They were as close as four peas in a pod
My uncle and aunt had close friends, F and D, who vacationed with them and went out with them all the time. F was also the receptionist at my uncle’s accounting firm. The two couples were thick as thieves.
F and D were a good-looking couple and had a fantastic marriage. They didn’t have children. But when D died in his early seventies, F went into a tailspin. She began turning down all my uncle and aunt’s invitations to join them…anywhere. That was understandable for a while, after she lost the love of her life, but it went on and on and on.
She didn’t even come to the party for my uncle and aunt’s 60th wedding anniversary. They rationalized that she didn’t want to let her sadness spoil anyone else’s time, but I said “hogwash! She’s selfish,” especially since D died years before. My cousins agreed. It was sad F couldn’t remove her permanent veil of grief for an evening to share in the joy of dear friends.
I admire great marriages and understand how it must feel when your soulmate dies. But if we let our pain overtake us, aren’t we negating the joy we once had and the joy we can still have and share?
F came to my aunt’s funeral and accepted my uncle’s invitation to join him for dinners and the movies during the next few years. When she came to his funeral, she stood away from everyone.
I wonder what she was thinking.
“I got to know my daughters as women before they became wives,” FOF Margaret Starner said. One of the leading women financial advisors in the country, Margaret was in New York from Miami to sit on a financial panel. We met for lunch and a chat, FOF style.
Margaret’s two daughters are now both married with children, but Margaret is glad they didn’t marry young. “It gave me a chance to see them as independent women, to hear about their jobs and their love lives,” Margaret explained. “I became friends with them and their friends.”
She recalls when one of her daughters (then single) discovered the book, All the Rules: Time-tested Secrets for Capturing the Heart of Mr. Right. “She’d call all her single friends to tell them about each rule. Within a year, they were all engaged,” Margaret laughed.
Once our daughters become mothers and wives, they talk more about their husbands and kids. “I never talk to my mother about anything else,” confirmed 33-year-old Nicole, who was with us at lunch.
FOF women like Margaret set the stage for our daughters to be successful and to build careers. We’re excited to hear when they get promotions, new jobs and raises and to see how they’re structuring their adult lives. We also love to meet their boyfriends, their husbands, and eventually, their children.
All in its own time.
I wasn’t a big Joan Rivers fan when she was Johnny Carson’s permanent guest host on the Tonight Show in the mid-eighties or when she hosted her own late night show on Fox. But I love her now. And I’m certain I’ll love her even more after I see the new documentary about her life, “A Piece of Work,” opening in theatres on June 11.
Apparently, I’m not alone. An article in New York magazine quotes Joan: People who have seen this film come up to me and say, ‘I never liked you until now.’ TV interviewers say, right in front of me, ‘Even if you have always hated Joan Rivers…you are going to love her and be mesmerized by this film.’”
I LOVE HER SENSE OF HUMOR
The article says she has embroidered a pillow with the words: DON’T EXPECT PRAISE WITHOUT ENVY UNTIL YOU ARE DEAD.
I ADORE HER DIRECTNESS
“Bad things can happen, even in a pretty house,” said Rivers, who refers to her husband’s suicide in their picture perfect home in LA. “We were in Architectural Digest. Edgar still jumped.”
I ADMIRE HER WORK ETHIC
People always ask Rivers why she doesn’t just retire, enjoy her old age. ‘But they don’t get that I love it,’ she says. ‘All I ever wanted was this. I’m lucky, you idiots.”
I RESPECT HER PRACTICALITY
“I want her (daughter Melissa) to get married to the boyfriend and they don’t want to get married. I’m sorry, I am not comfortable with somebody coming down the stairs in his jockey shorts who is not married to her.”
I APPRECIATE HER HONESTY
“All I want you to do, if we are sitting down and it’s after 6 p.m., is to tell me the truth. Because we’ve all lied to each other all day long in business and we’ve all had these lunches and we’ve all ass-kidded to the point where I carry Chapstick. If I am going to sit down and eat with you, just tell me the truth and let me say to you, ‘Things are lousy and I’m sad.’”
As far as I’m concerned, Joan Rivers should replace Leno, Conan and all the rest of them. Her ratings would go through the roof. Joan at FOF is better than ever.
Jayne Conroy
Jayne Conroy is beautiful, sharp and a successful lawyer, and she’s a woman’s woman through and through. Now Jayne will be representing women who own Toyotas (over 60 percent of Toyota owners) in a class action suit against the company.
FOF Jayne was recently appointed as one of 18 lead plaintiff attorneys nationwide (including only one other woman) in the Toyota suit. These lawyers represent all of the people in the US who have been hurt financially or personally by Toyota’s failure to disclose the car’s sudden acceleration problems. (Individuals do not need to file separate lawsuits in cases such as this.) It’s estimated that Toyota’s consumer fraud caused about 6 million Toyota/Lexus vehicles in the US to lose value and about 400 deaths or injuries.
Jayne isn’t real pleased that there are just two women lead lawyers, but “it’s an old boys club that’s hard to crack,” she says. Originally, no women were proposed to the Court to run the litigation, but after Jane complained about lack of female representation in such a high-profile case, she and other women lawyers were allowed five minutes to pitch their credentials.
Wrecked Prius
“Apparently I persuaded the Judge that I am completely qualified for the role (despite my being female!),” Jayne says. (Qualified she is, having successfully worked on and settled the class action suit against Pfizer for the deaths and injuries caused by the drugs Bextra and Celebrex.)
Toyota’s lawyers (two out of four are women) will be paid hefty hourly fees, whether or not Toyota wins. Jayne and the other plaintiff lawyers will be paid only if Toyota makes a settlement. In the meantime, they’ll be paying all the necessary expenses to defend the case for millions of Toyota owners.
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