Bands of Roaming Expat Kids

Clowning in a photo booth in London with my friend Lynn. 

While our parents were partying it up 70s style, my friends and I at ASL were roaming the city of London going to concerts, stores, restaurants and, on one occasion, sneaking into the Osmond Brother’s hotel so one of us could meet Donny.  Thanks for the photo, Lynn! 

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Posted by Wendy Lawless  70s London, American School in London, Americans Abroad, ASL, Chanel Bonfire, ex-patriots, expats, Wendy Lawless

Second Chance at a Happy Childhood

Readers often ask how it was possible for me to have children to have a happy home life after everything I’d been through as a child, teenager and young adult and having had a role model like Mother.  I tell them that having children has been for me a second chance to have a happy childhood by giving my children one.  And as for not having a mothering role model, I kind of made one up.  When faced with a question or challenge with my kids, I’d often ask myself what Georgann would do and then… do the opposite.  It’s worked out quite well.  My son Harry graduated from high school this week and my daughter Grace is a delightful middle schooler.

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Posted by Wendy Lawless  Chanel Bonfire, childhood, children of divorce, Georgann Rea, mental illness, mothering, surviving childhood, Wendy Lawless

Joyce Chen and My Summer of Candy

Yesterday we were in London.  Today we jump to Cambridge, MA.

The eponymous Joyce Chen restaurant in Cambridge where I was a hostess in the summer of 1977.  Joyce was branded the “Chinese Julia Child” and brought a quality of service and authentic chinese cuisine to a country that had only seen chow mein or chop suey or egg drop soup.  Many of Cambridge’s 70s luminaries including Julia Child, John Irving and Robert Parker came to the restaurant.  One night I had to go into the ladies room and rescue a very drunk Ginger Rogers from the floor and escort her out.  The waiters had trouble pronouncing my name, so I was rechristened Candy.  Sadly, the restaurant is no longer there.

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Posted by Wendy Lawless  Cambridge in the 70s, Chanel Bonfire, Ginger Rogers, John Irving, Joyce Chen, Julia Child, Robert Parker, Wendy Lawless

ASL — The American School in London

Our old school in London, ASL (The American School in London).  The school was started in the 50s but this building, where Robbie and I went was begun in 1968 and finished in 1970.  The cornerstone was laid by Ambassador Walter Annenberg and The Rt. Hon. Margaret Thatcher, MP, then secretary of state for education and science (aka at that time, Margaret Thatcher Milk Snatcher) spoke at the dedication.

The campus is in St. John’s Wood.  I’m guessing the fortress-like street presence was developed to counter terrorist threats.  In the early 70s, for us, it was the IRA who called in a couple of bomb threats to the school.  We were happy there amongst the army, oil, CIA and State Department brats.  We were the swinging divorcee brats and got to see Elton John and do our first acting.

I kissed Sam Robards in my first play — strictly a stage kiss.  And was seen by Alan Parker and asked to audition for a movie he was making: Bugsy Malone.  I didn’t get it; Jodie Foster did.

But I wasn’t disappointed.  With Mother happy and occupied by new people and parties and songwriting, Robbie and I were free and for a couple of teenagers in 70s London, that was easily as much fun as making a movie.

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Posted by Wendy Lawless  Alan Parker, American School in London, Bugsy Malone, Georgann Rea, Irish Republican Army, Jodie Foster, Margaret Thatcher, Robin Lawless, Sam Robards, terrorist threats, Walter Annenberg, Wendy Lawless

Moccasins of Shame — An Outtake

Sometimes, for the sake of narrative flow, style, character–any number of reasons–a writer has to cut passages in order to make a better book.  As Faulkner said, “Kill your darlings.”  In memoir your darlings are not simply scenes you made up, they are part of your life, part of you.  This passage had to be cut from Chanel and I think it’s a better book for its absence but it doesn’t make it less meaningful for me.  Thanks to the modern miracle of blogging (like the extras section of film dvds) I can share it with you.

Moccasins of Shame

The hospital was bright and clean inside and smelled like a swimming pool. Mother’s room was all bleached white and glowing with sunlight. Her blond hair was pulled back in a bun. Looking at her in the skinny hospital bed, I didn’t think she looked sick at all. She looked beautiful, like a fairy princess.
Mother laughed and smiled and was so happy to see us. Daddy stood against the wall with his arms crossed over his chest, as we climbed up onto the bed to hug her and kiss her. She told us that she got to eat her breakfast in bed and that most nights they showed movies in the dining room after dinner. She told us about a woman she’d met there who had been a famous Olympic diver, but had then dived into a swimming pool with no water in it and now she had problems thinking straight. I wondered aloud why someone would jump into an empty swimming pool in the first place, but Mother said it had been an accident.
Before we left, she gave us each a little pair of moccasins that she had made for us during recreation. I asked what that was, and she said it was a time when everyone at the hospital got to make something with their hands—baskets or pot holders, for example—and that she had decided to make something for us. The moccasins were brown suede and had little beads sewn onto the tops of them—they were so pretty. I told her I loved them. Then a nurse came in and said that visiting hours were over and we kissed Mother good-bye.
“I’ll be home soon,” she promised.
I rode home in the car smiling the whole way with my moccasins on my lap. I told my father that I planned to wear them to school the next day to show everyone. My father said nothing; he just looked out at the road over the steering wheel.
The next day, I pranced into my classroom wearing the moccasins to show everyone how clever my mother was and how much she loved me.
“Look! See?” I said to anyone who would listen.
“Gee,” said Carol Rulnick as I modeled them for her.
“My mom made me these pretty Pocahontas shoes!” I sang.
“Those are nice,” said Tommy Flatto.
“Is your mom an Indian?” asked Phillip Braxton.  He was so dumb.
“Can I try them on?” asked Carol but I pretended I didn’t hear her.  I was crazy in love with those shoes; there was no way I was going to let her.
 I basked in the attention of my classmates and struck a few dramatic foot poses to show my moccasins off to their best advantage.
“Wendy Lawless, you come here this instant,” said my first grade teacher Miss Entus.
“Yes, ma’am,” I said skipping up to her.  I figured she just wanted a better look at my beautiful shoes and maybe to ask me where I got them.  But she didn’t.  She took her glasses off and stuck her hands on her hips.
“Wendy, I am appalled that your parents would allow you to wear bedroom slippers to school.”  She looked down at me sternly. 
“But…” I said. 
Until this moment I had loved Miss Entus with all my heart.  She was thin and blonde like my mother and she gave us lollipops during the spelling test.
“I’m afraid that it’s against school rules,” she said folding her arms across her chest.
I wanted to tell her that they weren’t bedroom slippers and that my mom had made them for me, that she had sewn the little beads on herself.
“You go to the office right now and you tell them that you are to be sent home,” Miss Entus said.
“But…” I tried again.
She pointed to the door.  I looked down at my feet, heartbroken.  There was hush as I walked out of the classroom and down to the office to wait for my father.  
Apparently no one had told Miss Entus that my moccasins had been hand-made by my crazy mom during her recreation period at the loony bin. 


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Posted by Wendy Lawless  Chanel Bonfire, Georgann Rea, James Lawless, mental hospital, mental illness, moccasins, Robin Lawless, Wendy Lawless

Valerie Harper and Chanel Bonfire

We interrupt this holiday weekend to remind you that…

So if you live in Southern California or you’re visiting the Los Angeles area for the Memorial Day weekend, check out Vicki Abelson’s website and get a ticket.  In Chanel, I describe visiting my father in the summers and him taking Robbie and me to Dayton’s department store in Minneapolis to buy playclothes which we never had in New York.  Dayton’s is the store in front of which Mary Tyler Moore tosses her hat into the air in the opening credits to The Mary Tyler Moore Show, co-starring none other than my reading buddy this Tuesday, Valerie Harper.  Small world.

http://www.vickiabelson.com/site/Women_Who_Write/Women_Who_Write.html

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Posted by Wendy Lawless  Chanel Bonfire, Dayton's, I Rhoda, Mary Tyler Moore, Rhoda Morgenstern, Valerie Harper, Vicki Abelson, Wendy Lawless, Women Who Write