DINNER WITH JACKIE
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Wearing a pale blue satin evening suit featuring a collar-less jacket adorned with four buttons swathed in matching blue, Jackie Kennedy smiled demurely as she and her husband, Senator John F. Kennedy, entered the spacious living room of Morven, the 18th-century Georgian mansion then serving as the official residence for New Jersey governors. I was agog. She was the most beautiful and elegant woman I’d ever met.
Jackie whispered, “Hello, Valerie,” and offered a gloved right hand when we were introduced. (I wondered if I should curtsy but managed to say, “Good evening, Mrs. Kennedy.”) Her lacquered brunette hair was perfectly coiffed in a pageboy. Sapphires studded the gold bracelet on her left wrist and sparkled from her earlobes. As she settled onto a jonquil-toned sofa and slowly slipped off white leather gloves, I noticed her dyed-to-match two-inch blue heels, and watched as she carefully positioned her right foot behind her left, then ever so subtly, gracefully, purposefully, tilted her knees.
Sixty-six years later, an 80+ memory frequently results in calling my grandsons the wrong name (“Max, whoops, I mean Miles!”) but I vividly relive details of that evening as if it were 10 minutes ago.
I wore my best outfit — a flowered navy blue Lanz dress and Capezio flats, perfect for Saturday afternoon tea dances at nearby Lawrenceville School but definitely sub par compared to that satin suit. My makeup was “1960 high school Senior” — lips smeared with Tangee, pink rouge dabbed over my face to camouflage the Clearasil, cropped blond hair brushed back into a D.A., and hands clasped tightly to hide unpolished and undoubtedly ragged nails.
How did I get to attend this dinner? My politico father worked for Governor Robert Meyner and Senator Kennedy was seeking the governor’s backing for the 1960 Presidential nomination. However, Meyner was sitting on his endorsement because he hoped to run as “New Jersey’s favorite son.” At that time, state delegations frequently nominated a “favorite son candidate” which became a bargaining tool for votes and potential cabinet positions during the party conventions. The three men — Dad, the Governor and the Senator — had powwowed and discussed the situation earlier that afternoon at the gold-domed Statehouse in nearby Trenton.
But it was my mother who insisted I go with them that frigid February evening. And as we drove from our Titusville home to Princeton, I was vocally grumpy because I’d planned to watch “Father Knows Best” on our black and white television that same evening. Harumph!
Before dinner, seven of us —the Meyners, Kennedys, my parents and I — chatted in the living room. They sipped Manhattans in crystal stem glasses. I drank ginger-ale, and still recall sitting on an uncomfortably lumpy Victorian sofa. During dinner, Senator Kennedy asked me numerous questions about my high school debate team. I occasionally peeked at Jackie and saw that she barely touched a morsel on her Wedgwood dinner plate.
It was quite an evening! I was clueless I’d be dining with a future First Lady, soon recognized and lionized as an international icon of exquisite style and taste. But Mom had been so correct when she said, “Val, Dad and I want you to be part of this evening because we know you’ll never forget it.”
I’ve also never forgotten the “Jackie leg move” and whenever I plop into a chair or sofa, I immediately, and carefully, place my right foot behind my left, then subtly tilt my knees.
