M A R LOW E B . W E S T PREZENTZ HOLLYWOOD REVIVAL Q: Describe happiness for me, Mamie ... Please ...
MVD: I wake every morning to a lovely white German Shepherd licking my face. Lilly Mae is the love of my life. She shares my breakfast (along with my other four dogs), and is my companion when I make my nightly pilgrimage to the beach. I truly love the ocean. It revitalizes me. And Lilly loves to dig in the sand. Q: What is your greatest love? MVD: My greatest love, I think, is life itself. Like all things we love, it is finite. The spice of the love is the knowing it will eventually end. My Lutheran upbringing tells me that if you’re good--very good--your reward will be eternity in that Kingdom in the Sky. However, my recent exposure to Buddhism says that if you pay attention to your karma, your reward will be rebirth and, eventually, enlightenment. I kind of like it that Buddhism is very open ended. We accept that there is suffering in this life, face up to it, and move on. If you experience suffering, that’s okay. That’s just suffering Buddha. If you experience goodness, that’s okay too. That’s joyful Buddha. What really counts is that you search for, cultivate, and experience the Buddha within you. Q: I bet Mamie was super impressed with Marilyn Monroe when she was a little girl. I would love to ask her about that.” How about it Mamie Van Doren. What do you have to say on the subject ??? MVD: I always admired Marilyn, but I found her vulnerability frightening in a way. As we became acquainted, you could almost see that she was bound for great success--and an inevitable fall. That it would be the tragic
death she had, no one could have guessed, but she lacked the coping mechanisms that might have kept her on the straight and narrow. Q: ... What ... in your opinion and from your point of view ... from the inside looking out ... really happened to Marilyn ??? MVD: I don’t have any special insight into her death. I don’t believe she was murdered. The most likely answer is that she drank too much and forgot how many sleeping pills she took. Q: We would really enjoy your sharing the thrill of it all ... The victory ... The glory ... & ... The elation of being Mamie Van Doren.” MVD: I don’t have a direct answer for this one. Alan J. Watts, the Buddhist philosopher and writer was once asked what being enlightened was like. He replied that it was just like everyday life--only about a foot off the ground. Q: Can you put into words the kind of mindset you must have to achieve and maintain a place so high as Queen Bee Of Golden Hollywood ??? MVD: No. Achieving any sort of success in Hollywood is 90% luck and I’ve been lucky to have an angel on my shoulder. It helps to be in the right place at the right time. And it helps to be unafraid of hard work. I Steel Notes Magazine | 23