Blondie Aging and the Blondie Factor
.... by D. Grant DeMan
Despite the obvious drawbacks of becoming Old Folks, I feel some comfort in knowing that most everything else ages along with us. Seedlings we planted now block out the sun. Children and grandchildren grow up to write term papers we sweated long ago, and arduously journey through the life-bump terrors of youth we left in our misty past. When I open my morning Times-Colonist though, one glaring aggravating exception rages back at my ancient soul: Blondie. There I've said it and I'm glad.
In 1941 I vaguely remember standing on a wooden chair, the Winnipeg Free Press spread before me, taking reading lessons from the Chic Young account of Cookie's birth. She is the second child of Blondie and Dagwood, Alexander, as Baby Dumpling, having issued forth in the spring of 1934. That makes him two years older than me, and seven more than his sister. Tell me now: Does he look it?
Is it fair that these kids are still living at home, going to high school and enjoying a teen life, when I am of an advanced age? And their parents - married for sixty-seven years and still living in the same house - forced to support them? They must be in their nineties, for Pete's sake. In 1991 poor old Blondie began a catering business with Tootsie Woodley, who must be pushing a hundred, causing both Dagwood and buddy Herb to go into psychological shock. Marriage counseling as a golden wedding celebration? I think not.
It seems just last week that Arthur Lake, as Dagwood, screamed for Penny Singleton "Blooondieeeee!" from our RCA Radio, in contrast to the golden tones of announcer Bill Goodwin advertising Camel Cigarettes, and we witnessed their antics at the Plaza Theater movie show. They're long gone now, with Chic Young whose son Dean carries on their story while Denis LeBrun does most of the cartooning for the strip, following the death of Stan Drake in 1997.
Things were much different back in 1930. Blondie Boopadoop - yep, that's her maiden name - was a dippy, gold-digging, dance hall flapper, and Dagwood a dopey, loose-cannon playboy, heir to the J. Bolling Bumstead Locomotive Works fortune. Despite hearing from all and sundry that he was making a big mistake, Dagwood so wanted to marry Blondie that he went on a long hunger strike to gain the consent of his parents, but lost the family fortune in the process. Now that's what I call True Love.
And what a couple they made. Somehow Dagwood barely held on to his office job at the J.C. Dithers Construction Company for nearly seventy years, though I seem to recall he got himself fired a couple of times. He was constantly late for the bus, rushing pell-mell down the walk to hit poor Mr. Beasley, the mailman, scattering letters and packages everywhere; constantly making those mile-high sandwiches and taking naps and baths, disturbed intermittently by Elmo Tuttle, the neighborhood Dennis the Menace, or some annoying door-to-door gadget salesman. Daisy and her pups, especially Elmer, were always uprooting the placid home too. Somehow Blondie transformed herself from coquette into a quintessential wise - but not really bright - model housewife who kept it all together.
Meanwhile a huge industry grew up around this seemingly normal family. I loved my Blondie Big Little Books, watching the actors move comically in the corner when I ruffle-flipped the pages. She held the attention of the whole world not only in movies, and radio - with big guest stars like Fanny Brice's Baby Snook's - broadcast overseas during World War II, but also with hundreds of product spin-offs: lunch boxes, toys of all kinds, cook books, stories, mysteries and novels ad infinitum. Camel cigarettes did very well also. But no matter the millions of dollars they made, the Bumsteads, much to their credit, remained just the normal, humble, appealing family - translated into hundreds of languages - equally at home in Iran and Brazil.
Therein lies the problem of growing old. Gone are such favorite cartoon characters as L'il Abner, Mutt and Jeff and Smokey Stover. Where is the world is Allen's Alley, and Alley Oop? Little Orphan Annie now fades from the picture like Invisible Scarlet O'Neil. Apple Mary became Mary Worth and left her busy-bodying to others, it seems. Even the new guys on the block - George Shultz and Peanuts - alas are on reruns.
Only Blondie remains, bright and young, though the pups seem to have bought the farm. And I haven't seen Mr. Beasley for some time. Maybe Dagwood finally finished him off, I really don't know. And I won't condemn Alexander and Cookie as slow learners, but after a half-century don't you think it's high time they graduated high school and went to college, at the very least?
Sigh.
Pass the Geritol, hand me the Times-Colonist, and let's take a gander at what those folks are up to.
