My Mother: A Remembrance

As I was the writing a collection of stories about my much-loved old clothes, my mother emerged as a major character. Her love language was clothing. Mommy loved pretty things— for herself, for me, for my younger sister Dianne, who she dressed like a little doll. My grandparents bought her lovely clothes when she was a young girl. Later she bought them herself. There was a picture of her taken in our house in Butte where she wears a strapless red formal looking especially glamorous. I remember a teal silk cocktail dress that she wore in Barstow to parties at the Officers' Club with my father. Such a strong sense of personal style.

Note my mother’s childhood style..

In my memory the height of her glamour was in the late '50's and early '60's when we first moved to California. Slim, her hair cut short in the fashion of the era, red lipstick and flattering clothes. During that period, she worked in a small dress shop on Main Street in Ventura. Mr. Galasso, the owner of the shop had hired her even though she had no retail experience. She was an attractive regular customer who wore the dresses he sold with a panache that was unexpected in our Southern California beach town. And she knew how to chat people up. It was a brief stint, but she loved being surrounded by all the pretty clothes, and her charming banter was an asset with the clientele.

Mommy and me, well-dressed in the late 50’s in Ventura.

She always took me shopping when I need something special to wear—easter bonnets and spring coats, party dresses with crinoline petticoats, good school clothes and eventually formals with all the accessories including long gloves and dyed-to-match shoes. My prom dresses hung in her closet long after I left for college and because she saved them, they now hang in mine.

 My sister Dianne tells a story of my mother trying to talk her into staying home from school, offering to take her to lunch at the Red Balloon and on to the mall to shop. While Dianne demurred, there must have many other shopping trips because she, too, always had pretty outfits.

When I was preparing for my junior year abroad in Bordeaux, France, we went to Los Angeles to shop in better department stores than she thought we had in Ventura. Searching the racks at Bullock's Wilshire she encouraged me to choose outfits with more sophistication than I might have on my own. She had never been to France, but she knew I would need more than college girl casual clothes.

By the time I was a teenager we often quarreled, and I was not completely sure why. Looking back, I understand. She had Cushing's Disease. A debilitating illness that robbed her of her energy, her looks and her happiness. Yet, as angry as she might have been with her situation and with me, when it was time to make sure I was dressed for an occasion, she rallied. We would have lunch at the Red Balloon and go shopping.