I Love Lucy!!!

When I was a little girl, I Love Lucy reruns were shown in the mornings, at 9 AM.  Once my brothers and sister left for school, my mom would settle in to do the morning chores, like cleaning up after our breakfast and ironing.  She would turn on the black and white portable Philco TV that sat in a corner of the kitchen on a gold painted metal stand that was on rollers. 

I would follow my mom around and as she washed the dishes and did the ironing, I would settle in at the red formica table at which we sat to eat our meals.  When Lucy came on, I was riveted to the TV set.  I loved the show and even more than Lucy's antics and her friendship with Ethel, I loved the sense that the two couples sat down together every evening and watched TV and had conversations.  I enjoyed the arguments and the misunderstandings with the language and Ricky's accent.  I could understand the Spanish and it let me in on some of the jokes that not everyone was privy to.

I loved Lucy so much that I wanted to be her.  I wanted to know her.  When it was time for me to go to kindergarten, I refused to go because I didn't want to miss I Love Lucy!  I remember asking my mom to buy me a tiny television set that I could take to school with me and watch the show at my desk.  She laughed at me.  The year was about 1962 and there were no tiny portable television sets! 

Finally, I was placed in afternoon kindergarten and that suited me just fine because I could go to school and still watch Lucy.  On the first day of school my teacher, Mrs. Hart, asked the class if we had nicknames so she could put it on her list and she and the rest of the class would call us by our nickname.  I didn't know what that was so I asked her.  She said it was a name that we were called at home that wasn't our real name.  I smiled and nodded my head vigorously.  I told her my nickname was Lucy.  She said she couldn't call me Lucy because it wasn't part of my name.  I was devastated so I settled for my middle name, Joy.

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Now I am far from the little girl I was when my family lived at 321 N. 7th Street, but I still love Lucy.  In fact, I am watching Lucy reruns as I write this.  I watched the episode where they are in Italy and she stomps grapes like the locals do.  That was followed by the one where they have a birthday party for Little Ricky and Lucy dresses up as Super Man and gets stuck outside on the ledge.   There's another episode beginning now so I have to run and watch!