The Women Who Raised Me

by Victoria Rowell

  The Cinematographer was clearly smitten and I was definitely scared. Before things developed, I departed for San Francisco, where the promise of adventure and opportunities had beckoned.

  Not much adventure or opportunity cropped up in the Bay Area, where I boarded with a club owner and his girlfriends, getting by on affordable junk food and splurging on a ticket to see myself in the movie Hair in an otherwise empty movie theater. Where was everybody?

  I returned to NYC after asking the Cinematographer to meet me at the airport. When I arrived with my one black trunk, I informed him, with my heart beating wildly, “I’m moving in,” which was what seemed to be my only option at that time. I compromised myself for basic food and shelter.

  Two years later, some of which was turbulent, and many ports of call afterward, my desire to see Europe in 1979 had been far exceeded—even if I had been on a tight leash.

  Highlights from my visits to Czechoslovakia, where I learned more Czech than I ever thought possible, included witnessing arrangements to clandestinely acquire family photography belonging to Milos Forman that had been left behind during the invasion of Prague Spring of ’68. There was also a memorable trek through the lush Czech forests to gather Lisichky—fox mushrooms—meant to be served with freshly hunted deer. In a throwback to my New England youth, I thought perhaps of screaming to warn the hapless deer. Instead, I watched hunters from the village gut and tie the carcass to a tree limb, which I helped carry down from the mountain into the village for a feast. Two days of celebrations by the villagers proceeded with beer and stories flowing as a local accordion player accompanied fanciful tales of Slavic royalty. Having not seen a brown face since World War II, they treated me as a celebrity.

  The more I saw of the world beyond my corner of it, the more I wanted to see. One of our most memorable trips was when the Cinematographer and I vacationed in Saint-Domingue/Haiti. We stayed at Habitation Leclerc, a converted colonial estate owned by dancer Katherine Dunham. Once occupied by Pauline Bonaparte and General Charles Leclerc during the Haitian Revolution, it sat atop an aquifer, nestled in Marssaint, a neighborhood just outside of Port-au-Prince. We drove into the heart of the countryside over washed-out mountain roads, past historic battlefields and monuments, and through sudden rainstorms. The soul of the country spoke to me, making me feel a strong connection. (Many years later, I would return to that rich history filming Feast of All Saints, written by the brilliant Anne Rice. Since energy so often follows thought, that would be fitting as I had so much wanted to return to one of the most beautiful places on the planet.) During my trip there with the Cinematographer, we seemingly stumbled upon a guarded hotel, complete with an aviary. Inside the lobby, a woman with her back to me was giving the kitchen staff instructions. All I could see of her was her coarse waist-length black hair. As I approached her, she turned. Her beauty was blinding. Her name was Lahaina, and she would curiously turn up in my future in a very different capacity. But at that time, she and her husband were gracious hosts, whisking us for the day to their private island, attending to our wants and needs.

  Lahaina was lonely in her gilded cage, even with the company of her daughter, and hated to see me go. As we were saying our good-byes, she implored us to return, promising, “The next time you come back, I’ll have my leopard cubs.”

  My travels certainly fed the passion for photography that had been instilled in me at an early age by Agatha and my ever-ready Brownie camera to capture moments that would otherwise be lost. It so happened that in the same building where the Cinematographer and I lived, I’d met a fascinating female photographer named Sina Essary.

  We had met one morning on the elevator and she asked if I would pose for her, to which I answered, “Sure,” little imagining until I entered her penthouse apartment and saw some of her work what a phenomenon she was. Sina apparently had three apartments—one to live in, one for her studio, and entirely separate quarters for her Persian cats.

  It was my first portrait shoot, created from stunning shadows and light that felt true to my existence. What most fascinated me was that she made a living as a medical assistant, not full-time as the prodigious photographer that she was. Sina didn’t seem to mind in the least, as though it was enough for her to do her art, even preferable to create images that pleased her rather than having to live up to the market’s expectation. Still, I wondered how she supported herself in such a well-appointed lifestyle. Few clues arose until one visit when Sina, with tears in her eyes, told me that she was a widow. Describing in detail how much she had loved her husband, she went on to recall the day when she sat next to him and witnessed him being gunned down by hitmen. He was Joey Gallo, a mobster known in most New York circles.

  Not that my situation had any direct parallels, but it was instructive to meet Sina and realize that being dependent on a man for financial support under any circumstances was dangerous. This was another wake-up call for me at a time when the Cinematographer was trying increasingly to isolate me, very much like a concubine. Finally I realized I needed to take control of my life and end the relationship.

  This fairly recent chapter was all news to an alarmed Paulina, though I reassured her that what had seemed to be a detour had provided me with many lessons that were now helping me back on course.

  To find myself and my balance again, I had gone back to studying ballet—both at Carnegie Hall, where, for the first time, I paid for classes, loving every minute of being in that hallowed space, and also in Harlem with Arthur Mitchell through a scholarship I had received. To pay the bills, I took a job in a department store, managing fairly well.

  Paulina asked me probing questions, as was her habit, without being invasive. What was it really, she wanted to know, that would make me happy?

  No one had ever asked me that question. My dream of being a prima ballerina was just that—a dream. To become a ballerina required that strength a dancer finds just above her pelvic bone, forsaking all else; I couldn’t do it twice. I had kept that part of myself for my very survival. The life I lived outside, walking up Broadway to my next audition. Why not? It was an open call and I needed the cash. My training gave me the appearance of having a fistful of dollars, when in actuality I had little more than a subway token.

  I was Odette/Odile on and off the stage, executing thirty-two fouettés every day I woke up; it was a way of life. The idea of being a ballerina had been such a part of my being that it was automatic to say so. But I had finally figured out that it wasn’t really what I wanted to be at all. I did just want to be a part of the corps de ballet, the spit and glue of a family that danced. I wondered if maybe I could pour my life into something else artistic? Was there something else out there? The first thing that came into my mind, at that moment, sitting in Paulina’s expansive living room that overlooked the Hudson, was that I had wondered what it would be like to connect to the family that I first came from, most of whom I didn’t know. It felt important to see my mother, Dorothy, and to locate my brothers. It was time.

  Paulina Ruvinska cheered me on, as usual, telling me that before we had dinner she wanted to give me something and then presented me with three gifts: a Japanese cloth cloche, a 1930s perfume bottle, and a twenty-dollar bill that she retrieved from her brassiere.

  “I can’t,” I pleaded, insisting that she had done too much. It was ironic that I had been jet-setting all over the world not so long ago, but now could really use the carfare.

  “Yes, you can,” she insisted more vociferously. “Give an older woman her pleasure.”

  What was it about her that created such a defined aura of sensuality? Certainly it was how she revealed herself, enhancing her soulful eyes with black eyeliner, keeping her red lipstick smoothly applied at all times, and never shying away from showing her décolletage in her array of plunging necklines accented by multiple necklaces.

  As every great grande dame should, Paulina had a handful of passions that were separate from her calling, three passions to be specific—art, Italy, and be
auty.

  I hoped that she didn’t mind if I had those three passions as well, I joked.

  “Not at all,” she replied thoughtfully.

  In the nearly two decades that followed this night, we would stay in frequent contact. In 1998, when she was eighty-six years old, Paulina hadn’t responded to letters for long enough that I worried horribly about her. I called “Skane,” a term of endearment for a man I loved and secretly dated, Wynton Marsalis, whom I met at the Hollywood Bowl through jazz impresario George Wein. I had desperately wanted to introduce him to Paulina but hadn’t been able to do so. I loved that Paulina—who knew jazz luminaries like pianist Teddy Wilson—was of the opinion that what made Wynton so great was his classical prowess.

  From California, I called Wynton in New York and asked for him to personally go and check on her. He did so, whereupon the doorman informed him that she had died—which he explained to me when he called to say, “Vicki, she’s gone.”

  There was such an inheritance of passion and resilience that this grande dame had bequeathed me and that I wanted to thank her for one last time. Her vitality, however, stayed with me always through letters like these—

  Vicki, dear,

  How sweet of you to send the Valentine Day’s message—it arrived with green enclosure…you are probably the most reliable “repayer” in the whole art world…and the only one who acknowledges debts…Teddy Wilson may do the Chester Dichter Memorial Festival Concert. Wouldn’t it be great if he could pull it off?!…Ted is now in Germany concertizing…(concertizing?) and he’ll be in touch. And I’m to be in a Off-Broadway play, by David Wolfman. So, life moves on—

  Bless you and all my love, darling

  —Paulina

  Dear Vicki,

  Just played a most successful recital in Rome and also gave a one and half hour lecture at the Marymount Int. School, on music and demonstrations, kids from eight to nineteen loved it. Danny, my son, was delighted and so were the other teachers—Back after Easter—Carnegie Recital Hall again on May 12—Save that evening.

  Love,

  Paulina

  That concert left me with a magnificent memory of the indomitable Paulina Ruvinska Dichter. But more than anything the most priceless gift given to me by Paulina was in a question she posed at the end of one of our long talks.

  No one had ever asked me this, so she took me by surprise when she leaned in and said with great curiousity, “Vicki, do you know that you are beautiful?”

  An awkwardness overcame me.

  “Vicki,” Paulina repeated, in all seriousness, “take the time to look at yourself and know that you are all that you need to be, just as you are.”

  EIGHT

  DOROTHY & AGATHA

  There were a handful of important reasons I left New York City in the early 1980s and returned to Boston and vicinity, each framed by earlier events that I should explain before describing the whirlwind in which I was soon immersed.

  As early as June 1978, one month into emancipation, I sat down and wrote out a check in the amount of ten dollars, payable to the Cambridge School of Ballet. This was the last of my Seventeen modeling earnings. I had just made my first charitable contribution. Henceforth, I would consider myself a patron of the arts, and when I had a chance to do the same on behalf of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, the feeling of being able to contribute to the leading organization in the area of civil rights was equally amazing. What better way to honor every woman who had raised me than to pay it forward, as it were, in one form or another?

  Earlier that spring I had sent a repeated request in an exchange of phone calls and letters with my social worker, Patrick Moynihan—who had been exceedingly helpful already in the many particulars related to my case—asking, please, that the State of Maine write a letter of commendation to Agatha Armstead for her exemplary contribution as a foster mother.

  Patrick Moynihan did his best but wearily explained that his superiors were concerned that it would set an unfair precedent. Their position was “It hasn’t been done before.”

  Those had become fighting words for me. “That’s not how we do it.” “We don’t do it that way.” “It’ll never happen.” I was relentless. I was a daughter of Maine, born under the sign of “I lead.”

  Needless to say, Agatha was soon sent the commendation, signed by the governor, to my lasting gratitude, and her infinite surprise. Modest as she was, after she called to say how thrilled the letter had made her, Ma switched quickly to the topic of how I was doing, asking, “Did you get my Toll-House cookies?”

  Our conversations were always truncated, not only because she didn’t believe in wasting money on the phone bill when a well-composed, newsy, thoughtful letter was much more preferable, but also because Peter Cassell was probably standing over her shoulder with a stopwatch.

  The ability to give a little something back, both to the Cambridge School of Ballet and to help give Agatha long overdue recognition, had started me thinking early on about the idea of one day teaching ballet to inner-city kids. Part of the ethic of having the caliber of training that I had received is to eventually pass it on. Also one of the things I learned in 1981 when I took my first clerical job in New York City was that typing wasn’t going to be my calling in life.

  The job had come through my wonderful friend Colleen Atwood—the multiple-Oscar-winning Hollywood costume designer then in the nascence of her career. Colleen and I had been introduced by another dancer friend, Kimberly Von Brandenstein. Colleen had worked with Kim’s mother, Patrizia Von Brandenstein, also an award-wining costume designer, on such films as Ragtime and Amadeus. When I needed somewhere to live, it was Kim who reminded me that I had met Colleen before and suggested I get in touch with her.

  I recalled a dark-haired woman of tremendous focus taking direction from Patrizia. A wide worktable in front of them was covered with accent ribbon and flowers, materials they were using for period hats for Ragtime. Exuding calm, Colleen seemed not to flinch under the crunch of the deadline, the same calm with which she greeted me at her door, knowing I was having a crunch of nowhere to stay, welcoming me in with a wide smile.

  A grande dame in the making already, with her signature brilliant style, Colleen had decorated the room that she had to offer me—complete with a daybed and kitchenette—with fabulous fabric to camouflage cracking plaster. Sharing her decorating secrets with me, Colleen was a maestro in her treatment of cloth and garments. I studied how carefully she folded and preserved her extensive knit collection in a large cedar chest, how she cared for delicate articles of clothing, how she examined and compared vintage lace, buttons, and beads.

  Her generosity during this time could never be measured. At a critical point in her career when she was studying for the oppressively difficult test to get into the union, Colleen energized and motivated me to tackle the next challenges of finding the independence that I was looking for. A staunch advocate of a hot bath at the end of every day, she was also enormously supportive, giving me space to regroup, and was interested and intrigued in the research that I had undertaken to find my family that I knew so little about.

  During this time, my attempts to contact Dorothy were to no avail, mainly because of her sister Lillian. Even so, I was able to collect more Bevan-Sawyer-Collins genealogy that helped me see the ancient roots and ties to the past, giving me that connection I sought.

  I followed some clues that led me to Normal Rowell Sr. When he answered the phone, it felt strange to talk to the person whose name I carried but who was of no blood relation to me. Of my three brothers, David was the most forthcoming. It meant the world to me when he made the effort to meet in person by riding his Harley to Manhattan as soon as he could. We connected through our different stories and experiences, not quite putting all the puzzle pieces together but allowing me to be grounded in the reality of how we ended up where we did.

  Colleen never pushed but encouraged me to find employment, not only for income but also for structu
re and a sense of purpose, responsibility, self-esteem. All of those things were to be lasting requirements to which I would become addicted, although when the temp agency landed me a secretarial position with the New York State Council on the Arts, I could see that my stay there might be short term. Colleen and I celebrated her admittance into the costumers’ union together and my being gainfully employed. She never, not once, made me feel like I was a burden. She always encouraged me not to give up, no matter how inexplicable or ridiculous my new job seemed. Many of the organizational skills, in fact, would help me on numerous fronts to come.

  It had been almost a year as I heard myself promising Colleen that she could have her room back, knowing that it was time for me to move on, but not sure where I was headed. The destination suddenly became clear when three distinct reasons became cause for me to leave New York.

  Out of the blue, almost, I had received one offer to teach ballet in Pawtucket, Rhode Island, and another job offer from Elma Lewis in Roxbury, Massachusetts. The third reason was that Agatha was dying.

  For the next two, almost three years, my return to Boston was to grace me with a graduate education in what we commonly call reality. These lessons came from big events—life and death passages—and from smaller, everyday moments. At the same time, they were crash courses in the beauty and power of mystery that continued to color my experiences. Tests of faith, they reaffirmed that there weren’t always clear-cut explanations to why things happened, but that it was important to accept and trust the generosity of the universe.