Not
that sinners, reprobates and sly offenders didn’t live there [in San Bernardino] like anywhere else. A headstrong girl
turned down a man high up in the church because of his white-filmed eye and the
fur on his tongue (and got the licking of her life). One time a calf was
stolen, the Roberts lost a shift off their clothesline, pies had vanished
cooling on a sill. But of course that could have been thieving Mojaves. The
Lord’s name was taken in vain, the Ten Commandments went against. Many a wife
and house had been coveted. Maid-servants would have been coveted too, oxen and
asses also, had any lived around there at the time, which none did.
--From Variation West
"But of course that could have been thieving Mojaves" - oh, how much she could say with a single line! Nancy, I always wondered about Grandpa Bannon. Do you know of a real-life basis for that story (and Clara pursuing the widower, and Ishmael at the laundry, et al)? Her characters are so vivid and real, I'd swear she was describing them from memory.
ReplyDeleteI don't know of any real-life basis for Grandpa Bannon, Clara, and Ishmael, but there certainly could have been. I'm sure that growing up in Salt Lake City (until about age 11) and Albany, Oregon, with many neighbors and many relatives in both her own family and her stepfamily, she saw, heard of, and noted with her sharp mind a lot of interesting events, circumstances, and characters. Her mother, Lulu (known as Lula) Olsen Kennelly Parker, did work in the Troy Laundry in Salt Lake City at age 15 or 16, so Ardyth no doubt heard from her mother what that was like.
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