Slate's Bizbox
the breakfast table: An e-mail conversation about the news of the day.

Alfred Gingold and Helen Rogan

the breakfast table
entries
12345678910111213141516
from: Helen Rogan

"What would Téa Leoni do?"

Posted Monday, Aug. 27, 2001, at 5:05 PM ET

Alfie,

You're right. It was good to read People today. You know what a huge thrill it used to be for me, but recently I've found it hard to summon up my former enthusiasm. I guess being middle-aged means you're not up for reading about Téa Leoni's life or even for knowing who she is. The Condit interview is really chilling, though, and for me, it's the wife. The reporter describes her as "frail and uneasy," and you'd have to say she looks it. When these wives get trotted out to prop up their cocky, perfidious husbands, they have to do the thing with the classic pearls and the subdued outfit and stand there smiling in what they hope is a classy, dignified way, and how do they come across? Pathetic. Humiliated. There have been so many of those wives doing that grotesque routine over the years, but the one that stays in my mind is Mary Archer, wife of English millionaire novelist and Tory politician Jeffrey Archer (Lord Archer to his nearest and dearest). Of course, English-politico sex scandals have a gaminess that sets them apart. Likely as not, the high-ranking Tory (always a Tory) is discovered swinging from the chandelier in a girls' lacrosse uniform, but poor Mary's situation is extra-remarkable, in two respects. One, she's brilliant (one of the UK's top solar experts, says the BBC), and secondly, she's loyal beyond belief, sticking with Lord A. through 35 years of embarrassment. Infidelity with prostitutes, bankruptcy, perjury, professional disgrace--he's really put her through it, and finally a month ago, Lord A. was given a jail sentence of four years. What did the divine Mary say about his behavior? "I think we have explored the further reaches of 'for better or worse' far more than some other couples." Will she stay with him? "I do it because I want to," she said. Mrs. Condit is clearly a different breed, a more traditional wife. But it takes a perverse kind of bravery and persistence to spend more than 30 years looking away, raising the children, just getting on with it--and you have to think (if you're me), what a sick and terrible waste of time. What would Téa Leoni do, I ask myself?

the breakfast table
entries
12345678910111213141516
from: Helen Rogan

"What would Téa Leoni do?"

Posted Monday, Aug. 27, 2001, at 5:05 PM ET
Print This ArticlePRINTDiscuss this in The FrayDISCUSSEmail to a FriendE-MAIL
Share on FacebookPost to MySpace!Share with MixxDigg ThisShare with RedditShare with del.icio.usShare with FurlShare with Ma.gnolia.comShare with SphereShare with Stumble Upon
Alfred Gingold has written eight books (including three with Helen Rogan) and for numerous magazines and Web sites. Helen Rogan, his wife, is the executive editor of My Generation, the AARP's magazine for baby boomers, and has written books and magazine articles.
Join the Fray: our reader discussion forum
What did you think of this article?
POST A MESSAGE | READ MESSAGES

Reader Comments From The Fray:



[Notes from the Fray Editor: Reparations and museums were the hot topics here. There was news from Tony Adragna that there is an African-American museum in DC. Elusive Fray poster Amyntas started a splendid discussion on reparations and taxcuts here, featuring posts titled "A nonsensical argument" and "Typical disingenuous twaddle." A high moral tone, and criticism of young women, were the common themes in two posts: a most unusual view on the Chandra Levy affair, here, and one on Tea Leoni here.]


The ambiguity of the reparations debate is what I like most about that entire issue. Whether reparations ever get paid or not (I suspect that they won't), to the extent that national attention gets focused on this issue, we'll be talking about basic moral issues.

Any serious discussion of this issue will involve questions of duty and obligation, culpability, history, values, rights and wrongs. In short, it will be (finally!) a public debate worthy of a democratic nation. Whatever conclusions we reach, either individually or as a nation, it seems likely that we will be better for having thought about these matters in depth

--Thrasymachus

(To reply, click here.)


 The CD-ROM thing is scary. How's Bloomberg going to top it? Will he try to make his hologram appear in all our living rooms?

--Claude Scales

(To reply, click here.)

 (8/28)

Didn't it ever bother anybody else that the Weathermen took their name from a line in "Subterranean Homesick Blues" that implied that a weatherman is superfluous under the circumstances? Is this part and parcel of the Marxist-v.-Leninist- historical-determinist conundrum? (i.e., that if historical/economic forces are pushing toward an inevitable result, why do they need me to help them along? As it is sometimes put, if Marx didn't exist, it would be unnecessary to invent him.) That felt good--somebody call me a jackal, it really brings me back...

--Ex-Fed

(To reply, click here.)


 I happened to walk by the site of the Village explosion the morning of the event. The exposed apartments, with their wall clocks and tables precariously clinging to the ordinary around the gaping proof of anti-civic rage; the apartments seemed like a stage set for some kind of apocalyptic Beckett drama. The scene was mute, webbed with the yellow crime scene tapes of the municipal police. A mix of fear and curiosity animated the passers-by. I stood and stared, hearing the news in bits and pieces. Suddenly I noticed a sign, hand lettered, pinned to the police sawhorse. I looked closer and saw a few others, same hand, same posting method. In repeated, and therefore intentional orthography, the phrase "nothning is free" was scrawled in black marker on typing paper.

The phrase burned itself into my subconscious. I have never seen it since, nor heard it mentioned in the context of the Weathermen or other underground groups.

Nothning is free. Even if it has escaped justice. Especially if it has escaped justice.

--Zeitguy

(To reply, click here.)

 (8/31)





Washington Post