Hart to Hart Talk

Your Dec. 22 article on Lee Hart convinced me that Gary Hart did the right thing to re-enter the public limelight. It’s an opportunity to open up some discussion on contemporary marriage relationships.

In this celebrity family, marital indiscretion, a private cancer in so many marriages today, is a public fact. Lee Hart was placed in the typical aggrieved person’s dilemma of either deciding to be tough and demanding a divorce or running the danger of being called a wimp. She’s done neither.

At a time in America when man/woman relationships are characterized more as warlike than as caring, that’s refreshing, even instructional.

Educated, attractive, competent enough to carry on by herself, she obviously still values her marriage and family life and is willing to make that statement in public. Instead of picking legal weapons or hiding, it seems that she, and her family, have chosen to grow, as if they’ve decided there can be life after humiliation--and sometimes a more honest one.

Quite frankly, I don’t see either of the Harts as heroic, saintlike, pathetic or wimpy. I see them as two human beings who, in addition to public ambitions, are struggling daily with the relationship issues and problems--as well as satisfactions--that many couples have.

The Donna-Gary story may have been more sensational; I believe the Lee-Gary story is the far more valuable one.

MARVIN CHERNOFF

Northridge