No Ordinary Woman

by Valerie Byron

  In the classroom, I would sit with my hand covering my nose, so that no-one could see my profile. I felt awkward and ugly around the beauties in my class. I had the wrong clothes, bitten nails, a growing nose and a gap between my teeth. Life could not have been worse and I just didn’t know how to deal with it.

  Eventually, I became best friends with a girl called Deana. She was everything I wished I could be – petite, huge breasted, with perfect white teeth and the tiniest of noses. She had a natural tan and all the boys were drawn to her. She was Jewish, like me, but had none of the usual features you would expect. Deana took me home to meet her younger sister, Binnie, and their parents. They welcomed me into their family and made me feel a part of it. It was at this time that I noticed Binnie was wearing the most wonderful worn, faded blue jeans and I asked if I could borrow them. I had never owned a pair, and they were on my list of things to get, once my mother started earning money. Binnie loaned me her jeans, which fit perfectly, and I wore them with glee. I knew I would have to give them back eventually, but hoped Binnie would forget and let me keep them.

  Deana and I joined the Westside Jewish Community Center when we were fourteen years old. We would take the bus in the evenings to attend the dances and classes that were offered. Although Deana was the belle of the ball, and I was hardly noticed, I still enjoyed going. I had a huge crush on one of the counsellors and he alone was worth the effort of getting ready and attending several times a week. Of course he was polite but never responded to my shy, lovelorn looks.

  I was desperately lonely all through junior high school. Although I had a couple of friends, I was shy and awkward. My mother allowed me to purchase a parakeet for company, which I kept in a cage on the kitchen table. In my enthusiasm, I overfed the bird, and one day found it lying on its back on the floor of the cage, overstuffed and dead.

  My mother was not as attached to animals as I was. You may recall she had told me she had given away our cat when we left England. She later admitted she had had it put to sleep. When I found out, I was beside myself. When the bird died, she flushed it down the toilet, as she did with the fish that had previously died, due to my overzealous ministrations.

  I maintained my friendship with Deana for two years. We graduated 8th grade, wearing fancy cocktail dresses and our first high heel shoes. I remember walking up and down Canon Drive, practising wearing them and trying not to topple over. At 5’5” I was fairly tall for fourteen, but still undeveloped. I would not start to blossom until I was fifteen years old, in my freshman year of high school.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  The summer after 8th grade graduation was a pivotal period in my life. My mother had taken in a young English divorcee to share our apartment, which she felt would help us out financially. Jean was twenty-five years old, a vivacious blonde, who was larger than life. She would strut around the apartment stark naked, with her round breasts bouncing, showing not a shred of modesty. She slept on our living room sofa at night, stuffing her sheets and blankets into the hall closet the following morning.

  She dated fabulous young men and seemed to know everyone in town. She worked for Pamela Mason, wife of James Mason, and was constantly name-dropping. Jean always spoke in “headlines” and was quite amusing to be around.

  She started to see a very plain, overweight Jewish psychologist and it became apparent that she was out to marry him. She had recently undergone a nose reconstruction, and encouraged my mother to let me have the same surgery. When Jean made this suggestion, I leapt at it, even though the thought or possibility had never crossed my mind before.

  “Oh, Mum, please. I'll pay you back, I promise,” I pleaded. “I will be so happy if I could look like everyone else.”

  Of course she relented, and agreed to pay for the surgery.

  Now I knew my life would change. Finally, I would be beautiful. At last I would be able to date boys, not have to hide my profile in class, and be the girl I was meant to be. I was beyond excited – I was euphoric. I had no thought of the pain or discomfort I would have to undergo, just the end result.

  My mother’s best friend, a doctor, felt differently about the matter. “Valerie” she said, in her guttural Austrian accent, “You are beautiful. You will grow into your nose as you develop.”

  In a way, she was right. My nose had only changed in the past year and it was possible that my face would become more interesting as I matured. But I wanted an upturned nose now! I was desperate to have a “nose job” and look pretty. I wanted to be “cute” like the rest of the Beverly Hills girls and so it was that in the summer of 1957, just before my fifteenth birthday, my mother made an appointment with a prominent Beverly Hills plastic surgeon. Dr. Lipsett agreed that I had grown enough, and we made an appointment for the surgery to take place in August, just before my freshman year in high school was to start.

  It was June, and my fifteenth birthday was still a month away, but the hell of junior high school was done with. I had two whole months of summer to get through before I would be re-invented as a beauty when I entered Beverly Hills High School.

  While I was anxiously waiting for my surgery date, I again spent lonely days alone in our apartment on Canon Drive. My mother worked each day and there was not much for me to do. As usual, I watched endless television, walked the streets of Beverly Hills, or went to the library. I spent my allowance on the trashy Modern Romances or True Confessions magazines that I purchased at the local Thrifty drugstore. On one occasion, after leaving the drugstore empty handed, I was approached by a man wearing all black. As I stood outside, he came up to me and spoke “You need to come with me,” he said. I looked at him blankly, not understanding.

  “I saw you take something from the store,” he went on. “I am a detective. You need to get in my car and come to the station.”

  Feeling outraged, but knowing that I had taken nothing, I refused. I walked away, ignoring his outstretched hand, wondering vaguely if I would get in trouble for not going with him. He was obviously a sexual predator, because he turned away and did not pursue me. Again, I was saved from what could have been a terrible incident.

  During the days of summer, I often stood by my upstairs living room window, peeking through at the apartment house next door. A boy my age lived there, and I had a huge crush on him. I would spend hours watching and waiting for him to appear, and I often walked up and down the street, hoping he would notice me. But he never did.

  Once in a while, Deana and I would take the bus to the beach in Santa Monica, and I would come home with my skin burned and in pain. I felt that my life was boring and I was ugly. I wanted all that to change. But there were still weeks to wait.

  One day a letter arrived in the mail for my mother. It was from her lover, and my guardian, Alan Aitchison, who had written from England. I could not wait for my mother to get home so, in all innocence and curiosity, I opened it. He had a beautiful way of writing, and very lovely penmanship. I started reading the letter, not truly understanding what was written there. I re-read the letter, and then dropped it in shock and horror. My world turned upside down there and then!

  The letter contained not only words of love and longing, but of a sexuality that was beyond the understanding of a young girl. He had drawn pictures of female and male genitalia. He wrote of making love to my mother and how he missed her. All of these things were shocking and disgusting to the young adolescent that I was. I could not imagine having sex with a man – it was too horrific to contemplate. I threw the letter down, and ran out of the apartment. I walked through the streets, with tears pouring down my face.

  My mother had literally tumbled off her altar. She had had sex with a man! She had never dated anyone except my father and Uncle Alan, and had never spoken of intimacy with men to me. In my innocence, I saw her as virgin-like, and to realise she was a sexual being was a shock that changed everything. It altered my attitude towards men and sex from that moment on.

  That evening I confronted her, and she sat me down to explain.r />
  “Val, when two people love each other, there is an intimacy between them,” she confided.

  “What do you mean, exactly?” I asked.

  And so she tried to explain about sexual intercourse and what actually occurs.

  “Oooh,” I cried in horror, “I'll never let a man put his thing in me. That's disgusting.”

  If only I had known then what was to occur in the not too distant future!

  CHAPTER FIVE

  An exciting event occurred when our flat-mate, Jean, decided to take my mother and me to a Hollywood film premiere. I was excited beyond belief at the prospect of seeing movie stars in the flesh, and was outfitted in a beautiful lilac dress with spaghetti straps. It was the prettiest dress I had ever owned and I felt like a princess, despite my adolescent gawkiness. Jean arranged for a limousine to pick us up at the apartment, and we rode in style to Hollywood to see Bing Crosby and Grace Kelly starring in “High Society”.

  The movie was wonderful, and as we paraded around in the lobby after it was over, Jean called out to me, loudly, in her very upper-class English accent “Oh dahling, you were wonderful in the film.” People turned to stare, and I flooded scarlet with embarrassment. Like the poor folk we were, after arriving in style in the limo, we waited at the bus stop, and took the bus home. What fun it was!

  Another notable milestone that summer of my fifteenth year, just months before I was to have my surgery, was my first kiss. Jean decided to throw a party at my mother’s apartment and invited all sorts of theatrical types. John Dennis, the actor, showed up and gave me a big hug. I was a little nervous around John, as I felt he was taking an inappropriate interest in me. A few weeks earlier he had shown up at the apartment when I was alone. He was excited because he had won a small part in the movie “Marty” starring Ernest Borgnine the year before, and was hoping for an audition for “The Desperate Hours.” He brought the old “Marty” script with him, and asked me to read lines, explaining that if I wanted to be an actress, this would be good practise for me. There was a kissing scene involved, and I became quite nervous, hoping he would not expect me to actually do the deed.

  Fortunately, a call of nature made him leave the living room and go to the bathroom. I quickly closed the script, and made my way to the bedroom. As I passed the bathroom, I noticed he had left the door open, and was standing in front of the toilet, with his back to me. It was with complete shock and horror that I saw his enormous penis, the size of a horse’s member, protruding from his open trousers.

  I cannot say that John intended for me to see this, but the fact that he left the bathroom door open, keeps me wondering to this day. My mother arrived home in the nick of time, and I was saved from the dreaded kiss. I didn’t see much of him after that incident, and it would be another twelve years before we would meet again, under much different circumstances.

  Back to the party! It was exciting for a young girl to be included, but I had nothing in common with these glamorous people. I hung back in the hallway near my bedroom and watched the interaction from afar. I was wearing a grey chiffon dress with little black dots on it – which fit snugly around my waist, making me feel very grown up and sexy. As I was wondering what to do, a man approached and started talking to me.

  “Hi, I’m Robert,” he pronounced. “And who are you?”

  “Hi,” I stammered nervously. “I’m Valerie. I’m fourteen.”

  Robert Cavanaugh was a musician, a pianist, who must have been in his early thirties. He was good looking in a scholarly sort of way, with a crew cut and glasses. For some strange reason, he seemed quite taken with the little ugly duckling hovering near her bedroom. After chatting for a few minutes, he suddenly took my head in his hands, and planted a kiss on my lips. I felt a roaring inside my head, like a vacuum cleaner going off. I almost fainted with bliss and followed when he took my hand and led me into my bedroom. We lay on the bed and talked until my mother poked her head through the door, at which point he hastily took his leave.

  My first kiss! It was a moment in time that I have remembered all my life. He had stirred something inside me and I was ready for more of the same. After the party was over, I stood in the small hallway outside my bedroom and stared at myself in the mirror. Had anything changed? No. There was the same dark hair and eyes, and the hated aquiline nose. But a grown man had kissed me, so perhaps I was sort of attractive, in a weird way.

  The following month, on July 4th, I celebrated my 15th birthday quietly, with my friend Deana, and her family. In August, it would be “miracle time” – and it couldn’t happen soon enough for me. I had patiently waited until I was fifteen because doctors would not perform plastic surgery on young girls who were still growing. I was beyond excited and counted the hours until it was time for the big day.

  On the day of the surgery, I was up early, but could not eat, according to instructions. My mother and I took the bus to Dr. Lipsett’s office in Beverly Hills, and I was taken into a very small operating room and given a light anaesthetic. I was awake the entire time, but kept my eyes tightly shut for fear of seeing blood or worse! There was a loud sawing noise as he broke my nose and a great deal of pressure, but no pain.

  “All done,” Dr. Lipsett finally pronounced with satisfaction, and I was wheeled into a recovery room.

  Later, after my nose was packed and light plastic sunglasses were placed on my nose, I was told we could go home.

  My mother still had to go to work, and I needed care. So I was packed off to her best friend’s house in West Hollywood to recover. Erna Gale, my mother’s friend, was an Austrian doctor and although I was bored out of my mind staying with her, she took great care of me. I remember cleaning out my bloody nose with Witch Hazel, and preening in front of the mirror as I tried to see my new profile underneath the bandages. I was quite amazed to receive several phone calls from a few popular girls in my class at Beverly Vista, inquiring about my progress and wishing me well. I wondered how they had found out about my surgery – perhaps Deana had spilled the beans? The excitement within me was mounting daily, so anxious was I to see the new me.

  After a couple of weeks of hanging around Erna’s house, reading trashy magazines or watching television, it was time for the unveiling. My mother took me to the doctor’s office, and he removed the dressings. We all held our breath as the final tape was removed and the mirror held up to my face.

  I could not believe my eyes! Finally, I was pretty. I was more than pretty, I was beautiful. I held the glass mirror in my hand and looked at my swollen profile from both sides. There were bruises and swelling, but I could see that my nose was small and straight. I touched it tentatively with my finger, and smiled.

  Exuberant with joy, I knew from that moment that my life would change. I could not wait to get home, telephone Deana, and show off my new look to the world.

  My first outing after the surgery was to Balboa Island with Deana and her family. We took photos together in the little 25-cent booths, and I made sure there were plenty of profile pictures. I now wore my hair without bangs, because I didn’t need to hide my face any more. I just knew that life was going to take a turn for the better.

  As I preened and showed off, I thought of the prior year when Deana and I had taken a trip to the newly opened Disneyland. She had an attractive boy for her date, while I was paired up with some nerd called Marshall. I had felt awkward and ugly sitting next to my pretty friend. I was with a blind date who had no interest in me. I had hated feeling jealous of a friend’s face and body, and hoped that changes were going to happen in my life as soon as the surgery had been performed. Now was the time.

  Deana’s down-to-earth parents were always supportive and warm. Her father, Ben, gave me some sterling advice, especially important when I started to enter the dating world. I failed to follow it on many occasions, but I always remembered his words: “Valerie, date the cream of the crop, not the cream of the crap.”

  CHAPTER SIX

  In September of 1957, one month after my surger
y, I entered as a freshman at Beverly Hills High School. I was just fifteen years old, but a year older than the majority of my classmates.

  Few people recognised me, and of course there were so many new kids from other junior high schools that I felt as if I were making a fresh start. My confidence rose, and boys started taking notice. I was overwhelmed with all the attention and found it difficult to know when to say “no” when I was asked out. Consequently, I had dates with some boys whom I found totally unappealing. But I soon learned that the cute guys were interested in me too, and that I could pick and choose.

  I still spent a great deal of time alone since my mother was at work. After walking home from school each day, I was responsible for cleaning the apartment and grocery shopping. To get to the local Ralph’s supermarket, I often walked down the alley behind our apartment to Wilshire Boulevard. I started to notice a young man working in a garage at the end of the alley. He would wave at me as I walked by, and I smiled inside as I strode past him, with groceries in my arms. I made sure to walk by as often as I could until I could get him to talk to me.

  Jimmy was a mechanic working for British Motor Cars. He drove around the streets of Beverly Hills testing the various sports cars, and worked on them in the garage behind the showroom. After several weeks, we started to chat and I learned that he was twenty-three years old. Wow! An older man. I was only fifteen, so he seemed like an adult, which of course he was. We started to date and I saw him once in a while, but on a casual basis.

  At this time in my life I was old enough to earn my own allowance, and found the perfect job as an usherette at the Fox Beverly Theater on Beverly Drive in Beverly Hills. It could not have been more perfect. I got to see all the latest films, gape at movie stars, and even sneak my friends in for free on occasion.