Liza Blue

Born in 1952, I am the only daughter with five brothers.  You might have thought my mother would have doted on her only daughter, but she didn't provide any advice on what it meant to be feminine.  She never said to me, “Oh, you look so cute in that dress, let’s put a bow in your hair.”  She never spent time dressing herself for a party, no hairdos, no daubing on make-up, no discussing which dress to choose from her limited wardrobe.  She'd scrape a comb across her hair, take a quick look in the mirror, grab her purse and she was ready to go.  Her purse only contained a nail file and a tube of ChapStick – so distinct from the bulging purses of other mothers.  I could understand the ChapStick, but the nail file mystified me.  What fingernail emergencies could occur at a dinner party?  She told me that it had been there for years and she figured she might as well leave it there. 

Other mothers might refer to the “beauty parlor.”  My mother called it the “beauty store,” as if beauty was not innate, it was a commodity that could be purchased.    She only went to the beauty store for haircuts, never perms or dye jobs.  This was in the 1960s when Clairol’s slogan was “Only your hairdresser knows for sure,” when dark roots would be a social catastrophe.  She told me, “Once you fall into that dye pot, you’ll never get out.”  I had seen TV moms with those perms and dye jobs,  June Cleaver among them, and maybe Donna Reed.  My mother looked nothing like them.

I thought she was kidding when she told me people said she looked like Ingrid Bergman and my father looked like the 1950s dreamboat actor Tab Hunter.  There was unexpected pride in her voice, implying that she knew that she was pretty enough to land a heart throb as a husband.  A few days ago, I was sifting through some family albums and found a rumpled picture of them taken at their 1950 wedding.

Well, there it is.  Yes, I can see it now.  Wow.  Who knew?