Welcome to the World, Baby Girl! (18 page)

When they got backstage, her mother’s friend, a nice lady named Christine, gave them a complete tour from the huge mirrored rehearsal hall to the dressing rooms. Backstage was teaming with Rockettes, musicians, stagehands, and other costumed ladies but Dena wanted to know only one thing: Who made the lights way up in the curved ceiling of the auditorium change from one color to another and how did they do it? Christine had laughed at the question
coming from such a small girl and introduced her to a man named Artie. He took her over and showed her the main control console, with its 4,305 colored handles that controlled the amber, green, red, and blue lights, and told her about the 206 spotlights. Dena stood listening, enthralled. Later they had dinner with Christine in the private Radio City Music Hall cafeteria, where all the dancers and the staff ate. That night Dena’s head was still whirling. She had never been so excited in her entire life. She slept with her mother and held her hand all night and dreamed about the lights. Then, two months later, without warning, her mother suddenly quit her job and moved to the Altamont Towers apartments in an older section of Cleveland, Ohio, and Dena didn’t see her at all until the summer. But she never forgot that night at Radio City and had been fascinated with lights ever since, any kind of light, sunlight, moonlight, lamplight, so much so that it was the lighting that first attracted her to the theater. She started working with the lights in college and was amazed at how she could change the mood of the stage set from a light and cheery room with pure white sunlight pouring through the windows to a dark, shadowy, scary room by just pulling a lever. She would sneak into the college theater in the middle of the night and play with the lights for hours. She learned how to create any mood she wanted. It was that year that she became totally obsessed with light, and eventually the light became obsessed with her. It was the first time she ever really felt in control of anything in her life. And the lights had pulled her all the way back to New York.

Hello, Kappas!

If you are wondering why I am in such high spirits, I can tell you that this year has been a fabulous year for finding and renewing old friendships and our new rush chair, Leslie Woolley, tells us that this year was the most successful rush of all. We have 34 NEW KAPPA KUTIES! I was on hand as each new pledge was given her special fleur-de-lis pin and was welcomed by all KAPPAS ON KAMPUS with lots of KAPPA KISSES and hugs. Each active named her special pledge with a KAPPA KNICKNAME to make her feel welcome. Then each senior stood and told what KAPPA has meant to her (that really got the tears going!). Then we walked all the rushes out and ended by singing the Porch Song.

And now for my most exciting news! I was able to catch up with one of our most famous KAPPAS in Atlanta last month. She was in town to receive an award from the American Women in Radio and Television and of course I am talking about none other than DENA NORDSTROM! She
sends all the KAPPAS her best and we reminisced about the good old days when we were roomies! Back in the dark ages, HA HA. The picture below is out of focus but I am sending it anyway.

KAPPAS KONTINUE TO SET THE WORLD ON FIRE, so all you gals who have aspirations, maybe one day some of your KAPPA sisters will find you and say I REMEMBER YOU WHEN!

—Sookie Krackenberry Poole,
Class of ’65

After her first lunch with Howard Kingsley, Dena tried her best to do something to stop the direction the show was going in but had little luck.

This was the fourth time she had asked Ira Wallace to program an interview with the blind woman who had just been named teacher of the year and for the fourth time he had turned her down. Wallace, who was having what was left of his hair cut by his personal barber, Nate Albetta, said, “Nobody wants to see that sickening candy-ass stuff, do they, Nate?”

Nate said, “Don’t ask me, I couldn’t tell you.”

“Yes, they do, Ira,” Dena said. “You don’t know it but there are a lot of nice people out there. Everybody is not trying to rip everyone else off. You need to get out of New York and travel around this country and meet some of the people who are your audience.”

Wallace said, “You’re telling me I don’t know my audience? Me? Have you seen the numbers this week?”

“No … but that’s not the point.”

“Let me tell you something, and this I learned from that great journalist, Walter Winchell: gossip is like dope; once you get people hooked, they need a little every day, and if you don’t let them down, you have them for life.”

Dena rolled her eyes. “Oh, great, Ira, why don’t we put that on a bronze plaque and hang it on the wall?”

Dena looked at Nate with the straight razor in his hand. “While you’re at it, why don’t you cut his throat for me, will you?”

Nate laughed; he was used to their arguments.

“You know, kid, you’re gonna have to get over this mistaken idea you have of human nature. This ain’t nothing new. People can’t wait to get the dirt on other people. That’s what makes the world go round and pays your salary and you better hope they don’t ever get over it. You’ve got some fantasy about brotherly love. It don’t exist. You think people are some kind of pure, white feathered birds flying in the clouds. They’re not. They’re pigs and they love to wallow in the mud and dirt.”

“A lovely sentiment, Ira. Gee, I’m glad you told me all this. I was starting to think that there might be one or two decent people out there. A good thing you caught me in time.”

Nate laughed again while Wallace said, “Yeah, yeah”—he relit his cigar—“you may think it’s funny but if you don’t watch out, you’re gonna get stomped on. You got some idealist idea about man being some noble creature … and all this crap about how we can change human nature. You can’t change it, you’re beating your head against a brick wall. People have had a couple of million years to change and they ain’t changed yet, have they?”

“Not much.”

“No, and they ain’t going to. Not in your lifetime. So get over it.”

“Don’t you ever feel just a
little
bit guilty?”

Wallace threw up his hands. “Jesus, what is this?” He looked at Nate. “I’m in a Frank Capra movie all of a sudden. Now, don’t let me down and turn out to be some loser.”

“Ira, I’m not trying to let you down. I know it’s OK to expose real corruption, but I don’t think you realize that people are complaining about how mean the show is getting. I hear it all the time.”

“Sure, you do. The rich and the powerful can’t control the press anymore and it’s making them mad. But we ain’t the villains—they are. Don’t shoot the messenger.”

“I’m not but these hidden camera things you are doing are pretty iffy.”

“Hey—who is going to decide what to withhold? Are you? Is the president? No. Is Howard Kingsley? No. That old craptrap about news being withheld for national security reasons don’t wash anymore; we’ve pulled down their pants and exposed them and they don’t like it. That’s
why
they’re squealing like stuck pigs, and when we catch anybody, and I mean anybody and I don’t care if it’s the goddamned pope, with their fingers in the till or anywhere else they don’t belong, we’re gonna report it. Right, Nate?”

“Right.”

“You’re gonna see a lot more respect for television. We can make or break them and now they know it. You stick with me. Do what I tell you, people will be knocking each other down to get on the air with you. You’re gonna be more famous than most of the assholes you interview—and believe me, you’ll be working long after these slobs have crashed and burned.”

Wallace put his hand up to stop Nate and leaned toward Dena. “You remember that guy that was on top of the building over at Sixty-seventh Street the other day? And a crowd gathered when he threatened to jump and after about thirty minutes the crowd started yelling at him, ‘Jump, Jump!’ ”

“Yes, I remember. Disgusting.”

“Yeah, disgusting, but that’s your audience, kid, those are your so-called nice people. So when you’re doing an interview, remember they’re down there just waiting for something to happen. They want action and I’ve got the ratings to prove it. You think Winchell had guilt? Hell, no, but people remember his name, not those country club snobs who thought they were better than him.”

“Ira, all I am asking is why we have to hit so hard all the time. We’re not at war, it’s just a television show. Can’t we even try to do a few human interest stories for a change?”

“You wanna preach? Get a church. This ain’t
The Waltons
, this is the news.”

“So I take it the answer is no, no teacher stories?”

“Only when the teacher,” Wallace said, signaling Nate to resume, “is also a child molester. Now, that’s a story.”

There was no way to argue with Ira, of course. He was right. And he had the ratings to prove it. He had been the first to jump on
the trend of ambush interviews and perfect the sensationalized sound bite. In the beginning, everyone had laughed at him, then hated him, but not now. The world of what they called television news was changing and changing fast. Now they were all scrambling to change their own formats.

And as Ira liked to say, “Hey, it was gonna happen—I just came up with the idea first.”

Dena woke dreading her doctor’s appointment that day but she had to go. He would not prescribe any more medicine unless he saw her. It was just her bad luck to have picked out a doctor who was completely thorough. After her examination she sat in his office dying for a cigarette while Dr. Halling went over his findings and read the results of the GI series tests he had forced her to go through again. He did not look happy.

“Dena, your ulcer is not healing as it should. In fact, it looks worse.” He looked at her. “And you’re not smoking?”

“No.”

“No coffee, no alcohol?”

“No.”

“And you are watching your diet?”

“Oh, absolutely.” She had eaten a bowl of oatmeal last week.

He sighed. “Well, I’m baffled. The only thing I can figure that is causing this is just plain old stress. So all I can do at this point is to put you on complete bed rest.”

Dena’s alarm system went off. “Bed rest! What does that mean?”

He looked at her again from over his glasses. “Dena, it means just what you think it means. I’m going to put you to bed for at least
three weeks. I have a feeling that’s the only way I’m going to get you to slow down. We are approaching a dangerous stage as it is. You don’t want to wind up with a bleeding ulcer and have to have emergency surgery. Or worse, bleed to death.”

“But it’s not bleeding yet, is it?”

“No, but that’s what we’re headed for if it gets any worse. And I am not going to let you kill yourself.”

“But I have to work. Really. I’ll lose my job if I stop now. I’m just getting my foot in the door.”

“Dena, this is your health.”

“Look, I promise. I’ll come straight home and get right in bed and drink milk shakes and eat mashed potatoes—really take it easy. I promise. I’ve worked all my life to get to this point. Can’t we just do something … isn’t there some sort of medicine I can take?”

Dr. Halling shook his head. “No. You’re taking everything I can give you and it’s not helping.”

“Look, I think that now and then I might have not eaten like I should have. And I smoked a little. I have been running around, maybe too much, but I promise I’ll do better. The next time you see me I will be a hundred percent better. Please?”

He sat back. “This is against my better judgment but I’ll make a deal with you. I want you back here in two months … and if it’s not better, I’m going to order you into the hospital, do you understand?”

“Oh, yes. I understand.”

“But in the meantime, I want you to talk to a friend of mine. See if he can’t do something to help you try and figure out what’s causing all this stress. You’re too young to be in this condition. Talk to this fella and let’s see if he can’t find out what’s … eating you. It might be more than work.”

He took out his pen from the holder and wrote a name and address. Dena was relieved. “Fine. I’ll see anybody you say.”

When he finished writing he held out the paper. Before he let her take it he said, “I want you to
promise
me that you’ll go to see this man at least twice a week—or I’ll put you in the hospital now.”

“I swear I will. I’ll call as soon as I get home.”

She would have
run
out of the office if she could have.

She called this O’Malley that afternoon and three days later she walked into his building and looked on the wall directory in the lobby.
DR. GERALD O’MALLEY, PSYCHIATRIST. 17TH FLOOR
.

Dena was appalled. A psychiatrist! What in the world was Dr. Halling thinking about? She wanted to turn around and leave. But she was stuck. Halling would find out if she didn’t show, so she might as well go on in and humor them both.

She got out on seventeen, knocked on his door, and heard a voice say, “Come in.” Dena walked in the office and a young man, not much older than she, stood up and shook her hand.

“Hello, Miss Nordstrom, I’m Dr. O’Malley.”

He was a neat, preppie-looking man in horned-rimmed glasses. He had blue eyes and fair, almost baby skin. He looked as if his mother had dressed him and combed his hair before he left this morning.

“You’re the doctor?”

“Yes. Won’t you have a seat?”

“I don’t know why,” she said, sitting down, “but I was expecting an older man with a beard.”

He laughed. “Sorry to disappoint you but I haven’t had much luck with beards.”

He sat down, took out a pad and pen, and waited for her to speak. This was something she would soon find out he did a great deal.

Finally she said, “Umm, I’m not here to see a psychiatrist. I mean, I’m not here because I think I need a psychiatrist, believe me.”

He nodded. Something else he would do a lot.