In the late 1970’s my Gay Uncle Vern was having back problems. He was what in the business you would call a ladies “Rag Salesman.” He would travel from store to store selling wholesale women clothing. I volunteered to go with him. It was my job to unload the dress samples then roll the racks into the stores. We were in a very small town in western Nebraska. So far west that there were mountains in the background. Uncle Vern warned me that this would be a wild stop. The dressing rooms in this dress shop were the old town out west whore house quarters and still kinda were.
Up pulled a huge fairly new red Cadillac sliding to a stop in a country dust cloud. Out jumped Miss Lucy. She was in her 80’s wearing a white leather fringe country western outfit. Jet black hair with red, red, red lipstick. We were all set up in her favorite dressing room when Miss Lucy said, “You men folk like a drink before we get started?” Following Uncle Vern I said, “Yes” it was 8AM after all. She moved the curtain below the dressing table and pulled out a bottle of Jack Daniels and 3 not so clean dingy water glasses. She poured each a trip shot and said, “CHEERS” .
I soon found out why Uncle Vern loved this stop so much. Miss Lucy & her girls went on to buy over $6,000 in one hour. All finished Miss Lucy asked me if I would like to see her party room in the basement. Young & dumb I said, ” Yes.” With a flick of the switch on went the black lights. In the middle of the room was a big waterbed. Around the edges of the bed and strung everywhere were hundreds of Christmas lights. There were big bunch’s of plastic flowers that Miss Lucy has sprayed & painted gold.
After we finished talking about the decorations Miss Lucy asked me if I would like to try out the bed. OMG!!! I was out of that room so fast! I’m sure they were all laughing about me that night! Six months later is was January when Uncle Vern called me. He had just heard that Miss Lucy had passed away. With a smile in his voice he said that they had found her on the back steps of her house frozen to death. She had gone outside to get some ice, slipped and hit her head. There was a empty cup and bottle of jack close by. All she was wearing was a see thru red ‘peek-a-boo’. Everybody commented on this was how she would have liked to go. Age 88…..You just can Not make this Up.
