Venice Part 2 - Maurice and Daisy
As I stepped out the door of the Venice PD, I heard one of my friends shout out, “Hey, we’re over here!” Sure enough the driver had followed the cruiser and was waiting at the curb. It was a relief to see them, since at that point I didn’t know the area well enough to find my way home. We all had a good laugh over the “false arrest,” but it left a bad taste in my mouth. From then on, I was on “high alert” whenever I saw a cop car or police on the street. The comment that I looked like on of Manson’s followers made me paranoid.
Life took a sudden turn for the better later that month when Richard (Malibu Media) offered me a full time position. I would be driving the newly purchased company van around Southern California. On any given day I was picking up bolts of fabric, making a delivery to Maurice at his pattern cutting shop in the garment district, picking up completed merchandise from Daisy the seamstress, or handing off racks of chic dresses to staff at retail stores.
About Maurice and Daisy.
Maurice’s business occupied the second floor of a huge, windowed warehouse in the Garment District in downtown LA. He was average height, slight build, with a head of curly gray hair. There was an air of sophistication about him. Maurice came to work mornings in a suit, but when an extra hand was needed he lost the suit jacket, rolled up the sleeves of his starched white shirt, got to it.
One afternoon as he was helping to pack the cuttings for me to take, I saw the tattoo on his left forearm. It wasn’t decorative; he wasn’t making a statement with it like people do now days. It was a plain, purple number. As soon as I saw it, I understood. I looked away, and said nothing. Later Richard confirmed that Maurice was a survivor of the Nazi extermination camps. It was never mentioned again.
Maurice was erudite, soft-spoken, focused on his business: pattern cutting at scale. This consisted of laying out yards and yards of fabric, stacking them in layers, placing a template on top of the stack, and precisely cutting the fabric into what were essentially puzzle pieces. These would be delivered to Daisy’s shop to be stitched into dresses. There was no AC in the warehouse so the cutting was hot and sweaty work, dangerous too. The cutting was done with long, vertically reciprocating razor-sharp blades powered by an electric motor. The cutter skillfully guided the machine back and forth through the stack.
Daisy was a rotund, resolutely happy, woman of Japanese descent. If she hadn’t told me otherwise, I’d have guessed that she was Native Hawaiian with her dark hair, brown eyes, and larger build. She always greeted me with a smile. Her seamstress shop was staffed with Japanese American women. They were wizards at the sewing machines, which whirred constantly in the background. They seemed to never let up.
Whenever I delivered a load from Maurice, Daisy would help me stack it in her shop. She loved to make conversation, about the weather, where I was from, about how Richard was doing. A people person, she was. On one occasion I asked about her background. She told me that she was born in the US, but that during WW2 she and her family had their home and most of their worldly goods taken. She spent the duration of the war in an interment camp with other Japanese Americans.
This upset me, as it was so unjust. I asked her if she was angry or still harbored resentment for the way she and her family were treated, dispossessed of everything they had. Not missing a beat, she shook her head and said, “No, it was what happens in war. I’m not resentful. Now, I own my own business and have a good life. See?” She turned and swept her hand over her workshop. It was difficult for me to understand how it was that she felt as she did. Perhaps it's the difference in our temperaments. Hers was indefatigable. I certainly admired her.
What I surprised me most about Maurice and Daisy was that while each had suffered hardship, in his case unfathomable, they both found the strength to build new lives. Writing about them has allowed me to reflect on how resilient each of them were, and to express my good fortune in meeting and knowing them. In my memory I hold them both in the highest esteem.