About eight years ago, just before I became Mrs. Martin Melcher, a man I once knew well, phoned and asked to see me. I hadn\u2019t seen John in a long time, and didn\u2019t want to now.<\/p>\n
When Marty said I ought to, I argued back: \u201cBut he always works so hard at being a character; he\u2019s in the hell of constant failure and he drinks too much.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cAll the more reason why you should see him,\u201d Marty reproached.<\/p>\n
I did. It was the best thing that ever happened to me.<\/p>\n
John always had been tense, mixed up, going nowhere, and in a hurry to get there. But now he was calm and sure. He\u2019d stopped drinking. There was a strange, new peace in him.<\/p>\n
\u201cSay, you\u2019re different,\u201d I finally said. \u201cWhat\u2019s happened to you?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019ve discovered that none of us can do anything alone,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
At first I didn\u2019t get it. \u201cWho\u2019s the fellow who helped?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cGod,\u201d he said simply.<\/p>\n
I stared at him, and then begged: \u201cTell me. I need the same thing.\u201d<\/p>\n
It seemed that one night he knew he had reached the end of his road, the road he\u2019d been on. He was friendless, terribly alone, and empty with the thought that the next day, like all his tomorrows, held only the anguish of bitterness, of more whiskey. He searched his mind for someone to turn to, something.<\/p>\n
He opened the window and looked out at the night, and tried to reach out for its quietness, its harmony. And from somewhere in a dim, forgotten corner of his heart, he remembered a similar night as a boy, when he and his father had tried to touch the night, and he heard the echo of his father\u2019s voice:<\/p>\n
\u201cThere\u2019s quiet and harmony out there; without them, we\u2019re nothing.\u201d<\/p>\n
John closed the window and went out to find it. He started by walking the streets, repeating to himself all the disharmony in him, then muttering little supplications that it might end. With the dawn he went into a church and prayed.<\/p>\n
\u201cIn finding a faith in God I found myself, new friends, a new life. I\u2019ve just started living. I wasn\u2019t before.\u201d<\/p>\n
What John said held me from then on, without letting me go. I tried to figure it out. John might still have been called a \u201cfailure.\u201d But was I a success? Seemed I had everything\u2014including a lot of fears I couldn\u2019t put my finger on. Everything but peace. John had that. Why couldn\u2019t I?<\/p>\n
\u201cYou\u2019ve been searching a long time for the same kind of peace I found,\u201d he had said, \u201conly you don\u2019t know it. That\u2019s why I wanted to see you.\u201d<\/p>\n
Those fears in me? Where did they come from? Not from my childhood. Those were sunny days back in Cincinnati when I was Doris von Kappelhoff. I loved to sing and dance. Oh, I knew I\u2019d be in Hollywood one day\u2014as a dancer.<\/p>\n
When I was 14 three friends and I drove over to pick up my mother at a party. None of us saw the train that hit us and sheared off the whole front of our car. When I crawled out I tried to stand up, but one leg dangled, and I asked myself:<\/p>\n
\u201cHow can I dance with this?\u201d<\/p>\n
Then I fainted.<\/p>\n
One boy was unhurt, the other had a broken leg, and the girl had a concussion. But we were all alive. I was in the hospital for over a year. Dancing was out. So I learned to sing.<\/p>\n
I got my first singing job while still on crutches. Then I began leading the punishing life of a singer with touring bands … those long, lonely, one-night stands.<\/p>\n
I married a musician and had a son, Terry, when I was 18. We tried keeping him with us on our tours but it didn\u2019t work. Marriage didn\u2019t work either. That\u2019s probably where my confusion started. I don\u2019t know.<\/p>\n
Out on the West Coast, feeling completely crushed, I was asked to test for movies.<\/p>\n
\u201cStop kidding,\u201d I said. \u201cMe? Dramatics? The only part I ever played was a duck in a Mother Goose play in school.\u201d<\/p>\n
But they first asked me to sing a song. While singing, all my troubles crowded in on me and I began to cry and couldn\u2019t stop.<\/p>\n
\u201cFine,\u201d they said. \u201cWe\u2019ll test her.\u201d<\/p>\n
Well, after a number of movies, there I was in 1948 with all that a successful movie career meant, and floundering\u2014until I met Marty Melcher. He was the head of the agency that represented me.<\/p>\n
He seemed matter-of-fact, calm, secure. Actually he was muddled too. He was an expert at handling my business affairs, but was unhappy with his own. And he had these inside fears too.<\/p>\n
I came back from meeting John and told Marty all about it. I think I was not very clear, but the wonderful thing was that Marty understood. Probably because we both needed what John had.<\/p>\n
So what we were both searching for alone we began to search for together. When we were married, Marty adopted Terry legally. That\u2019s when I think I became a mother, a wife, and a grown-up girl for the first time.<\/p>\n
We joined a church and began attending regularly. Together we discovered a harmony and a sense of peace we didn\u2019t know before. Then we tried to apply what we found to our daily lives.<\/p>\n
For instance, we taught ourselves not to think of yesterday or tomorrow. So we never have any regrets or expectations. We just believe in \u201cnowness,\u201d of what we can do best today.<\/p>\n
It was no great, blinding flash of light. We muddled it through, slowly, sometimes painfully.<\/p>\n
One of the first constructive results of our beliefs was that Marty dissolved his partnership and went out on his own.<\/p>\n
His contention was that lack of harmony in business could lead to lack of principle, and if you\u2019re really principled in your faith, you can\u2019t be without it in your business relationships, or any relationship for that matter.<\/p>\n
Our new-found faith also taught us that whatever we do individually should in some way benefit someone else. Harmony is not a solo. So we try never to quarrel with directors, writers, a contract, or with any role I am assigned.<\/p>\n
We want the same feelings inside our home as we do out of it. Our housekeeper had a cold recently. A small thing, you say, but it strikes a discordant note. So it becomes our concern beyond just feeling sorry for her.<\/p>\n
The lack of harmony in anyone around us diminishes ours; when it\u2019s missing it can lead to anxiety and anguish.<\/p>\n
When Terry wanted a learner\u2019s permit to drive, we felt he wasn\u2019t ready for it. We reasoned it out, not by scorn, or by shouting orders, but by the love in our thinking. That\u2019s harmony.<\/p>\n
Both my men are big. Terry is getting pretty tall now and recently, I watched them wrestling. Holding my breath, feeling fearful but wonderful too, I heard Marty beg Terry: \u201cKid, this is one of the last times I\u2019ll be able to floor you. Let me.\u201d Terry let him. Both my men are kind of special.<\/p>\n
Marty and I are both pretty strong-minded. There are differences between us. Bound to be. But when we clash our faith helps. Helps? Faith is the only way a marriage really sticks. Everything else in it depends on what you believe.<\/p>\n
Marty used to be sensitive about being the husband of a Hollywood actress. Well, we\u2019d argue, starting with something about a script, or food, or clothes, but ending on the same note. Who\u2019s the boss? Pointless.<\/p>\n
The argument would end quickly when we reminded each other there was only one real Boss. One mind\u2014God\u2019s mind.<\/p>\n