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Book: There Was a Little Girl: The Real Story of My Mother and Me by Brooke Shields
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Authors: Brooke Shields
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that Mom decided it was the only suitable place for her baby girl.
In 1974, Ford Models did not have a children’s department and had no plans of incorporating one into their already thriving business. But we had an in. Eileen and Jerry Ford, who had started Ford Models, knew my father from various social circles and from supplying models for Revlon ads, and my dad was now working for Revlon as a sales executive.
I remember that my mother had met Eileen and Jerry many times. They had all remained friendly, so Mom decided to approach Eileen personally. She loved to tell the story about how one day she opened the door and marched up the three flights to Eileen Ford’s spacious and bright office. Mom said she stood in front of Eileen’s desk with her hands on her hips and explained to Eileen, “This agency doesn’t have a children’s division, and it should. Brooke will be your first child model.”
Eileen was initially against it because she did not want to represent children. She turned my mom down. I am sure my mother did not appreciate being told no and would never admit it happened thatway. Mom instead intimated that it was on that fateful day that she changed my future and helped make Ford a success. Ford did eventually begin a children’s division that remains today. I was not the first child model to join, as I had been led to believe. Mom always claimed credit for being the woman who convinced Eileen Ford to start the Ford children’s division. But did she at least plant the seed?
• • •
Somehow, as time went on, I began thinking there was something wrong with my mom’s drinking. We were so busy that it was easy to overlook, but looking back, I see that although I would not have had the vocabulary to articulate it at the time, I realized that Mom was a highly functioning alcoholic.
She kept it hidden for years, but the signs were there, even if I was too young to see them. I recently met a man at a funeral who said that when I was two or three he lived in an apartment on East Seventy-Ninth Street and Mom lived temporarily on a floor above him. He had met her with my father and they had become friends. He told me that Mom would sometimes knock on his door in the evenings and say, “I’m going out for a drink. Here, just take her for a bit.”
She would leave me there and we would hang out. It would be 10:00 or 11:00 P.M . He and I would just climb into bed and fall asleep. He said he never knew what time it would be, but Mom would eventually return and take me back upstairs. It is a bit sad to think that Mom just dropped me off so she could go drink, but at least she wasn’t keeping me out all night.
Still, Mom was the world to me, both at home and when I was working, and we had wonderful times together, but they were increasingly tempered by alcohol. She managed to keep our lives going for years before it would become a more obvious and debilitating problem; the negative effects becoming undeniable. In addition, it’sequally surprising to see how humorous the results of her drinking actually were early on.
Mom went to church every Sunday, no matter where she was. I was raised Catholic and completed catechism to receive my first Holy Communion and was also later confirmed. Every Sunday I accompanied her to this little church on Seventy-First Street and Second Avenue. It was there that I sang my first song on stage, for the Saint Patrick’s Day concert. I sang “When Irish Eyes Are Smiling” and was so nervous I twisted the bottom of my green velvet dress into such a balled-up knot that I showed my white big-girl pants to the entire congregation. I won first prize but will never be sure if it was for the song or my early attempts at striptease.
Mom and I were once at Mass and I was not aware that she was hungover. I was still rather naïve about such a thing as a hangover and she must have done a lot of her drinking alone or while I slept. Mom dozed off during the sermon and I did
In 1974, Ford Models did not have a children’s department and had no plans of incorporating one into their already thriving business. But we had an in. Eileen and Jerry Ford, who had started Ford Models, knew my father from various social circles and from supplying models for Revlon ads, and my dad was now working for Revlon as a sales executive.
I remember that my mother had met Eileen and Jerry many times. They had all remained friendly, so Mom decided to approach Eileen personally. She loved to tell the story about how one day she opened the door and marched up the three flights to Eileen Ford’s spacious and bright office. Mom said she stood in front of Eileen’s desk with her hands on her hips and explained to Eileen, “This agency doesn’t have a children’s division, and it should. Brooke will be your first child model.”
Eileen was initially against it because she did not want to represent children. She turned my mom down. I am sure my mother did not appreciate being told no and would never admit it happened thatway. Mom instead intimated that it was on that fateful day that she changed my future and helped make Ford a success. Ford did eventually begin a children’s division that remains today. I was not the first child model to join, as I had been led to believe. Mom always claimed credit for being the woman who convinced Eileen Ford to start the Ford children’s division. But did she at least plant the seed?
• • •
Somehow, as time went on, I began thinking there was something wrong with my mom’s drinking. We were so busy that it was easy to overlook, but looking back, I see that although I would not have had the vocabulary to articulate it at the time, I realized that Mom was a highly functioning alcoholic.
She kept it hidden for years, but the signs were there, even if I was too young to see them. I recently met a man at a funeral who said that when I was two or three he lived in an apartment on East Seventy-Ninth Street and Mom lived temporarily on a floor above him. He had met her with my father and they had become friends. He told me that Mom would sometimes knock on his door in the evenings and say, “I’m going out for a drink. Here, just take her for a bit.”
She would leave me there and we would hang out. It would be 10:00 or 11:00 P.M . He and I would just climb into bed and fall asleep. He said he never knew what time it would be, but Mom would eventually return and take me back upstairs. It is a bit sad to think that Mom just dropped me off so she could go drink, but at least she wasn’t keeping me out all night.
Still, Mom was the world to me, both at home and when I was working, and we had wonderful times together, but they were increasingly tempered by alcohol. She managed to keep our lives going for years before it would become a more obvious and debilitating problem; the negative effects becoming undeniable. In addition, it’sequally surprising to see how humorous the results of her drinking actually were early on.
Mom went to church every Sunday, no matter where she was. I was raised Catholic and completed catechism to receive my first Holy Communion and was also later confirmed. Every Sunday I accompanied her to this little church on Seventy-First Street and Second Avenue. It was there that I sang my first song on stage, for the Saint Patrick’s Day concert. I sang “When Irish Eyes Are Smiling” and was so nervous I twisted the bottom of my green velvet dress into such a balled-up knot that I showed my white big-girl pants to the entire congregation. I won first prize but will never be sure if it was for the song or my early attempts at striptease.
Mom and I were once at Mass and I was not aware that she was hungover. I was still rather naïve about such a thing as a hangover and she must have done a lot of her drinking alone or while I slept. Mom dozed off during the sermon and I did
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