Home > Pulpwood Queen Blog > Archives > 2007 > May > 15 > Entry
HAPPY ANNIVERSARY JAYBIRD!
I get this phone call out of the blue.
“This is Kathy!”
“Kathy, this is Rue McClanahan, calling from Manhattan. Do you know who this is?”
Did I know who this is? Absolutely! Besides books, music, art, I love the theater. Rue McClanahan is a star of stage and screen. She probably has become most famous by her role on televisions /Golden Girls/ where she played the southern sex kitten Blanche Devereux. I have loved Rue McClanahan! She is smart, sexy, and always made me laugh out loud. I have always felt that an actor that can make you laugh out loud had major talent. It is easy to make someone cry but to laugh, now that is a gift.
We talked for quite some time. In fact, I was talking to Rue on my cell phone in my car in front of my shop so long that a couple who had gone into my shop for a haircut came back out to find me still on the phone. John and Debbie Chamberlain and I had quite a laugh over that, well we had a lot to say. Mostly, we were scheduling a time for Rue to come visit my book club, The Pulpwood Queens for a book signing of her latest,/ My First Five Husbands…And the Ones Who Got Away! / Great title and really much, much more than her life in marriage. This book was her memoir and I found the book fascinating.
The morning of the day I was to pick her and her assistant, Kathy up at the airport, my husband kissed me and wished me “Happy Anniversary”. I gasped and realized I had done it again. I had forgotten our big day when we got married 19 years before. Jay laughed as it has been our own running joke, either he forgets or I do. Sometimes we both forget and I think this is mainly because we married one Sunday evening on the sly thinking we were escaping everybody’s radar. We eloped. Now that is another story that I will tell at maybe our 50th Anniversary!
Rue came to Jefferson, Texas and besides treating her to lunch at The Hamburger Store and the best pie ever, I actually got to do Rue’s hair. What a pleasure! To say that her event which I called /An Evening with Rue/ was a success is an understatement. At the last minute, due to the fact that the sky was about to fall with a torrential storm and the numbers of presold tickets where climbing, we decided to move the event to the Banker’s Building generously donated to us for this event by The First National Bank of Hughes Springs here in Jefferson. We brought in extra chairs loaned to us by Jimmy Moore owner of East Texas Forest Products and got 13 volunteers from the Jefferson High School Drama Department to help run the event.
Rue loved the drama kids and to one boy in particular she gasped and stated, “Why Kathy, he is the spitting image of a young Rock Hudson.” I think Adam Brooks will never be the same. She even talked about the striking resemblance the next day. But the thing that impressed me the most was she gave each and every one of those kids an autograph after signing well over 100 books and having umpteen photographs with each and every attendee. Rue McClanahan is a trooper!
Rue had requested that I put on a skit just for her and we did. My best friends. Pulpwood Queens and Timber Guy, Pam McGregor, Carol Lancaster Lucky and Fred McKenzie helped me put together a skit that we titled /The Pulpwood Gals /as a tribute e to Rue starring on /The Golden Girls./ We were three middle age sisters, Earleen (me), Pearleen (Carol), and Sherleen (Pam) Boudreaux who had all come back to live with our MeeMaw (played hilariously by Fred) in her double wide trailer on Caddo Lake just outside of Jefferson, Texas.
You may go to www.easttexastownsonline.com to scroll down and view photos from the event. Photographer, Ron Munden has truly captured these “golden” moments and the photos are also available for purchase.
Now you may wonder what my husband did on our anniversary since I was so involved in the Rue McClanahan event? He was filming the event for your enjoyment and you may click on the link below to watch our skit or you may go to www.beautyandthebook.com and click on Videos to watch that Academy Award winning performance. Well, at least an East Texas Academy Award Winning performance, ha ha ha!
Rue’s book is climbing the charts and I certainly hope you will read her book. A fascinating life from a fascinating person and sends home the message that reading can be a wonderful entertainment. The following morning my friend and Pulpwood Queen Margie Dilday of Monroe, Louisiana escorted Rue and her assistant Kathy on to the rental car place with me in Marshall. As it took them quite awhile to get a car ready, we had plenty of time to chat and recap our event. Then Rue spotted this woman diligently working in the service department of the car dealership where we were to pick up the car. Rue told me, “I have to reward that woman in some way.” We walked across the parking and entered the building. As we approached this woman sweeping, I called, “Excuse me, I have someone I would like you meet.”
Rue asked her, “Have you ever watched The Golden Girls on television?”
“Yes ma’am,” she replied.
“Do you know who I am?”
“Yes, ma’am, you are Rue McClanahan.” Then it was our turn to be surprised.
“Ma’am, aren’t you from Ardmore, Oklahoma?”
“Well yes I am,” Rue answered surprised.
“Well ma,am I’m from just outside of Ardmore, Wilson, Oklahoma and they have all your things there in the museum. Your clothes and things.”
We found out her name was Nancy and Rue signed a Cadillac catalog from the dealership and gave it to the young woman with the broom. As we said our goodbyes, I had goosebumps. Of all the people to choose to go out of her way to meet, a fellow Oklahoma girl. You know that some things are just meant to be.
I live for the days when we have authors grace our doors. I think Rue McClanahan was truly my first brush with dealing with a major celebrity, a real live STAR! Quite frankly, it was a little frightening how many people recognized her and then asked for an autograph. From the moment she arrived at the airport to the minute she drove off in the rental car to continue her book tour we were approached by people wanting her autograph. I asked her about her about just that and she told me that that just comes with the territory. I hope I am that gracious at 73. Through her small acts of kindness I felt besides earning that “star” quality she also deserved a halo!
I’m not too sure what Jay thought of our 19th Anniversary but I had a blast. Jay has just resigned himself to the fact that he has married an obsessed reader. Anyway I can honestly say our marriage has never been boring, high drama to say the least. Now we are on to our next events with author, Ron Rash who I will be taking to visit our Shreveport, Louisiana chapter the evening of May 7th. Then again he will be featured Tuesday night, 6:30 p.m. at Beauty and the Book in Jefferson hosted by our Pulpwood Queens of East Texas. Ron has two books I have selected as Pulpwood Queen Book Club Selections, The World Made Straight and Chemistry and other Stories and being sent to us by Picador. Yes, the Jaybird will be filming that event too! Thank God Jay is not one who got away, ha ha! The official press release will be forthcoming but in the meantime go to our official website for all news pertaining to Beauty and the Book, The Pulpwood Queens Book Clubs, and book and author events.
Also if you are in the area, stop by and visit me at Beauty and the Book! I have these leopardlicious postcards that my publisher, Grand Central Publishing has sent to me to hand out to promote my up-and-coming book release, The Pulpwood Queens’ Tiara Wearing, Book Sharing Guide to Life. I would love to give you one and more if you promise to send them to all your friends! And if you see Jay tell him he is a saint for putting up with me. I know he would greatly appreciate it! Thank God he believes that reading and literacy are important too even when his wife booked an author event on their anniversary!
Tiara wearing and Book sharing, Kathy L. Patrick Hairdresser to the Authors Beauty and the Book 210 West Austin Jefferson, Texas 75657 903-665-7520 www.beautyandthebook.com , official website of The Pulpwood Queens www.pulpwoodqueen.com , official blog site of The Pulpwood Queens
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