The red rose tells you of his passion, the white rose his love so true

I recently pulled out some of the old tapes that have been lurking around in my car for the last ten years or so.  At one point I made a tape of the 60s music my parents had on records when I was a kid.  And this one was on the tape in my car:   Patti Page "Hush Hush Sweet Charlotte"

I remember many nights hearing this song playing.  Somehow in my memory, this song came up a lot on Saturday nights when I would get done taking a bath and putting on my little red corduroy robe that my mom made for me.

I always thought it was such a sweet song.  And as I got older I found myself saying that I didn't want a dozen red roses.  No, I would settle for two roses--a red one and a white one.  That's the power those words had for me even as a little girl.

Fast forward a few years and I realized that the song was also connected to a movie starring Bette Davis.  the shortest synopsis I can give you is that Ms. Davis' character is an old woman living alone in a huge old house, the same one she lived in when her (married) lover was killed in a very brutal attack nearly 40 years ealier.  When family comes to live with her, they work to make her believe she is insane.  They are terrible.  They play this song on a music box for her just to taunt her.  At one point she is awakened by the strains of this song being played in the music room on the main floor of the house.  She goes to the music room and sees a severed hand--and believes it is his.  And she is terribly scared when his head rolls down the curved stairwell and lands at her feet.

Sounds horrid doesn't it?  But this movie and this song make me smile.  You see, when I was a teenager my sister and I stayed up late one night watching this movie on cable tv.  My dad snuck out into the kitchen and got a grapefruit which he slowly rolled down the basement steps to my sister and I.  My sister screamed bloody murder. 

The family history on this one goes back even further.  When my parents were young newlyweds my mom decided to play a trick on my dad and hide from him when he got home from work.  He came in and knew she had to be home but she wasn't answering him.  So he went to the basement steps (it was a scary scary old basement) and gently called down to her with his hands cupped around his mouth--"Chaaaaaaarrrrrrrrlotte.  Chaaaaaaarrrrrrrlotte."  Mom came running up the steps and told him "Don't you ever do that again!"

So many memories and thoughts packed into a three minute song.