The couple must want to do things together. In 1913 Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney explained this essential ingredient in an unmailed letter to her husband Harry:
It seems very obvious that we are drifting further and further apart and that the chances of our coming together are growing remote. I say this for several reasons –- there is no inclination on your part to have explanations which might lead to understanding. Also our mutual indifference to the pursuits and pleasures of the other is leading us constantly to have less even to talk of and forms no bond on which we might try to bridge our difficult moments. Of course for a very long time we have done absolutely nothing together because we wanted to. . . . I am not going to throw the rest of my life away. I am going to face things and understand as much as I can, and then build on a solid foundation for I am tired of the sand that crumbles and will not hold my poor little house.
(Quoted from page 35 of The Whitney Women and the Museum They Made, by Flora Miller Biddle. Arcade Publishing, 1999.)
For a brief biography of Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney, click here. For images of or relating to Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney, click here.
For a brief biography of Flora Miller Biddle, click here. For images of or relating to Flora Miller Biddle, click here.
It seems very obvious that we are drifting further and further apart and that the chances of our coming together are growing remote. I say this for several reasons –- there is no inclination on your part to have explanations which might lead to understanding. Also our mutual indifference to the pursuits and pleasures of the other is leading us constantly to have less even to talk of and forms no bond on which we might try to bridge our difficult moments. Of course for a very long time we have done absolutely nothing together because we wanted to. . . . I am not going to throw the rest of my life away. I am going to face things and understand as much as I can, and then build on a solid foundation for I am tired of the sand that crumbles and will not hold my poor little house.
(Quoted from page 35 of The Whitney Women and the Museum They Made, by Flora Miller Biddle. Arcade Publishing, 1999.)
For a brief biography of Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney, click here. For images of or relating to Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney, click here.
For a brief biography of Flora Miller Biddle, click here. For images of or relating to Flora Miller Biddle, click here.
Comments