If You Ask Me Part 3

Cheers to you!

Sincerely, Donna Kail a.s.sistant to Robert Redford More than a note, the congratulation consisted of a delightful, funny funny six-stanza poem that began with "Dear Betty" and ended with "Congratulations, Robert." six-stanza poem that began with "Dear Betty" and ended with "Congratulations, Robert."

By now I don't have to tell you how my mind was blown. Of course, my first reaction was that someone was putting me on, but the stationery was authentic, and on looking further, I found a great picture of himself, signed "Guess who? Robert Redford."

Finally, I found the courage to write him a thank-you and said I couldn't promise to stop using his name-unless he didn't find it funny.

I can only say that Robert Redford is one cla.s.s act.

P.S. I know you would love to hear the poem. Sorry.

BETTMANN/CORBIS.

With Bandit, Dancer, and Stormy.

ZUMA PRESS/NEWSCOM.

WRITER'S BLOCK Certain common cliches maintain that most men love hardware stores, just as women dote on shoe stores. I have no idea how accurate that is, because, personally, I am strange for stationery stores. Not for the fancy writing paper-it's those tablets and packs of lined three-hole notebook pages and those packs of typing paper that turn me on. I even buy those things when I go to the grocery store, whether I need them or not.

Let's say I am in the middle of a writing project and have, perhaps, hit a slow spot. Bringing in this stuff can recharge the battery. Or, if I am not not in the middle of a writing project, it can often cause me to start one. in the middle of a writing project, it can often cause me to start one.

Why? I have no idea, but it has been that way all my life-even back to my school days. A fresh pack of paper was the best incentive in the world for me to tackle my homework.

As weird as all this sounds, I am not alone. I can remember once being told by an author-who was rather well known at the time-that on the rare occasions when he hit a stubborn writer's block, there was only one specific brand of green-lined paper that could get him started again. He called it his "paper laxative." As soon as he'd bring in a pack, the ideas would start again.

Okay, so I'm weird. At least I am in good company.

John Steinbeck, who was Allen's and my good friend, did his writing standing up at a drafting table-in longhand, his white bull terrier, Angel, lying across his feet. People always seem amazed that I write in longhand. Well, if it's good enough for Steinbeck, it's good enough for me! I really can't communicate to a machine-the thoughts want to go from my brain down my arm to my hand to the page. After I've written that first draft, I copy it over again onto another page. That's when the most changes are made, as I polish and rewrite the original-once again, in longhand.

My mother had beautiful handwriting her entire life. As a little kid, I loved the time with her when I would make her write something so I could see how closely I could copy it. At wasn't a learning ch.o.r.e, which I probably would have resisted. It was a game.

Somewhere in there fun sessions she managed to make a point that has stuck: handwriting is a means of communication. Why not make it as easy to read as possible?

I still remember those lovely times with my mother when I would try to copy her handwriting. Maybe it isn't only John Steinbeck's influence after all.

With our computers today, we have a whole new population who will find all of this totally academic, since they write by hand as little as possible. Even signing their names seems to have gone by the boards.

Computers can't take all the blame. Both my business manager and my doctor have handwriting that is practically unreadable. Whenever I get fan mail in which the handwriting is absolutely illegible, I wonder if they've taken writing lessons from my business manager!

Ironically, when I grew up and entered into show business, I found many people who actually practiced diligently to make their autographs as eye-catching, illegible, and uncopyable as possible!

On Hot in Cleveland Hot in Cleveland, Valerie Bertinelli, Wendie Malick, Jane Leeves, and I sign scripts each week to be used as charity auction items. I am always so grateful that I know their names, because I wouldn't have a clue from their signatures, which are as distinctive and interesting as they are. You can't imagine how dull my readable but boring "Betty White" looks on that script cover in that distinguished company.

I must practice.

Tess, my mom, of the beautiful handwriting.

BETTY WHITE PRIVATE COLLECTION.

FANS AND FAN MAIL.

The term "fan" somehow seems more appropriate for one in the faceless crowd at a sporting event than for those nice folks who greet me on the street, or in the market, or at the airport-or wherever. The greetings are warm and friendly, probably because they have been inviting me into their homes for decades.

The Betty White Fan Club, Bets' Pets, has been around since 1971. While it has grown some over the years, it is still kept very personal, thanks to long-serving president Kay Daly and charter member LeElla Moorer. They have hung in there since the very beginning and have become treasured personal friends.

Over all those years, Kay and Lee have attended almost every performance I've done, not only in Los Angeles but out of town as well. As of today, they are in the audience every week when we shoot Hot in Cleveland Hot in Cleveland. They are deeply appreciated.

Bets' Pets was so named because from its inception, the club was dedicated to helping animals. The members pay minimal annual dues, and at Christmas and for my birthday in January, they put together a bonus gift-all of which is forwarded to various animal charities in my honor. They are a great group.

As well as sending out newsletters to the members about my activities, Kay manages to put out a great journal every year, comprising pictures and articles and pet news sent in by club members, which keeps us all updated on one another. She did all that while working as a fourth-grade schoolteacher until she retired. Lee, after serving as a nurse in the military, became head surgical nurse at UCLA Hospital until her retirement. I am most grateful that they haven't retired from my life!

Fans, in general, continue to amaze me. When I'm working out of town and I show up at different studios for appearances, no matter which city we are in, there is always a group waiting, holding pictures of me to be autographed. How How do they know my schedule when I hardly know it myself? Time is always short, and I feel bad when sometimes they rush me past and I can't stop and sign, but these people always seem to understand and keep smiling. do they know my schedule when I hardly know it myself? Time is always short, and I feel bad when sometimes they rush me past and I can't stop and sign, but these people always seem to understand and keep smiling.

Fan mail mail is something else again, with which my invaluable a.s.sistant Donna Ellerbusch and I contend! We try to keep up, but the mail continues to burgeon. A good percentage of it consists of picture requests, which I sign for Donna to send. I can't answer it all, of course, but there are a few categories that Donna sets aside, to which I do respond: those who have just lost a life partner and need to share their pain with someone who has been through it; boys and girls achieving Eagle Scout and the Gold Award, respectively; hurting individuals reporting the loss of a beloved pet; and students writing me as part of a school project. My answers are understandably brief, but answer I must. is something else again, with which my invaluable a.s.sistant Donna Ellerbusch and I contend! We try to keep up, but the mail continues to burgeon. A good percentage of it consists of picture requests, which I sign for Donna to send. I can't answer it all, of course, but there are a few categories that Donna sets aside, to which I do respond: those who have just lost a life partner and need to share their pain with someone who has been through it; boys and girls achieving Eagle Scout and the Gold Award, respectively; hurting individuals reporting the loss of a beloved pet; and students writing me as part of a school project. My answers are understandably brief, but answer I must.

Fellow actors have urged me to send the mail to companies that make a business of handling fan mail rather than complicate a busy schedule. One actor friend maintains that he never deals with his fan mail in any any way-he just dumps it. way-he just dumps it.

Truth be told, I need to read these letters to discover what I'm doing right or, more important, wrong wrong, and these writers don't hesitate to tell you.

[Editor's Note: My life has changed dramatically since I began writing this book.]

I used to be able to travel alone without thinking about it. I can't do that anymore. I have to have a meet-and-greet on both ends to get me through the airport. People are just being nice, but recently I actually missed a plane because I couldn't break away.

Between the Snickers commercial and the explosion of projects on which I worked in the past year, and a whole generation of fans who have met me through syndication, it seems like the number of people who call themselves fans just keeps growing. (There was a time when The Golden Girls The Golden Girls was on four times a day!) was on four times a day!) I don't mean for this to sound self-serving, but it can be a problem, and yet these are the people responsible for your good fortune!

Please know how grateful I am. Even if I do have to rush by to catch a plane!

With Dancer.

GLOBE PHOTOS.

STAGECRAFT.

a.s.sOCIATED PRESS/CLIFF OWEN.

RANGER.

One of the first questions in every interview since I started in television more than sixty years ago has always been, "When you were growing up, did you always want to be in show business?"

My answer has never changed. As a kid, show business wasn't even in the mix. As far back as I can remember, I wanted to be either a forest ranger or a zookeeper. The problem was, back then a girl wasn't allowed to be either one.

That was a real problem for a girl who grew up the way I did. Even today today, my earliest, fondest memories are of the pack trips in the High Sierras on horseback I took every summer with my mom and dad. Mules carried our camping equipment and food supplies. The first time we went, I was just four years old and rode in front of Daddy on his horse. The following year I graduated to a mount of my own.

It was a two-day trip to our destination, Rae Lakes. (Today, you may be able to drive there-I don't want to know.) Once there, we pitched camp, put bells on the horses and mules, and turned them loose. Pros that they were, they all hung out together nearby.

I can still hear those bells.

The next day, the guide would leave us and corral the animals to take them back to the ranch. Three weeks later, he'd bring them back in to pick us up. In those days, we would never see another human during the whole three weeks-it was true wilderness. Heaven.

After those earliest years, we moved our campsite to a remote area of Yellowstone National Park. In the way a lot of kids look forward to Christmas all year, I used to count the days from one June to the next, until we could take off again.

On the last half-day of school for the summer, my folks would pick me up at Beverly Hills High School, and we were on our way. Dad always wore a forest ranger hat on vacation, and when I'd spot that hat, I would know the day had finally arrived.

So it's no surprise that I developed a love of animals and the outdoors, but as a child I could only dream of becoming a zookeeper or a forest ranger. Today, after forty-seven years of working with the Los Angeles Zoo, I am satisfying the zookeeper part. Now, let me tell you the clincher.

Not long ago I received a letter from the United States Forest Service that thrilled me to my toes. It seems someone there must have read one of those interviews about those early dreams, because there was an invitation to Was.h.i.+ngton, D.C., where, in a special program at the Kennedy Center, the Forest Service would make me an Honorary Forest Ranger! It was all very official, and I couldn't believe my eyes.

Of course, I went back for the ceremony, and it was a beautiful program. Thomas Tidwell, the Forest Service chief, made the presentation with a huge Smokey Bear standing behind him. As I stepped to the podium to accept, I got a big hug from Smokey, which almost got me, but I didn't actually lose it until-after receiving the certificate and the badge-they presented me with an official ranger's hat.

He's been gone all these years, but as the memories washed over me, I would swear my dad was standing right there. It is a moment I continue to replay in my mind.

My eternal thanks to the Forest Service for this honor, which is so deeply appreciated. It truly was one of the greatest moments of my life.

I shall continue to work my hardest to spread the word that not only must we protect our wilderness areas-we must appreciate them. They are an endangered species.

a.s.sOCIATED PRESS/CLIFF OWEN.

ON STAGE FRIGHT.

I can remember my first attack of stage fright. I was in grammar school, in the third grade. And I had to get up in front of the cla.s.s and recite a poem. can remember my first attack of stage fright. I was in grammar school, in the third grade. And I had to get up in front of the cla.s.s and recite a poem.

"Little Machi met a cameraman on a Chinatown Street one day...."

That's how it started, and I was panic-stricken. I don't remember if I made it through the poem at all, but I can remember what it felt like.

Still, I somehow managed to continue as a young girl, partic.i.p.ating in plays throughout grammar school and high school. In fact, I wrote the play commemorating graduation from Horace Mann Grammar School-which was called Land of the Rising Sun Land of the Rising Sun. We were studying j.a.pan at the time, and like any good red-blooded American girl, I wrote myself into the lead! I also wrote a prologue for the show, explaining that it was traditional j.a.panese theater and props were held by non-actors. The play opened with the princess talking to a nightingale. Since one of the football players was going to be onstage holding a birdcage, clearly this all had to be explained in the prologue.

Guess who spoke the prologue?

So I was the star and and the interlocutor. And anything else I could be. Remember who wrote it! the interlocutor. And anything else I could be. Remember who wrote it!

But I never outgrew the stage fright.

To this day, it still happens-every single time I go onstage.

Jay Leno and I are good friends, and I appear on his show all the time. We greet each other before the show and have a catch-up in the makeup room. Suddenly it's showtime. I'm in the wings and those b.u.t.terflies appear. Ballplayers have rituals. They may touch each corner of the plate with the bat to calm themselves down. I have no ritual. I have-b.u.t.terflies.

Color Day at Beverly Hills High. I sang "Heart and Soul."

BETTY WHITE PRIVATE COLLECTION.

So you work your way through it.

Let me be clear: You are never calm You are never calm. But your job is to deliver.

In the case of Jay Leno, or Craig Ferguson or David Letterman or Jimmy Fallon, suddenly the conversation gets interesting and it carries you along.

Just hope the audience comes with you.

At the 2011 SAG Awards, when my name was announced, I was so shocked-it was so unexpected that I would win the award, given the other nominees, that my first thought was, They read the wrong name. They read the wrong name. Then I got up to the podium and thought, Then I got up to the podium and thought, Oh, no, I'm going to have to say something! Oh, no, I'm going to have to say something! On air, I might look calm, but if you knew what was going on in my head, your own head would spin. On air, I might look calm, but if you knew what was going on in my head, your own head would spin.

None of the tricks I try work. I'm lucky if I can breathe.

It's amazingly common for actors to have some form of stage fright. It just manifests itself in different ways.

I remember Rue McClanahan used to say, "That's one thing I never get! I never get stage fright!"

I think she was lying through her teeth.

NBCU PHOTO BANK.

You're taking a chance every time you step in front of an audience.

So is the stage fright due to fear of forgetting lines? Fear of drawing a blank on what to say? Fear of making a fool of oneself?

All of the above.