THE TRANSATLANTIC MAGAZINE
THE TRANSATLANTIC MAGAZINE
My decision to cross the Atlantic to live in Britain a couple of decades ago was influenced by two things. Being held up at gunpoint outside the swanky offices of Young and Rubicam on Madison Avenue, and a desire to get much closer to my musical idol, Sting.
I came armed with just one introduction from the head of my family to an elderly Peer, Lord Strathcarron. Having served as a reconnaissance pilot in the war, then taken up car racing against Stirling Moss, he was famous for appearing outside the House of Lords with a parrot on his shoulder and was very welcoming.
My previous experience of London was in dire digs in Finsbury Park as a student at the LSE. Realizing that the Brits were liable to look down their noses, culture wise, at a girl from Indiana, I enrolled in the Christie's art course, enabling me not only to tell a Monet from a Manet, but a Sisley from a Fragonard. A less successful enrollment in a Cordon Bleu course came to an end after just one day, the whole of which was spent "turning" vegetables.
But the Brit who had helped to lure me from New York, determined to thrive in a new job with an investment bank, was spending most of his time in Australia and South Africa, reappearing only occasionally, very briefly, and failing to introduce me to anyone! Left to my own devices, I joined the Harbour Club to play tennis indoors, where I encountered Hans Rausing and his American wife, Eva. I had no idea that the Rausings were uber rich [the Rausing family founded the successful packaging firm Tetra Pak – ed] but Eva, who was very friendly, invited me to join her table at a large shindig at the Hilton on Park Lane for the Prince's Trust, which then and now has helped young people in many countries.
Arriving to join this throng I was, I thought, quite smartly dressed in an Escada blazer and not too short black Leger skirt. I was quickly disillusioned about this as a woman I had never met or heard of rushed up to me to launch an all out attack on my appearance and attire. "I hate that eighties look! It's so yesterday!" she yelled at me, declaring that I needed a complete make-over and treatment by a French doctor to dispose of alleged pimples on my face.
While I was reeling from this surprise harangue from, I was told later, the well known fashionista, Trinny Woodall, to my great relief and surprise it was interrupted by a very polite gentleman who asked me if I would like to join the Prince's table. I said that, surely, would be more appropriate for my friend, Eva, but he insisted that the invitation was for me.
Arriving there, I was introduced to the beautiful Joanna Lumley, Stephen Fry, Rowan Atkinson (of, I learned later, Blackadder and Mr Bean) and Joanna Trollope. To my amazement, as this turned out to be his birthday, I was asked to sit between the Prince of Wales and the only other person there I had ever heard of, who was David Gilmour of Pink Floyd. He proved invaluable in advising me which of the numerous pieces of silverware to use for the various courses: "Go from the outside in." Confronted by a dish the like of which I had never seen before, plus what looked like dental instruments, he explained that these were to extract the snails!
The then Prince Charles, who could not have been more welcoming and charming, asked me about my experiences in the White House as a very humble assistant to President George Bush senior, of whom he turned out to be a great admirer. I was interrogated about the White House Rose Garden and the cherry blossoms around the Tidal Basin. I mentioned that George Bush was so hyperactive and such an early riser that I had been obliged to go jogging with him to see the cherry trees blooming while it was still dark! On his quite late departure, the Prince seemed very cheery, as his great love, Camilla, was waiting for him in the car.
When my errant Brit arrived, panting, back from Melbourne, or maybe Johannesburg, and asked how I was getting on, I was able to report that we were making good progress in the women's doubles tennis at the Harbour Club, which, thanks mainly to my partner, Sophie, we ended up winning. I then also mentioned, as casually as possible, that I had especially enjoyed talking and sitting next to Prince Charles on his birthday, producing a strangled cry of "What?" from the delinquent Brit. I was able to assure him that, in my opinion, the Prince of Wales would turn out to be an excellent King, which I am very sure he will.
Not content with this coup, a few weeks later I was invited by a wealthy fellow American, who seemed to hope that I could help him to become a US Ambassador, to dinner with John Major, who turned out to be a huge amount more fun and better looking than he is ever given credit for.
I was so impressed that a newly arrived and not at all well known mid-Western American could be invited to meet the future head of state and the, until recently, Prime Minister that I resolved forthwith to apply for British nationality, without relinquishing my US passport, though I might have been tempted to do the latter as Boris Johnson did, due to the fact that I still am required to pay taxes in six different US states, plus federal and income taxes, without almost ever being there.
Ann Bracken's entertaining memoir, How to Break Into the White House, is available in the main book stores and from Amazon.
