1. A good hair cut solves a lot.
Mary wants to send Tony off into the sunset with Mabel, but she can’t make it too easy for them. So of course she gets the latest hairstyle, shocking her father and grandmother and placing herself in the center of everyone else’s attention.
2. The world doesn’t stop just because you’re upset.
The news finally arrives that Michael Gregson was killed by Nazis. No one but Edith feels like this is news, and she’s insulted when her family doesn’t want to go into mourning with her. They’re getting hair cuts, riding in races, and throwing picnics. And when she ignores the Drewes wishes and tries to visit her daughter, she finds a Mrs. Drewe who is just as unyielding as ever.
3. If you live in a fictional world, you will either avoid conversations normal people have or never have one of them uninterrupted.
Ok, who’s with me here–if you were hiding a diaphragm for your employer while you’re trying to conceive yourself, you’d tell your husband something about it, right? There’s no way you’d leave the prophylactic in a drawer for him to find. Because normal people don’t do that. Only fictional ones.
Fictional people also can’t have these important conversations straight through, either. Someone has to walk in, allowing one character to leave in a huff without anything resolved.
4. Your love life will inevitably inconvenience someone at some point.
Whether it’s Mary, Mabel, Charles, and Tony dancing around each other, Edith’s prolonged grieving process, Violet’s former admirer resurfacing (and not wishing to track down his still-living wife), Rose and Atticus falling for each other when they are from different faiths, Isobel resolving to become Lady Merton. or Robert and Cora having it out over her flirtation with Simon Bricker, someone was bothered by someone else’s pairing. I know there were a few different girls who were disappointed when my husband asked me out. Anyone else think this is true in your case?
5. Always keep (well hidden) proof.
Was anyone else impressed that Edith kept copies of Marigold’s birth certificate? I didn’t see that one coming. I honestly thought that she was just going to kidnap her own child. I was impressed that she had not only kept copies of her daughter’s birth certificate but also hidden them so well that her family never discovered them.
I’m not as enamored of her decision to take her daughter and run away. I realize she’s desperate and sad and grief-stricken. But how is she going to make it as a single parent living in a hotel with a publishing company to run?
So what did you think of this episode? Any story lines you loved this week? Hated? Bored you?
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