It wasn’t much easier for young women in an age when they’re all so mindful of being trim that they practically live in exercise clothes, which leave little to the imagination. In my day one boarded an airplane in a suit, gloves, and a hat. However, last time I went to the airport, I mistook it for a fitness center. All the rules of appropriateness.

Maternal figures don’t just comfort and nurture; they also set limits. In.

Great style, of course, has less to do with physical beauty than with high intellect. Joan Rivers, who for many years has come to the Solutions department, reinvents herself season to season, which only someone with great intellect can do. She is the definition of multifaceted, moving from QVC to a nightclub in Minneapolis to a program with her daughter at the 92nd Street Y, with the style of her clothes.

So that’s how you do it, I thought while exiting my little office. You get on with life by facing it.