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The Last
SOA Newsletter ( Ladies Tea)
by
Diane Burgy
Thirty
dozen cookies, huge urns of coffee and iced tea adorned
the table for the Convention's Sunday Afternoon Ladies'
Tea. So, while our beloved husbands walked around a 100
degree parking lot asking Carroll Shelby to
"lean" on their cars for pictures (something
we're never allowed to do), the Ladies of S.O.A. sat in
air conditioned comfort enjoying the company of the Guest
of Honor, Jeanne Shelby.
Jeanne
Shelby was much the way you pictured her to be . . . full
of poise and always smiling. A soft-spoken woman who
loves the out-of-doors, she gardens and plants Bonsai
Trees as a past-time. Jeanne and Caroll Shelhy have three
children, the oldest a son who is 30 years old. However,
he is married and happily raising his own family.. some
people have all the luck. As Carroll Shelby was busy
signing autographs outside, Jeanne too. was kind enough
to sign Polaroid snapshots and name tags for our
scrapbooks.
As
usual, when two or more women get together, many things
were discussed: from Carroll Shelby, to the cars he built
to the hours of patient waiting until the Shelby is
tuned, polished and whatever, only to find that by that
time, it needs to be tuned, polished and whatever all
over again. It was at least comforting to learn that for
one afternoon, women from all over the United States got
together and found that all households had one thing in
common: "What the Shelby needs, the Shelby gets -
FIRST".
We
also discussed grease and how to get transmission fluid
out of underwear, and how hard we think we have it.
Perhaps,
if you can picture little 4'11" Susan Greene doing
hers, your grimmy chore will seem smaller. Her husband,
Dr. Bill Greene of Florida is blessed with an 18
1/2" neck and at least a 6'3' body to go with it.
She can barely load the washing machine since, one soiled
work outfit weighs almost a ton. Once the one outfit is
in the washer, the poor machine can hold no more. As it
goes through its cycle, banging from side to side, one
wonders if Dr. Bill has taken pity on her and rigged up a
conveyor belt from washer to dryer.
When
the Tea was nearly over, we were paid a visit by our Club
President Dave Bythewood. He discussed the club and
wanted to assure us that the wives were members too, not
just the men, and that anytime we had something to say,
to write it down and he would print it in the newsletter.
I'll bet there are a lot of wives who have a story to
tell about their Shelby lives with each other, knowing
that we're not alone.
A very
special thanks goes out to Tami Wagner, who organized the
Tea. It was a very nice idea to have, something just for
the ladies to do. Also, to be thanked are all the ladies
of the Kansas Region who baked the many dozens of cookies
enjoyed by us all.
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