I Got the Fever

"It's spring fever.  That is what the name of it is.  And when you've got it, you want - oh, you don't quite know what it is you do want, but it just fairly makes your heart ache, you want it so!"
  - Mark Twain



 

Joan Crawford in "Spring Fever" - 1927


I think this is a lovely picture of a very young (20-ish) Joan Crawford just two years after arriving in Hollywood and changing her name from Lucille LeSueur, which I really don't understand at all, since the French-sounding cabaret-esque name sounds far superior (to me) to the newer one. "Lucille LeSuer" rolls off the tongue, while "Joan Crawford" gets stuck in the back of the throat. I wasn't around, though, to correct this travesty, so the deed was done.

Did you know that little Lucille grew up in Kansas City? Her family moved there when she was about ten, but she went to school, worked there, and eventually even spent a little time at Stephen's College in Columbia, Missouri, before dropping out and moving back to join a dance troupe in Kansas City.

Lucille worked at Emery Byrd Thayer department store as a teenager. That's the department store downtown that my mother would take My Twin and me to (years later, of course) to do our New School Year shopping each August. We would shop all day for school dresses (not actually buying more than one or two each...Mom was a gifted seemstress and 'knocked off' most of what we tried on) and have lunch at the Emery Byrd Thayre tea room. Wonderful memories.

Anyway, Lucille...oops, Joan's movie, "Spring Fever," is a 60-minute silent film about a golf groupie (they existed back then...who knew?) who falls in love with a charming but poor professional golfer who pretends to be rich. Years later, Joan would remark that the film was "a waste of everyone's time and money. God, golf is dull on film."  Well, some things never change. I guess that one won't be lining up in the Netflix queue.

Me, oh, my. Is anyone else feeling it? I have a very bad case of theUgh-I-need-to-move-outdoors-but-I-know-it's-not-quite-time-yet malaise of some sort. I'm anxiously awaiting fair skies, gentle breezes, and warmer temperatures, but rather than filling me with nervous energy, this year's Spring Fever has made me lethargic with daydreaming, imagining, and distraction.

Paralysis is setting in. I find it more and more difficult to tend to my work, my tasks, my chores. The only cure will be blue skies and sunshine, yet I continue to languish, wrapped in the not-so-warm gray chiffon skies of winter.


Jo Floyd Lucas in "Spring Fever" - Paris, 1995

 This is a picture of tree-hugging me on a wonderful outing to the Bois de Boulogne in the heart of Paris. I was slightly older than Joan  was in her photo (like, double her age), but both share a similar dreamy, spring fever feel. I might have missed my calling, now that I look at it. Does anyone still make silent films?

The Bois de Boulogne is to Paris what Central Park is to New York City, except two and a half times larger. Really a system of gardens and parks withing the park proper, it's filled with pristine ponds and nature trails, rose gardens and oak forests, meticulously groomed grounds and authentically wild growth. One could spend weeks exploring the magical vignettes within this wondrously vibrant oasis. I've been longing to go back there and become the Henry Stanley ("Dr. Livingstone, I presume?") of the Bois de Boulogne. 

In my distracted,daydreamy malaise of Spring Fever, that's exactly what I've been doing.

Do you have the fever, too? How do you cope with it? I wonder if it's contagious, this awful fever? How do we keep it from becoming an epidemic? Oh, bother...I'm getting all worked up again. Now I must go lie down and flip through my photo album to settle down. 

I hope you have a wonderful, nearly-spring day today.

This is the quintessential music to illustrate my case of Spring Fever this year...Mendelssohn's "Spring Song". I know you won't be able to listen to it without thinking of this little guy...

Pepe Le Pew in "Spring Fever" - c.1962


That's okay...I can't either...Enjoy!