Peggy o’ my heart is now a grandmother

By Ron Kantowski

Thursday, July 30, 2009 | 3:44 p.m.

NOW

Peggy Fleming is a senior citizen. I can't believe it. It seems like only yesterday she was twirling around the ice in Grenoble, France, in that little lime green dress. Or maybe it was yellow, because color TVs didn't have automatic tint control in those days.

Anyway, Dick Button, the figure-skating analyst, was saying all these nice things about her and some other things I didn't understand. What the heck is a Salchow, anyway?

But it didn't really matter. I was nine years old and remember asking my mom if Peggy Fleming could be our babysitter the next time she and dad went down to the Elks Lodge for drinks.

On Wednesday, Peggy Fleming was the special guest at the official send-off for Las Vegas' qualifiers to the 2009 Summer National Senior Games in Palo Alto, Calif.

Peggy Fleming. Senior Olympics.

Man, I'm getting old.

And that was before they put Bruce Springsteen on the cover of the September-October AARP magazine.

THEN

After Dorothy Hamill won the gold medal in figure skating in the 1976 Winter Olympics, a lot of girls cultivated her hairstyle. My high school girlfriend was one one of them.

But I still have no idea what a Salchow is.