The Millers

by Deborah

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(left to right) That’s me, Barry, Finn, my Dad and Nana in Torrance, Calif., December 1998

The living members on my father’s side of the family start with Nana, pictured left. She’s well into her 80s, but she’s as spry and devoted to her feline following as ever.

Nana is originally from Chickashay, Oklahoma, where as a young girl she married our grandfather, “Gog,” who passed on about 12 years ago. She and Gog, along with a toddler son, all struggled out West during the Depression of the ’30s and set up home in a part of Los Angeles that at the time was nothing but countryside and orange groves. She still lives in that home where they raised my dad.

Nana’s days start early, end late and typically include two rounds of feeding the alley cats, visiting with her many neighborhood friends, doing a spot of shopping at Del Amo Mall and lunching out with her grandson (and my brother), Bill.

Hers is a warm, helpful, generous spirit that is always giving to others and seeing to their every need. No visitor to her home has ever left with a grumbling belly or without a plateful of foil-covered food to take home to the rest of the family!

Next in line is my father, Fred, a gifted artist and painter, as well as an ace guitar player, both acoustic and electric, with a special talent for flamenco. He no longer paints or plays any instruments, but I have many happy memories of watching him do both.

He won’t hear a word of it, but Dad has always been an excellent father to us kids and son to Nana. He regularly stops by to check on Nana and sorts out her business affairs.

Dad worked for United Airlines out of Los Angeles Airport (LAX) for the best part of his life, incurring work-related back injuries along the way. He has recently retired and, I suspect, finding it difficult to enjoy his well-earned time off for good behavior. He’s not exactly the time to put on a wool cap and go potter about in the garden (even though he doesn’t own either one)!

Dad has been married for many years to a lovely, talented and family-oriented woman named Nancy, whom I am proud to call my “second mom.” Like Dad, she is talented and creative, often making hand-crafted gifts and cards for friends and family members. At my request, she once made a gorgeous wedding photo album for a friend of mine who was getting married. I wish now I had taken a photo of it; it was a stunning piece of work that was a big hit with the newly married couple.

Born and educated in the Philippines, Nancy had arrived in the U.S. after having occupied a high-powered government post for many years.

Since marrying Dad, she has continued her education by embarking on a succession of college courses pertaining to her current job as a bank loan officer. Nancy’s credits include a stint as a hand model in a local television advertisement for her then employer.

As well as being the clever one in the family, Nancy also is a brilliant cook of no less than michelin-star quality. Our family get-togethers wouldn’t be the same without a huge banquet of Nancy’s mouth-watering specialties such as buttery baklava and savory beef hors d’ouvres. Bon appetit!

Together Dad and Nancy had my 11-year-old sister, Noelle (pictured here, second from right), who is a budding pianist and aspiring ballerina.

An avid reader and star pupil, Noelle already has jumped a grade and collected several certificates of academic achievement along the way.

In free moments, while her peers struggle to match eye shadow to sweaters, Noelle follows archaeology, with a keen interest in Egyptology, and I send her British newspaper clippings for her scrapbook and foreign currency from my travels.

Meanwhile, my brother Bill is a talented actor whose star is on the rise.

Over the years he has appeared in “Star Trek: The Next Generation,” “Roseanne,” “Herman’s Head,” “Moonlighting,” “The X-Files” and a clutch of films including “Independence Day,” “The Net” (with Sandra Bullock) and “Air Force One.”

Most recently he has worked on an upcoming TV series “The Others” and plays an FBI agent in the recent Martin Lawrence film “Blue Streak.”

Of all the roles Bill has landed over the years, my favorite (and most often bragged-about) is that of stand-in for the back of George Clooney’s head on the set of “ER.” No kidding, they’re the same height, and they could be twins from behind!

And a bit of breaking news, he has landed a role in an upcoming movie called “A Rat in the Can,” starring Robert Forrester. He plays a game-show host, and when he completed his lines, the producer congratulated him on doing an excellent job. He also has finished shooting a made-for-TV movie starring Shirley MacLaine in which he plays a police officer who gets beaten up by Shirley MacLaine’s handbag. More on that later! 

I can’t resist the temptation to include this gold nugget of a retro photo. Dated September 1966, it shows (from left to right), my Dad, my mother, brothers Bill and Larry, and way in the background, Gog, stylin’ an’ profilin’ over that crazy Buick that sat in Nana’s garage for yonks. In fact, I wouldn’t be surprised if it weren’t still entombed in that garage draped with that same dust sheet!