We're Having a Heat Wave
By ice rivers
- 141 reads
Marilyn Monroe was not popular with the Sisters of Mercy. The Legion of Decency which rated movies according to their "morality" made it a sin to see a Marilyn Monroe movie. I don't think it was mortal but it was a bad one especially for kids.
I didn't know who Marilyn Monroe was except that I better not see any of her movies. I heard terrible things about her, mostly that she had posed nude.
Displays of the naked female body were frowned upon by the Sisters of Merfcy and condemned by the Legion of Decency.
This is where my fear of and respect for the naked female body began.
Then one day, I saw a picture of Marilyn.
I recognized her.
I had in fact seen one of her movies.
There's No Business Like Show Business.
We saw it at the drive in.
I remembered the song that she sang.
Heat Wave
"we're having a heat wave, a tropicl heat wave"
I liked the song. Aside from a bare midriff, I didn't sense anything sinful about her performance. I was seven years old at the time.
By the time I put two and two together, I had already received my first communion and went to confession once a week. I was more aware of sin than ever before. I had committed a sin that I hadn't confessed and which must have lingered in my sould causing me all sorts of spiritual damage. I had seen a Marilyn Monroe movie. This was serious.
I really dreaded going to confession. Up until that point my main sins were spitting, swearing, and getting mad at my parents. I didn't know how the hell I would bring the matter up to the priest in that dark confessional.
I entered the cubicle "Bless me father for I have sinned. It has been one week since my last confession.. I came right out and said that I had seen a Marilyn Monroe movie. The priest asked me about the circumstances under which I had seen the movie. I told him that we were at a drive in and I was with my mother and father. He asked me about the movie, whether I liked it or not. I told him the best part was at the end when the whole cast gets together and belts out the song "There's No Business like Show Business." I told him that I liked the song Heat Wave but had no idea that Marilyn Monroe sang the song. If I had known then what I knew now about her being nude, I would have closed my eyes during that scene. He told me that it wasn't my fault but he forgave my unintentional sin anyways. For pennance I made an act of contrition, said a Hail Mary and promised to not see any more Marilyn Monroe movies.
A couple of years later, Playboy magazine published its first issue featuring a naked Marilyn Monroe. For awile, I thought that the United States was going to hell.
And then we elected our first Catholic President.
And then on his Birthday.....
And then she was gone
And then he was gone
And Viet Nam was cranking up
And I went to college
Where everybody was reading Playboy
Except for me
I stuck with Stan Lee
And the rest is history.
- Log in to post comments