I didn’t have to go anywhere today.

Nevertheless, I woke up and quickly fell victim to a case of debilitating stress. It happens, most often when I have a huge list of to-dos, but none that demands immediate attention.  I cannot decide where to start, for everything needs doing at once – and my mind succumbs. One of the side-effects of an over-scheduled life, I guess.

Not proud of it.

Anyway, the hubby sent me back to bed, with a book, and instructions to read.  Anyone who has ever suffered from debilitating stress knows that I didn’t feel like reading, or sleeping, or doing anything.  My Cat, looking at me with utter disdain, eventually shamed me into picking up the book.  So, I read Persuasion cover to cover.

I love Jane Austen. I find myself speaking her prose for days afterward. I am acutely aware of how ridiculous I sound, in 2011, telling my husband that “comprehending the wind to be severe, I find myself disposed to take my exercise indoors” – and then popping in a P90x DVD.

Don’t pity him. Well he knows the danger of sending me to bed with Jane.

As a self-professed feminist, of course I must rationalize my adoration for old English tales where the endgame is the marriage of the heroine, preferably after the enigmatic, wealthy suitor has proposed more than once.

In defense, however, Austen dwells very briefly on actual professions of love, and the ultimate weddings merit hardly a paragraph – so terse, in fact, as to leave a romantic reader with a feeling of being short-shifted.

This is what reconciles me to Jane Austen:

While Austen’s heroines run the gamut of education, experience, “accomplishment”, wit, and intelligence, her ideal is a self-possessed woman blessed with clarity of thought, self-knowledge, and truthfulness.

The above characteristics have the convenient side-effect of attracting affection, but also make one deserving of affection.

I can support that.  Romanticism and feminism need not be mutually exclusive.  I am no historian; based on the complete introductions of her works written by better scholars than me, I understand that the idea of a woman thinking for herself and making her own judgments – logically rather than emotionally, and from a depth of understanding not expected from the sex – was revolutionary enough for the time.

And I’ll admit, I would be ready to greet the inevitable marriages of the heroines with forbearance, even if pages of romantic nonsense were dedicated to each.  Hypocrisy be d—-d.