The Ludmila Confessions

As usual the Holidays were full of busy social events for the Millmans. We went to the house of Dean Martin for Christmas, for the second time, our third event there. This time I invited my  sister and my niece. Every time was an adventure, fantastic parties full of 60s stars who were as big as Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie in our era. After the party Rex Harrison called our home again, but I was too busy to get to know him better. My lifestyle was modeling, partying and drinking, which took up all my time– so I guess I will never know what he wanted!

Then it came time to prepare for the Country and Western Jubilee. We tried to sign on Jerry Lee Lewis, David Carradine, and Johnny Cass as well as invite some famous stars.  Our hope was to have a great turn out, so with only a few months to go, we went to as many parties as we were invited to, signing every star we could, either to perform or as a guest at the Festival.

Ludmila with red hair

Friends called our ranch home Sherwood Forest. I called it Piggy Pig Farms. I had so many animals there and I started selling them. In those days, the flower children were calling the police officers “pigs”. I loved pigs and so did my niece. Pigs are very intelligent animals and I don’t understand why it’s considered an insult.

One day, we ordered a whole piglet for New Years, and left it hanging in the cool room just beside the big garage. We were going to roast the pig over an open fire by the pool. That was for a New Years party, but it was only December 30 and we had another party going already.
The 30th was my sister’s birthday so after a quiet dinner with my blood family, we retired to our Hacienda. We should have called it Las Vegas– what happens here stays here! My dear husband disappeared in the middle of the party, though I did not even miss him with so many young men around me, flirting and wanting me. I later discovered that he was in the “pig room” with the girlfriend of Gus Savalas– doing what animals and people do. She was quite different from me bodywise, and I think she was a nymphomaniac, so they had really lustful, promiscuous sex. I was more open to my sexual behavior than my husband, he knew every one I had been with. I did not suspect nor worry about him though, because I thought we had no lies or secrets regarding our behavior at the parties of sexual indulgence. Later I found out that was not his way.

Gus Savalas, Jack Millman and Ludmila 

If the only value my book will have for anyone, besides entertainment, is to make the reader see how an alcoholic functions and what makes him or her that way, it will serve a purpose.  It is the same with all of us, a sickness. It shows up in different forms with different people, but it is really all the same. No matter if you are white, yellow, black, or purple, it is always the same. I don’t like to generalize but I think we are all borderline genius, idiot, artist. Of course this is only my opinion, and for sure it is an unscientific one, but by the same token the doctors will confirm one thing that I mention here. Alcoholism is a disease that only a Power greater than ourselves can remove– but how? The only way I personally found out was through Alcoholics Anonymous, where the members showed me by their example, and I did the work. After fifty years of drinking every day, God still let me live and sober up, so that today I am a writer and have a reborn life.  Though things became real, instead of remaining an unreachable dream, I am only now rediscovering the greatness of every minute of life.

Yes, today I am still beautiful and attractive, but now I am also grateful for everything– for my friends and admirers, and especially to the men I loved and that loved me in return, though there are too many to remember each by name. Each one left a lesson that was whether good or bad, it was a lesson never the less. . Above all I am happy, and I still have a lot of love to give to the world– to humanity, animals and nature. Today at last I can stop and smell the roses, even laugh at myself when it is appropriate!