In the 1970's, my family moved from a San Francisco rental to a cozy house
on Ash Avenue in Corte Madera. In those days there was no pristine
cobblestone-laden Village Shopping Center, no fancy-pants Nordstrom with a
Baby Grand in the men’s department, nor a conveniently located Williams-
Sonoma for that must have polished-copper fondue pot.
No, back then, amid acres of crumbling black asphalt, marshland and dust,
we shopped at the spartan Corte Madera Center. Its Woolworth and JC
Penny’s, 1950’s-era stalwarts, provided shoppers with Kraft cheese,
Halloween candy, or a whole selection of leisure wear. Whatever we needed.
We’d stop at Cala Foods, pick up hamburger meat, and grill it over
smoldering charcoal in our UFO-shaped orange Webers. On calm summer
evenings, pink skies carried the thick smells from our salty slough and the
low gravely thunder of kids on Big Wheels echoed in the distance.
Corte Madera was magical because the nights were darker, the stars were
brighter, and there was a giant Don Quixote statue made of driftwood and
junk who guarded the freeway, standing watch over our little hill town at the
foot of a small mountain.
