I am terrible at recognizing people. Worse than terrible, like seriously bad. The summer when I was ten, I was at LAX waiting for a flight home from a two-week trip to visit with family friends in So-Cal, and we saw Betty Buckley {from Eight is Enough, my all-time favorite show at the time} and got her autograph. Okay, I didn't see her, my friend, Ramona, recognized her and approached her, I just shyly followed and nodded when she asked if I wanted an autograph, too.
As an assistant wardrobe stylist, I got to work with lots of celebrities on the Macy's Passport show, most of whom, I didn't recognize and a few whom I didn't even know who they were. The obvious exceptions being Cindy Crawford and Elizabeth Taylor {I know, I had to sew a button on her jacket as she was about to go on stage and I was so star-struck I could barely do it, my hands were shaking so much!}.
And, unlike my husband, I can never identify which actor does the voices on animated features {WHAT?! Eddie Murphy is Donkey on Shrek?! You're kidding me!}. It's because people on tv or in movie or on the radio don't look or sound like they do in real life.
So, it was quite a surprise when, one day, I turned on the radio and heard {and actually recognized!} my Mother-in-Law on the air!
Rob and I were married almost two years. We were living in San Francisco. He worked at an independent record store in Noe Valley and I was, as I mentioned, a freelance wardrobe stylist. We had this amazing Art Deco apartment and even though parking was a bitch, we were pretty darn happy there. Rob took the bus to work {because parking in SF is a bitch!} and I did things like bring him his lunch when he'd forget or didn't have time to pack one on days I didn't work.
That's what I'd just done, dropped off a brown-bag lunch for my sweetheart, when I heard his mother on the Dr. Dean Edell Show.
"Now we go to Sue. Sue welcome to the program..." Dr. Dean, the affable host of the long-running call-in medical advice program on KGO, greeted her.
"SUE" {she didn't even make up a fake name!} was calling about her daughter {my Sister-in-law, Alison} who was pregnant with her first child and was not taking her prenatal vitamins! Now my MIL is a nurse and she's pretty knowledgeable about medical stuff {and a great deal of other stuff too}, but I guess when it comes to your progeny}, you just can't help but worry about every little thing.
"SUE" went on to say that she kept urging her daughter to take the vitamins, but that Alison, hard-headed, stubborn little twit that she was {okay, I just made that up}, would not do it and it was causing problems between them.
"How can I get her to take her prenatal vitamins?" SUE begged the good doctor.
I won't bore you with all the blow-by-blow details, but he basically Dr. Dean told her to get a life that a woman who eats a well-balanced diet should be getting all the vitamins she need from her food and that the stress of being nagged about it was worse for the health of the baby than the lack of prenatals.
Excitedly, I called Rob, but he flat-out did not believe me. "My mother would not call a radio show to ask a medical question! She's a nurse. I'm sure it was some other Sue."
"Oh, no, it was your mom," I assured him.
I couldn't wait to speak with my MIL. That evening we called her and I could barely contain myself as I asked, "Soooo, have you done anything interesting lately? Like... oh I don't know... call Dr. Dean Edell?"
She screamed. I actually made my MIL scream! Then she swore me to secrecy. "You can't tell Alison!" she begged me. Ah ha! I had an ace in my sleeve. Over the next couple of years, she would periodically check in with me, "You haven't told Alison, have you?" or I'd casually slip in a little blackmail from time to time, "You wouldn't want me telling Alison, now would you?"
It was a running joke that brought us closer together as Mother- and Daughter-in-law. She eventually did tell Alison {who didn't even care, in fact she thought it was funny} and the game was over.
And the baby who was being denied prenatal vitamins? She is turning ELEVEN tomorrow and she is the healthiest of Alison's three kids! Go figure...
Happy Birthday, Emmalena!
You turned out just fine...
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