When My Life Changed - Again

Mother's working changed it, for better or for worse.

In the early 1960’s, most mothers (rather those of my friends) didn’t work unless they absolutely had to for financial reasons.  Our mothers carpooled, helped with homework and of course had chocolate chip cookies ready after school. They were home when their husbands returned from work and cooked dinner or supervised their maids.

The girls/daughters religiously watched The Mickey Mouse Club and Father Knows Best, the latter as if it were gospel.  We all believed in (sic) perfect marriages or at least, I thought the other girls did. I didn’t because I didn’t have a father and lived on the 6^th floor of an apartment building.

All I wanted was to live in a house and have a (forbidden) puppy rather than a goldfish named Rover.

Yes, my mother worked which took precedence over childrearing. However, if you’d asked her, she’d claim she had to. Still, I always suspected Mother’s working was as much for her ego and to show the world, OK, the DC world, that she was superior to other women who stayed home and went to the country club and to charity lunches. 

Mother prided herself in doing her best for me.  Considering her pressures and limitations, she (kinda) did.  

I ranted and railed about wanting to stay home and I would have preferred if I’d been attached to her hip.  I was the consummate Mother’s girl, but between life (meaning hers) and her cancer, she opted to send me to boarding school.

Mother tried to shield me from the realities of an a-typical life and felt it was the best option.  Each day, I’d anxiously wait in front of the wooden mailboxes hoping she’d write. Homesick should have been my middle, or even my first name. Even though I was one of the tallest, and in many ways the most sophisticated, I was undoubtedly the youngest and graduated at 16.  

Mother did write and I was armed with envelopes that were pre-addressed and stamped, so there wouldn’t be any excuses for my not writing. Her letters were invariably typed and always ended with, “Stand up straight” and “Darling, watch your diet.”

She was 100% right about diet because the school insured its boarding students were well-fed. Well-fed was synonymous with gaining weight. I don’t remember ever complaining about the food and loved when the caring and overweight Polish cooks, served the Mississippi Mud Pie dessert that oozed chocolate. I left for school a big girl and returned a fat one.

Mother’s letters always arrived in one of her legal-size business envelopes that had her business name and a thin gold stripe on the edge. As soon as I saw one sticking out of the mailbox, I immediately knew it was from her.  What I didn’t imagine is that she’d kept every letter I’d ever written plus a carbon copy of every letter she’d written me.  Of course, she kept all of my report cards and commented on what the teachers wrote.

Mother was a compulsive editor and wasn’t shy about telling anyone, and everyone, about their grammatical errors. When I was older, she’d edit my published articles and fax them back hoping I’d learn.

However, imagine my horror (please remember, I was 16-years-old) when I saw one of Mother’s signature envelopes sticking out of my English teacher’s mailbox. Hèlene Cantarella was undoubtedly the best teacher I ever had but scared me to death. Small in stature, she used to bellow (in her heavy Italian accent) “VINER, you can do better.” I immediately wanted to hide under my desk and had nightmares about getting F’s in her class.

But even this teacher would commit the ultimate grammatical sin when she wrote that my reports should be more “fulsome.”  Mother didn’t miss a beat in responding that my reports should have been “fuller” since they were clearly “fulsome” enough. After that correspondence, I never could tell whether Mrs. Cantarella looked at me with anger or perhaps enhanced understanding.

In truth, Mother was extraordinarily competitive and excelled in everything she set her mind to do. She was usually the best dressed even though by no means the most expensively, set the best table and carried on the best conversations. She was a champion listener and did her homework/research before venturing out or meeting others. She was acutely aware she never graduated from college and compensated. Even though she wasn’t a first-rate actress on stage, she aced it in real life.

For example, Mother was a class A Scrabble player; 13-letter words never eluded her.  I’ve never recovered from her saying, I could’t do anything as well as she could except “breast-feed,”  which I remember as if she said it yesterday. I guess so since Michael and I were bottle fed. In later years, she admitted I was a better cook and was pleased to delegate that role.

When Mother opened Jeanne Viner Associates on Jefferson Place in 1962, I was in boarding school. I’d brag to classmates about how my mother was a professional, as if she were unique and doing something strange and wonderful. In retrospect, she was.  Her DC public relations agency, the first owned by a woman, employed exclusively women. It served as a training ground for a generation of females who entered the profession. She mentored many women who went on to have distinguished careers.

Among her clients were some DC restaurants. When I was on vacation, I went to eat in some of them because Mother had to work. I loved going to Trader Vics for pu pu platters and Shirley Temples adorned with tiny umbrellas. 

I’d occasionally accompany her when she went to her French restaurant clients and innately knew their food was special.  I wonder how much subliminal influence the French restaurant scene had on me.  When Jean Louis opened, I was thrilled to go to the Watergate, where I was allowed to sit at a desk in the kitchen and silently watch the cooks doing prep work. Jean Louis Pallidin was very French and very precise when it came to his cuisine

Mother was elected president of the American News Women’s Club and would have liked it if I’d followed in her footsteps. But that was the last thing I wanted to do. Being extremely dyslexic, plus crippled with anxiety, made a career in communications out of the question – or so I thought.

When I was in my last year of high school, Mother decided to move from the Westchester Apartments to a townhouse near Dupont Circle.  I was furious because I always wanted to live somewhere where my friends wouldn’t didn’t have to be subjected to the building’s security.

Why did Mother decide to move when I was off to college in a couple of months?  It was clearly no fair.

By that time, Mother was madly in love with a very married man, whom of course, I didn’t like.  Dana was Mother’s Svengali and convinced her she should combine her home and office. He also bought her a Smith and Wesson gun since we moved to a more dangerous part of DC. Mother had numerous lovers but none affected me as much as Dana. It’s as if I decided to turn on the competitive button and misbehave, or as a therapist would say, act out too.

And boy did I misbehave and had to leave home in order to survive - and not kill my mother. Nor vice versa. To say the least, it was a more than tense time.

But that’s another story for another day.