Betty White in Person

by Betty White

  For me, after Allen left, my work shifted into another, more accelerated gear, and life gets more interesting with every day that passes. My animal work continues, as well as some charity appearances . . . and, best of all . . . there are some great Superfriends to glue it all together. They understand my alone times . . . and I have the comfort of knowing they are there. How I wish everyone had that luxury.

  Widows have another alternative we haven’t talked about. What about an arrangement similar to that of the Golden Girls?

  Although Blanche and Dorothy and Sophia and Rose are together more for companionship than economy, the sharing could make sense from either standpoint. I have received quite a few letters applauding the concept as a great possibility. I have yet to hear from anyone so far saying, “We tried it, and the idea’s a bummer!”

  You already know how I value solitude, so my advice must not be taken too seriously. All I would suggest, however, is that you think twice before risking a Superfriend on the experiment . . . maybe you should try it out with someone you can afford to lose. Remember, the Golden Girls only live together for half an hour at a time . . . once a week.

  On Love

  Ask three people to give their definition of love, and you’ll get nine answers. At least.

  “Love” covers almost anything. Love is what you feel for your family, your parents, your friends . . . two-legged and four. Or you can add to the list . . . one loves his car, music, chocolate, his favorite comedian, the Dodgers . . .

  We have addressed some of these elsewhere here (not the Dodgers) so let’s narrow it down to the man/woman relationship. Narrow it down, she says! Love still covers such a lot of territory. There are so many different kinds and degrees of love, and they all weave into the same fabric . . . the more varied the threads, the more interesting the tapestry . . . you.

  Love can be pleasure, or pain . . . sometimes even therapy.

  At one point in my life I drifted into a romantic encounter that had absolutely nowhere to go. However, for a time it made life a very warm and tender adventure. No, it was no one you would know, so don’t bother to guess.

  It happened when . . . and no doubt because . . . I was at my most vulnerable. I shall be eternally grateful for a lovely memory, and there was no damage done . . . it could have been a lot worse. Instead, it served an invaluable purpose . . . I felt like a person again . . . and, for the first time in a long time, an attractive one. It isn’t what it was, but rather that it was. It may have saved my life at the time.

  Love is a matter of personal semantics. Elizabeth Taylor has often been quoted as saying she was only happy when she was in love. “In love” is such a special state . . . again, my own personal interpretation . . . that it happens but rarely in a lifetime. More than once, but certainly not often. And for me, it isn’t an annual bloomer . . . for one season only. With the right care and attention, it’s a hardy perennial.

  Let me paraphrase Elizabeth. I am probably happiest when I’m “in like.” You know the feeling . . . when someone has caught your attention, but good, even though they might not be aware of it. When the mere sound of his name can give you a little private buzz. When you find yourself replaying things he has said, in the back of your mind . . . or quoting him inordinately, whether it fits into the conversation or not. “In like” is a grown-up (!?) equivalent of “crush,” I guess. It is that lovely before state of mind when there are not yet any problems or choices. It is fleeting. It doesn’t stand still. It must grow into something more serious, or evaporate completely, leaving only a slight momentary disappointment.

  Now . . . should that private buzz change to a constant roar . . . if he never leaves the back of your mind for an instant, and you alternate between a state of euphoria and sheer panic . . . that, dear reader, is a sure sign that you are what I call in “fatuation.” Maintaining any kind of perspective at this juncture is a lost cause . . . you just have to steer the boat the best you can. Difficulties are compounded when you find you don’t recognize yourself as the same sane person you’ve always lived in. Bad decisions and misjudgments abound . . . but there are goodies as well, make no mistake. When it is over, just hope you emerge wiser, and relatively unscathed.

  But then . . .

  Rarely . . . oh, so rarely . . . the feeling simply will not go away. Instead, a deep warning bell begins to sound. Whether or not you are ready to listen, it says, “This is different.” Try as you will to silence it, bury it, abuse it, laugh at it, or run from it . . . you can’t deny it. You are “In Love.” And nothing is ever quite the same again.

  Incurably romantic? Maybe not.

  Fairy tales and Barbara Cartland novels notwithstanding, we know that over a lifetime it is possible to have more than one deep and abiding love. There have even been cases on record where someone was genuinely and totally in love with two people at the same time. Knowing my problem with decisions, I don’t even want to contemplate the inherent difficulties in that situation.

  How do you know when what you feel for someone is beyond “in like” or in “fatuation”? I don’t think you do, at first . . . for a short while they all seem to have the same symptoms . . . more . . . or less. Time has a way of sorting the wheat from the chaff, and before long the day might arrive when you think, “What did I ever see in him!”

  Unhappily, if time takes too long with its sorting, a lot of mistakes can be made in the interim.

  What if the feeling stands the test of time, and qualifies as pure gold . . . not brass . . . this time around? And let’s say the feeling is mutual, not a one-sided affair. That should be the end of the rainbow, shouldn’t it? . . . They lived happily ever after.

  You and I know it doesn’t work that way. People change, situations change, problems prove insurmountable . . . and lives go in different directions. But that does not mean that the love wasn’t very special for its time. It has earned its own little private place within you forever. You may even polish it now and then.

  Sometimes . . . often . . . when the love has been that strong, it evolves into a lasting, warm friendship. It may have to undergo an uncomfortable period of adjustment, but once out of the storm, it can be a tranquil and unbreakable relationship . . . with a set of memories all its own.

  Even discussing love raises more questions than it answers. If they haven’t been able to figure it out in thousands of years, I seriously doubt if we will here.

  What I do know for sure about any and all love is that it can die from neglect, or abuse. That you have to work at it to enjoy it. And that I never want to be without it.

  On Grief . . . and Hope

  Grief is not a real fun subject. There are few laughs to be had here, so you are welcome to skip to the next section. I will understand completely.

  Inevitably, grief does find its way to each of us at some time or other. How we handle it, or how long we let it stay, is something we can’t predict ahead of time. It is such a totally personal experience . . . it seems to cut all the circuits, temporarily, and insulate you against sympathy, condolences, comfort . . . anything that might diminish it. Numbness alternates with searing pain, and each individual must find his own way of getting through it. Talk about on-the-job training.

  Allen’s and my relationship was on so many levels beyond husband/friend. He would keep a pragmatic anchor on some of my flightier ideas . . . he would critique my performance on camera . . . he even kept a watchful eye on how my makeup or hair looked. He would be tickled when I got what he called “the writing look,” and I never felt I had completed anything until I gave it to him to read. As well as a great kisser, he was a good, tough editor. Oh, how I need him now.

  For a lifetime, my mother served as my mentor, and my best audience . . . but also my severest critic. She didn’t pussyfoot around if she didn’t like something . . . she had a good eye and I listened. Again, it may sound as though I had no mind of my own . . . believe me, I did, and I would go down swinging if I disagreed with either of their opinions.
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  With Allen gone, I still had Tess . . . but only for a little while. More and more, as she got weaker, our roles began to reverse. I almost became the mother . . . she the child I adored . . . and then, she just wasn’t there anymore.

  One of the toughest things for me to handle, among many, was the sudden realization that I was in charge. No longer was there someone to turn to and ask an opinion, or a decision . . . even a painful criticism. Being the new boss, you are aware that you are expected to do something, but haven’t a clue as to what it should be . . . and even if you knew what it was, there’s no time to do it because of so many maddening details and the paperwork that must be dealt with constantly. It took me a while to get wise to the fact that those very details were what kept me going forward . . . they wouldn’t wait while I jumped into bed and pulled the covers over my head. They kept me occupied through the first few hours, days, weeks . . . until I began to breathe again.

  Grief, the monster, doesn’t just finally go away. It goes into a very light sleep, deep inside you, where, now and then, something unexpected will cause it to stir uneasily. You tread very lightly until it dozes off again.

  I have talked a great deal in these pages about missing the people I love. Deliver me from becoming one of those who wear their grief like a mantle . . . almost seeming to grow to enjoy it . . . using it to justify anything and everything. They feed on it constantly, keeping it very much awake and alive. It becomes too easy to stay on that long downward spiral, until getting back to anything near a normal life is next to impossible without a great deal of outside help. It follows that those around them aren’t having any real picnic either.

  The Greeks had a word for it . . . Pythagoras said a long long time ago, “If you have a wounded heart, touch it as little as you would a wounded eye . . . There are only two remedies for the suffering of the soul: hope and patience.”

  It is impossible to talk about grief without also talking about hope . . . without some degree of hope, grief doesn’t bear discussing.

  It is a constant source of amazement to me to think back on the number of times in my life when things were at their bleakest . . . when I thought there was absolutely no hope of anything ever being worthwhile again.

  Superfriends don’t like it when you talk about them too much . . . that isn’t what the friendship is about. And that privacy is one of the special things you love about them.

  But I am going to make two exceptions . . . because they make the point of hope so eloquently.

  Mary Tyler Moore Levine and I don’t see each other often . . . we live a continent apart. If we’re lucky, we may be together once a year . . . we talk on the phone for a minute maybe every few months . . . but she has been my strength more times than she will ever know.

  In the middle of the night . . . one terrible night . . . at the hospital in Monterey, California, Allen was in a coma and not expected to make it to daylight. Mary’s son Richie had died that day, and she had just flown in from New York to Los Angeles. It was around midnight when she called me . . . I took the call at the nurse’s station . . . and I can still hear her say, “Oh, Betty . . . where did it all go wrong for us?” We cried at each other for maybe ten minutes, holding so close.

  When I went back into Allen’s room . . . for the first time I was able to let it all go. The purge was painful, but, oh, so necessary. In her grief, Mary had helped me. We both came through the black time, somehow.

  Mary had a lot more heartache ahead of her . . . so did I. But today, we’re not only “still here,” as the song goes . . . we are both tremendously happy and healthy and productive . . . with completely new lives. You could never have made either one of us believe such a thing was possible that miserable night in Monterey.

  At that time, Mary and Grant had long since gone their separate ways, but, as usual Grant was there for both Mary and me during that nightmare period.

  When Allen’s doctors said he could be brought back to Los Angeles after three weeks in the Monterey Community Hospital . . . it was Grant who sent the ambulance plane to transport him.

  During Allen’s last week . . . although it was supposed to be no visitors . . . it was Grant who showed up every afternoon . . . saying he just happened to be in the neighborhood. (His office was fifteen miles away.)

  One early morning I had to tell Grant that the battle was over . . . he and Melanie came and spent the afternoon with me.

  And when I asked if he would mind saying a few words at the service . . . Grant simply said, “You don’t worry about that. You let me produce it.” And what a lovely send-off he put together for his best best friend.

  It was not until weeks later when the news was made public . . . that I found out what else had happened on the day Allen died. Grant had been offered and had accepted the position of Chairman of the Board of NBC . . . at a luncheon meeting on that day. His career . . . his whole life had undergone a monumental change . . . yet he and Melanie were with me that afternoon for a warm, unhurried visit as though there was nothing else going on in the world.

  Among other things, Allen had great taste in best best friends.

  When I count the high spots that have taken place in my life since that grim time, I determine never to give up again. That is, of course, until the next black time, when, once more, I will be certain that things are absolutely hopeless.

  Will I ever learn?

  Where did Emily Dickinson get off being so wise?

  “Hope is the thing with feathers

  That perches in the soul,

  It sings the tune without the words,

  And never stops at all.”

  VI

  BRINGING UP

  THE REAR

  On Forward

  This book is due in the publisher’s hands this coming Thursday. I feel like I’m turning in a term paper, except that this has been much more fun. If you have hung in there with me to this point . . . many thanks.

  Before I bail out . . . two things have happened in the last five days that somehow brought everything into focus for me.

  The first one was last Wednesday night . . . when I learned that you can’t trust anybody.

  Following rehearsal, Bea, Rue, Estelle, and I were scheduled to do a photo layout for McCall’s magazine. We were all grousing about having to go through the long makeup and hair session on a day when we weren’t taping . . . it takes over an hour . . . and then get gussied up in fancy wardrobe, after rehearsing all day. Our photographer, Wayne Williams, promised to keep it as short as possible . . . and we all started horsing around while he snapped pictures.

  Suddenly . . . out of nowhere . . . Ralph Edwards materialized, with That Book under his arm . . . and announced, “This Is Your Life, Betty White!”

  There is no way to describe the next few hours. First, the sheer panic, when I literally considered running away . . . followed by total catatonic shock.

  We’ve all seen Ralph confound people through the years . . . 504 times, if you’re counting . . . but never, repeat never do you think it can happen to you. You would be too observant and aware not to suspect that something was going on . . . especially when so many people were in on the secret . . . The girls knew, the director, the producers, my trusted secretary, Gail, who helped Ralph sort it out, my housekeeper . . . and God only knows who else. Well, maybe you would be too observant and aware to be fooled, but not this kid.

  At this point, Bea and Rue and Estelle could laugh with relief, take off their finery, and go home . . . the subterfuge was over. (In all truth, you can’t imagine what a test of friendship it was for them to go through all that phony preparation . . . which they hate at the best of times. I am eternally grateful!)

  But for me it was just beginning. From here on in, everything was out of my hands. Ralph transported me to the Aquarius Theater. Someone else took my car keys. Someone brought my street clothes from my dressing room. Another elf brought my car to the theater.

  I kept worrying because I had dinner plans wi
th my friend Rudy Behlmer and didn’t know how to reach him to cancel. I needn’t have worried . . . there he was at the theater when we arrived . . . he’d been a co-conspirator since the beginning! Nobody is to be trusted.

  One of the reasons . . . or at least my excuse . . . that I had been taken in so completely, was that “This Is Your Life” had been off the air for a while, and I had no idea they were planning a special.

  All that was going through my mind while waiting for Ralph to lead me onstage was “Who will they get to come on . . . everybody I know is dead!” Another hazard that fretted me was my rotten memory.

  Well . . . Ralph had done a superb job in the surprise department:

  My Beverly Hills High School drama teacher, Robert Whitten.

  Also from Beverly High, my first leading man! Larry Rose and I had done Pride and Prejudice, our senior play . . . and they brought him in from Washington, D.C. . . . still in costume!

  Jack Paar flew in from New York!

  Mark Goodson flew in from New York!

  Gene Rayburn flew in from New York!

  The whole gang from “The Mary Tyler Moore Show” were there . . . Ed Asner, Valerie Harper, Gavin MacLeod, Georgia Engel, Cloris Leachman . . . and somehow Ted Knight was there, I swear.

  Then, live by satellite from New York, there was Mary herself! She’s in the middle of a Broadway show, Sweet Sue, or she would have been there in person. As it was, she and my buddy Dash, her golden retriever, introduced me to her new basset griffon puppy, Dudley!

  And then Johnny Grant, the mayor of Hollywood, presented perhaps the best surprise of all. There is to be a new star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame . . . for Allen Ludden! Oh, would that tickle him!