Lettie
The most admirable dedicated career woman I have ever met. Small town relationship banker. She was not my boss but she was very much Queen of the bank at which I worked. She was in her late seventies, well dressed in the best of suits always sporting a broach. She walked slowly on tiny heels. She held on to desks as she moved through the department. She was a bit shaky. She wore her hair in a beehive. Every Thursday morning at 9 am she had a standing appointment to get her hair washed and set. She was the quintessential figure of her time. A permanent fixture of the bank since its founding thirty years earlier.
Tiny but mighty and a shining example of everything I hoped to be. A professional, career women well into my seventies. Lettie never smiled or laughed much, think Queen of England. She was always proper. The bank had three branches in a small town. A bigger out of state bank would soon gobble it up. But Lettie weathered the merger. She stayed in her office, located just inside the front door. It was the first corner office that overlooked the tellers and the lobby. Popcorn was made there every Friday for the patrons. The busy days back then were the 1st and 3rd of the month. On the 1st, social security recipients who were veterans would line up. On the 3rd, regular retirees came to line up. Lettie knew almost all the customers by name.
Lettie had a tiny accent, originally from the south. But the air of which she projected seemed of an east coast socialite. Please, if you are a female let Lettie be the shining light of what we all can be. Don’t let society hold you back or throw you out at sixty. We all have the right to work as long as we like, wrinkles and all. Like a brook or a mighty river, keep cutting your own path in life.
Fabulous, Fun, and Frustrating, People 
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