New York Post

Another candle on the cake

- Cindy Adams

SUNDAY, my birthday, was atop the Freedom Tower’s One World Observator­y. It was born seven years ago. I’m older.

Floor 102 was Mindy Levine and her Yankees president husband Randy Levine’s special dinner for me. Mindy Levine was rememberin­g how it started for me.

I was set for college at 15. But Andrew Jackson High required females to make their own white lawn graduation dress in home ec. I can’t sew. After my mother paid a pro to finish it for me, the principal said: “She didn’t make her own dress, she can’t graduate.” So: No diploma, college, graduating high school. I’m living proof that you can’t get anywhere without a college education.

Years later, interviewi­ng Prime Minister Nehru in New Delhi, an accompanyi­ng Library of Congress official inquired about my university. I said, “I never graduated high school.” Forget his reply. But I remember — and have since reported — Nehru pinched my behind walking in back of me.

Years later, outside Vientiane, I’m teaching English along the Mekong Delta. Parsing “exactly on time,” I had one student employ that precise phrase. She said, “I want a dress exactly on time” as yours. My teaching career ended.

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Cindy’s always been drawn to the smell of gossip and it’s made her lifelong friends, from the famous (Judge Judy) to the small and furry.

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