I’m Adele, Fly me!

I was going to say it started as an ordinary day, but truth be told, I haven’t had an ordinary day since I met Rose. She was the first person I met after moving to this town. There were other women, of course, it was a fairly large town, even in 1956, but they just about smothered me in Southern sweetness, then gossiped about how they wished me and my Yankee kind would just go on back to Pennsylvania where we came from. They had real attitudes about Farber building the plant in Victoria. Rose didn’t. It probably helped that her husband had gotten a job as the head of Human Resources for the new plant, something her old oil family had a real problem with. Rose was the kind of friend who would come over and help you clean up after your sick kids. You can’t have to many of that type.

Rose called at seven or so that morning, early for her. She normally didn’t speak to anyone until ten. But she called, breathless, and told me to get ready, she would be by in thirty minutes to pick me up. “Dress nice, Adele,” she said, “We’re going to Houston.”

“Dress nice? Are you suggesting that I don’t normally?”

“Well, I wanted to make sure you weren’t in one of those pedal pusher moods. You Yankee girls don’t always look like ladies, you know.” She did an excellent impersonation of Myrna Coolidge, the Junior League President and resident Queen of Proper Southern womanhood. Rose hung up and I rushed around to get dressed and fix my face. 

In thirty minutes, the black Buick pulled into my driveway. I taped a note for Charles on the Frigidaire and ran out to join Rose.

“Don’t ask how I found out,” she said, “but we’re going to meet Franky!”

“Franky?”

“Frank Sinatra! His plane is landing in Houston for a short while and I thought this would be a great chance to get to meet him. I have always wanted to meet him, haven’t you?”

“Rose? Are you crazy? We can’t just walk on the plane and talk to him…can we?”

“I cannot let Frank Sinatra come this close to my home without him getting the chance to meet me, can I?” Rose smiles. She had a smile that let you know she had a plan. That smile usually put me in a cold sweat. But that day was different. I did want to meet Frank Sinatra. If Rose had a plan to do, it would work. Her plans did work, most of the time.

It took about two hours to get to the Houston airport. Rose wouldn’t tell me about her great plan or how she got her information (“Never reveal your sources!”) so we spent the trip planning the next tea for the Farber Wives Club. We started the club when the Junior League wouldn’t let us join. They seemed to think that the plant would not be around long, so why let temporary people into the League? Now that it’s been forty or so years, we can joke about it now. I think they let the plant wives join about the same time they let the Negro women join.

People filled the airport, mostly men in suits, but some nicely dressed women too, they all looked like they were on their way to someplace important to do great works. Not many flew in airplanes to go on vacation in those days.

I followed Rose through the halls and across the waiting areas. She went straight to the place where the stewardesses checked in for their work assignments. I started to get a bad feeling about this.

Rose walked up to two very young girls, dressed in the airline flight uniform. They looked fresh from the training school, ready and eager to pour drinks and offer hot towels.

“Could we ask you girls a favor?” Rose asked. “We’d like to rent your uniforms for an hour or so.”

“I’m sorry. we’re not allowed…”

“Fifty dollars,” Rose dangled a crisp fifty-dollar bill about two feet from their faces.

“That’s very generous of you, but…”

“Each!” I chimed in, pulling some cash from my purse. Mr. Sinatra would be worth the price, I reasoned.

That was a lot of money then. We followed the girls to the ladies’ room and switched clothes. Rose took the uniform of the larger girl, but it was still a bit snug around her hips. The uniform I wore fit me as if it were custom made. We told the girls that we would meet them at this same ladies’ room in an hour. They were supposed to leave on a flight in an hour, so they bargained us to forty-five minutes.

“That’s all we need!” Rose said and she led me out the door to the tarmac where the plane stood.

 As we approached the plane, a woman in a uniform matching ours saw us and waved her arms, “Hurry, you are late! This isn’t good for your first flight.”

I paused a moment, “Rose, maybe we should tell her that we’re not…”

“Nonsense, you heard the lady, we don’t want to be late for our first flight. Hurry, Constance!”

“Constance?” Then I looked down at the nametag on the uniform jacket.

As we climbed the stairs to the door, Rose turned and whispered, “He’s probably in first class. That will be in the front.” We boarded the plane and started walking slowly down the aisle, looking at the passengers already on the plane from the first leg of the journey. No Frank to be seen. Rose turned and pointed towards the door, indicating that we should head out so our little friends could come do their job. The Lead Stewardess stopped us.

“This is first class, you two should be back in coach. Get going, we take off in ten minutes.”

As I started to try to explain, Rose elbowed me in the ribs and said, “Yes, ma’am.”