Part 1 (1/2)

Carrie and Me_ A Mother-Daughter Love Story.

by Carol Burnett.

PREFACE

In late 2000, my daughter Carrie Hamilton was working on a story, ”Sunrise in Memphis,” writing in her small Colorado cabin. The story was about a bohemian girl's strange road trip to Elvis's Graceland with a mysterious cowboy. Carrie planned to turn it into a screenplay eventually. Because she felt a kins.h.i.+p with Kate, her main character, Carrie (being a free spirit and somewhat bohemian herself) decided to hit the road and take the same trip for research purposes.

So she got out her maps, filled the gas tank in her Jeep, and headed south toward Memphis. She e-mailed me fresh pages of the story almost daily, along with tales of her own adventures on her journey to Graceland. As a side trip, Carrie visited our family's old stomping grounds in San Antonio, Texas, and Belleville, Arkansas, since the two of us were writing a play together based on my family, who came from those parts of the country.

Carrie didn't live to finish either project. She died of cancer a little over a year later at the age of thirty-eight.

This book has taken me on a bittersweet journey. When she was in the hospital for the last time, Carrie asked me to finish ”Sunrise in Memphis” for her, which I haven't been able to do. Try as I might, the characters in the story were hers to write, not mine. Carrie's request had been living with me for over ten years when I finally figured out what I could do.

Fortunately, I had saved all of the letters and e-mails we wrote to each other during her road trip to Memphis. In Part One of this book I've combined that correspondence with my own memories. These include a few episodes I've written about before, but I feel they bear repeating to round out the order of events. I've also written here about Carrie's brave fight against her illness. Part Two is Carrie's story ”Sunrise in Memphis,” which is fun to read in its own right, but also eerily echoes Carrie's journey.

This book is my way of honoring her last request, bringing to the page many of Carrie's thoughts and feelings and also my own journey with her, including all the ups and downs in the early years (which got pretty b.u.mpy when Carrie became a teenager).

Carrie was widely known as a magnetic young woman with a stunning smile, an infectious laugh, a throaty voice, and the soul of a poet. She was someone who cared deeply for others, particularly for those less fortunate. Whenever a homeless person approached her, she would offer them a deal: five dollars if they told her their story. As you'll see, Carrie used those stories, and the personal narratives shared with her by everyone she met, as inspiration for her prose, her poetry, her music, her lyrics, and her acting. Carrie piled so much into her young life that one can only imagine what she would have tackled and accomplished in the second half.

For myself, I hope you will get to know the daughter I loved and cherished. I can honestly say that just about everyone who knew Carrie loved her. Maybe that's because she loved them right back.

I also hope I've succeeded in bringing Carrie's essence to these pages. I treasure her words, and even after reading them again and again, each time I am grateful for the reminder that she has never left me.

PART ONE

Carrie and Me

Some Very Early Memories

December 1963

New York City

In spite of the cold, snowy weather, I was very hot all the time because I was very pregnant. One night I was burning up, but didn't dare open the window in our apartment bedroom for fear that my husband, Joe Hamilton, sleeping next to me, might wind up freezing to death. So I went into the second bedroom, opened the window to let the cold night air blow in, and plopped myself down on top of the covers. At last I was finally comfortable. The next morning I woke up refreshed after a good night's sleep and found myself covered in a lovely white blanket of snow, which had blown in sideways through the open window during the night! Heaven.

I went into labor the evening of December 4. Small pains at first, but we knew this was it. Joe and I checked into the hospital around eight o'clock, and I was a.s.signed to a labor room. The night nurse, Louise (I remember her name because it was my mother's name), helped me get undressed and issued me the regular hospital uniform-a singularly unattractive, knee-length gown, opening in the back. She hung up my dress and coat in the closet, put my boots on the shelf, and led me to a rather lumpy bed. I obediently got in and she hoisted up some metal bars on both sides. I figured she must be worried that I might roll off onto the floor and bounce down the hall.

A doctor on duty came in to examine me, and my water broke immediately.

A short while later, Joe was ushered in and was advised by Louise that he might as well go home because it looked like it would be a long night. I secretly wished he would stay with me, but in those days the father wasn't necessarily a welcome figure in the labor room. Louise promised Joe she'd call him when the time drew near. They left, and I was alone in the dark. The nurse had given me a shot and I dozed off, thinking this labor thing wasn't nearly as difficult as they say... .