Reviewed by Alicia Bennett

     The first day I did not think it was funny. I didn't think
it was funny the third day either, but I managed to make a little
joke about it. "The most unfair thing about the whole business,"
I said, "is that I can't even date." Well, you had to be there,
as they say, because when I put it down on paper it doesn't
sound funny. But what made it funny (trust me) is the word
"date," which when you say it out loud at the end of a sentence
has a wonderful teenage quality, and since I am not a teenager
(okay, I'm thirty-eight), and since the reason I was hardly
in a position to date on first learning that my second husband
had taken a lover was that I was seven months pregnant, I got
a laugh on it, though for all I know my group was only laughing
because they were trying to cheer me up.'

     '"Stay here," he said.
     "No," I said.
     "Where are you going?"
     "To my father's for the night. I've missed the last plane."
     "Rachel," said Richard, "it had nothing to do with how
much you cooked for him. It had nothing to do with how much
you wanted to be a couple. It had nothing to do with you."
     "It must have had something to do with me," I said.
     "Why?" said Richard.
     "Because if it didn't, there's nothing I can do about it."
     "That's my point," said Richard.
     "I know that's your point," I said, "but I can't accept
it."
     "Well, if you ever do," said Richard, "you ought to do
what I did. I feel much, much better."
     "Are you suggesting I ask someone I'm not in love with
to marry me and then jump into the seal pond?" I said.
     "I'm suggesting that you make a wild and permanent gesture
of size," said Richard, "and mine was to ask you to marry me
and jump into the seal pond. Yours can be anything you want."
     "The only wild and permanent gesture of size that has ever
crossed my mind," I said, "is to have my hair cut."
     "You'll think of something," said Richard. "And when you
do, I'll be here." Then he smiled and fell asleep.