Here’s looking at you.

It’s difficult to write about not being beautiful. It’s so easy to sound envious. Or self-pitying. People want to leap to your defense: Yes, you are! You’re a beautiful person! That’s not what I’m talking about. I’m talking physical beauty, the kind that gets you voted Hot rather than Not, the mathematic formulas that make up the perfect proportions of your body parts. I’m not talking about making the best of what you’ve got. I’m talking gorgeousness that comes from being kissed by the angels.

I’ve probably told this story before: Sometime in maybe week three of the Princess Diana Worldwide Mourning Tour, I wrote a column suggesting maybe, just maybe, the world had gone a little nuts and it might be a good time to step back and ask ourselves what, exactly, we were so upset about. A reader responded in a letter: “I wonder if you wrote that because you are envious of the attention Princess Diana is getting, because you are so plain.” This is what people think un-beauty is worth: That it makes you envy the dead. The beautiful dead, anyway.

Another story I’ve probably told before: Once, many years ago, I attended a horse show with a friend at the time, one blessed with the whole package — tall, slim, lovely,  great eyes. The show was at a hunt club in Snootyville, and I was happily surprised to find people were anything but. It was a gray, chilly, drizzly day, and we were watching one class at ringside, next to a large pickup truck parked at the rail. The door opened. “Would you ladies like a warmer seat?” the man inside said, inviting us in. My friend took the front seat and I slid into the back. It was a minute before I realized the man behind the wheel, now paying a great deal of attention to my friend, was judging the class. In the middle of doing a job he was being paid for, he’d taken the time to offer aid to the leggy beauty out in the rain. Her, and her less-attractive friend.

It was like that all day — merchants gave us close, helpful attention in the sales tents, the waiter at the restaurant where we ate lunch performed outstanding service with a smile. It took hours before I realized Snootyville was so welcoming not because we were wrong about the place, but because one of us had the sort of face and body that just makes people…nicer.

Over the years, I’ve seen great-looking women get extra everything — attention, praise, career advancement, and as to this last, I stand firm. I’ve seen it happen so many times I simply won’t argue it anymore. It happens, and it happens a lot.

If Princess Diana had led the exact same life she did, but looked like Princess Anne, would the world have collapsed in mourning her death? Would Sarah Palin be known outside Alaska if her looks hadn’t bewitched Bill Kristol? Do we even have to ask these questions?

Being born beautiful is like being born with a great deal of money. Like money, beauty comes with its own problems, but they’re problems anyone with the opposite set of problems would trade for. A gorgeous woman may complain that she never really knows if a man likes her for her, or for her face and body. The next time someone says this, suggest she go to a plastic surgeon and have some lumps of fat added to her thighs, or a bump to her nose, or maybe she could just shave her head or put on 35 pounds. Ha ha! Will never happen. You probably couldn’t even find a doctor who’d do such a thing.

Which brings me to Kim Novak, again. As much as I liked Farran Smith Nehme’s excellent take on the pathetic sight of Novak, now 81, showing up at the Oscars with her wrecked face, a tiny part of me was not kind. Poor pretty lady isn’t pretty anymore and can’t stand it, boo fucking hoo. If you’re invited to the Oscars at 81, you show up in a nice dress and you read from the cards, because if you can’t get over yourself by 81, what’s the use of anything?

But then I read Laura Lippman’s equally excellent take on Novak, on faces of both genders, on the way we see and don’t see ourselves.

I am generally unhappy with all photographs of myself these days. I look older, fatter, messier than I am in my head. When I pick up my iPad or iPhone, the reflection I see in those devices makes me shudder.

…Yes, beauty isn’t exactly my stock in trade and I am only a semi-public person. I am ridiculous. So all I could think was, God love you, Kim Novak. We criticize women for aging. We criticize women for not aging. We criticize women’s bodies. We criticize women for bad plastic surgery.

You know who doesn’t get criticized? People who look great and pretend they’ve never had surgery. Come on, someone must be getting terrific results or no one would do this. I wish that every person who walks a red carpet was annotated or wore a label, detailing exactly how much work they’ve had done. Not to shame them, quite the opposite. We need to stop lying about how people age. We need to own our Botox, our fillers, our nose jobs, our liposuction. Remember that crazy alibi in Legally Blonde, when the fitness guru accused of murder was getting liposuction and would rather go to jail than admit it? That happens in real life. Not the alibi, but the lipo.

I’m with Laura that we should probably all ease up on ourselves, starting with Kim Novak. But I’d like to reserve the right to be a little judgey about those of you were were kissed by the angels. I’d like you to come out and say, Yep, I’m very lucky, and I got that promotion because I batted my baby blues at my boss and he liked the shape of my ass. You probably deserved that job. Sorry-not-sorry. The friend who went with me to the horse show? She married her way richer boss. I found her on Facebook a while ago, a little wrinkled, a touch of gray, but with the same killer cheekbones. Lucky.

So, some bloggage:

What’s it like to walk across eight miles of Lake Michigan ice to North Manitou Island? It’s like this. Great photos.

What I said the other day about appreciating fashion as art? One aspect is how it relates to the times in which it is made. A good piece on the fashions of the 1930s.

Finally, Charles Pierce on Sarah Palin. A gas.

A long entry for what promises to be a long week. Expect scantiness later. We shall see, but onward we go.

Posted at 12:30 am in Current events, Popculch |
 

54 responses to “Here’s looking at you.”

  1. Deborah said on March 10, 2014 at 5:19 am

    The location of the ending of True Detective is indeed a real place http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fort_Macomb

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  2. ROGirl said on March 10, 2014 at 6:50 am

    I have experienced the effects of the beauty lottery from a similar perspective and have thought about how my life could have been different if I had been one of the lucky winners. Aging is not much fun, no matter whether you are Kim Novak or Kim Smith, but it can’t be easy when your looks have been the key to your success and you have to look in the mirror and see an old woman with lines, wrinkles and sagging jowls. The answer isn’t to end up looking like the Joker, but who is going to tell her that it’s too much? There’s always going to be a plastic surgeon who will do the work.

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  3. Jeff (the mild-mannered one) said on March 10, 2014 at 6:50 am

    Nancy, I appreciated all of what you’re saying here, but I also think the Kim Novak reaction was also largely about the fact that she seemed either high or in some kind of befuddled state that did not speak well of her, anyone close to her, or the Academy producers. Any snark about Novak online got a bunch of pushback about “why are you being so sexist about her aging when men look old, too” and I thought she looked better than plenty of women half her age…but why was she put on that stage? McConaughey was pretty impressive (I thought) in how he handled his supporting role for her. And clearly, I need to see “True Detective” when it comes out on little round shiny things; haven’t seen a bit of it, but all the buzz about “The King in Yellow” and Lovecraft has me curious.

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  4. Alan Stamm said on March 10, 2014 at 7:13 am

    Thoughtful, brave reflections, Nancy.

    I’d say it’s a beautiful post, but it deserves better than wordplay. I hope you write a memoir someday.

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  5. Julie said on March 10, 2014 at 7:54 am

    Thank you for this…true, every word. I have the misfortune of the tall, lovely, leggy younger sister, as well as the gaggle of quite-a-bit-younger fellow moms, and sometimes the burden of plainness weighs heavily. A professional opportunity looms, so we shall see if I can overcome the obvious. A boss once said of me, “She does the best with what she has.” Hmmm.

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  6. alex said on March 10, 2014 at 8:39 am

    I’m surprised there’s all this fuss over Kim Novak’s face when Liza Minnelli is no longer recognizable as herself.

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  7. Dave said on March 10, 2014 at 8:40 am

    Heck, they even want Philly to be safe, I like the way it says, “including Philadelphia”.

    “CSX places the highest priority on the safety of the communities in which it operates over its 23-state, 21,000-route-mile network, including Philadelphia.”
    Read more at http://www.philly.com/philly/news/20140310_Can_rail_infrastructure_get_back_on_track_.html#TyOfLQABRVTpTyRT.99

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  8. Dave said on March 10, 2014 at 8:41 am

    Ooops, sorry, wrong forum, and I can’t delete it, having no edit. Apologies.

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  9. Dave said on March 10, 2014 at 8:50 am

    Last week, this column by Carolyn Hax, an advice columnist in the Washington Post, was published in the Tampa Bay Tribune. It was about the burden of beauty. Thought it appropriate for the topic: http://tinyurl.com/mhhoj6j

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  10. coozledad said on March 10, 2014 at 8:59 am

    She is in perpetual tantrum, railing against her betters, which is practically everyone, and volunteering for the job of avatar to the country’s reckless vandal of a political Id.

    That’s good stuff. John McCain’s life has been a fuckup ever since he swam down his daddy’s epididymis. And he left that malignant bitch on the doorstep like a flaming turd.

    Before I die I’d like to see her mud wrestle Michele Bachmann for the title of queen of the pinched-faced hair gelled baptist muck our fifth tier educational system has shat out. They can follow the winner to Chile:
    http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2014/02/libertarian-expat-communities-chile

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  11. Jeff Borden said on March 10, 2014 at 9:38 am

    I’d prefer a cage match like “Thunderdome:” Two twits enter, one twit leaves.

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  12. Bitter Scribe said on March 10, 2014 at 10:21 am

    Years ago, the Oscars aired a segment with Mary Pickford, who was in her eighties and looked every minute of it. There was a lot of criticism over that, too: “We wanted to remember her the way she was,” etc.

    It’s been said a million times, and it’s still true: Over the long run, women in Hollywood can’t win.

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  13. Charlotte said on March 10, 2014 at 11:49 am

    Having grown up among the cheekbones-on-horses set, those faces are as much a result of generations of breeding as are the horses going over the fences. No accident that. My godmother is one of them — a great horseman, and one of the most glamorous women ever (also incredibly kind, and the closest thing I have to a real parent). One of her daughters and I are 3 months apart, and Dede grew up to be a model — one of those tall girls with the tiny round face, cheekbones, and dead-straight long blonde hair. She hated it. HATED it. We’d go out for a drink when we both lived in NYC, and you couldn’t leave her to go pee or she’d have a bunch of skeevy guys around her (because we couldn’t possibly be in a bar to have a drink with one another. We must be there to pick up guys). Ugh. Eventually married a nice normal guy and has a pretty regular life — of course, as the short cousin with the weird curly hair, braces, and glasses — I figured out early where I fit in that world. And got out.

    Interesting piece in the Guardian a ways back about the Titles Equality Act in England — the part that struck me was the interviewee, the daughter of an earl, whose father told her at 17 always to wear her seatbelt because her face was the only fortune she was ever going to have: http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2014/jan/11/downton-bill-women-rights-liza-campbell

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  14. Deborah said on March 10, 2014 at 12:01 pm

    My sister was really cute as a kid and was a knockout in college. It was hard being compared to her all the time. But she peaked early, by the time she was in her 30s she looked like a regular person.

    Laura Lipmann’s description of seeing her reflection in her iPad or iPhone was something I could relate to. Many times I recoil at what I see on mine. Especially my droopy neck. I’ve taken to wearing turtlenecks and scarves.

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  15. Heather said on March 10, 2014 at 12:20 pm

    Interesting discussion on beauty. I suppose I have experienced it from the other side of the fence. Not that I am drop-dead gorgeous but I have been told all my life I am very pretty. But I never really had a lot of confidence in it, and so I worked hard at cultivating an interesting personality–in high school I remember actively working on being funny. I never consciously used how I look to move forward in my professional life; in fact I was (and am) really uncomfortable with that idea. However, I am sure I got a lot of breaks because of how I look. Romantically I never really had guys hanging on me in bars (thank God), but I knew I had a good shot at a guy if I was interested. But let me tell you, being pretty does not mean you have good taste in men, alas.

    Now that I am in my mid-40s, I am waiting for the day when I become invisible. So far I’m holding up pretty well but it’s not going to last forever! I hope I can accept the inevitable loss of my looks with grace and acceptance. I think the fact that I never really relied on them as the only tool in my arsenal will be a big help. I was just in Mexico and one day at the beach we met a gorgeous young couple, an Italian guy and a Venezuelan woman. I looked at her a bit wistfully but not with rancor or (too much) jealousy. I had my time and that is enough. Of course I wonder if I would be so sanguine if I had not already found the love of my life.

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  16. Charlotte said on March 10, 2014 at 12:33 pm

    I have a couple of girlfriends who are having real trouble with becoming invisible. One is in the classic bind — her two girls are growing up and it’s making her really, a little crazy. I’m with Nancy, I sort of feel like “welcome to my world.”

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  17. Scout said on March 10, 2014 at 12:50 pm

    I’m in the downhill end of my 50’s now and it still shocks me sometimes to catch an unexpected glimpse of my reflection and wonder who that old lady is. I suppose I was OK looking in my heyday, but being 5 foot nothing tall always made me feel inferior to the long legged thorobred types. In my experience taller women also seem to have a professional edge over the diminutive ones, as if height equals credibility. I’ve recently acquired a new facebook “friend”, a new acquaintance I speak with weekly at an activity we both attend. She’s a former model, in her late 30s or early 40s now, but still quite beautiful. She’s friendly enough but I’ve noticed that she gravitates more to people who look more like her than me, which I find an interesting phenomenon.

    That CPP piece was one of the best he’s ever written. It cuts right to heart of exactly what is wrong with SP and the people who idolize her. I pity them too, but not as much as I fear their abject ignorance and hate filled view of the world.

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  18. A. Riley said on March 10, 2014 at 12:59 pm

    Years ago, my two roommates and I decided we liked our looks (taller than average, prominent noses, etc., etc.) because we’d always be interesting-looking.

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  19. LAMary said on March 10, 2014 at 1:19 pm

    My level of attractiveness is very much connected to my weight. When I’m slim, I get hit on. Not so slim, invisible. A couple of years ago I lost quite a bit of weight and I found that prosperous looking older men here at the hospital were asking me for directions and then asking if I wanted to have a cup of coffee or something. One of nurse managers here, an attractive fiftyish type, told me that if they were old, prosperous and possibly ill to consider it a win. She was joking.
    My ex was good looking and was very critical of women who didn’t come up to his standards. I first starting dating him when I was in college and one day he came to pick me up at my job, working for Molly Ivins. She offered him a beer and we chatted for a while. Next time I saw her she said, “Watch out for him, daughter. He thinks he’s prettier than you are.” I should have listened.

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  20. Scout said on March 10, 2014 at 1:26 pm

    LAMAry – you worked for Molly Ivins? You never cease to amaze. That may already be common knowledge here at nn.c, but I missed it.

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  21. Charlotte said on March 10, 2014 at 1:44 pm

    I second Scout. What?!? Molly Ivins?!? For real? I bow down …

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  22. nancy said on March 10, 2014 at 1:57 pm

    This must predate you both, but we once had a several-days-long discussion of Celebrity Brushes With Greatness, and Mary basically retired the trophy. She also worked for Leona Helmsley and packaged Mr. T’s liquor orders for home delivery.

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  23. LAMary said on March 10, 2014 at 2:20 pm

    And I shook hands with Andy Warhol.
    I didn’t mention I worked for Molly until we were discussing her when she died. I worked for her when she was the bureau chief for the New York Times in Denver. I had been the office assistant to the previous bureau chief for a few years and when Molly took over that job she inherited me.

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  24. jcburns said on March 10, 2014 at 2:24 pm

    I pity the fool who screws up Mr. T’s home delivery liquor orders.

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  25. MarkH said on March 10, 2014 at 2:26 pm

    Oh, now I get it. I thought she was head honchess of the cocktail mix company.

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  26. LAMary said on March 10, 2014 at 2:29 pm

    You thought I was Mrs.T of the Bloody Mary mix fame? Well maybe…

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  27. Sherri said on March 10, 2014 at 2:35 pm

    LAMary, I’d say you got two pieces of sound advice there: always listen to Molly Ivins, and never marry a man who thinks he’s prettier/smarter/better/more important than you. It’s a recipe for him to treat you like shit. I never dated a man who thought he was prettier than me (not that I’m really pretty), but I dated plenty of men who thought they were smarter than me. We didn’t agree, and eventually, that always became a problem.

    I’m incredibly jealous you got to work with Molly. I would have loved to spend time with her. I don’t usually go to book signings, but she was one of the writers I’d make an exception for (Calvin Trillin is another.)

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  28. Dexter said on March 10, 2014 at 2:42 pm

    c’mon, cooz…tell us what Mary was packing in Mr T.’s home delivery order.

    Like most people, I have seen quite a few stars of sports, TV and movies at different times. Here’s one: Bob Hastings was our tour’s meet and greet actor at Universal Studios 44 years ago. He was then most famous as Lieutenant Carpenter on McHale’s Navy, a black and white show from the mid-60s. He was gregarious, funny, and a real feel-good addition to our tour. 🙂
    I got “yelled at” when I first went to message boards years ago and began opining on a TV show’s episode…that was the night I learned about spoiler alerts. I fucking hate spoiler alerts. If you don’t want to discuss a show, stay the fuck of the computer. Anyway, it’s a real waste to avoid discussing a show for fear most of your friends have everything dvr’d forever, so we end up with no discussion. That’s the way it is, and that’s why we have spoiler alert, I should be so happy! Last night’s finale of the current year’s True Detective blew the top off my head, too…oh damn, sorry…I just spoiled it! Fuck! I quit.

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  29. Dexter said on March 10, 2014 at 2:52 pm

    http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2014/03/10/true-detective-finale-review-close-to-perfection.html

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  30. LAMary said on March 10, 2014 at 3:01 pm

    Mr T was ordering Olde English Malt Liquor from a very posh wine and liquor shop. We had to order it for him because we didn’t carry it.

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  31. LAMary said on March 10, 2014 at 3:13 pm

    I didn’t work for Leona Helmsley. I used to sell tiny jars of English preserves to Helmsley Hotels.

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  32. Dexter said on March 10, 2014 at 3:19 pm

    Wha’? St. Ides not good enough for the dude? 🙁
    I just remembered I also saw Mr T. one time. My brother Bob was an ace salesman for a firm in Chicago back about 29 years ago, I guess, and a perk was Chicago Bulls season tickets. This was when Michael Jordan had hair, so think way-back. It was a Saturday night game, Bulls versus Boston Celtics. The Celtics were injured and plagued by the flu bug and they played terribly as the Bulls slaughtered them…Bird had nine points as I recall. The biggest cheers were for Mr. T. He was sitting on the sidelines and he would periodically leave and go back into the concourse, dressed in a tank top and those crazy pants, I forget what they called them..sorta like army fatigues but crazy-patterned with Z-shapes interwoven throughout. And the crowd went wild…for Mr. T. What a distinctive man…NO-BOD-EE looked like that, ever! 🙂

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  33. Dexter said on March 10, 2014 at 3:23 pm

    Get some nuts, foo’!
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tsNyjuugtMs

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  34. Judybusy said on March 10, 2014 at 3:45 pm

    Add me to the completely envious list for Mary’s experience with Molly Ivins!

    I had a samaller brush with local fame this weekend at a performance of a taiko group. The founder of the group and retired director of the umbrella group, Mu Performing Arts, sat right next to us. During the performance, they had different members of the group talk about what taiko meant to them, and it was profoundly moving for each person. This guy, Rick Shiomi, has changed so many lives through his work in the arts. I leaned over and thanked him, and of course, he’s very unassuming. Here’s a bit of Mu Daiko: http://www.muperformingarts.org/production/rhthm-in-motion-mu-daiko-at-the-cowles-center/ The performance was amazing–this group get better and better. I feel so lucky they are based in Minneapolis and we get to see them every year.

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  35. Julie Robinson said on March 10, 2014 at 3:53 pm

    I bow, too, Mary! What great wisdom from Molly concerning your ex.

    It’s interesting that people feel/felt unattractive because they’re short, when I also felt it because I was tall; and tall early, as in way before the guys in school. I just once wanted to look up to a guy. (Physically, that is.) I guess I had a few goodish years in college when I was slim and still wore contacts. But getting wolf whistles from construction guys is not fun; I found it very intimidating. Now I’m an average middle-age overweight lady and I’m fine with it 99% of the time. I would never have plastic surgery but I look old and sick with gray hair so it gets colored.

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  36. Charlotte said on March 10, 2014 at 4:13 pm

    I lived in Lake Forest when Mr. T cut down all the trees. Old family friend was the mayor, and it was his last day in office. Everyone came in up in arms and he just stalled (it was an unpaid position) — his line about “Let Tyler Cain deal with it” is only funny if you know that both Mr. Clarke (yes, I still call him that) and Mr. Cain are plaid-pant-wearing, old school, born-and-bred Lake Forest types. The idea of either of them dealing with Mr. T was hilarious alone. As I recall, Mr. T cut his trees down and everyone squawked for a while and then it blew over.

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  37. Jeff Borden said on March 10, 2014 at 5:08 pm

    I almost rear-ended Mr. T’s white Rolls-Royce Corniche on Michigan Avenue when I first moved to Chicago. My car was a 1980 Accord that had been stolen and stripped right before I moved up here from Charlotte, so it was pretty much held together with chewing gum and bailing wire. Mr. T hit his brakes hard and I damned near went right up the tail pipe.

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  38. James said on March 10, 2014 at 5:49 pm

    What I find amazing is your worship of Princess Diana, Nancy.
    Sure she had even, symmetrical, waspy features, but a beauty? Not in my book.

    Now Princess Grace? There’s a waspy beauty.

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  39. Deborah said on March 10, 2014 at 5:50 pm

    Speaking of envious, I so envy LA Mary and her celebrity connections. I enjoy stuff like that way too much. *green*.

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  40. Scout said on March 10, 2014 at 6:09 pm

    @James: I don’t think Nancy was saying that she worshipped Princess Di at all; rather I think she was speaking of how nutso the whole world went over Di’s untimely passing and wondering if some of that was due to the fact that she didn’t look anything like the rest of the royals.

    I too envy LAMary’s having known Molly Ivins. She is someone I would loved to have met. She was something else.

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  41. LAMary said on March 10, 2014 at 6:20 pm

    I was really lucky having that job at the NYT at all. An incoming bureau chief, Grace Lichtenstein, put up an index card on the bulletin board at University of Denver. I was the only person who applied for the job. She didn’t mention on her card that it was the NYT. She just said a writer needed someone for office duties and basic research. I worked for Grace for about three years, then Molly for a few months until I graduated. I’m still in touch with Grace from time to time and I had breakfast with her last time I was in NYC. I had my kids with me and she told them that their mother was the most persistent person she ever met. I could get anyone on the phone for her.

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  42. David C. said on March 10, 2014 at 6:30 pm

    Not that I’m great looking, but I’d trade some looks for some extroversion. It’s really hard to be quiet and thoughtful in a world that values talk and action.

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  43. paddyo' said on March 10, 2014 at 6:38 pm

    Bravo for the life fascinatingly lived, LAMary —
    We newsies, present and former, can claim meetings and interviews and elbow rubs with celebs of various sorts, but such brushes aren’t at all the same as working for/with. We were simply sent on assignment or whatever, never to meet again once we had preyed upon them, notebooks in hand.
    Working for Molly certainly would be a keeper . . . and here in Denver, you say? I have a friend who had your NYT bureau job much later, late-’90s and into the 2000s, and I knew the Denver bureau correspondents during my decade as the USA TODAY bureau guy, but no such lights have shined here since her time . . .

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  44. LAMary said on March 10, 2014 at 6:47 pm

    My job was reading all the papers from all the states covered by the Rocky Mountain Bureau and clipping stuff that either pertained to something we were following or working on, or stuff that looked like it might turn into something interesting. I also did the mail and the expense reports and all that stuff.
    One of my classmates at University of Denver was Andy Rosenthal, btw. He was in a few of my poli sci classes.

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  45. Suzanne said on March 10, 2014 at 8:51 pm

    Yes, David @ 42. Read Susan Cain’s book “Quiet”. I almost hurt myself nodding in agreement so much while reading it.

    There was an episode of Seinfeld that centered around beautiful people being “in the bubble”. So much truth.
    I attended Tapestry for Women in Fort Wayne a few years ago when the keynote speaker was Patricia Heaton who admitted that she’d had just about everything nipped and tucked. She said that it’s because in her business, you are judged on your looks. It bothered me some because we are all judged on our looks everyday. It may be worse in Hollywood, but it’s everywhere.

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  46. Dexter said on March 10, 2014 at 8:56 pm

    Molly Ivins was in so many magazines; I found her in both The Progressive and The Nation but she could be found in Time Magazine (guest column) and many dailies as well.
    She died way too young, and next time you feel compelled to wear pink in remembrance, remember Molly, who only lived to be 62 , fighting inflammatory breast cancer as hard as she could. 🙁

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  47. Linda said on March 10, 2014 at 9:23 pm

    Re: Heather at @15: beauty is a strange gift. You may work at it a little, but it’s nothing you can get mostly through self-cultivation, like wit or wealth: you either have it or not. But it will always go away if you live long enough, and maybe tomorrow (for instance, if you have a bad accident). And when your gift goes away, you can pretend to extend it through plastic surgery, but you really can’t: when it goes, it goes. And often it slips slowly away: you go from a hottie to someone who “looks good for their age” to….Kim Novak.

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  48. alex said on March 10, 2014 at 10:15 pm

    Patricia Heaton’s face work is very obvious these days, which makes her look less than credible as a Hoosier housewife in her current role. Roseanne Barr had the same problem in the second half or so of her run, although she never lost the midwestern matron’s floating fat ass that animated her character even better than the coarse rube she was channeling. My hubby’s home nurse could’ve been Patricia Heaton’s twin sans botox and collagen. I think they even shared the same politics.

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  49. Deborah said on March 10, 2014 at 10:58 pm

    Dexter, After not hearing from you for awhile I thought your computer had bit the dust but it seems ok. Yes?

    Michael G, I know you had some health issues surface. Hope things are going as well as can be expected.

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  50. Dexter said on March 11, 2014 at 12:22 am

    Deborah, The coffee spill ruined only the mouse pad. The mouse dried out and didn’t get all gummed up like I feared. The keyboard actually only got splattered and wasn’t ruined, if it had been, I have a couple extras anyway, but a fried mouse would have sent me to the store for a new one. I have a new Galaxy tablet but I still prefer sitting on my ergonomic desk chair and tapping away on the Dell.

    LAMAry…did you have to empty Molly Ivins’ overflowing ash trays? Was she still a chain smoker when you worked for her?

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  51. Dexter said on March 11, 2014 at 12:26 am

    This new show wasn’t too bad last night…from lohud dot com :
    “Believe” stars Johnny Sequoyah as a young girl whose extraordinary abilities could change the world. The cast also includes Jake McLaughlin, Delroy Lindo, Kyle MacLachlan, Jamie Chung and Arian Moayed. It airs Monday nights at 10 p.m.NBC ” .

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  52. susan said on March 11, 2014 at 12:36 am

    I was once mistaken for Patty Duke. At a fruit stand in NYC. I said I was her sister, Marma. The guy just kept staring at me.

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  53. Sherri said on March 11, 2014 at 12:40 am

    I mentioned last month that I had almost 12 years of sobriety. Well, today’s the day: I have been sober 12 years today.

    I may still have my problems, but I’m not making them worse by pouring alcohol on them!

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  54. LAMary said on March 11, 2014 at 9:39 am

    Dexter, I just emptied ashtrays in general since I was also a serious smoker at the time.

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