Aphrodite for the day

I had just arrived in Paris, fresh from high school graduation and with a modeling portfolio of very American photographs. Eileen Ford had made arrangements for me to be represented by Models International.

I was instructed to get some new shots with a French photographer,and that we would be shooting on the beach in Britany. It was about a three hour drive from Paris. I was whisked away in a taxi cab yellow VW bug convertible. It was early July and it was bright and hot with enormous castle like clouds billowing high into the sky.

The photographer spoke no English,and I no French yet.Vivaldi's Four Seasons played on the cassette the whole trip.I cannot hear the Four Seasons without the exquisite French Countryside pervading my mind with its cinematic beauty. I was excited and filled with anticipation.

My changing room was one of the bunkers from the Battle of Dunkirk, and there I was changing into sexy bathing suit after sexy bathing suit for my romps in front of the lens. In my final shot I was braless and wearing a white gauze tunic while emerging from the swirling surf. It was an effort to become less modest working in France for their asthetic often required revealing breasts in a natural way...nothing like the cheesy American pin up way.

As I worked in front of the camera I could see the bunkers from the Battle of Dunkirk and was struck by how at times, how surreal life could be.

Only thirty years before one of the biggest battles of WWII was waged, and there I was frolicking in the sea, and feeling every bit like an almost eighteen year old Aphrodite.