Sherman Oaks has been my home for many, many decades. At one time I left and went to live in Switzerland. But I came back.
I love it here. I love the Valley because it's the underdog to Bel Air and to Beverly Hills and Brentwood, and I love underdogs.
Politically, I'm a moralist.
I was born in Germany in 1920. I am happy to tell you that. I am very happy to be alive at 92, I am. I intend to live to be 100, to the year 2020. And that is enough. One gets tired.
I left Germany in 1935 to have a child. An illegitimate child. Which I was told was born dead. She wasn't. It's another story for another time.
I am Jewish. Very. I like it. You undergo things. When I was seventeen they shipped me off to America.
I came to Los Angeles, got a job as a maid at $20 a month. I worked for the producer Mervyn LeRoy as a maid and a nanny for his son. Harry Warner put me in the wardrobe department at Warners. I sewed there for a while. I watched the people on the lot. I watched the editors - they took the longest lunch, which appealed to me.
I told them to teach me how to do it, and they did. I was an apprentice and an assistant. Eight years. I became a music editor. I worked with all the great composers. My favorite was my dear Dave, Dave Grusin. But there were so many others - Quincy Jones, who I adore. He calls me his Bavarian princess.
Many actors today believe in drugs. Just as those people in the olden days believed in glamour. They believed there was another world. There is no other world. But the one you live in. And so you'd better make it as comfortable and nourishing for yourself as you can. I'm saying that to you. And to everyone else who wants to listen.
I know how to stay in the Valley and why. The roses grow better because the heat is higher. It reminds me more of the desert here, which I love, and I am glad we have two very close Costcos. I love Costco, it’s a holiday for me! But I am 92, it's tiring for me. I can't do it in one day. But there is always garden furniture and I sit down. Take a little rest. If you're elderly too, pay attention. There's always garden furniture. Sit down. Take a moment.
You have to learn how to find joy in your life. So that you can make life as comfortable for yourself as possible.
Joy and comfort, finding that, it’s an inner thing. I live with two cats I dearly love. The cats are not because I buy breeder's cats. I buy cats because I can caress them, my children are grown. These are my solvings. I read, I have friends to talk about what I’m reading, and it's always something based on curiosity, how other people live.
One must learn to manage one's expectations.
Expectations. It’s the deadliest word in the dictionary. Put aside expectations, and be open to a surprise. It may be better, it may be worse. But it is the plotting, the planning, the expecting, that is hard.
I have been friends with [the actor] Jamie Cromwell for a long time. It's a beautiful friendship because I have no expectaton. I don’t want to bed him, marry him, I don't want him to give me any money. We have a nice time, we go to Art's Deli every week.
The moment you put the pressure on, and feel that the other person is exactly the one you dreamt of, then it gets problematic. Or aren’t we having a wonderful time in bed? Okay? Or what I really want is many many children. You put any of those out there, and you create expectations. And that's a problem
Men fall in love or lust; women plot. Men are too busy becoming what their father expected them to be. There’s no room for that in life. I see it in my Jamie. I was with him and his girlfriend, and she took a picture of him talking to me. He said why?
She said, "I want you and the world to see what you see what you look at Else."
And that is all I want from him.
This is my first blog, and I dictated it to my old friend Paul Zollo, because he wanted me to. I am not sure what I will say next. But there will be more.
