kind

“Never let the truth interfere with a good story.”

The reader comments on this issue are interesting. For people who struggle with obesity, the answers are never as simple as some people would like to believe. Otherwise, fat people would lose weight. No one wants to be unhealthy and few people want to be fat. In the Beach: You say you “can’t even imagine eating like the woman in the story.” That is obvious from your post. You are posting at great length about something that you may not fully understand.

My advice to Hillary Clinton is to work as hard as she can to get a Democrat into the White House. She should be proud of what she has accomplished. But the primaries are over now, and we must focus on the general election in the fall. Also, she should absorb the $11 million she lent to her own campaign and not expect others to repay her campaign debt. Another candidate who did not have the $11 million to lend themselves would have stopped their campaign when they ran out of money.

I will never forget that night. I was on the verge of flunking out of college so I was in summer school. I remember distinctly sitting in the lobby of my dorm, watching it on television, late at night. I don’t remember anyone else being there. I remember thinking that it was normal for people to get shot and killed all the time. Already JFK had been assassinated, then Martin Luther King, and Andy Warhol had also been shot. That summer was to be a turning point in my life. A girl in my dorm had told me that if I took a theatre course in summer school, they would let me wear jeans to class. Otherwise, girls were required to wear skirts. I took that course, and I wore jeans, and I discovered that I loved the theatre, and I became a bona fide liberal, which I am to this day. But I was still too young (only 20) to vote in the election that fall. How was it possible that Richard Nixon actually won the election? What would have happened if Robert Kennedy had not been killed? What was all this dying for if not to make us understand our responsibility to make the world a better place?

MaryPage, you said this perfectly. I do not understand why strong, capable women still obsess over their appearance when we are all smart enough to know that undergoing surgery of any kind is serious business. We need to get our faces away from our own mirrors and look around us to see how we can use our time and talents in a less self-indulgent and ignorant way than having unnecessary surgery.

This is great news for everyone. I am straight, married, and a New Yorker, and I am very proud of our wonderful new Governor. Let’s remember what we used to say in the sixties: MAKE LOVE, NOT WAR.

Mugsy, I agree one hundred percent with your last sentence. I just don’t agree that using the word “Sweetie” is patronizing. I absolutely do believe that using the word “Boy” is patronizing and awful. And that shoulder rub incident was horrifying. The lesson is that we all need to be careful with our language and our body language. But I truly believe the Obama/”Sweetie” thing was blown out of proportion. However, just as what is and what is not sexual harrassment is in the eye of the beholder, I will grudgingly concede that if the use of “Sweetie” offends someone, then it is offensive. I just wanted to make the point that I like that word, I do not find it offensive, and I don’t believe it was his intention to disrespect that reporter, even unconsciously.

I don’t understand why people are getting so upset about Obama’s use of the word “Sweetie.” I am a feminist and I address people as “Sweetie” frequently - both women and men - and I have never noticed that anyone is offended by it. I work in the entertainment business, where many people address each other as “Darling” and no one is offended by that, either. With all respect, I really do believe we have bigger battles to fight, as women and as people.

J B, that reminds me of the time my mother and I were in the car and drove by her University, and she said “That’s where Mama went to college.” I was 8 years old at the time and I said, “And it’s still standing?” To give my mother credit, she thought it was hilarious. I couldn’t understand what was so funny.

During the AIDS crisis, I remember a friend saying on his birthday, “I never worry about getting older. I have a lot of friends who didn’t make it.” And he was about 30 when he said it. And he is dead now too. So I find this talk about aging a little precious. Let’s be grateful that we are alive, and let’s do something with our lives besides worry about how we look. I think we all probably look pretty good.

My mother’s engagement ring, which I wear on my right hand. She died 25 years ago, and every time I look at my own hands now, they remind me of her.

I have always been someone who acted on impulse. I decided where to go to college based not using logic but because of how I felt, fell in love with my husband in college, moved to New York because he wanted to, decided to get married impulsively and also because I knew I loved him, took every job I’ve had without much thought or angst, and I have a wonderful life. A couple of these jobs made me miserable, but now with hindsight I can see that they thoroughly taught me the “money does not buy happiness” lesson, for which I am extremely grateful. And I was able to learn that lesson because I listen to my heart. It’s not that I have not known tragedy or sadness. Scores of our friends died during the AIDS crisis, many of them in agony and enduring great indignity despite all our efforts. Our parents all died during their fifties or sixties. I joke with the twenty-somethings I supervise at work that they agonize more over a minor career decision than I did about getting married.

This morning’s New York Times lead editorial says it all: “The Low Road to Victory.” It goes on to say “Voters are getting tired of it; it is demeaning the political process; and it does not work. It is past time for Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton to acknowledge that the negativity, for which she is mostly responsible, does nothing but harm to her, her opponent, her party and the 2008 election.” I am a lifelong Democrat and I am absolutely disgusted with her. Hillary Clinton is not behaving like a leader. She is behaving like a sleazy politician.

I am absolutely thrilled that I heard about this site at the beginning, so that I can watch and be part of its development! Thanks to all the smart women (and men) who’ve shared their thoughts on so many provocative topics.