Not So Merry Mouseketeers

Wipe that goofy grin off your face, Mickey.  Everyone's very favorite Mousketeer died today. Sob! Annette Funicello has gone to the Clubhouse in the Sky.

The talent given to you and me
we must develop faithfully
so we can be good Mouseketeers.

The boys all wanted to "date" her, and we girls wanted to hate her, but we couldn't because she was so damned nice, and, really, in our hearts, we wanted to be her.  I had brown hair, so why didn't I look like Annette? Well, that would be genetic; once and "een" always an "een" so the best I could hope for was Doreen who looked like she came out of the same boiled-potato-face gene pool that I did.  


When she graduated to the beach blanket, I still wanted to be her.  Q: Why couldn't I have fun like Annette?  A: Because my mother was mean, and back in the 1960's good Catholic girls didn't wear two-piece bathing suits or show cleavage.



By the time Annette got around to shilling for Skippy peanut butter, I had long stopped worrying about being Annette.  For one thing, ours was a Peter Pan family, so I wasn't impressed with her taste.  For another, she and Frankie and the gang were way over on the other side of the Great Cultural Divide of 1967. Summer of Love didn't include any beach blanket bingo as far as I could tell. 

But she'll always live in my heart as my first style icon.  And while four years older seemed an awful lot back them, it's not a lot now, and I think "So young to go."  Maggie Thatcher also died today, but she was 87, and I certainly never thought of her as an icon of anything beyond annoying politics, although, come to think of it,  her helmet head hairdo did resemble Annette's.

So, on this sad day in Trouserville, let's raise a glass of milk and chow down on a peanut butter sandwich in honor of Annette Funicello, always and forever a good, good, good Mousketeer.