That's the way it happens for most of us: The pose, our means of
meeting those needs that are most persistent and real, eventually becomes
pretty much who we are.
The key is always being at least somewhat aware of what we're
after. Bullshitting the world is one thing; doing it to ourselves is
quite another. For it is hardly news that we find ourselves in an age of
unprecedented insecurity--a time when, in epidemic numbers, we base our
aspirations on models imposed from without. Inattentive to who we
fundamentally are, we strive to become who we're supposed to be.
Often we make it, of course, but that kind of success rarely passes
for fulfillment. A sharp observer can spot an extreme case in
seconds--the tone too urgent, the laughter too forced, anxiety always
lurking as a subtext. The French, who certainly know more about false
fronts than anyone, naturally have a term for it: mal a l'aise dans sa
peau--ill at ease in one's skin.
The syndrome cuts across societal lines, across generations. But
there is little question that women have gotten as rotten a deal in this
regard as anyone. Indeed, it is an enduring irony that, for all the
women's movement's remarkable achievements, the failure to realize its
perhaps most ambitious goal has left countless women in a harrowing bind.
For where the initial intention (one embraced by many of us men also) was
to feminize the workplace, in practice it has almost always been women
who have had to change to fit in. Long before the storm over sexual
harassment broke to hammer the point home, there existed the melancholy
reality that, in their crucial self-presentation, many women have felt
obliged to mute crucial aspects of themselves--not just their sexuality,
but their conventional style, their brand of humor, their very emotional
range. And often, they have had to replace them with assumed personae
that are the opposite of natural.
"Right out of law school I joined a big, prestigious firm," notes a
female acquaintance of mine, now the mother of two young children. "And
for ten years I wore a mask that said 'I am serious, don't mess with me.'
"She smiles. "The irony is, I think I became far more effective when I
finally took it off."
Which, in a roundabout way, brings us back to Palm Beach. For the
most tightly wound character in the courtroom day after day seemed not to
be the defendant, but his nemesis across the aisle. In striking contrast
to Smith's chief attorney, Roy Black--all easygoing sincerity; Abe
Lincoln at $400 an hour--Moira Lasch was a Grant Wood portrait in a
dress-for-success suit: brittle and forbiddingly chilly. So much so that
many of us who identified her with the side of the angels soon began to
wonder about how such a demeanor would play with jurors.
This is written before the start of testimony; by reputation, Lasch
is a gifted prosecutor and could yet win. If so (and, given the current
state of the collective attention span, perhaps even if not) such
questions will soon be moot.
But for me, watching up close, one episode early in the jury
selection process will remain fixed in my mind. A 78-year-old prospective
juror named Florence Orbach, as seemingly comfortable in her skin as
anyone any of us will meet, had barely finished entertaining the court
with her outspoken views on the fabled Kennedy libido when Lasch publicly
characterized her as "borderline incompetent."
What set her off? Evidently it was a casual remark--intended as a
piece of grandmotherly advice--that Mrs. Orbach tossed the prosecutor's
way en route from the courtroom: "You should smile. You have a pretty
face."
PHOTO (BLACK & WHITE)
Tags:
abiding respect,
behavior,
brown shoes,
capper,
chief lawyer,
family compound,
image,
jumper cables,
jury selection,
lasch,
perception,
prospective juror,
responsible men,
self-presentation,
smarmy,
station wagon,
will o the wisp,
will rogers,
william kennedy,
william kennedy smith,
William Kennedy Smith trial,
willie horton,
willie smith,
yellows,
yuppie
