The Velvet Fog And For Valentine's Day, Do Something Nice For Someone

When I was 16, I was on the newspaper staff of the high-school paper. I liked a singer named Mel Torme, and he came to town. I went downtown to the Hippodrome Theatre where he was appearing. My mom and I went on the street car (no buses yet in those days), and I obtained a fine meeting with him right before the show was to begin.

He was very pleasant and agreeable to answering my high-school interview questions and gave me an autographed photo of himself. I was so excited to meet a celebrity and especially, since he was kind to a teenager. I often bought his records then and played them on the kind of record players in the 1950s available to us then.

Many years later, Mel was not only known for his singing voice, which was quite different in those days than now, but he collected guns for a hobby. They called him the Velvet Fog.

My husband collected antique guns in later life for fun and for investments, and Mel Torme was known to have a vast collection of lots of guns. One was put on auction and my husband tried to buy, but it went for a large sum of money.  I felt like if he had, I would have had a dear piece of something owned by someone famous, I knew as an excited sixteen year old kid.

All the kids at school were impressed that I had gotten an interview with him. So was I! He always remained my favorite male singer, and when he died recently, I felt I had lost a friend from the past. He was considerate and dear to a 16-year-old teen whose day he certainly made that winter of 1950.

He was so different than when Mom and I were in New York visiting her friend when I was about the same age as meeting Mel Torme. We were walking on the street, when I noticed the famous actor Henry Fonda. He was appearing in a play in New York City and I walked up to him and said Hi. He did not answer me and walked on. I guess he was scared of a tiny teenager who only said hello and never got a chance to even ask for his autograph. I met Joey Bishop one day in the elevator of an Atlantic City hotel so many years later and he was friendly to me and my kids and we also met Don Ameche who had just appeared in a popular movie and he too, was very nice.The movie was called Cocoon.

Some entertainment people fail  to realize that their fans are what keeps them alive in the industry and to acknowledge someone who is admiring them and not even asking for an autograph is all part of being who they are- famous, well paid and noticeable figures. There is a quote that says “success comes before work in the dictionary.” Actually, work comes before success and many a hard working male or female who enters the entertainment world has to toil many years before they become “an overnight success.” They all go through that and to be recognized by your fans even on a street is to have gained success through your hard work. To ignore your public is not in your best interest. Do you know, I never watched any of Henry Fonda’s movies for many years? I could still feel his snub to a sixteen year old kid. Mel Torme remained a fond memory and I bought all of his song records (in those days, they were called 45’s because of their small size.) Mel was not a real tall guy, he was six feet tall in my memory and heart and Henry Fonda who was a tall guy in stature always remained a tiny person to me.

There are people you meet, sometimes for a minute or two and you never forget them. There are folks you know for twenty years and it does not mean a thing to you. I have met in the last few years several people who have touched my life and I am grateful for that. One is an assistant manager of a jewelry store I frequent. It is her dynamic laugh and wide smile, her thoughtful ways, her extreme courtesy and most of all her decency in life and business that drew me to her when I was making a purchase several years ago. She steered us to a restaurant for light meals and we had fun going there. Recently, in the last six months, I have made her acquaintance again through holiday Chanukah/Christmas and now Valentine purchases and I just enjoy stopping by and chatting. Sometimes, I purchase an item that I know she tells me the truth about its quality and I depend on her judgment; since jewelry can be what we can call a ‘blind article.” It is hard to compare one bracelet to another one or one ring with the same stone to another. It is difficult to decide to make a purchase of something costly and I can trust her to be honest with me.

She goes out of her way to do what I ask and get what I want and that is nice in this day and age. We now email each other and it is fun to hear from her. She is thirty-eight and I am seventy-seven and her mom is gone since she was a small child due to illness.

I kid her that I will adopt her and she cares about us as people, not just a client/customer. She cried when I told her I would ‘adopt’ her and I even gave her an alternate Hebrew name corresponding to her English name. I called her Dorona which is equivalent to Diana in Hebrew. It means gift. Gift, she is to me and my husband, just knowing her and her vibrant laugh and her sincere smile that is a gift. For Valentine’s Day coming up on Tuesday February 14th, I gave her a gold triple heart pendant and she put it on her gold chain. She wrote me: “I just want to thank you for the beautiful heart pendant you gave me.It means so much to me. I will cherish it always. It is by far the nicest thing anyone has ever done for me.The fact that you gave me something that was once yours, means even more to me. I am not great with words, but I am always honest with my feelings. Sitting at home now, your thoughtfulness makes me cry. It is nice to see that there are still good, genuine people in this world. You did something that you did not need to do, but still did, which just means so much. Thank you a million times over. Love  from Dorona.”

So always remember as little Ethan said and I mentioned it in a former article. He said “be happy to each other.” That line was from a little boy about five at that time. So we can all be happy to each other, we need not give trinkets, charms, other gift or even cards. We can just be nice to people, appreciative and showing a smile and even complimenting them on something and that will be a fine Valentine present. It is one that will cost you no money; it will be rewarding to see their smile and to know you contributed to their having a fine day. Success comes before work on a dictionary page, but kindness and empathy are all on the same page of that particular dictionary. There is another saying that says “things do not define who you are, you define who you are”. So true, so meaningful and so wonderful to define yourself without material things, but with glorious moments and happenings.

Her name is Diana Ragonese Mitchell. She works as an assistant manager in Littman Jewelers in Towsontown Mall.  She and I are friends forever. She is the younger and I am the elder, age means nothing except that we care about each other. Acceptance comes before caring in the dictionary, they both mean completeness and love. We each have our own immediate families; she and I join together in mental and social family connections. That is what life is all about and every meaning in the dictionary that is good can apply to all of us in our bonding and relationships. Try it for Valentine’s Day and see if you can bond, relate and care about someone new to you.