Why Vintage... Why Ziggy?

First of all, WELCOME. Secondly, you might be wondering why I called my blog Vintage Ziggy. I wondered too, so I looked up Vintage in the dictionary and here's what I got:

1. The year in which the grapes used in making a particular wine were harvested.

2. Wine made from a particular harvest of grapes.

3. The harvesting of grapes for wine

4. A wine, expecially an excellent one.

5. The period of time when something appeared or began or when somebody was born or flourished. (Hmmmm...)

Do I see myself as old grapes, sour grapes, or perhaps an ice wine? Or am I just playful or an ole hermitage?

I've been out of the limelight for quite a while now. I've come to realize that I've enjoyed it profusely. For the first two years of retirement I slept. Then I cleaned out all of my closets. That took about another two years. Another realization is that I never need to shop again I've accumulated so much apparel while I was in showbusiness. But I will... I most certainly will.

In the midst of the purge I decided I would start working on a new book-- a contra-factual novel about a famous literary southern belle. This set me out on a roadtrip through the United States from Toronto to Asheville, North Carolina, then through the gorgeous pines of Georgia to Montgomery, Alabama, my heroine's home town.

I loved Montgomery within five minutes of my arrival. There she was, totally Greek-Revival against a blue, blue sky. I saw a mockingbird sitting on a windowsill of a bank on Dexter Street singing to itself in the glass.

Within the half-hour I was asked whether I wanted a job as a tour guide at the Union Station. I really wanted to accept and spend the rest of my years wasting away in that smally, sleepy, sultry town.

Here are the other things I loved:

The Curb Market
The beef and gravy, broccoli casserole and German Chocolate Cake at Martha's on Sayre Street.
All the people who asked "How are you?" and meant it.
Being called Miz Ziggy
Winter Place--a decaying mansion on Mildred Street that's right out of Tennessee Williams.
Red Clay.
Early Spring.
Jasmine.

Oakwood Cemetary was by far my favorite place. I searched with my spouse John, for a grave built in the side of hill that Zelda Fitzgerald, (known as SAYRE) in Montgomery , wrote about in a personal letter to F.Scott Fitzgerald who used it verbatum in his short story The Ice Palace:

"It was covered with weepy,watery blue flowers that could have grown from dead eyes. I wanted to feel William Wreford 1864."

Well we walked all around and through little wrought iron gates and along steps and crevices and I looked very, very hard for it. I was so determined that I completely lost track of John who had walked way to the back of the cemetary and heard him shout amidst the shrubs, "I found it!". And there it was-- a rusty iron vault totally built into the side of a hill with a lock on it that Zelda herself tried to wrestle with in 1918. Only she got the date wrong. The vault was inscribed William Wreford, 1873. Somehow 74 does seem and sound better. Her instinct was fantastic. John found the vault because he saw the blue weepy watery flowers first! They led him there. Very, very romantic.

At any rate, my book was written and is flawed. There is something totally wrong with it and I need to go south again to figure it all out. I'm going in February. I am so happy there!

You see, I am a literary detective. When I get back to Montgomery, all I'll need to do is close my eyes a little and sqint.. and then I'll see everything just as Zelda did.