A Class Feminists Might Abhor - March 5, 2000

Mon Mar 6 09:09:21 EST 2000

from: Smart Marriages

 March 5, 2000

 A Class Feminists Might Abhor

 Issue in Depth  The New York Times: Your Money 

By ABBY ELLIN

heryl Marks has a good job and close friends. She travels often. She's 
healthy. What's missing? A relationship. And though she never defined 
herself by her marital status, after turning 31 last year, she decided to 
take action. 

So Marks, director of treasury and cash management for the Children's 
Television Workshop, did what so many other New Yorkers do: She signed up 
for a class, in this case one taught by Marilyn Graman, a 
psychotherapist, on how to land a husband. 

While feminists might bridle at the course objective and the curriculum, 
Marks found herself studying alongside Wall Street brokers, advertising 
executives, physicians, computer experts -- women who have a firm handle 
on the career thing but need a little help on the home front. 

"Women in the corporate world confuse softness and tenderness with 
weakness," said Graman, 53, a widow. "My goal is to teach softness as 
power." She half-jokingly refers to her program as the Marilyn Graman 
Finishing School for Feminists. 

Last week, Graman began her latest class, "Marriage Works," a six-month, 
276-hour course intended to lead businesswomen down the aisle. The cost 
is $9,600. 

Part therapy session, part personal pep rally, the course is broken down 
into modules about aspects of the mating game: 40 hours to study why 
participants might have a "relationship block"; 26 hours to talk with a 
"guidess," a paid relationship coach cum cheerleader who has already 
reaped the fruits of a Graman course; and 11 hours to discuss color, 
furniture placement and feng shui, the Asian art of energy flow. 

The course also devotes 9 hours to learning to move gracefully, 8 to 
wardrobe and 3.5 to the art of gracious gift receiving. 

The finale is a field trip to a bridal shop, where women try on dresses 
and visualize their wedding day. "If you see it, you can have it," said 
Graman, who leads similar workshops in Dallas and San Francisco. So far, 
eight women, ages 25 to 65, have signed up for the Manhattan course. 

You can just about guess what the editor of Ms. magazine thinks of all 
this. "I worry when women say women have to be soft again," said Gloria 
Jacobs, the editor. "Women are different from men, but does that mean 
we're all soft and nurturing? That's ridiculous. The goal is to have the 
freedom to be who you are." 

In fact, Jacobs finds the whole concept of Graman's finishing school 
rather annoying. "Everyone wants relationships; that's human nature," she 
said. 'But what I don't get is the idea that you can buy a relationship, 
or that if you spend enough money you'll be able to communicate with 
another human being if you have the right clothes or the right furniture. 

"Why aren't men being encouraged to do this?" Jacobs asked. "Why does 
marriage have to be the end result here?" 

On a snowy afternoon in mid-February, Marks is in her 600-square-foot 
Upper West Side apartment with Graman, Robin Lennon, an interior 
designer, and Debra Cox, an image consultant. Today's lesson: making your 
home more man-friendly. 

"What kind of thoughts do you want him to have when he walks in the 
door?" Graman asked. "This is a Rorschach test. When a man walks into a 
woman's house, he wants to feel that he has a space in her world. That he 
belongs." 

Gazing at her penguin collection, photographs of herself in exotic 
locales, a Nordic Track and the bicycle leaning against her sofa, Marks 
replied, "I want to be comfortable here, and I want a man to be, too. 

"I work a lot, but I don't want to give that impression," she said. "I 
want playfulness in the apartment. I also don't want it to look like a 
college dorm." 

Walking from room to room, Lennon deconstructed the apartment with a firm 
but gentle hand. Too many tchotchkes. Not enough light. Dump the boom 
box. Scatter pillows on the bed. Spritz perfume on the sheets. Get rid of 
clutter; it keeps men at bay. Paint the walls in soft, sexy colors: 
salmon or peach or rose. 

And the bike? "Do you use it?" Lennon asked. 

Not in months, Marks said. 

"If you want someone to think you're athletic, it's good," Lennon said. 
"Otherwise, could we put it in storage?" Marks nodded meekly. 

Next, the wardrobe. Since November, Marks had been out with 23 different 
men whom she met online and through dating services. Mostly, they met 
after work when she was still in professional garb. 

"You need to have clothes that reflect all the sides of you," Cox said as 
she went through Marks's closet, which was filled with corporate suits 
but lacking less formal attire. "You want to be professional, 
approachable, and feminine. You don't want men to think you're a man." 

She held up a dark blue wool skirt and jacket. "This is fine for the work 
world, but in the dating arena you want something a little more 
approachable and feminine," she said. 

"A dark suit says, 'I'm one of the guys,"' Graman added. "A buttoned-up 
jacket screams 'I'm unapproachable."' 

Cox then plucked a silk lavender suit from the closet. Her face 
brightened. 

"What a difference!" she said. "You look sexy and young." 

Marks admired her reflection in the mirror. She clipped on a pair of 
dangly silver earrings she had borrowed from Graman. The women oohed and 
aahed. Marks smiled. Then she scribbled in a little notebook. There was a 
lot to remember. 

If all this all seems a little dated, a little Cosmo, no one is forcing 
women to enroll. According to Marks, her office colleagues constantly ask 
for relationship advice and want her to conduct a seminar based on her 
newfound knowledge. 

Graman said the women in her course must first be happy with themselves; 
she lives by the motto "the rose is itself and the bee comes." She does 
not advise women to change themselves or to deceive their men. 

In the '70s, she said, she was the stereotypical angry feminist. But 
"there was a softness that was missing in me," she said. "I wasn't 
getting everything I wanted that way, and it was time to stop being angry 
at others. 

"Of course, the feminist movement needed to happen. In order to make 
change, you need to go far to the other side. Women had to stop being 
like women in order to be successful, and now we're coming somewhere in 
the center. We're learning how powerful it can be to be soft and tender." 

Some women have worked with her and discovered that they do not want to 
be married. Others have ended bad relationships. And contrary to popular 
perception, she stressed, Manhattan is teeming with men who are eager to 
tie the knot. 

"They're not the enemy," she said. "I see a lot of men in business who 
are longing for a wife, for someone by their side. When the house is 
empty, they feel lonely. That's why I have no doubt that I can help a 
woman find a man, because I know there are men out there that want to 
find her." 

**************************
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