Episode Report Card Couch Baron: A | 5 USERS: A YOU GRADE IT If You Love Someone, Shoot Them With A BB
By Couch Baron | Season 1 | Episode 9 | Aired on 2007.09.13
She mentions that Don observed that she didn't want to give the coat back. "It's always the hardest part." Hmm. She goes on that Don asked her out and wasn't shy, which she liked. However, she said no (she doesn't explain, but I'm thinking this was something her mother trained her to do), and then three weeks later, the coat arrived at her apartment. I guess being coy really can have its benefits. Betty says she wonders what kind of "Indian trading" Don had to do to get it. I wish Betty did know, because I'd love to hear the details of how Don bartered his way up to a fur coat while starting with nothing but a couple pens with the fur company's name on them. Betty says she had a few more jobs before she got engaged, but then she got pregnant. No mention of whether that happened before or after the actual wedding, not that it really matters. Unless, of course, Betty is lying and she actually got pregnant before the engagement, but let's stick with the idea that she was a Good Girl who would never Do That for now. She says they moved to Ossining because raising kids in the city is a nightmare, an opinion with which my mother would hopefully disagree, and at that point, she suddenly felt old. Dr. Wayne asks her to tell her more about that, which I think is the first instance of him addressing her in these sessions that we've seen. Betty brings it back to her mother, who she says was very preoccupied about looks and weight, and all I can say is it's a good thing for all concerned that she didn't give birth to Peggy. Betty confesses that she's always eaten a lot, and her mother warned her that she would get "stout." However, her mother also hated her being a model, even going so far as to call her a "prostitute," which I suppose is consistent with the idea that her mother valued beauty only to the extent that it could be used to catch men. Dr. Wayne theorizes (well, it seems pretty clearly fact, really) that Betty is angry with her mother, causing Betty to sit up, look at him, and snap, "What? Are you going to talk now?" Not if he knows what's good for him, given the CRAZY that just appeared in your eyes. Dr. Wayne, however, evenly repeats his assessment and points out that she's sitting up, which is against the rules of Freudian psychoanalysis, I believe. Betty complains that he doesn't listen and then provokes her out of nowhere, but when Dr. Wayne asks her to elaborate, she flops back down, lights a cigarette, and says she misses her mother. "She wanted me to be beautiful so I could find a man. There's nothing wrong with that." Just when you want to shake her, though, she has a small moment of revelation, saying that she doesn't know what happens after that goal is fulfilled: "Just sit and smoke and let it go 'til you're in a box?" So she realizes that she's unfulfilled, that marriage and family aren't the be-all and end-all she thought, and perhaps the rekindled interest in modeling is evidence of that. Now we're getting somewhere! So when do we start talking about Betty's dad? Betty adds that she doesn't care why Hobart gave her his card, which unfortunately allows her mom to shout "See? See? Prostitute!" from beyond the grave.