Wednesday, April 15, 2015

Tulsa, My Home Town

Today I've been thinking about how much Tulsa has changed over the years I have lived here.
The hospital I was born in (Burne Memorial...I think that's the spelling) has been torn down years ago and in its place at 15th and Peoria is a restaurant and a funeral home! 
My best friend, Betty and I used to take the bus downtown on Saturdays to "shop".  We really had no money to spend but it was so much fun to wander around in Vandervers and Dorothy's and eat lunch at Nelson's.  It was safe, we felt like real adults and even if it was hot and stuffy, we didn't care.
I remember buying my Mom a blue glass ash tray.  My Mom didn't even smoke but blue was a favorite color of hers and I thought it would be so pretty sitting on her dresser. 
Then Southland Shopping Center was built at 41st and Yale and we could just walk up the hill from our house and go shopping.  Brown Dunkin was my favorite store.  I could look around in that store forever and if I really, really needed a party dress or a girdle (oh, yeah!), I could ask the sales lady to call my Mom and see if she would agree to let me charge it to her account.
My sister loved TG&Y and spent a lot of time in that store.  And sometimes we would eat lunch in Walgreen's...oh yes, Walgreen's and we thought we were really something if we ate there.
Here we are again, talking about all the shopping, the hotels, the PAC, the Brady and Cain's....Pearl District, the Blue Dome....on and on, the blossoming of downtown Tulsa.
Tulsa, you've come back around.  You've rediscovered downtown and I for one am really glad that we are no longer digging up Main Street, one year it goes south, next year it goes north.....

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