Post 39: Model Behavior

Aunt Cam had dropped hints about mom’s youth and beauty on many occasions, but her big disclosure came the night of GranMag’s funeral. It was the third occasion in her life when Aunt Cam had wept. But it was the first time I had ever seen her drunk.

GranMag’s death shook Aunt Cam and the rest of us in ways we weren’t prepared for. At eighty-four, while GranMag had been in a slow decline for years, her death shook most of us. We had been in denial. A world without GranMag seemed unthinkable until her heart gave out one June afternoon and, without fanfare, she was gone.

            The night of the funeral Aunt Cam drank a lot of scotch.

Gathered at Mama and Daddy’s, GranMag’s children gave way to exhaustion one by one until only Aunt Cam and Mama were left in our living room with Kit and me. Daddy, handling grief and loss in his usual way, had withdrawn early. Aunt Cam poured another scotch.

“Cam, I think it’s time to call it a night. What do you think?”  My mother shot her an unmistakable look of disapproval.

Aunt Cam returned the volley. “Elizabeth, then I think you should go to bed. That’s what I think.” She stared my tired mother in the eyes. Mama blinked first.

 Kit looked relieved, and she and Mama climbed the stairs. At seventeen, I was old enough to decide bedtime for myself. I was also waiting for Mama to go upstairs so I could pour myself a scotch. It had been an emotional day and I was wide awake. I got my scotch and returned with the bottle. Smiling her “you devil” grin, Aunt Cam toasted me in approval and began to talk.

            “Well, with GranMag gone, it’s just the girls and your uncle Martin. No more Fishburns but my generation.” She sighed and reached for her purse and her Terrytons. She lit one and offered me the pack. At first, I feigned shock with an almost finished “I don’t smoke,” but she gave me her “never kid a kidder” look and tossed me the pack. I smiled, fished one out, and she slid her gold lighter, a bauble from her German black-market days, across the coffee table.

            “You know, your mother was a beauty in her day. Now, she’s still beautiful at her age, but I have to tell you, she turned heads in her twenties. No, I mean it. Men would actually turn to look. I know you’re too young to remember your mother’s photography studio. She took portraits of all of us. Made us look better than we ever had in real life.” I nodded.

She took a long drink, and set her glass on the table between us. I poured her a half and one for me. “Thatta boy!” she said and toasted me again with a cackle. “But I bet you didn’t know this: your mama was a fashion model.”

            “No, I can say truthfully that I never knew that.”  I was skeptical and the scotch belied that.

           “Well, she was.  And not just local department store stuff. Your mama was in Vogue.” That one got my attention. As a gay man in waiting, I had an inherent but not fully groomed interest in clothes and fashion and had thumbed through a few Glamours and Harper’s and Vogues in the dentist’s waiting room. Before I let myself get excited with Aunt Cam’s pronouncement, I remembered her penchant for exaggeration. Did “she was in Vogue” really mean that Mama had just assisted in a photo shoot? Once?

Aunt Cam sensed my disbelief. “No, I mean it. And yes, I’ve had my share of scotch tonight, but this is true. Your mama was in Vogue, in New York, modeling haute couture, more than once. She modeled and looked gorgeous, and she made good money. And your GranMag hated it.”

            I didn’t know which question to pose first. What was Mama wearing? How did she end up in New York? Did Daddy know? What was “good money”? The one that came sliding out was, “Why was GranMag so upset?”

            “I know it will be hard for you to understand, but in those days your GranMag and, frankly, a lot of people, thought that fashion models were one step below actresses and one step above prostitutes. You see, no respectable young woman from a good family would ever, ever put on clothes and take money to be photographed for her beauty!” Aunt Cam took a long drag and exhaled grandly. “GranMag was worried about your mama’s reputation.”

I gestured toward her cigarettes with a questioning look and she nodded, “Sure.” I lit another cigarette, looked at my scotch, and realized GranMag would have been a little horrified to see me smoking and drinking, especially on the night of her funeral. The irony was powerful, but not powerful enough to ruin my first grown-up moment with someone of the generation before me.

            “Did Daddy know?”

            “Oh, they had barely started dating, but I’m sure he did. You’ve got to remember, this was the Depression." Aunt Cam adjusted her armchair pillow and settled in for a good story as only she could tell.

" Your mama and I were each making twelve dollars a week at Beck’s Ladies Fashions, and that was for six days a week. If I remember this right, she took the four a.m. train up to New York for the photo shoot, and they flew her back the same night. An overnight was out of the question. Her first check from Vogue was three-hundred-forty-seven dollars and fifty cents. It was a fortune in those days. She was just eighteen.”

            The scotch was beginning to warm me through my middle. My head felt deliciously light. I was now fully given over to Aunt Cam’s story, and then remembered, “But Mama hates to fly.”

            “It was over three hundred dollars! She kept her eyes closed.” Aunt Cam was grinning now, but a sliver of doubt crept into my head: Was this the Chivas talking, or was it really true?

            Reading my face a second time, she feigned indignity. “This is true. Every word. I swear. And, just for the record, her second shoot was with Harper’s and she got paid double rate because it was shot on a Sunday. It was almost seven-hundred dollars. We had never seen that much money in our lives.”

            I studied her face, then the coffee table, and then the room began to blur a bit. Recovering I asked, “So how come Kit and I have never heard of any of this? Was Mama ashamed? I mean, what’s the big deal?”

            Aunt Cam looked annoyed at first, and then reconsidered. “I’m not sure, but all I remember was the work sort of faded away. By the time an agent approached her and asked her to move to New York and make a real career out of it, she was head over heels in love with your daddy. And that was that.”

            “And GranMag?”

            “Oh, she barely spoke to your mother for the better part of a year. But she was able to force herself to accept her first and only cashmere cardigan from your mama that Christmas.” Aunt Cam raised her eyebrows to underscore the hypocrisy of the whole thing. “And she wore that sweater to the Women’s Club and to church and bragged on your mama for her generosity. And, as your mama stopped modeling, GranMag started talking to her again. It got smoothed over. Was she ashamed to tell you? I doubt it. It was just so long ago. Did I mention how beautiful your mama was?”