How Do You Want Me? - Softcover

Wax, Ruby

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0091887895 ISBN 13: 9780091887896

Publisher: Ebury Press, 2003

Synopsis

The autumn 2002 publication of Ruby Wax's memoirs was greeted with shock - and delighted acclaim. In the tradition of the best memoirs, such as The Moon's a Balloon and Billy, Ruby Wax revealed, surprised and captured the public more than was ever predicted.

How Do You Want Me? was critically acclaimed as brutally honest, vivid and gripping. Ruby Wax's unflinching revelation of a childhood poisoned, and a youth spoiled, culminates in a moving account of her breakdown and recovery. But How Do You Want Me? is also funny, rude and irreverent. It's unusually honest about fame and celebrity and happy to burst ego-balloons and golden myths.

A brilliantly fast, furious and surprising read from the inimitable Ruby Wax.

About this title

About the Author

Ruby Wax's acting and presenting career has spanned stage and screen, and her writing talent has created some of our favourite television comedies, from Girls on Top to Absolutely Fabulous.

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.

1

LEGACY

'This life is a test. Only a test. Had it been an actual life, you would have received further instructions on where to go and what to do.' Someone Smart

Shortly after my grandmother died I went to view her grave. I happened to wander over to the 3 headstones nearby and saw they were marked 'For The Wax Family'. I didn't know they existed until then. On the right the Mother, on the left the Father and in the middle the Daughter, meaning me. This haunts me to this day.

My philosophy: who you are in the playground is exactly who you will be at the end of your life, unless something cataclysmic happens to you or you make a supreme effort to change your story. But it must be supreme. How are these parts cast? I don't know. All I know is I just showed up one day at recess, was handed a script and assigned my character. Who cast me in this role? Was it in the stars or in the DNA? Or is there some natural selection going on like in the animal kingdom? How do they recognise head of the herd? The one with the longest tusks? The buffalo with the biggest balls? Who's the natural born joker in the cow pack? Which heifer is going to make Vegas?

So many questions.

For some reason I was not part of the common herd in playground society and I do not know why I got exiled. Perhaps my parents sprayed me with weirdness dust. They clearly wore it, so maybe I picked it up. I had absolutely no chance to be one of the popular girls as they could smell I was not of their species; so I became one of the boys. I became their lackey, a 'runt/boy' who ran their dirty chores.

To trigger a memory of why I was rejected I tried to find some photos of me as a child. I noticed I had some drawbacks. Luckily my father chronicled every moment of my life in film and photographs, from potty training to summer camp - nothing was too embarrassing. Since I was an only child the spotlight was always trained on me. When I found the evidence, I saw immediately why everyone hated me.

I had front teeth that were so protrusive they were in another time zone - about an hour in front of my face. Kids thought my name was 'Roovy' since my lip flaps didn't meet. I made our dentist very rich from reining in the 'tusks'. He fitted me with a sputnik-like head brace that didn't so much bring my teeth to me but the rest of my body up to live under them. My first year in school I pretended to be a beaver. I took apart a Davy Crockett fur hat and pinned the tail on my bottom. This meant I couldn't hear the ridicule since I was far too busy sawing down trees and building dams.

My mother encouraged my unattractiveness by cutting my hair in a bowl shape, like a monk. She would also dress me in outfits to ensure I'd look older than her and uglier. Long before The Sound of Music I was in full dirndl and lederhosen. From four years old on, I was dressed as an Alpinian sheepherder while my mother was decked out in Yves Saint Laurent, Oscar de la Renta and Valentino couture.

You could hear an intake of breath as people realised such a bombshell had released something as plain as me. She always wore a mink coat or fox fur wrap where the head ate its own tail, smoking non-stop those extra long cigarettes. She was the beauty in the house, I didn't have a chance, I could only ever be understudy waiting for her demise. There she was, this golden goddess, nyloned legs soaring up from Italian, La Dolce Vita, high heels with leather ankle straps. I yearned for those legs and shoes; instead my feet were encased in saddle shoes, which she said I needed so I wouldn't develop bunions. (I did anyway to spite her. Ha ha.) On shopping expeditions I'd scream for black patent leather pumps but they might have made me attractive so I never got them. Just hush puppies to keep me hushed. And I'd get, 'Come on Ruby, they're cute, believe me I'm your mother I would tell you.' Sometimes, I'd sneak into her closet, which was off-limits, and see rows and rows of designer shoes lined up as if for an SS inspection.

Even as an infant things were strange. I know here in England, as children, you were read stories about Pooh Bear and his tiggily-wiggily friends. I was read German stories about Strange Peter who had twelve-inch nails and frizzed up hair like he had just been electrocuted. He would set fire to people for fun or cut off their thumbs for a laugh. Grimm's Fairy Tales was another bedtime favourite. I remember one charming character, Frau Rotzkauph (translation: snot-head) had a beard, a wart and ate her children. Then she proceeded to cook them in a pie for not washing their hands before eating. There was another tale about a goose that ate a whole family and how they had to be cut out of its carcass with an axe. They all jumped out smiling but covered in bile. I didn't need nightmares, they were read to me. It all makes perfect sense when you think that young Hitler must have gone to beddy-byes hearing those same enchanting little tales.

Even without this bedtime reading, I was somewhat nihilistic. I knew as an infant, when you lost your tooth, you were supposed to picture a beautiful fairy with wings and a wand who flew into your bedroom in the night to bring money just for you. By about five, I knew this was for a 'limited season' only and that later on I could have whole root canals and there'd be nothing under my pillow. And when I got older, it was clear that even if I had large vital organs removed she'd be a no-shower. I didn't believe in the tooth fairy, Santa, the Messiah, and certainly not Mr Wonderful; I knew nobody could save me.

Things were off-whack anyway, since I came from a German-speaking household, which caused me great embarrassment. You ordered food off the menu, it sounded like you were declaring war in Europe: 'I'll have the schvenkacktenzinka schvinetang Ga retchkavkch...' People came out of the kitchen with their hands up.

In German even a phrase like 'Have a nice day', 'Aren't the butterflies lovely?' was made by bringing up a large quantity of phlegm and spitting it in the face of the person you were addressing. To communicate, you literally had to lash someone to death with your tongue. My first language was German, which was so helpful at my nursery school called Busy Beaver. It was cruel to send me so ill-equipped, not speaking the language of the nation I happened to be a citizen of ... but it was only the beginning.

To try and understand my parents, I'd like to give you a little history. It won't last long because they never told me much.

They escaped from Austria in 1938 though they never discussed the specifics of their departure. It was only recently that I found my mother's passport, complete with red J for Jew, and the stamp of the swastika. My mother indicated that she had practically waltzed out of Vienna, being a great beauty of the age. I recently found a suitcase full of letters, pleading to my parents (then safe in America) to get papers for the writer to help his family escape. These were followed by other letters saying their young cousin Max was now in a camp. My parents never mentioned there were family members exterminated in the camps, let alone the fact that his name was Max which is the name of my son. Finally, four years ago, at a Deli called 'Barnum and Bagel', when I asked again if I had any relatives in Austria, my mother casually replied, 'Oh, yes, they were burned', and continued eating her muffin.

Everyone who remembers her would always tell me how beautiful she was, the perfect Aryan. She had blonde hair, turquoise eyes, a figure 8 body - just the way the Nazis liked their master race. When she was a toddler, my father used to babysit for her. After many years of a disintegrating marriage he told me he regretted that he hadn't held a pillow over her face when he had the chance. But back then, she developed into a glorious creature and he pursued and won her. It must be odd, changing a girl's pants one minute and a few years later trying to get into them.

They were married the last day Jews could legally get married in Nazi Germany, joining a queue with one hundred other couples. The rabbi literally ran down the line, shouting, 'I now pronounce you man and wife.' After the wedding my father went straight to jail. The law was you had to serve time for being a Jew. The bad news was, when you got out you were still one, so you had to go back in again. He was put in a labour camp, but in his telling it sounded fun. Each prisoner had to teach a class to the other inmates. My father ran daily aerobics. Afternoons were spent digging ditches, but a particular Nazi stood in front of him so he could stretch his back without being noticed - it all seemed like a great adventure. This particular Nazi, who was probably in love with my mother, sneaked correspondence between my parents, which was written in code. In these postcards, each weather condition represented a different financial transaction, so my father could carry on his business. The Jews weren't supposed to do business, which is like telling a fish to stay away from liquids. That Nazi was eventually caught and shot for being my parents' go-between.

My mother got out early because she was sponsored by our Chicago relatives, the Hambourgers, to whom she was related on her mother Julia's side. When she got on the train, three Nazis stood up to let her lie down across the seat. They never got around to checking the passport. If you're beautiful, the rules can be broken. Later in life, she treated these relatives (who saved her life) appallingly. She used to whoop at them like they were American Indians or address them as if they were savages who spoke 'with forked tongue'. Because of course she came from such a high culture and they were down there in the primordial slime with their donuts and baseball bats. Hers was a kind of Blanche Dubois reality, where she was queen and those around her were there to serve.

My father wasn't so lucky on his exit from Austria. His family was warned when he escaped from jail, if they found him, he'd be shot on sight. He tried to escape into Switzerland by skiing over the border from Germany. Unfortunately, thousands of other Jews had the same idea and the mountain was so packed, no one could move. It was probably the last time so many Jews were on the slopes. The non-skiers didn't make it. They were herded up and sent back to Austria, from where my father tried desperately to emigrate to Australia, Africa, Holland, England, Belgium: the policy was always the same: 'No more Jews', their quotas were 'filled'. Finally, he sneaked onto a cruise ship bound for the World's Fair, in New York City. He pretended to be an American, but the only image of one he had was James Cagney from the movies. So he got himself a gangster-type hat and spoke German with that tough guy, Yankee-sounding twang. The moment his feet hit America, he was practically U-turned back to the Fatherland. But because my mother pleaded with the authorities, he was allowed to stay. Probably, a decision she regretted throughout her life.

They lived in poverty in Chicago, but they swore they'd be rich some day. My father, driven by that immigrant spirit, with a sausage in one hand and the determination of a Rottweiler to sell it, became a success story. He told me he would walk across Chicago in pursuit of a sale. If he made a nickel, he'd save it, eating one slice of bread to give him strength for the journey home. My mother worked in a lingerie shop under the subway tracks; they shared a tiny apartment with furniture borrowed from the relatives. They saved and saved and never spent money, then slowly one sausage became two and two became an empire.

My father was ruthless. The Edward Wax Casing Company was the last remaining casing company in Chicago by the time he sold it - twice. Do you know what casings are? The piece of skin around the sausage that gives it that appetising shape - it's made out of the intestines of pigs, sheep and cows. He was always an expert in taking out your insides. The whole process of making casings is sort of like putting the farmyard in a blender and shoving it into a condom. I was always ashamed about his career so I told people he was a fashion designer for hot dogs. In Chicago, in those days, the industry was Mafia run, so you might wonder how he survived, while others went under. His vice-president, Robert - a black American - told me that no-one used revenge better than my father. Once he put someone on the shit list he spent his life hunting them down, just like The Terminator, only he was smiling. I always imagined that scene in The Godfather, where some guy wakes up with a horse head next to him, was probably my dad's idea of a get-well greeting card. He was tough and took no prisoners - including his wife and daughter.

I remember him shouting lovingly to his secretary, an obese loudmouth in a wig, 'Hey Barbara, how many abortions have you had today?' And she'd lovingly shout back: 'Fuck you Eddie.' God, they had fun. And so did his factory workers who stood up to their rubber boot tops in entrails-infused water, checking for holes in miles of pig intestines. Who wouldn't want to do that? Throughout my life my father would drag me to his factory and proudly say: 'Some day this will all be yours.' After I grew up, he used to pressure me to find a husband who could take over his empire when he died. I'd point out that telling a guy I was the heiress of a factory filled with pig guts didn't seem the most tantalising pick-up line.

Oh yes, I remember those visits. My father would shout to everyone at their pig intestine blowing stations, 'Here's Ruby, she's back from Europe,' like they should all pop the champagne to celebrate my arrival. Instead, they'd give me a look that said, 'Die in hell, bitch.' My father in his infinite insensitivity would go on about how they'd all been discussing me, how much they missed me, how eager they'd been for news. I have more than a few group shots of the workers, up to their knees in pig intestine juice, glaring at me like they want to stick a knife in my heart. (Very reminiscent of that scene where Caesar and Brutus and the gang are all together for the last time.)

Family-wise, we three should not have been in a house together. The air was toxic with revenge and fury. My parents used me like a round of ammo ricocheting between them. Of course, they loved me too and in the name of love wanted the best for me, which was the best for them. Things were fine and normal when I was a tiny blank blob of baby fat; a little something they could project their hopes onto. Then they realised this doll had a mouth and out of it came opinions different to theirs. I was cute till I spoke, but unlike our dog, I could not be trained. So war was declared and the biggest casualties occurred during mealtimes.

I tolerated this treatment from a young age because my father constantly told me he was leaving me a fortune. He never gave exact numbers but made a noise in his throat that indicated it was vast. He always told me I'd never need to work; now I know this was to ensure my dependency on him. His constant reminders of my stupidity were unconsciously intended to cripple me. On visits back home when I was older, our weekly ritual was to go to the bank, down to the safety deposit vaults, where I'd have to stand outside to wait for him. Inside I could hear him opening his box and rattling papers. He'd shout back through the door, 'Boy, Ruby have you got a lot of money. I wish someone left me a fortune like this.' As a child, whenever he'd beat me, I'd mentally charge him for it. I kept an account book of the humiliations in my head. By my calculations by the time I was grown, he owed me ten million dollars. When I finally inherited, the actual numbers were waaaaay off.

Edition details

• Publisher: Ebury Press
• Publication date: 2003
• ISBN 10: 0091887895
• ISBN 13: 9780091887896
• Binding: Paperback
• Language: English
• Number of pages: 288