a little Friday reminiscing ...

I saw this picture on Pinterest and saved it to my phone. It reminded me of an earlier time in my life, when I was still figuring out who I was going to be.

I lived in Key West, Florida from April 1975 until October 1982, before the Navy sold Truman Annex and the cruise ships arrived. For most of those years I drove a 1958 Nash Metropolitan just like this one. It was a hardtop with bench seats and the gear stick on the column. It was "Caribbean Green!"

I bought it for $260 from an older woman named Shirley who lived on the Gulf side of Big Pine Key. She purchased it "new" in Miami and drove it into the Keys and it had never been further north than Miami in its life. It had 5,800 miles on it when I bought it and it had been sitting in her garage for a few years. With the help of a friend, we put a new battery in it, and it started right up. The body was made of galvanized steel making it resistant to the rust that permeates vehicles in the subtropics and it was a very sturdy little car! It was an awful lot of fun to drive!

During the years I owned this car I was involved with the local community theatre group at the Waterfront Playhouse. One of the directors, Ruth Newton, brought guest artists into town for one or two shows at the theatre to raise money. One day, she asked me if I could pick up a man at the Key West airport. His name was Kevin McCarthy and he was doing his one man show, "Give 'em hell, Harry." I was to take him to the Pier House so he could check in to his hotel room, then bring him to the theatre.

When Mr. McCarthy (I never could call him Kevin) approached my car in front of the airport that day with his leather valise in hand, he laughed at my car, then told me he had done TV commercials for Nash-Rambler in the 1950s for the Metropolitan. He said there were less than 14,000 of them produced, which seemed like a lot to me, but, I would learn it really wasn't much. He seemed quite delighted to be escorted around Key West in my little car and it was certainly fun for me. He was an absolute gentleman the entire time and actually talked of his wife and son with much fondness. I took him back to the airport when it was his time to depart and he gave me his address and phone number and told me to call when I finally made it to New York City. I never made it and now he's gone. But, I've got this lovely memory!

I also had the privilege of schlepping Academy Award winning actress Estelle Parsons around in 1979 when she came to do her one woman show, "Miss Margarida's Way." My girlfriend and I were her "handlers." They didn't call it that back then, but, that's what we did. We took her shopping, out to eat, drinking, and, I'm telling you, she was a wild woman! She called us on stage during her performances and I do believe Kristy and I held our own during the improvisations! It was a dynamite experience to be that close to that kind of talent and I prayed some of it would rub off on me!

Superman's love interest, Lois Lane, drove a custom Metropolitan on the 1950s TV show, and that did as much to make it famous as any of the television commercials. Mine was the only Metropolitan in the Lower Keys and for those few formative years I was someone special because I drove that car.

I grew up in the Commonwealth of Virginia with a very bossy (some would say overbearing) mother, so driving around a tiny island at the southernmost point in the United States, far away from her, in my little Lois Lane car gave me the freedom to discover myself. I really needed that. I needed to be around other people, especially other women, who lived their lives on their own terms. It showed me the way I wanted to go. And, while it's not an easy path to travel, I think it's much of the reason I've been able to find joy in the face of despair. I had great role models and for that I am eternally grateful.

what's in a name?

Filomena & John with five of the husbands, Christmas 1946.
My dad is the uniformed officer.

My grandmother, Filomena Contella, immigrated to America from Italy in the early 20th century. She was promised to my grandfather, a well-to-do man from upstate New York. They had seven daughters during their marriage, my mother being number five and "daddy's favorite." (This, according to my Aunt Evelyn, who I've written about here.)

My mother often relegated the tale of my name whenever my birthday would come round on the calendar. Born in 1951 on a rainy, snowy day in February, my mother decided she wanted to name me after my grandmother, "but, the American translation." She told how she was going to name me Cheryl Constance, in honor of her mom. She said I would have had beautiful monograms with two "C"s in my name. {Don't snicker.}

As the story goes, when my mom announced to my dear grandmother that she was going to name me Cheryl Constance, my grandmother said if my mother wanted to use half of her name, she had to use all of it. Period. My grandmother, who was called Filomena even by her own daughters, always got her way with my mother. (And, my aunts, too!) So it was ... I was christened Phyllis Constance.

My family called me "Phyllis," except for my Aunt Christine who called me "Fifi." She didn't like the name either. But, it wasn't until I started first grade at Woodlawn Elementary School that I began to hate my first name.

If you Google "Phyllis," the first suggested entry is "Phyllis Diller." From Wikipedia comes this: "In the mid-1950s, she made appearances on The Jack Paar Show and was a contestant on Groucho Marx's quiz show You Bet Your Life.  Diller was part of the so-called "New Wave" comedians who began their careers after World War II and had no connections to vaudeville." She was loud. Her hair was wild. She wore outrageous costumes. And, the grown-ups loved her.

Diller on "Laugh In"

For those too young to remember this mid-century, modern woman, Diller was self-deprecating to a fault. A typical Diller joke had her running after a garbage truck pulling away from her curb. "Am I too late for the trash?" she'd yell. The driver's reply: "No, jump right in!"

Now that I think of it, she was, perhaps, the first in a new genre of comediennes that lead us to Roseanne. Their comedy comes from real life, with a twist. But, to a seven-year-old girl, it wasn't funny. It was mean spirited teasing from other first graders and by the end of my first year in school, I hated my name.

Other girls had names like Linda and Emily and Audrey and Diane. Real girl names. Names that said they were girls! I had "Phyllis," which sounded harsh and almost evil, like it was a curse. Which it was. Inevitably, in every new grade, in every new class, some sniggering jerk (males AND females) would make a joke about my name with a reference to Phyllis Diller. It didn't matter that Diller was so much more than a comedienne. She played piano. She painted. She made movies. She was an artist. It was her 'celebrity' status as a bawdy comedienne that made her my nemesis.

Then, I went to college. And, things changed.

During my sophomore year, I began an affair with my algebra professor. He lived aboard his sailboat and rode a bike everywhere. It was Key West in the early 1970s. At dinner one night, aboard his boat, he asked me about my name. He usually referred to me as "Miss P," and I suspected that he didn't like my name, but I was too afraid to ask. Anyway, this one evening I told him the story of my mother and how I got my name. When I had finished telling my story, he stated that he really liked "Constance." He said my middle name over and over, making silly sentences, causing me to feel silly. Then he announced that he was going to call me "Constance."  And, he did.

And, it stuck.

Here I am, 40+ years later, and 99% of the people in my life call me "Constance." My driver's license and passport have my first AND my middle name. It screws up the computers to go by anything other than your first name, but I prevailed. I found a way to keep it. And, I'm glad I did. I enjoy being "Constance."

Sometimes folks get confused and call me "Candace." I don't mind that so much. It's an easy mix up. However, I don't answer to "Connie." Again, another poor association with celebrities of the same name. It makes the hair on my arms stand up when someone reduces my name to THAT. I do try to be tolerant, but is it too much to ask for people to use your name the way you present it to them? If I introduce myself as "Bill," are you going to call me "William?"  If I tell you my name is "Margaret," are you going to refer to me as "Peggy?" What gives you the authority to change a person's name?

To young parents-to-be out there ... please give serious consideration to how the name you give your child will affect them throughout their life. I know I'm not the first person to say that, but I AM a person who had a name that caused unhappiness. It took many years to come to understand  that my mother meant well, but the truth is, "Cheryl" would have been so much better.