GWTW, My Mother and Me

 

When I was nine, my mother took me

to see Gone With the Wind for

the first time- that was back when

it was only shown in theatres and

my father, a farmer who had to get up

before dawn, refused to go

By the time I was sixteen and

drove there with my girlfriend, Suzie (who had

lived in Atlanta and could share

Southern culture) Scarlett O’Hara

 had changed!

She was not the provocative shrew

my mother said she was

She had become a strong, feisty

woman, who let no man dominate her

Then I read the novel and Scarlett grew

even more complex- In the film, she was

the mother of Bonnie Blue, one child

In the novel, Scarlett was the mother

of four! – Now that is a whole different

Job description and thus would create

a whole different character!

My father said he would see GWTW when

it came to television

I remember laughing at that,

but eventually, in the late 70s, it did!

However, it is epic and deserves the

Big screen…

I read the novel seven times over the years

My changing perspective made it fresh

each time- I plan to read it this spring-

a 25 year lapse should make it brand new…

My mother would have been 100 on

October 11, 2014- the almost 75^th Anniversary

of GWTW – I have new insight as to why

it so impacted her: She was 25 when it

hit theatres, a nurse in Palo Alto at the time-

A country girl in the city

learning the ropes, with Scarlett’s voice

in her head- truly it was Margaret Mitchell’s

voice, who, like an older sister may have said:

This is how it is for women, in a world of men,

we get along the best we can

Soon, my mother would move

back to Washington State and marry

my father, because: he wrote in a letter

that if she did not hustle,

he would not wait!

Even as an old woman

after my father’s death

Mother still spoke fondly of

Rhett Butler who offered

Scarlett a marriage of fun!