7-10-25 Begin Answering Body Building Questions
- What was it that made you want to start lifting weights
This has multi dimensional answers. Do I really know my UNCONSCIOUS mind? Mostly I wanted to have a BEAUTIFUL BODY. Specifically it was 1964 & I was SIX MONTHS pregnant. Everyone told one once you have a baby, your body goes to pot. I did not want this to happen so weight lifting would prevent it.
I saw men lift weights. My brother lifted weights for high school football.
When I was 14 living on the farm in New Jersey we knew this gorgeous police officer named Jim Doud. He wore a black uniform, had dark hair, – everyone was in love with him. He often visited us to speak with Mom & a 19 year old female who lived with us. He knew them from ‘Thorne’s Milk Bar’ where they both worked.
When he visited it was always in uniform so of course he oozed sex appeal, but I was just a skinny 14 year old.
Mom & this other lady LOOKED DOWN on me, like I was nothing – they even told me, directly & in actions, that I was ‘nothing,’ ‘not a good sight to look at’ & people stared at me in the street {when I wore shorts & a tank top} NOT because I was pretty but OTHER REASONS {what I could not imagine}. My Mom sought to demoralize me, take away my PRIDE, self respect & confidence, & she had marshaled these two persons – the 19 yr old female & my 17 yr old brother – to help her – which they gladly did for years. {They were see-sawed up when I was down.}
So you have to picture this waif, like Cinderella, broken down by her family & peers – subjected to daily hate – feeling inconsequential but wanting to lift her head high. I was the house slave. They all worked outside & gained money. I was given no allowance but had to do all the housework as well as ironing their clothes & baby sitting a toddler. I was not allowed to cheerlead even, while my brother played football, because there was too much work to do at home.
An incident with Jim Doud the cop proved they were wrong – I was not ugly. In fact, I had APPEAL FOR MEN.
One day Jim Doud stops by the house & we are alone. He aid he thought my Mom or other lady were there. I made him some tea & we sat in the kitchen. Then we step outside & he sees my bro’s weights lying there. He sets up some cinder blocks & loads up a barbell & puts it on them. He then takes off his shirt & t-shirt & proceeds to demonstrate how he lifts weights. I am in awe, just stood there shy as can be, hardly saying a word.
Then the 19 year old comes home & is FLUSTRED that Jim is doing the weight routine in front of me, half naked & we’re all alone – as both she & Mom were infatuated with him. She keeps asking me,
“How long has he been here?”
over & over, worried something might have happened, & I keep lying,
“Ten minutes.”
Josie aborted my meeting with the beautiful cop & I eventually forgot about it.
Many years later as I was writing my biography the incident came to mind & Mother God {within me} said,
“He was grooming you – you were only 14 but in 3 years you would have been legal, so this was making your acquaintance. He was attracted to you – not your Mom or Josie. But you could not imagine it as you were so beaten down. But this is proof of your desirability to men.
In this demoralized state, shortly after – age 16 – I got a ride to California & there started my career. I was keen to prove myself, that I was good looking. I suspected I had a good body. I was obsessed with entering beauty contests but I learned most local yokel contests were fixed – as ugly girls who were related to the promoters & judges got the top spots – I saw movie-star quality females not even place!
But the ONE contest that was NOT fixed was Miss NUDE Universe. Long story explained elsewhere. I WON that & it got me into Playboy.
And I became a dancer – first go-go dancing where I proved myself a star of sorts, then headliner of the Coast to Coast Baker-Berger Circuit, where ending up at the Roxy Theater on 42nd St. NYC, downstairs was Tom Minichiello’s mid-city gym. I saw a sign in the window – Miss Americana. Asked him if I had a chance & he said YES. That was the contest where I met Franco & Arnold – 1972.
To go back to 1964 I was pregnant with my child little Kellie, living in Santa Monica next to the Pier, went to an IFBB store where Dave Draper {who later sued Joe Weider was usng his pics without paying him} was sitting working on something. The man refused to sell me over 5 lb dumbbells, he feared I might hurt myself. I took them & went to another store for 10 pounders & eventually used my husband’s regular weights. He guided me on the standard routine which I kept for the rest of my life with some improvements.
I also understood that the hard lifting of weights dissipated some of the anger at being abused – I had PTSD from what Mom did for years. You know how people are encouraged to beat a pillow with a plastic baseball bat or do some other extreme exercise to vent negative energies – it works. So the weights served multiple functions for me. Throughout my career I trained almost every day – I even took 15 lbs dumbbells with me on the road like the Playboy Club Chicago. I intended to keep what they advertised as “Miss Nude Universe – the most beautiful body in the World.” Someone brought my Mom to see me in NYC & they said she CRIED when she saw me on stage. Did not explain why. After all that hate & abuse – before she died she said to the other kids, “Rasa was the best one.”
The gym where the famous body builders trained was close to me – “Gold’s Gym”- Venice, at that time a bit of a slum. I did not go there {it was men only} but I frequently went across the street from my apt to play volleyball – the renowned Muscle Beach. {End}
