1 post tagged “my mother's legacy”

A recent comment by AngeDe Terre got me reminiscing. I was born in the early 60's and my earliest memories are of my mother getting ready to go out. She was always on the go in those days. People said she looked like Lana Turner and while others who had come of age during the Depression, practiced thrift and economy, my mother's creed was quite different. She clearly remembered what it had been like to do without, and later to have to paint lines up the back of her shapely legs when silk stockings disappeared during the War. By the 50's, as a single mother slinging hash to make ends meet, she had to put her luxuries on lay-away. So by the time she met my father, she had clearly had enough of the "do without" lifestyle. With my dad to bankroll her, she more than made up for her early deprivations. She had accounts at all the best shops on the Square and her favorite words were, "Just put it on my bill. Matches will stop in and take care of it later."

I remember  her as she sat at her vanity applying pancake with a natural sponge and crimson lipstick with a retractable brush, putting on a Merino wool knit dress, and slipping on her alligator pumps, checking the lift on her beehive; but it was the smell of her that will probably stay with me as long as I live. After she had dressed, she would spritz herself with her signature scent, Youth Dew by Estee Lauder from the blue enamel bottle that fit just right in your hand.

Youth-Dew-Blue-Bottle

The Oriental spiciness of it mingled with the SenSen breath mints and tobacco smoke, and she would envelope me in all of it all as she bent down to kiss me goodbye and remind me to be good. Then off she'd zoom in her '65 baby blue T-Bird. She was quite a dish, I think.

It's interesting to me, that all the old ads I 've seen for that car, when they featured women at all, always had them waiting expectantly in the passenger seat. Lois expected a lot, but she never waited for anyone or anything. And she certainly didn't travel in the passenger seat. She was a force of nature and loved nothing better than cruising in her "Blue Bird". 

If I were to pick one legacy she left me, it would be that sense of brio and verve. She always appeared so strong and confidant. Later on in life, as her beauty, health, and finances waned, her outlook changed somewhat. But those earliest impressions stayed with me and made me a little more daring, a little more fearless than I might otherwise have been. I learned that women did drive fast cars and drive them well. They were strong and sure of themselves. If I am lucky, I may be able to pass some of that on to my own three girls.

Tbird