Love in the City

I time-traveled the other day to downtown Los Angeles as it was in the early fifties. I just happened to see a photo online and I was completely entranced by it. This was another era, you understand, almost as distant as the horse and buggy days. The cars were all big gas hogs and everybody was cool with that. People may have murdered each other in private, but in public, they were polite. Unlike our present culture, they didn’t use vulgar or foul language in mixed company. A man would knock another guy down for that. They dressed up to go out, and they dressed their kids up, too. Anyway, back to the old photo…..
The streets were crowded with cars and people. The people were all dressed up like they did in those days. The men wore suits with ties and hats. The women all wore hats, too, and gloves. Does anybody remember those days before the hippies ruined it for all of us when we were required to wear pretty clothes? It was assumed that if you were a lady, you put your hat on to go out. Isn’t that amazing, considering our present, somewhat slovenly times?
There was a traffic cop in the middle of the picture and I realized with a shock that I remember seeing those guys. They would stand right out in the middle of all that traffic, waving their arms and blowing a whistle. They wore white gloves! Isn’t that cool? Imagine them standing there for hours, in the middle of all that air pollution, directing traffic like it was the most important thing in the world.
Bullock’s Department Store was in the photo. It was a mecca for shopping ladies. Actually, a few years later, in the sixties, I got a job at Bullock’s. I was a “tea room model”, meaning I wore the Junior Miss sizes and walked among the lunching ladies so they could check out my clothes while they ate. I guess it was good experience for something. Walking and smiling, maybe, at which I excel.
I searched the photo for a glimpse of Clifton’s Cafeteria but didn’t see it. Clifton’s used to have a tree inside the restaurant, right in the middle of all the diners, and there was a fountain, too. It was almost like eating in the wilderness. Nothing thrilled me more than to be taken to Clifton’s. What a grand and colorful array of food! Lot of it was food I wasn’t accustomed to and I always saw it as my opportunity to experience new taste sensations. I’m still somewhat bitter over the fact that I was never allowed to choose all the plates I thought attractive. I had to be content with what my grandmother thought was healthy for children. I had to wait years to try some of those dishes!
When Grandma took me downtown, we first had to take the Kern Avenue bus to the Jewish Cemetery where the trolley was located. Really, there were trolleys in Los Angeles in those days. They were a fun and inexpensive way to travel. We rode the trolley to another bus that took us to the shopping center of the world, or so it seemed to me. And don’t forget, we were all dressed up. And we had someplace to go! God, women love that, even little ones. I had fluffy dresses, shiny patent leather shoes, and a coat that Grandma buttoned all the way up to my chin, and my own gloves and purse, just like a grown up lady. The best part of my outfit was my hat. It seemed to always be adorned with little silk flowers. Is there a woman alive who doesn’t love hats?
There were crowds of people and Grandma used to hang on to my hand so tightly, she’d squeeze my fingers. Except for the squeezed fingers, I loved going downtown with her. Well, the whole point of this tour into the past is that on one of these excursions, I fell in love. What, you don’t believe in love at first sight?
Sometime the natural world will intrude on civilization. It intruded in the city by way of the wind that blew between the tall buildings. The gusts would swoop in unexpectedly and snatch at clothing. Men would hang on to their hats and ladies would hold their skirts. I wasn’t prepared for it the time it blew my new hat off my head and straight into the street! I screamed…..not a little girl shriek of alarm, either, but a real scream, like a mother would, maybe, who saw her child in the jaws of a ravenous beast. I mean I screamed real loud, OK? I tried to dash into the street after it but nothing on this planet could yank me from my grandmother’s trap-like grasp. I screamed again, pulled desperately toward the crowded street with its onrushing traffic. “My hat, my hat!”
Then, all of a sudden…..here comes the good part…..all of a sudden, in the midst of the dangerous wheels and honking horns, a figure, darting in and out, reaching down, grabbing the hat, running right over to me, my hat in his hand, holding it out to me, smiling like a movie star, smiling like a hero, smiling like it was fun to risk one’s life for a trifle.
I was transfixed. All my screams froze in my throat. I looked up, up, up into his hero’s smile, dimly hearing my grandmother thanking him, hearing her, “Say thank you, mejia.” I was so struck dumb with breathless admiration that when I opened my mouth, no words came out.
He turned away with a wave and Grandma pulled me on down the street. I clutched my hat to me, twisting around as I watched him make his rapid way up Sixth Avenue, watched him leave us there in that cement canyon, watched him stride into the crowd, growing smaller and smaller until he disappeared.