My mom and Phyllis Diller

While it’s lost a lot of its power over time, when my mother was a younger woman she had a laugh that could wake the dead. On the rare occasions our family would eat dinner in a restaurant, I’d sit there wondering when the blast would come, because I knew it was coming, and when it did, any semblance of anonymity would be gone. All other conversation in the restaurant would stop, and all heads would turn to our table in wonderment.

Despite its explosive impact, people never seemed to be annoyed by it; perhaps because it was so obviously joyous and spontaneous that all you could do was laugh along or stop and stare for a moment in wonderment. It was so distinctive that sometimes a friend would stop by our table to say, “Oh we were way over on the other side of the room, but I heard you laugh and I turned to Bob and said, Mickey is here – that laugh can’t be anyone else’s.”

I was never embarrassed by it. It was a force of nature at which I stood in awe and wonder. It was like being near Old Faithful or Krakatoa.

* * * * * *

One day in 1961, my parents took my three brothers and me for a Sunday drive from our home in Northeastern Ohio to the magic city of Pittsburgh. We got to Cleveland at least once a year, but the 80 mile drive made Pittsburgh a much less frequent and more exotic destination. Its steel mills were beginning their last full decade of smoke-belching dominance, new glass and aluminum skyscrapers were already anchoring the Golden Triangle downtown, and the city had recently opened a modern new airport filled with retail and entertainment attractions, a noteworthy Alexander Calder mobile, and a spectacular observation deck where we could watch jet airliners, still a novelty, come and go. This was our exciting destination that day.

As we walked through the wide concourse dressed in our Sunday best, my brothers and I probably looked less like brothers with a strong familial resemblance than we did four crescent wrenches pulled from a set. I, being the oldest was the ¾”; my youngest brother was the 7/16”. We were missing the 9/16” which I will explain in a moment.

I don’t have strong memories of the look of the place except that it had a very Jetsons-like feel to it -- although it would still be a year or two before that show, which defined the early part of the ‘60’s for us kids, made its debut. Being small-town boys we were appropriately awed.

My parents, who rarely went to bed until they had watched at least some of the Tonight Show were excited to see a billboard promoting Phyllis Diller, one of Johnny’s favorite guests, who was appearing in the nightclub at the airport. We were all chatting about Phyllis, and teasing our mother that she was a woman with a laugh that could rival her own, when we turned a corner and nearly ran her over. Phyllis Diller that is.

In my memory she looked exactly as she did on television, wearing an upside-down, martini-glass shaped dress of a multicolored, dizzying pattern, her hair, the color of new piano keys, pointing in every direction at once, and of course, a long ebony and rhinestone cigarette holder firmly clenched between her teeth – a benevolent Cruella deVil. It’s probably not an accurate memory but I enjoy it and have no desire for greater truthiness in this case.

“MY! What a good-looking bunch of boys you have here!” Phyllis shrieked as she squeezed my little brother’s cheeks together the way you might fold a peanut butter sandwich in half. “How old are they?”

“12, 10, 6 and 4,” my mother replied.

“What happened 8 years ago?” Phyllis asked.

Mom didn’t hesitate: “That’s when we got television.”

The simultaneous, stereophonic, explosion of laughter from Phyllis and Mickey brought all pedestrian traffic to a halt. Heads turned and jaws dropped as mom and Phyllis vented their mutual mirth.

Phyllis was both charmed, and charming. We stood and talked to her for several minutes before she had to ran off, her back now to us we heard her mutter to herself, “Television. HA!”