Mr. Chatterbox

Sometimes I get the uneasy feeling that I’m turning into Barney Frank. It’s not that I’m smarter than the other congressmen; I’ve just been around longer. All the others have retired or lost elections or ended up in jail, but I’m still here. I started young and never lost my job. Or, as we say in Sarasota these days, never lost my job yet.

Back when I started writing a gossip/social column 25 years ago, the field was dominated by Helen Griffith, although there was a new young whippersnapper named Marjorie North who was causing a lot of comment. Also in the field: Carol Cheek, Pat Schlesinger, Jane Baldwin and Sally Traeger, plus a long list of others who are quickly being lost to history. My competition has always been female, and age is not a problem. Even after Helen started wearing her clothes inside out, she was still considered in her prime. It’s the perfect job for an old lady, and dementia may actually be a plus.

In Sarasota we have rules about writing gossip about society. The city is too small to bring up controversies or make enemies. Consequently, a typical Sarasota column contains a lot of elephants in the room. A person will be mentioned, but the main reason everybody knows that name will be tactfully ignored.

And these days, with the unprecedented air of crisis, loss, deceit and social realignment, making a judgment call on who to write about and what to say gets harder and harder.

 The old guard is fading fast, and when the economy comes back there will be a new guard running things, including social life. That Vinyl Fest that was such a surprise hit back in July will become the wave of the future. And what’s in it for me? I started getting Twitter and Facebook reports about what a fabulous success that festival was and my blood ran cold.

What could I possibly do for that crowd? Chaperone?

Fortunately, my competition seems to be taking everything in stride. In fact, we’re very lucky to have just the right group of columnists to lead us into the New Sarasota. Plus, they’re certainly not old women. OK, Molly Schechter is getting up there. She may even be over 60. But such energy. Not for nothing is her e-mail moniker aerobicgramma—or wait a minute. Maybe it’s bionicgramma . . .

Molly is one of those columnists who fit perfectly into the world she writes about. She’s been on the social scene for years and has served on every committee and is a personal friend of just about everybody whose name appears in a social column. When Emily Walsh Parry had to quit doing social coverage for the Longboat Observer (her father, Matt, the publisher, is making her sell ads so she can learn the business), Molly was the perfect replacement, one reason being she’s an excellent photographer. Now she’s still at every party, but instead of a designer gown she’s got her “work uniform” on—a black outfit with pants and a camera around her neck, looking very Annie Leibovitz.

The thing I like best about Molly is that she’s the perfect party companion. If you find her at your table, you know you’re going to have a ball. She’s full not just of gossip but of insightful gossip, wittily presented. Yes, she does a lot of event coverage, but my favorite stuff of hers is the items and stories in her weekly column, called “Black Tie and Tales.”

Molly had a career in advertising until she moved to Sarasota about 10 years ago and started getting involved in Designing Women Boutique and the Season of Sculpture (by the way, she loves the sailor). She began writing a fitness column for the Observer, then branched out to cover real estate and restaurants. But when Emily was kicked upstairs and she was offered the gossip job, she was flabbergasted. “I was replacing someone who was 40 years younger,” she marvels.

Exercising my prerogative as a gossip columnist, I asked Molly if she was dating anyone, and she said she was but wouldn’t say who. I do know that she has a dog named Rosko and that she takes her two grandsons to Bob Evans for breakfast every Saturday morning. And that she’s a crucial part of the Observer’s voluminous coverage of party after party, page after page. “People in this town take their social coverage very seriously,” she says in a tone of respect and awe.