Shalom:
What would our lives been like without I Love Lucy?
From 1951 to 1956, Americans weekly checked in to see what trouble the daff redhead would get into or cause.
I mean, can you really imagine not seeing Lucille Ball, Desi Arnaz, Vivian Vance and William Frawley?
Set in New York City brownstone, I Love Lucy centers on the lives of Lucy Ricardo, her singer/bandleader husband and their friends as well as landlords Fred and Ethel Mertz.
Lucy is as naive as she is daffy. An ambitious woman with an overactive imagination and a knack for getting herself into trouble as those around her. We know she her fiery red hair because of the often mention henna rinse. Lucy a scatter-brained homemaker a knack to turn an ordinary household chore into a complete and unprecedented disaster.
In short, she sounds like me.
And while she and her bandleader husband are happily married, Lucy dreams of being a star. her wild behaviour and crazy antics, she honestly yearns for stardom. It is the driving force behind her wild behaviour and zany attics. Lucy longs to join her husband in show business, yet Ricky wants her to remain home and be happy as his wife and one day to their children. Her bestfriends, Fred and Ethel are former vaudevillians and this only feeds her desire to get on the stage. Often it is pointed out that Lucy has few performance skills that commends her as a star. She really can't sing or dance and only able to play "Glow Worm" or "Sweet Sue or play anything other than off-key renditions of songs such as "Glow Worm" or "Sweet Sue" on the sax. Though with a little work, Lucy could have given Ricky a run for his money.
And that's the wonderful thing about I Love Lucy. Yes, it was the laughs, but Lucy Ricardo never said die. She was brave enough to run after her dreams.
And brave enough to get up after she fell flat on her face and start running again.
Boker Tov (Good Morning)
For the past few days, people have been sharing their favourite I Love Lucy episodes. So I thought it would be a good idea to share laughs and memories. In these days when so many people are having hard times, I thought we all could use a good laugh.
And I invite my readers to share your thoughts; I shall add them to the blog as well.
This is Desi and Lucille on their wedding day. Miss Ball, noted for her enjoying the company of older men shocked everyone when her attentions turned to the younger, tall, dark and handsome Cuban Desi Arnaz. This is when I Love Lucy really began.
Wanting to work with her husband, I Love Lucy was loosely based on a radio show she had starred in, My Favourite Husband.
Miss Ball wanted also to stay away from Hollywood glamour. Instead, she wanted to be a full-time homemaker, married to a Night Club performer, with dreams of stardom herself.
And the show was a hit.
" I would rather regret the things that I have done than the things that I have
not”
Lucille Ball
Boker Tov:
I love it when my friends, like Beth, leave comments. Not just because this way I know folks are reading our blog, but because their comments add so much.
Like Beth said in her last comment, Miss Ball never failed to bring a laugh to us. I hope one day to have the full seven years of I Love Lucy on DVD, but for now I just enjoy the last season I taped off TV.
One of my treasures is the Here's Lucy Show. My mother gave me the DVD set as a birthday gift few years ago.
By the time I was introduced to I Love Lucy, the show had been off the air for years, Lucille and Desi were already divorced and remarried to other people. But I still loved the show.
There was so much I leaned from Lucy; never give up, never stop dreaming. She wrote a lousy novel. But she still wrote a novel. She baked a huge loaf of bread, but she still baked bread. She got a charlie horse while dancing for the Queen, but she danced for the Queen. She was willing to at least try.
I remember in second grade school being asked to play the role of a teacher in the school play. I was so frighten. But then I thought, "Lucy would never pass this up!" So I threw my head back, put my hands on my hips and began to practice my grown up walk. Later, Mummy gave me an old pair of black high heeds and taught me how to walk in them.
Sadly, there are no pictures of me walking on stage in my mother's purple and black dress and black high heels, trying not to break my neck. But I was a hit.
Once the laugher died down and I could finally deliever my lines, I learned the power of making people laugh. How big people smile, how their eyes brighten. That for a brief moment they forget their troubles and pain. How it can heal. Even bring peace.
I would take my I Love Lucy videos with me when I worked as a Hospices Nurse's Aide. It was the highlight of my patients day as they recieved their daily dosage of laugher.
Even now, with all we are going through, Lucy's attics not only lifts our spirits, but gives us hope.
Lucille Ball left us much richer for the time she graced this planet.
Thank G_D, for the blessing of Lucille Ball.
"I'm not funny. What I am is brave."
Lucille Ball
Shalom:
Today, twenty-three years ago, one of this world's greatest treasures left us.
I remember that day well. On April 18, 1989, Miss Ball complained of back pain and rushed to hospital. Suffering from a dissenting aorta, Miss Ball went through an almost eight hour operation, receiving an aorta from a 27 year male donor. She began to recover quickly.
But then on April 26, just after dawn, Miss Ball awoke with server back pain. The aorta had ruptured in a second site and at 05:47 PST, Miss Ball was gone.
I remember being up and just applying a warm paste of henna to my hair. I started using henna at age six-teen years old and loved the way my hair looked. It was the closet I got to looking like my favourite actress.
As a hospices Aide, I carried video tapes of my favourite I Love Lucy shows. knowing they would bring joy to my patients. The power of laughter.
I remember reading about Miss Ball's sad childhood and how it was the fuel that drove her forth. While many who have lost a parent at an early age, had a step-parent who didn't like them, stern grandparents, have teachers who never thought they would amount to anything, Lucille set out to prove them wrong. Instead of striking out at the world in anger, she taught us to laugh. She taught us not to listen to those who said we couldn't sing, dance, write, paint and make our dreams come true. She taught us to get up and keep going.
Lucille Ball was a trail blazer. Not just as an actress. But as the head of the production company she began with her first husband Desi.
First airing in 1951, one can still find I Love Lucy on TV somewhere in the world. Where it is trying to talk Ricky into letting into his new show or trying to sneak eggs out to the hen house in her jacket past a sleeping Fred, she never failed to left us balled up in laughter.
We watched her handle trials with grace. When her first marriage ended due to Desi's cheating she and Desi remained good friends until his death, never speaking ill of him. She found love again and married Gary Morton. Her career continued, though shows after that, Lucy's character remained unmarried.
Miss Ball summed up her success in life this way: "getting rid of what was wrong and replacing it with what is right."
Desi summed her up well: "wanna woman!"
Set in New York City brownstone, I Love Lucy centers on the lives of Lucy Ricardo, her singer/bandleader husband and their friends as well as landlords Fred and Ethel Mertz.
