The Sexes: The New Housewife Blues

(10 of 10)
"To a greater extent than seems true elsewhere in the world, we Americans seem to cherish our right to the unimpeded pursuit of happiness no matter how much sorrow that pursuit may engender."

Roman Catholic Philosopher-Writer Michael Novak is less cool in his assessments. "Our highest moral principle is flexibility," he writes; our view, that "life is solitary and brief, and that its aim is self-fulfillment. In such a vision of the self, marriage is merely an alliance ... They say of marriage that it is deadening, when what they mean is that it drives us beyond adolescent fantasies and romantic dreams ... Choosing to have a family used to be uninteresting. It is, today, an act of intelligence and courage."

This is all somewhat more complicated, to be sure, than anything contained in the wit and wisdom of Marabel Morgan, but Marabel's subsequent evolution, too, is part of the story. "I haven't had a bubble bath in years," she admits. "The costumes—well, we have had an awful lot of company recently, so I've fallen down on that." In other words, the advocate of domesticity has acquired what she probably was destined to have from the beginning, namely a career. And she enjoys that: "I should be a philosopher and walk across the country interviewing people. If I weren't married, I'd take the world by storm. I would just take it by storm."

As long as she remains married, however, Marabel continues to interpret submissiveness in her own irrepressible way. One of her pieces of advice to the Total Woman is to wave goodbye to the husband when he leaves for work. A neighbor saw Marabel doing that herself one morning not long ago. Only she didn't just wave. She suddenly started doing the cancan.