Gary Barg: I
have to tell you, Valerie, I read
the book, I, Rhoda, and couldn’t put
it down. Some of my favorite
interviews that I’ve done for the
magazine were mentioned in your book
– Ed Asner, Betty White, Gerald
McRaney, and Delta Burke – they were
fun.
Valerie Harper: Oh, my God, what a couple. They’re
wonderful. And I had a front row
seat for that romance; it was
lovely. Mac and I would take Delta
up to Vancouver on a Sunday night to
shoot the movie. We’d meet on the
set the next day and then, Friday
night, we’d rush to the plane to get
me back to my newly adopted
daughter, my brother and my mom, who
was dealing with lung cancer. And he
was rushing back to see his darling
– inamorata, is it? The person
you’re engaged to, in Italian
[laugh].
Gary Barg: Like
many family caregivers, when your
mom took ill with lung cancer in the
80s, you brought her home and you
nursed her.
Valerie Harper: Yes; she was living in San
Francisco. She lived there as long
as she could in a little apartment
and, finally, it came time that she
needed to move in with me. I went up
and got her and closed her
apartment. I brought her down and
into the house and she was doing
fine. She did not need nursing care
at that time. You know, it was great
to be around her and let my newly
adopted little girl get to know her.
So it was more of Grandma coming and
moving in to live rather than a care
situation. Then it went into that
and I had to get the hospital bed
and have people come in and so
forth. But it was wonderful to have
that last time with her.
Gary Barg: Well,
you employed something that I so
firmly believe in. It’s called
Validation Therapy. When your mom
thought she was on a ship, rather
than try to disabuse her of the
notion, you went with her, where her
reality was. I think, as a family,
you had a good time together.
Valerie Harper: We did. She’d say, “Oh, it’s nice
that the captain lets the dogs
onboard. And you know, my two dogs
were sitting in the bedroom. She
knew I was there, she knew the dogs’
names, she was not in some strange
fantasy world. She just thought she
was aboard a ship. She’d say, “Oh,
smell that ocean air; isn’t it
great?” Those kinds of things. And
then, one day she said to me in her
deep sleep, “Val, what are the three
bells?” And I said, “Oh, you think
we’re back on the ship.” She said,
“No, I’m in my room at your house. I
was just wondering what three bells
are.” And I laughed so hard because
I had entered her fantasy, but it
wasn’t a fantasy at all. It was her
asking me what’s the meaning of
three bells—a way of telling
nautical time.
Gary Barg: Tell
me about the fabulous Mrs.
Vanderbilt.
Valerie Harper:
Oh, well, she was a fabulous woman.
She was a very lovely, elegant lady
from Mexico, Feliza Pablos. And she
was my neighbor and we knew each
other for years. We walked together,
we had lunch often. And then, she
started to decline. She died at 96.
I became her conservator when she
started falling and having trouble
getting her medication. She had been
married to Cornelius Vanderbilt for
eight years. He was drinking too
much and she – this was in the 30’s
or something, Gary – she left him. I
mean, this was unheard of. And her
Catholic family in Mexico said, “We
can’t have a divorce in the family.”
She said, “Well, I can’t have this
man as my husband.” She bought a
little house in Beverly Hills. She
was kind of like a Katherine Hepburn
spirit and fabulously beautiful; and
just dear, and we became family. She
was like Christina’s make-believe
Grandma and my good friend. I had to
get caregivers for her; I hired a
company.
But you need to stay vigilant.
Now, I was a conservator, but I was
more than that. I was a daughter.
I would go in the middle of the
night sometimes if I suspected a
caregiver of sleeping on the job.
There were two – one was to stay up
and one was to sleep. And I found
people there sleeping. And my doctor
would say, “Fire them immediately.
You’re paying all this money.” The
caregiving organization can’t always
be on that. I found that just coming
up at unspecified times was very
important. You have to stay on
top of who’s there and what they’re
doing and if they’re doing their
job. Sometimes breeze in with some
cookies, you know you can stay on it
in a different way. And I think that
works really well. Of course,
reputable caregiving outfits are
key.
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