Making the case for Mr. Alright

Image from the 2008 Atlantic Monthly article

I’ve recently become entranced by a woman who is single-handedly redefining what women want — if we’re to believe reports. Lori Gottlieb’s neatly-timed pre-Valentine’s book “Marry Him: The Case for Settling for Mr Good Enough” is based on an article she wrote for the Atlantic two years ago. And yes, I was surprised, too, that such a highbrow publication runs pieces on dating. I will certainly now be reading it more often.

Gottlieb’s argument is cut-throat and practical. Women on the dating market have a particular value, relating to their appearance and their youth. Many think, in their late twenties and early thirties, that they will meet the man of their dreams, but they’re WRONG! They won’t, she says, because “perfect” men won’t ever like ordinary women, who are doomed to hit their mid-thirties and find that they’re alone. As a London Times article put it earlier this week, “Woe betide the naive singleton who assumes her choice of men will widen, rather than narrow, with time.” Woe indeed.

In the Times interview, Gottlieb says, “I’m all for the feminist movement but I think what happened is we took certain feminist ideals — for instance, the idea of ‘you can have it all’, or ‘you deserve the best’, or girl power in general — and we applied that to dating.”

I avidly sought out all available accounts of Gottlieb’s stance, and traced it back to an article from five years ago, also in the Atlantic, called the XY files. There Gottlieb detailed how she broke up with her boyfriend because she didn’t love him, and became pregnant via artificial insemination because she wanted a child. She dreamed of the advice she might give her daughter when the daughter grew up (incidentally, she went on to give birth to a son):

“Perhaps by then I’ll be married to a man who was worth waiting for. But it’s equally possible that I’ll have revised my ’somebody isn’t always better than nobody’ theory and will tell her that some partner might be better than no partner.”

She had one thing right.

As a girl/woman in her early 30s, I must accept that Gottlieb’s frantic warnings are aimed straight at me. I am one of the poor innocents of whom she speaks, blithely imagining I’m doing the right thing with my life, and little suspecting the disappointment that’s around the corner when my stock plummets.

I’ve considered her reasoning closely, and I partly agree. Let me explain. “Some guys aren’t worldly, but they’d make great dads,” Gottlieb asserts. “Or you walk into a room and start talking to this person who is 5′4″ and has an unfortunate nose, but he ‘gets’ you.” Er, yeah. It’s a sensible point — nobody’s perfect, and therefore the guy you could love might well not be.

But the thing with Gottlieb is that like many polemical writers, she makes her case by extremes. It’s not a question of meeting someone nice who happens not to be tall or rich — both of which are superficial traits —  and “settling” (as she puts it) because you get along with him, or her. For Gottlieb, it’s an issue of total passion v. total tedium. In her dystopian marital vision she even proposes the relationship of Will and Grace as an ideal (Will’s gay).

For example: ”So if you rarely see your husband—but he’s a decent guy who takes out the trash and sets up the baby gear, and he provides a second income that allows you to spend time with your child instead of working 60 hours a week to support a family on your own—how much does it matter whether the guy you marry is The One?”

Mr. Good Enough is a bland creature, falling somewhere between a provider of cash and a babysitter. Despite her recommendations Gottlieb’s distaste for him is palpable. This puts her in a difficult position, because if she so dislikes Mr. Alright, it will be tough for her to settle for him. She is still single.

In the past her criteria in locating The One have apparently been rigid. She always believed marriage should have a “divine spark.” “Many of the guys I dated possessed these qualities, but if one of them lacked a certain degree of kindness, another didn’t seem emotionally stable enough, and another’s values clashed with mine. Others were sweet but so boring that I preferred reading during dinner to sitting through another tedious conversation. I also dated someone who appeared to be highly compatible with me—we had much in common, and strong physical chemistry—but while our sensibilities were similar, they proved to be a half-note off, so we never quite felt in harmony, or never viewed the world through quite the same lens.”

I’m sorry, but I just don’t know what half-note-off sensibilities are. And I thought reading at the table was rather rude. What would we say if a man did that? Gottlieb’s article is not that long, yet the word “tedious” features twice, and “boring” twice also.

The “tedious” Mr. Good Enough is not a creature of the real world, as Gottlieb’s trying to persuade us young women; he is a construction of her own neurotic mind. And although she says she’s already in therapy, the supposed existence of this man is, I suggest, nothing more than proof that she needs to keep going.

Obama: beats January blues with lilac

Lilac theme dominates at the SOTU speech*

More than a million people tuned in to the Whitehouse website to watch Obama’s State of the Union address tonight. The president was like a benign Santa Claus, doling out tax cuts to the middle class, and scolding naughty bankers (that’ll be coal for you guys!).

Although I’m a true fan of Obama, I could see some of the traits that the Republicans have been picking on. He started his speech by referring to history, and took us through occasions in the past when America has endured trouble. It really was a little like listening to a professor in college. (One rightwing pundit, S. E. Cupp, today criticized him as a “Harvard-educated, memoir-penning intellectual and oratorical genius“ who could never be a populist — that may be, but I just don’t see much wrong with having an intelligent world leader).

The text of his speech was already online as he gave it; and I’m sure it will have been analyzed to death by morning (I’ve found this site an excellent source of analysis). But a couple of things stood out.

“I’ve been told that addressing our largest challenges is too ambitious,” he said. “I have one simple question: How long should we wait? How long should we put our future on hold? Washington has been asking us to wait for decades.”

In his 1963 Letter from Birmingham Jail Martin Luther King dealt with the issue of waiting:

“Frankly, I have yet to engage in a direct-action campaign that was ‘well timed’ in the view of those who have not suffered unduly from the disease of segregation. For years now I have heard the word ‘Wait!’ It rings in the ear of every Negro with piercing familiarity. This ‘Wait’ has almost always meant ‘Never.’ We must come to see, with one of our distinguished jurists, that ‘justice too long delayed is justice denied.’”

Obama’s speech, of course, had lots of other rhetorical flourishes. The familiar term “hope” popped up numerous times, as well as, just once, the now-Bush-tainted word, “freedom.” And there was a poignant moment when Obama said of the famous Change: “I never suggested that change would be easy, or that I can do it alone.” He responded to attacks (on healthcare: “I take my share of the blame for not explaining it more clearly to the American people”), and admitted it’s been a difficult year.

Nancy Pelosi, sitting behind Obama alongside Joe Biden, was constantly on camera, her glossy mauve lipstick matching both her own lilac suit, and Biden’s stripy purple tie. In the audience, Michelle Obama wore a long plum skirt and plum-coloured top, reflecting the Pelosi-Biden purple pairing. Isn’t it odd to imagine them co-ordinating their outfits? [Update, Jan. 28: My friend C. reminds me that purple = red + blue which (kind of) = bipartisanship. That would be ingenious].

The speech was 71 minutes long, and the first 30 minutes, at least, went by in the blink of an eye. Forget about rhetoric and academicism. As he warmed to his subject, which he perceptibly did about 15 minutes in, Obama was an engaging, personable performer. And there was no talk of anger, as my friend S. E. Cupp had foretold (“Expect the President to announce he (suddenly) hears you. Drink every time he says the word ‘anger’”).

The conservatives can go crazy about it, and who knows what liberals will say, but to me the speech hit its mark.

It was only on re-reading Cupp’s piece that I realized the SOTU is a party event, complete with drinking games. Another American custom I found out about, too late! I watched it on my laptop, alone, at home.

*The pic comes from an LA Times politics blog.

Brooklyn pays tribute to MLK

Dr. Martin Luther King jr.

NEW YORK* — It’s astonishing to think that Martin Luther King was just 39 years old when he died. Had he not been shot by James Earl Ray in Memphis, Tennessee, in 1968, he would be 81 this year.

Today is Martin Luther King day in the US, the only American public holiday dedicated to an individual. It falls on the Monday closest to January 15, MLK’s birthday. It’s designated as a “day of service,” the idea being that people use the holiday to volunteer to do good work of some kind. To mark it, I went with friend L. to a tribute to this brave man at the Brooklyn Academy of Music.

L. had warned me to arrive early. In previous years, after the event featured in the media, it was impossible to get in. So I turned up at 9.45am, a good 45 minutes before it began, and joined the line outside. It was fascinating to see who was there — a small number of white people (why so few?) but mostly elegant African Americans in their Sunday best.

We were bowled over by the brilliance of the gospel singers from the New Life Tabernacle Mass Choir. The pastor himself was musically gifted, and he led the choir with a smooth warm voice. The singers swayed and clapped and sang their hearts out, while several in the audience stood up and whooped and sang along, including one adorable little boy in the seats in front of us. For some songs, a woman led the choir, wearing a short black dress, high heels (of course) and a delicate long coat that looked like a dressing gown. She was joyously over the top, urging the choir to sing out and at one point lying on the stage in a fetching pose.

One of the preachers summed up the mood perfectly. In his church, he said (in the underprivileged area of Bedstuy in Brooklyn), the congregation tell him they are “too blessed to be stressed.”

Actor Danny Glover was the keynote speaker, and he described America as living in the wake, not of MLK’s death, but of his absence. Glover wondered what questions MLK would ask if he were alive today. Wouldn’t he ask why Haiti had been treated so badly by history? Glover, who is 63, broke down, his voice cracking.

Brooklyn has the largest population of Haitians in the world outside that country. There must be many who are suffering here.

The district attorney, Charles Hynes, said that at any point in time, 25% of young African Americans are in prison or on probation or parole. This statistic was so shocking I wondered if I’d misheard it, but L. said that was right.

One of the last speakers was Dr. William Pollard, president of  Medgar Evers College, a historically black school. He too spoke of Haiti. A student from the college recently visited Haiti with his mother for a holiday and is still there now, trying to return. Pollard said the student had told him, over email, that US embassy officials had arranged a line at the airport. It was for journalists and caucasian Americans only.

At the tribute’s end, the choir-master preacher returned to the stage and said, “Let’s have some more church!” And the singing began again.

*I got back to NYC last week.