An Even C-Note.

Welcome To My 100th Post!

To celebrate I'm initiating the first in a series of posts featuring my art collection.  This humors me as most everything in my little cottage has been found in thrift shops.  There are a few pieces that have been given to me by the Artists, but mostly it is the Hollywood National Museum of Goodwill.

To start with let's look at the one thing I have that was handed down from the family.  In 1974 we went up to spend a long weekend at my Aunt and Uncle's house in Brielle, NJ.  They had a beautiful home with a swimming pool so we were dressed in swimming togs for most of the weekend.  At some point my Dad took a picture of my Mother.  Later, back in Maryland he took the snapshot to painter and commissioned a painting of it.  The guy did a wonderful job; it looks just like the original photo.  My Mother was 41 at the time and enjoying a period in which she was at the height of her looks.  She is wearing her favorite black velvet bikini with gold metal fastenings.

The painting is all at once very cheesy and terribly fabulous.  My Mother and I had an extremely difficult relationship.  Enmeshed and unhealthy.  But when I look at this picture, I am reminded that Dee could at times be a fine and fun gal!

Improbable - But True!

When I was around nine years old we lived, for a couple of years in beautiful Niagara Falls, NY.

While living here my mother was in the middle of her "Being nothing but a housewife experiment", which was ultimately a miserable failure.   Now don't get me wrong, she was a fine cook (made better by my father's instruction) an incredible and manic housekeeper.  As far as decorating, she could do much with little and she could even sew a little, when pressed.  It's just that this stuff bored her senseless.  And when bored, there was scotch.

One of the things that she did to alleviate her boredom, besides appointments with the Air Force Base psychiatrist and a Librium prescription, was to join the Officers Wives Club.  And amongst the many activities that the wives involved themselves in was a bowling league.

 

But this was no ordinary Officers-Wives-Club-ladies-bowling-league.  No.  It was a wig league.  Perhaps I'd better explain.  Upon joining and paying a member fee, each gal was given a catalog from a wig and hairpiece company.  They were then allowed to place an order for their choice of any cut, color and style of 100% human hair wig or wiglet.  

  

Then they met every Friday to have spirited competition at the local bowling alley.  At the end of the season, they received their wigs and held a big luncheon at the Officers Club and wore them.

 

What, you may be wondering, did my mother order?  Well fortunately for her, she had a little gayling son who encouraged her to get, what I knew would be, the best wig of the bunch.  And it looked exactly like this:

The wig would be employed for the next couple of years whenever my folks had a cocktail or dinner party.  And it was generally teamed with a 'down the block from Pucci' print one piece hostess outfit that had a halter top and palazzo pants.  

So let's hear it for the ladies who bowl.  And lunch.