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PNB interview, take 2:

Ronnie Bueche 
talks to Patrick Nathaniel Bartholomew III

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Bueche: That's a hard question. I think I'd say Jamaica, because I like the beach and the sun. We were in Negril. Venus is so good to work with. They really treat us like royalty when we're on a shoot with them. It's not all work. We do have to get up early. They expect us to do our jobs. We shoot for a couple of hours in the morning, and then, of course it gets too hot so we have to take a break in the afternoon, and then we come back and shoot again in the evening. During the down time, we're playing and cutting up and running around. We always find the best places to eat. I'm a "beachy" kind of person, and I like Jamaica and I like all of the islands. That was probably the most fun for me.

PNB: Let's back up a little. Where did you grow up? Where were you educated? Bueche: I grew up in a little town called Denham Springs, Louisiana. It's about 15 miles outside of Baton Rouge. I did all the little pageant things, the little girl things, the homecoming queen, and all that kind of silly stuff. The children's pageants were big in my hometown. I probably entered 50 to 100 pageants from the age of 8 to 11. I had a room full of trophies and crowns. I just got addicted to it. It taught me a lot of discipline, but there is a bad side to it, too. You see the overbearing mother and the crying children. I was lucky because I didn't lose very many. I was kind of the queen of that little area.

Photo by Golden Photography

And then homecoming was a big surprise. I had been on the court the year before, but everyone knew that the head cheerleader would get it. She and I were the rivals all the way through high school. She was the head cheerleader, and I was the head dancer. The dancer won. It was a total shock. It was just wonderful. It's one of those fond memories that I have. I can look back on the pictures and dread the hairstyle but enjoy the memories. (Laughter.)

Then, I had an interest in modeling in my late teens, but I was told that I was too short. I went to a couple of agencies near my hometown, and all they wanted was money. They wanted you to take this course and that course, so I gave up. I went on with my life. I went to college at LSU for three years. I danced with the "Golden Girls" dance line there, and that was an absolutely wonderful experience.

I left there and went to nursing school at Southeast Louisiana in Hammond. I finished nursing school there with honors. Then, I fell in love and got married. The whole modeling thing was totally forgotten. I never looked back.

My husband and I moved to Mississippi, and my husband encouraged me to enter the Mrs. Mississippi Pageant. He knew that I'd always wanted to enter the Miss USA system. So I entered and won the 1997 Mrs. Mississippi title and then placed as the first alternate in the Mrs. America Pageant. That was a great experience, but what happened, which was good for me, was meeting these other women who were just as short as me, just as old as me, and they're modeling in their hometowns. So I'm thinking, the agencies didn't tell me about this.

Right then and there, I made a promise to myself that when I got home, I was going to figure out how I could model. So I got home, and I put a little book of pictures together. I went to a few local agencies, and I learned about COMMERCIAL modeling. There was a whole different side to modeling that no one had ever told me about. There is actually a lot of work to be done in commercial modeling. I went ahead and started getting work locally. Then, I happened to send a comp card to Lou Maggio (director of photography for Venus Swimwear), and he liked me and he wanted to use me, but he didn't get me into the summer shoot, so I entered the Model Search. I met Lou at the Model Search, and it just rolled from there. I came to Venus once before I won, and I was a finalist and got a contract with Venus. I decided to come back and try one more time. Thank God I did.

More talk with Ronnie Bueche ...

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