The Girls in Their Summer Dresses

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- FRANCES LOOMIS

FRANCES LOOMIS

- Middle-aged woman

- Has her own attractiveness

- Married to Michael Loomis

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- She really loves her husband and likes to spend time with him. She is very involved and eager to please him.

- - “This is a wonderful morning. When I have breakfast with you it makes me feel good all day."

- "You're getting fat,"… "I love it,… an extra five pounds of husband."

- "Let's not see anybody all day," …"Let's just hang around with each other. You and me.”…

- "I want to go out with my husband all day long. I want him to talk only to me and listen only to me."

- She is excited about the idea of spending time with each other only and starts to “arrange a program”

- "I haven't even looked at another man," Frances said, walking straight ahead, "since the second time I went out with you."

- At first, she makes joke about Michael’s girl-watching on the street and laughs freely about it. But when her husband looks at another girl, Frances starts to burst with anger and somehow sarcastic.

- She has noticed his habitual girl-watching before and is emotionally confused but Michael has been doing so before the marriage even started

=> This is clearly a cause for her confusion as Frances did not bring up the issue until now

- "That's the program for the day. Or maybe you'd just rather walk up and down Fifth Avenue."

- "You always look at other women,"

Frances said. "At every damn woman in the city of New York."

- "Everywhere," Frances said. "Every damned place we go. Restaurants, subways, theaters, lectures, concerts."

- "Every woman." Frances took her hand off Michael's arm. "If she's not pretty you turn away fairly quickly. If she's halfway pretty you watch her for about seven steps. . . ."

Sometimes, she’s quite a predictable woman.

- Frances walked faster now, looking straight ahead, her face showing nothing, which was the way she always managed it when she was arguing or feeling bad.

Frances is a stereotypical sensitive woman whose actions are confused by feelings.

- Her husband offers her to have a drink => She refuses it, "I don't want a drink." Later, she is the one who offers to drink.

- When her husband tells her that he is wonderfully happily married and he is the envy of all men between the ages of fifteen and sixty in the state of New York, she tells him to stop kidding and insists him on telling her the ugly truth. However, when he starts to be honest with her and tell her his feeling about other girls, she suspends him in cheating her, starting to cry and then tells him that: "Stop talking about how pretty this woman is, or that one. Nice eyes, nice breasts, a pretty figure, good voice," she mimicked his voice. "Keep it to yourself. I'm not interested."

She is insecure about their relationship

- "You say you love me?"

- "I'm pretty, too," Frances said. "As pretty as any of them."

- "I'm good for you," Frances said, pleading. "I've made a good wife, a good housekeeper, a good friend. I'd do any damn thing for you."

- She’s envy with other beautiful girls and feels terrible about herself

=> Because Frances loves her husband, so she’s afraid that one day he will leave her to move on with other woman. There is an internal conflict between Frances’s unhappiness and her love to her husband. She concerns about their relationship but fails to communicate with her husband so she decides to ignore it and does not have any attempt to resolve their problem by further discussions.

1. Why does Frances insist on knowing the truth from Michael?

- There is a saying of Oscar Wilde: “We women, as some one says, love with our ears, just as you men love with your eyes...” That’s why women wear make up and men lies. A girl sure is bowled over by the guy's words of reassurance that he loves her. Frances has already noticed about her husband habitual girl-watching. Even though at first he denies and says that he is a happily married man, she keeps pushing him because somehow she wants him to say something much more pleasure to her ears than what he has done to her eyes, even if it’s just a lie. Saying that he is happily married is not enough for her not to feel insecure about their relationship, she needs more than that and she hopes that he will say or do something different for her than just being too honest. She’s just a typical woman who wants to be loved.

2. Does Frances love her husband?

- Yes, she does. She likes to spend time with him and does whatever it takes to please him. Her feelings depend so much on his attitude towards her so that when he tells the truth, she hurts. She feels insecure in their relationship. She wants him to talk and listen only to her. If she doesn’t fall in love with Michael, she will not have those feelings.

3. Should Frances be able to handle Michael’s constant “checking out” of other women as long as he doesn’t cheat on her?

- When Frances tells Michael that she will call their friends and they will spend the day in the country rather than alone at a football game