Joy Zelig

Yes, No, Maybe Joy Zelig

Arguably, at the time of her father's death, the point at which she was married, she'd felt entitled to just-about-nothing. Her mother had told her she was to be married. To whom. Under what "terms."And so she was. Her mother had "unwound" as well, had spooled out and revealed to her, a whole skein of relationships-and hierarchies-calmly and openly: her own relationship, now terminated, with the man who was to be her daughter's husband; the requirement of submission; the manner in which her mother-she had lightly referred to it as a kind of balance-had, in-every-way-imaginable, dominated her father; it had sounded like she was going to miss that more than anything. All of this had been-well, what to call it?-seemingly both functional and, certainly, discrete: invisible, really, until purposefully revealed. That had been impressive: The Secret Life of Her Family. She didn't complain; she didn't argue; she didn't negotiate-merely observing the facts of what was going on around her, what was happening to her, and. . . complying.