When I was seventeen years old, I stood at the crossroads. All I had was a suitcase, a talent for singing, naïve ambition, a scholarship, and a one-way ticket on a small DC-6 plane bound for New York City. As you will learn in the next few pages, I was very fortunate to be there, to have survived given everything that had happened to me in my young life. Unbelievably, doors would open quickly. My talent would soon be discovered and I would be taken under the wing of Rodgers and Hammerstein and the other giants of Broadway. Television also beckoned, and good fortune followed me there too. But through it all, I feel in some ways that I still remain that hopeful, wide-eyed, and excited teenager on that first trip to New York City, eager to explore the farthest boundaries of where our talents and our determination can take us.
What I hope will come through to you on these pages is how I cherish my past, both the good and the bad. It has made me who I am. It has given me the gift of knowing how every day there is something joyful to discover. I love living in the present. I am fascinated by the people I meet every day. I love studying how they behave and how they think.
A short time ago, I was in St. Louis visiting my son and his family. I was staying at the Ritz-Carlton Hotel. The doorman, a tall man, came over to me when I was standing outside in front of the hotel.
“Are you being picked up?” he asked me.
“Yes.” I told him that I was waiting for my son.
“Would you like to sit over there?” He pointed at a comfortable chair just inside the lobby.
“No, I’m loving looking at the trees. The air is so refreshing.”
“I could tell,” he replied. “You’re very serene and peaceful.” As I took my sunglasses off to look at him, he looked at me and said very calmly and assuredly, “I see heaven in those eyes.” His words hit me deeply because I knew what he meant. When we take the moment to look into the eyes of another person, even a stranger we may never see again, we understand how it is a golden opportunity to learn.
He had no idea who I was. Being Florence Henderson or Carol Brady didn’t matter to him. I learned his name was Dewitt, and he turned out to be a very wise man. Each morning I came down early just to have a few extra minutes to speak with him. We talked a lot about spirituality and many other things. I wish I could remember all the pearls that came out of his mouth. One in particular I cannot forget: “Attitude determines altitude.” It is something that I certainly believe and have put into practice.
Like my time with Dewitt, I hope that our time together on these pages will be a similar “moment of grace.” In that spirit, I dedicate this book to that child who wrote the letter and to millions like her, young and old, who are looking for hope and promise but feel trapped in their sadness and pain. Come along with me.
CHAPTER 1The Faith of a Child
Please, can I go home?”
When I got the news of my father’s death, I asked for a leave to travel back to Indiana. His funeral was to take place in two days. I had just been cast in the lead in the last national touring company of Oklahoma! We were set to open the next night in New Haven. It was the big break, a dream come true for an eighteen-year-old girl. It had come only months after I had moved to New York City to study theater and hopefully to find work.
At the first opportunity during the rehearsal, I had gone over to Jerry White and Richard Rodgers. The director and the composer were seated in the audience of the empty theater in New York. “We don’t have an understudy for you yet, and the place is sold out,” Mr. Rodgers told me in sympathetic but no uncertain terms. He was the Rodgers of Rodgers and Hammerstein, the legendary duo behind such other Broadway classics as The Sound of Music, The King and I, South Pacific, and Carousel. Jerry White told me about all the publicity they had done. There was a lot riding on this first performance. They went out of their way to tell me how bad they felt about the situation. It made me feel even worse, which almost immediately manifested in a painful medical problem that made me wonder if there was some divine payback as a consequence for my actions. Strange how the mind works, but I’ll get to more on that later.
Ironically, I knew that this dilemma, as gut-wrenching as it was at that moment, was within the natural flow of an improbable, sometimes horrific, and often miraculous young life. Despite the abandonment, neglect, and poverty I experienced as a child, I had an abiding faith I would do better than just survive. I knew with absolute certainty that everything was going to be okay in the end. I felt the undeniable presence of a guiding and protective hand from a higher power above. This gave me a sense of optimism,
