Welcome to the board, Daisy! Don't know why you had trouble. I think your observations are dead on!

I didn't get a metaphor with the salt, but maybe I'm not that hip. I do somewhat agree with you about Don and Bobbie's sexual relationship. I think it makes Don feel less guilty and that maybe its not really happening if she doesn't discover who he is, his idiosyncrasies.
You can tell from some of the episodes that he's really starting to look at the man he's become and what its doing to his family. He wants to stop but at this point he doesn't know how. Maybe this is him not escaping his past. His mother was a prostitute and all he wanted to do was leave his home life behind. Now he has the so called perfect family and what is he doing but stepping out on his relationships.

I would also like to add that I think that January Jones acting is superb! She is pulling off that character of being reserved, polite, and unobtrusive perfectly! You have to mentally put yourself there in 60's households. How would a typical housewife act, and especially with a husband like Don? To me, she embodies this iconic 60's housewife to the hilt.

Thanks for the warm welcome. I also think January Jones plays the perfect 60s housewife. She looks so much like Grace Kelly with a little Robin Wright Penn thrown in.

Welcome to the board Daisy..., With your first post you are an official Maddict!...

Your salt analogy was spot on.
In the episode between Don and Betty, what Betty says is, "I wish you would just tell me what to do." She could tell he was not fully present and didn't know what to do about it.

I continue to think Betty actually knows nothing about Don's real sexuality. She told her psychiatrist sometimes she knows he is doing things (in bed) that someone else likes. He has continued to distance himself from her because he views her as the perfect madonna/mother and can't incorporate placing her in a role that is also raw, open and responsive to his sexual nature. So, he hides his real sexual nature from his wife and continues to seek extracurricular activities with women who are raw, wild and sexually responsive to him.

I agree, January Jones is superb in this role. Watch for the proof in next years Emmy nominations!

Good post!

Thanks for the warm welcome everyone. I remember thinking the same thing when Betty says "I wish you would tell me what to do." He comparmentalizes his life so much that he can't tell Betty what to do because, like you said, then she wouldn't be the Madonna wife anymore. It's so sad. He has a wife who is gorgeous and wants to please him, but he can't see her that way. He only sees her as this pretty thing that can't be tainted.

....howdy, Daisy - sounds like you are off to a good start. pretty soon your brains will be as twisted up as all of ours!!

.....a lot of you have been married, right? would you say that the circumstances, or distance, between the Drapers is more, or less, normal as far as most marriages?

things between Don and Betty Draper seem lukewarm, at best, most of the time. the scene in the Coupe de Ville was as "wild" as i've seen yet, I think....

I guess I just wonder, because i've sometimes heard, don't they all get cooler in the end, anyway?

(that's not to say that one or both the Drapers doesn't need therapy!)

She is almost always passive about those things. The only time that Betty's really been the aggressor in their sexual relationship (besides that time in the Coupe) was after Betty got the phone call that she was going to the get the modeling job in "Shoot". She was so happy and confident in herself that she kisses him in their living room and tells him they should go upstairs to their bedroom. However, he quickly takes control of the situation and insists that they stay in the living room, and she complies.

They do cuddle a lot, and he's been sweet and tender with her at times, but it's not very sexual. In those moments they're more like companions or like he's being protective in a fatherly way.

Hanna:
Don't forget Valentine's Day night at the Savoy when Betty wore the Merry Widow and black stockings. Forget the bikini poster. That's the poster I want!

And they weren't exactly cuddling on the couch in the living room scene (at least by my definition). A few words from her while she was straddling his lap and kissing him... Who needs to go upstairs?

Yes,Dry Manhattan, as one of the "married-a-long- time" folks I'd say that the Drapers' marriage is definitely on the distant side. I'm not saying my marriage is as "hot" as it was when we were newlyweds--(just had our 32nd anniv. on Aug 21) but it is still really REALLY warm! ha And I assume they've been married between 6 and 10 years since Sally is 7 (?) now.
Marriage does cool somewhat over time but not nearly to the degree theirs seems to be at a relatively early point. I agree they need to see why they are still (Betty anyway)sexually attracted but not so much able to communicate with each other in the "everyday marriage" mode. JMHO as an "old married lady" ha

Oh, the rest of my answer, Dry Manhattan---I think Betty and Don need to go together to a marriage counselor next season and figure out why he needs to go elsewhere for his kicks sexually and why they both don't "talk out" their problems instead of burying them in silence and letting the resulting animosity build and come out in all the destructive ways it does. I'm not sure marriage counseling was all that "sought" until the '70's, though, anybody recall?