Show A top model describes her life among the chic and the famous her hidden miser- y- and her self-resc- ue KM3 IN THE SPRING AND SUMMER OF 1971 I WAS ON THE COVERS OF COSMOPOLITAN NEWSWEEK ESQUIRE AND NEW YORK MAGAZINES YET I FEU LIKE A FAILURE SIXTEEN YEARS LATER NOTSUREOFTHE NEXT MONTH'S RENT I FEEL TERRIFIC For years I had been carrying around 4 To a lot of anger and little cope with this and to forget my pain 1 sought to escape through sex alcohol and drugs Running away never worked It isn't easy to repair a life But 1 resolved to try One night seven years ago— crying screaming inside— I sat self-estee- m down at die typewriter Instead of trying to avoid the facts of my life I was determined to examine them Sort them out Write them down Finally I would stop being a stranger a fiction to myself and try to find out who 1 really was It helped me Maybe it will help you too Here is some of what I discovered had been struggling for years with the feeling that I didn’t fit in Where did that come from? I remember first feeling that way at the age of 7 Throughout second grade I was bedridden with rheumatic fever I was advanced to third grade with my classmates but from men on 1 never really felt 1 belonged 1 felt different and with a damaged heart 1 was Medical care helped the physical problem but the emotional feeling dogged me into adulthood 1 was always desperate for approval and acceptance from others — without them I had no value That would remain true until 1 could accept myself Loving a man almost always meant losing him My first love was my father He used to tell me I was “good" and that made me feel good about myself I lost him to illness and to my mother Mom was the disciplinarian in the family She would often say 1 didn't do things right— and eventually I began to feel “wrong" As a skinny child— 1 was niclmamed ‘‘Toothpick”-- I dreamed of being a voluptuous model and a starlet But Mom said anything sexy was a sin I felt naughty My father on the other hand liked sexy things Once on the way to the beach as a joke he drove into a nudist colony and parked for a few minutes in full view of all the naked swimmers Mom screamed: “What are you trying to do Herb? Get a divorce?” My sister and 1 giggled as we always did when he got Mom's goat My father laughed at my jokes too when Mom didn't She worried aloud about the neighbors They might disapprove— of something we'd say of how we’d look “You're so messy Carole” she'd say “You’ll never amount toanything YouTejustlikeyourfather" 1 however thought my father amounted to a great deal Fop was a proud graduate of the Wharton School of Business Administration Envious of the fame of his great-uncGen Lou Wagner who fought in the Battle of Bull Run Fop wanted to be rich and famous (Would this cause Mom and others to think he was important after all?) At an early age I concluded that if I became famous it would please him le (and maybe make Mom think I'd fact the facts f aqrlffe IMaPilfatl terrific" “amounted” to something) At 13 my body began to change Mom would inspect me each time I left the house to see if my bra straps were showing (people might be shocked by such shameful things) To hide my tiny breasts 1 hunched over as 1 carried my books Around this time my father developed a mysterious twitch followed shortly by a nervous breakdown Every conceivable test and drug was given to him His condition worsened He was given shock treatments Nothing worked When 1 was 14 doctors performed a lobotomy on my father Only after the operation was it finally determined that he had Parkinson’s disease for which a lobotomy is no help The twitch never left But his eyes no longer blinked He squinted He drooled He shuffled his feet He grunted He made involuntary funny faces He walked like an ape his right arm constantly swinging while his right shoulder pointed downward Each year he became more deformed People would stare All the same he still laughed at my jokes By this time —if I put on makeup just right — I was pretty I knew because people looked at me instead of my father (Boys in particular!) I reasoned that if 1 could make myself pretty enough I could distract their attention from Daddy 1 would think as I stared back into their eyes: “If you look at my father and laugh you’ll have to deal with me" BY CAROLE WAGNER MALLORY COVER PHOTOGRAPH BY EDDIE ADAMS HME 4 JUNK ML MS7 PMUK MMfiUME |