in 1955 – that intersection is in one of Colorado’s wealthiest areas with a fancy King Soopers, restaurants and boutiques We have seen Denver grown from less than 500,000 in 1955 to over 3 million today.

Any of us can shop at those stores.  We have our own credit cards – even if we have a husband – the Xcel bill is in our names or included with the names of our husbands.  We have little gadgets (cell phones) in our purses that can do even more that the watch cartoon character Dick Tracy wore.  And my where we have traveled – flying all the country and the world in Mr. Stix’ airplanes and others. (Jeannie’s mother never flew in a commercial airline.  She died in 1964.  Jeannie did not fly until she was in college, but her grandchildren flew as infants.)  Who would have ever dreamed – let alone our mothers – that you can even nap on a plane and wear blue jeans and a t-shirt to the airport.  When Jeannie was on her bike that day, women did not venture downtown without hats, gloves and high-heel shoes.

But, that little girl on that bike had gumption and guts and drive and although the fear of her father’s anger stopped her that day – she continued to ride that bike.  Shortly before her father died when she was 39, Jeannie was visiting him in the hospital wearing her “interview suit” since she was looking for a new position.  He looked up at her and said, “I’m so proud of you, Stinky (his term of endearment for her.)  He would never know how much her head would hurt  from bumping it on glass ceilings in years to come nor how proud she is of her granddaughter zooming down the road on her bicycle with that  sticker on it stating, “Girl Power!”

Have you seen your little girl lately? What personality traits does she have that have served you over the years? Where has she been?

*In 1995, I legally changed all three of my names from Jeannie Kay Verhey to Elizabeth Jeanne Wheeler. Verhey was my married name.

Copyright – Elizabeth J. Wheeler, May 1, 2016