Tribute to My Mother's Beautiful Legs
- Jayne Lisbeth
- 2 days ago
- 5 min read
My mother was beautiful and elegant. She always wore heels, even in the mornings as she prepared breakfast for my father before he left for the train to his office in Manhattan. She wore silk or later, nylon stockings. Pantyhose and knee-highs had not yet been invented.
My mother’s glamour was part of the history of women showing off their legs. In Victorian times, men swooned over the sight of a woman’s ankles. It was unheard of for a man to openly admire a woman’s cleavage or curves. Time advanced to when a woman’s shapely legs, or ‘gams’ were open game. Wolf whistles were still considered compliments. In the 1930s-1950s women wore silk or nylon seamed or unseamed stockings held in place by sexy, lacy garter belts. Seamed stockings were “fully fashioned.” During WWII nylon was used in the making of parachutes for the war effort, and fully fashioned stockings became more expensive. Women who couldn’t afford this luxury drew black lines up the back of their legs to create their own fully fashioned look. From starlets to pinup girls women's legs were greatly admired. In the forties Betty Grable, the queen of beautiful legs, had hers insured by Lloyds of London and 20th Century Fox for $1 million dollars. In today’s dollars, that equals $18 million. Talk about women’s legs being their most valuable asset!
My mother was known for her shapely legs, her perfectly turned calves, her delicate feet. She wore beautiful dresses which offset her lovely legs. When she aged and her big toes misbehaved and grew sideways due to a genetic defect, she taped her toes together to allow her to wear heels until her death in her eighties.
I was thinking of my mom as I raced around preparing for an upcoming visit with my children and grandchildren. My grandchildren had never met my mother, and knew nothing about the vast differences in our lives. I wanted my mother to be part of their visit.
On a whim, I dug through old photos of my mother and father. There she was, partying from Manhattan, to Miami and Paris nightclubs. She and my father always held court around a large table of happily inebriated friends and my father’s clients. On the plane to Europe she wore a tweed suit, as my father sat proudly next to her, smoking a cigarette. At hotels throughout Europe she always looked perfect, she could have been in a magazine. Instead, she was in my photo albums.
These images of my mother frequently interrupted my thoughts as I planned for my upcoming family visit. I cleaned and washed, dusted and vacuumed, making our home welcoming and kid fun friendly. I planned our menus, always health conscious, and shopped accordingly.
My planned meals were a far cry from our Sunday family dinners when I was growing up. Sunday dinners were mandatory. You would attend. You could not be late. There were no excuses, outside of an accident requiring hospitalization. The menu was always the same, steak or London Broil, grilled by a boyfriend, or later, sons-in-law. Lindy’s Italian salad, baked potatoes, a fresh vegetable, a nice pie or German Crumb Cake from Wyckoff Bakery for dessert. In the spring, dessert was Angel Food Cake and strawberries with whipped cream. Together, my mother and I set the table with her best China and silver, just as I do now. How life had changed. My mom sat and read magazines or books while our cleaning man, Frank, performed his weekly tasks. Now, Tim and I cleaned for days.
There were many differences between my mother’s childhood and my own. My mother had
never ridden a bike, which was my favorite mode of transportation, freeing me to explore my neighborhood. I fell often, my knees a testament with their many bumps and bruises. I learned to ice skate and discovered that frozen water is the hardest of surfaces and skates ruin your ankles. My mother never skated or rode bikes. I rode horses, and was thrown more than once. My mother rode once, and was too fearful to ever get in the saddle again. I climbed trees. My mother told the gardener where to plant them. I made little houses and pathways under our pyracantha bushes when I should have been practicing the piano. My mother played the piano beautifully. When she asked me if I had practiced, I would escape into the yard. I took long walks exploring the neighborhood, sometimes tripping over fallen branches and hidden potholes. My mother only walked during family vacations in Fort Lauderdale. One of my favorite memories is of my mother and I collecting shells on the beautiful beaches of the Lago Mar.
I moved to Vermont, learned how to ski, chop wood for the fireplace and make maple syrup. I foraged in the woods, picking Wild Asparagus and strawberries in the spring, and vegetables from our garden all summer long. Scratches from gardening and lawn mowing healed easily. I largely ignored my lower limbs. They got me around. My legs weren’t supposed to be beautiful. They were supporting my active lifestyle. They were utilitarian.
Later in my life I began going to the gym. My mother thought I was crazy and could not understand my desire to exercise. We would discuss our different lifestyles over martinis. My mother didn’t understand my goals. Hers were to “Marry someone you love, have children and grandchildren.” I had to admit, in that regard we were the same. It just took me longer to work around detours and potholes to get to the same result.
Whenever I rush around the house completing some task, calamity follows. I constantly bump into things or fall. A friendly joke is, “There goes Janie, falling, again.” I laughed along, paying no attention to the resulting bruises and bumps up and down the beautiful legs I had inherited from my mother.
The day before my family arrived while cleaning I crashed into the corner of our Futon. A huge gash on my left shin resulted, which required stitches. I refused to waste hours at the ER. My left leg now sported a deep gash which I wouldn’t allow to slow me down. I tightly bandaged up my leg, wore floppy pants and soldiered on. There was no way I would allow an injury to affect this special visit with my family. That’s what free-spirited pioneer women did, as I imagined myself to be.
After completing my pre-visit housework I admired our home in satisfaction. The house looked perfect. Tim had even cleaned up the garden, mowed the lawn and planted new flowers. I examined my latest injury to add to all the previous bruises and bumps. Various scars, bumpy knees, and now a brand new gash for my scar Hall of Fame. There was no mistaking it.
I was aghast. I ruined my inheritance of my mother’s beautiful legs!
And I had. Life had changed and shaped me, the same way it had shaped and changed my mother. Our legs bore witness to lives well lived, happy and full. My mother’s legs were unblemished. Mine wore the scars of a busy, crazy, active life.
I regret not a single scar, bump or bruise which can never deflect from my mother’s beautiful legs. Thank you mom, on Mother’s Day and everyday, for giving me so much of yourself, including lives fully lived.
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I would also like to pay tribute to Ina Haas, who passed from this world on April 29 at the age of 104. She was a second mother to me from my age of fourteen. She made me a chef, instilled in me a love of antiques, taught me how to refinish antiques and cane chairs. She will be sorely missed by myself and my dear Vermont sister, Sherrie, and all of her very extended family.
Happy Mother's Day, Jayne.