For Bacall

 

A woman on a piano has always been way up there for me. You may recall the scenes in The Fabulous Baker Boys and Pretty Woman.

I think back to the days I spent in jazz bars in San Francisco. And a talented singer I got to know in a club on Clark Air Force Base in the Philippines. She made moves on that piano that were so graceful. Do you recall Dixie Carter as Julia Sugarbaker doing a sultry number on top of a piano?

Dixie was a Southern Belle. Bacall is mine.

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5 rules that a true Southern Belle should live by:

1. It’s manners, not money, that really matter.
2. If your friends need you, be there. Period.
3. Always wear clean underwear (seriously, this may seem like a given, but it’s REALLY a given if your mother is from the South and delicately explains to you as you’re growing up that you could have a wreck or become incapacitated and wind up in the hospital at a moment’s notice. And that is most definitely a situation in which you don’t want to be caught wearing underwear that’s either holey or dirty!).
4. Always be ready to share the news, but keep the family secrets.
5. Both your silver and your pearls should always be real.