though, was none of these. When her “bald and malcontent boyfriend” of twelve years broke up with her, her life finally took a turn for the better. While living with Kenny, she was striving to become a novelist. She had taken all the normal steps in the process of writing but those steps were the exact things that were stopping her. She joined a writing group to get constructive criticism and while the group was supportive of her writing, they always told her it lacked something. What it usually lacked was something that terrified her, sex. I wrote “pretty parlor skits about manners and used actions which suggested rather delineated sexual activities” (64). The reason she was unable to do that was because sex was what would eventually lock her into a lifelong relationship with Kenny. He had told her that the only way he would ever marry her was if she conceived his child or he felt like it. Sex was the only way to produce his child and since she always knew deep down that their relationship was out of comfort rather than love, a child would trap them both. This fear of entrapment is seen later in the book when Harriet is worried about cooking. “I don’t mind cooking, but what if I want to sleep late or go out for dinner?” (75). Another reason she cannot write about sex is that she is not comfortable with herself. Harriet comes off immediately as a very self-conscious person. At the first glance from Isabel, her gray hair goes from an extension of “character and substance” (13) to just gray hair. She feels frumpy in her mail order clothing and can only think about what she should be wearing to make Isabel happy with her. Her whole life has revolved around making other people happy. She became her mother’s confidant when her parents got a divorce to ensure her mother’s love. She changed her writing in order to make her writing group happy with her and she ...
