Summer of '69(14)

At the end of September, Angus traveled to Houston, then to Cape Kennedy. Blair stayed home and kept house. She bought Mastering the Art of French Cooking and decided that she would become a gourmet cook and host fashionable salons twice a month, evenings of cocktails and delectable bites where the conversation would focus on literature, art, music, history, and travel. Blair clung tight to the vision of these salons for a few feverish days, imagining that they would be in the same vein as gatherings hosted by the Duke and Duchess of Windsor. But then Blair tried and failed to make an edible poulet au porto three times, and she realized that Angus would never be able to commit to two nights home per month, and they didn’t have any friends anyway.

The middle of October brought the annual faculty potluck, the very same one Angus had famously skipped the year before. This time it was to be held at the home of Dr. Leonard Cushion, professor emeritus of microbiology; he lived on Brattle Street, a few doors down from Julia Child herself. Blair was excited for the potluck—finally, a chance to get out of the house and socialize. She slaved over a potato galette made with clarified butter, thyme, and rosemary that, when cut into slender wedges, would be a sophisticated shared dish. She was eager to meet Angus’s colleagues and enjoy some adult interaction. Blair wanted to appear serious and intellectual and so she chose to wear black bell-bottoms with a black turtleneck. She pulled her normally bouncy blond hair into a sleek ponytail and secured it with a black, orange, and pink Pucci scarf that had been a gift from her friend Sallie. Blair considered wearing silver hoop earrings but feared they would make her seem frivolous. She decided the same about makeup; she applied only eyebrow pencil and clear lip gloss.

When she came downstairs, Angus said, “That’s what you’re wearing?”

Blair picked up the galette with two quilted oven mitts and strode ahead to the car. Angus knew a lot about astrophysics and a little bit about Edith Wharton, but he knew nothing of women’s fashion.

Or did he?

Much to Blair’s dismay, the other wives at the potluck were wearing sheath dresses or dirndl skirts in fall colors—goldenrod, flame orange, burgundy. They had all had their hair set and were in full makeup, complete with false eyelashes and bright lipstick. Blair was greeted by Mrs. Nancy Cushion, who was a good thirty years younger than the esteemed Professor Cushion. Blair handed Nancy the galette, and the other wives—Judy, Carol, Marion, Joanne, Joanne, and Joanne—gave it sideways glances as they arranged trays of hors d’oeuvres, most of which appeared to be composed of three ingredients: cream cheese, olives, and toothpicks.

By the time Blair finished introducing herself, Angus had disappeared.

“Where did my husband go?” Blair asked Nancy Cushion.

“Men in the den,” Nancy said, raising her pencil-line eyebrows. “They drink bourbon, smoke cigars, and talk science.”

Blair was offered a glass of Chablis, which she gratefully accepted, and then a celery stick stuffed with salmon cream cheese and topped with paper-thin slices of olive, which she originally declined but then changed her mind and accepted.

She turned to the person next to her, a woman who wore turquoise eye shadow that exactly matched her silk bolero jacket. “Have you read anything interesting lately?” Blair asked. She hoped that this woman—Blair thought she was one of the Joannes—wouldn’t mention Cancer Ward by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn because Blair had twice tried to read it but found it too bleak.

Maybe-Joanne said, “Oh, please, the only thing I’ve read in the past twelve months is Pat the Bunny.”



The very next day, Blair applied to the graduate English program at Harvard. She didn’t say a word to Angus, telling herself it was a lark; she merely wanted to see if she could get in. She received a letter three weeks later—she had been accepted. Classes started in January.

When Angus returned home that night—at quarter to eleven—Blair was awake, waiting for him with a couple of glasses of good scotch that she’d bought to celebrate and the acceptance letter. Angus had been displeased to find Blair still up.

“Whatever it is will have to wait until morning,” Angus said. “I feel an episode coming on.”

“Just read this quickly, please,” Blair said, and she thrust the letter into his hands.

Angus read the letter; there was no change in his expression. “This is lovely news,” he said when he finished it, and Blair clasped her hands to her heart. “But you’re not going to go.”

“What?” Blair said. “But it’s Harvard. I got into Harvard, Angus.”

“Didn’t you tell me your grandfather went to Harvard?” Angus said. “That probably helped.”

It was all Blair could do not to slap him. “I didn’t mention my grandfather,” she said in a tight voice. But the arrow had hit its mark: Angus didn’t believe Blair could be admitted to Harvard on her own merits. This pointed to a deeper, more disturbing truth: Angus didn’t think Blair was as smart as Blair thought Angus was.

“We agreed you wouldn’t work,” Angus said.

“It’s not work,” Blair said. “It’s school. Surely you, of all people—”

“Blair,” he said. “We’ve been over this. Now, good night.”



Blair kept the acceptance letter in her lingerie drawer, where she saw it every day. She decided she would revisit the topic with Angus in a few weeks, during the morning hours, on a weekend perhaps, when it was less pressing for Angus to get to the university early. She would make sure he was feeling okay. She would cook corned beef hash with poached eggs, his favorite, and inform him that she was enrolling at Harvard despite his objections. After all, it was 1968; he couldn’t tell her what to do.