Filthy Rich by Dorothy Samuels

Author:Dorothy Samuels [DOROTHY SAMUELS]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780061743580
Publisher: HarperCollins
Published: 2007-03-03T05:00:00+00:00

* * *

On Gilligan’s Island, Jim Backus played the blustery millionaire Thurston Howell III. What was the name of his flighty society wife?

a. Muffy

b. Lovey

c. Mimsey

d. Lulu

See correct answer on back….

* * *

* * *

ANSWER

b. Lovey

* * *

Nine

It occurs to me that I haven’t told you yet about Ellewina Nash Goldberg, my all-time favorite Personal Life Coaching client. Ellewina, as readers of the society pages may already know, was the daughter of Aldous Nash, the rabid right-wing industrialist and mortal enemy of Franklin Roosevelt. Her rebellion against her family took the form of marrying a Jewish socialist from Queens, Myron Goldberg, whom she met at a Norman Thomas rally in the thirties. Their marriage, which lasted half a century and produced three daughters, all of whom live in big mansions in Greenwich, ended when Myron quite unexpectedly ran off with the nubile eighteen-year-old waitress who served him fruit cocktail at a buffet fund-raising dinner he attended with Ellewina at Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago in Palm Beach.

Well, to say Myron “ran off” is actually something of a misnomer, as by then the cad was in the early stage of Parkinson’s disease and got around using a walker. But, of course, that made the situation no less painful for poor Ellewina.

By the time Ellewina reached out to me for coaching, her father was long gone, and she herself was a widow. Myron, not long after dashing off with his young cutie, had expired from a heart attack brought on by the mysterious Chinese herbs he’d taken to boost his libido. Well into her seventies, Ellewina was hampered by poor eyesight and slowed by advancing arthritis in her joints, but was otherwise in decent health.

Moreover, unlike a lot of oldsters, Ellewina did not have to worry about money. As her father grew older, he became quite fond of Myron and put Ellewina back in his will. Indeed, near his death at the age of ninety-two, old Mr. Nash wrote a much-admired op-ed piece for The New York Times in which he expressed regret at his previous anti-Semitism and publicly resigned his membership in several exclusive clubs, all as a prelude to explaining his recent decision to convert to Judaism.

Anyway, Ellewina sought my help to get rid of the terrible depression she’d fallen into as a result of hanging out with people her own age.

“All they do is sit around and complain about their latest ailment,” she said. “Isn’t it possible anymore to have a friendly conversation where no one uses the words bowel or bladder? I can’t listen anymore. I know it sounds silly at my advanced age, but I need to change my life.”

My strategy was to get Ellewina actively engaged in the various charitable causes she supported instead of simply handing the money to the New York Community Trust to dole out.

The going wasn’t always smooth. There was the time, for example, when Ellewina threw a party at her vast seaside estate in Southampton to raise money for impoverished Native Americans out west.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.