Tad Friend

5601. Cheerful Money Me, My Family, and the Last Days of Wasp Splendor, by Tad Friend (read 5 Dec 2018) I had this book and for no good reason decided to read it, and since I usually finish books I start I did finish it. There seems little point to the account which the author, now a writer for the New Yorker, tells of himself, his family, their social status, and their lives which I found of minimal interest. Before the author finally married he did lots of fornicating, which he blandly tells of, to my boredom. He spends years seeing a psychologist, for no reason which made sense to me. He writes clearly but I could find no reason to hail his life and existence.… (more)

I picked up this book because 1) I like Tad Friend's writing in The New Yorker, 2) I am a WASP, 3) I attended Swarthmore College, where Friend's father was President from 1973 - 1982, and, 4) said father gave me a one hour oral exam in American History as part of Swarthmore's Honors program (before he was President). I passed.

Friend's examination of his WASP family and friends produces a number of witty vignettes. Here are some of the best.

"Wasps love mud because it - along with beach sand in the sheets - is their only sanctioned form of filth. You are allowed and even encouraged to get dirty on a birding ramble or in a game of touch football. Such stains are dueling scars, noble marks of privilege and leisure. It's discretionary mud, clean mud."

* * *
"Grievances in my family are like underground coal fires: hard to detect and nearly impossible to extinguish."

* * *
"Wasp tableware is anything that abhors the dishwasher: gold-rimmed chargers, etched-crystal wineglasses, pedestaled fruit plates, egg spoons of translucent horn. My parents' inherited silver alone included mint-julep spoons, bouillon spoons, demitasse spoons, a stuffing spoon, a berry spoon, a pea spoon, sugar tongs, a butter pick, a pickle fork, a lettuce fork, a cocoa pot, salt tubs, and an egg warmer."

* * *
"[B]oozing was permitted, even encouraged, in our world, as long as it conformed to protocols designed to avert that word 'alcoholic.' There are, after all, only a few circumstances in which Wasps may properly drop their guard: charades or costume parties; roughhousing with dogs, who enact their owner's feelings by proxy; and cocktail hour, the solvent of all care."

* * *
"An older Wasp friend remarks, 'The new rich behave as if they don't have to deserve spending their money. Whereas when I took my family to Nevis recently, I had to tell myself, 'I'm going to die soon.' The prospect of a swift and retributive death makes giving yourself pleasure just tolerable. Otherwise it's too close to masturbation.' "

* * *
"If Catholic guilt is 'I've been bad' and Jewish guilt is 'You've been bad,' then Wasp guilt is 'You probably think I've been bad.' Wasp guilt derives from knowing your ancestors would say you'd let down the side."

The book presents these trenchant observations as it meanders through Friend's life, his loves, his endless analysis and, mostly, his family and relations (both close and distant). The Family Tree at the start of the book provides only minimal help in sorting through nicknames, friends, and relations who did not make "the tree." But Friend's writing is so good that you don't really have to know who he is writing about to enjoy what he is saying.… (more)