u/Historical-Most4409

Here is my take on Sally after her mother's death in the spring of 1971 and her HS graduation in June 1972:

Part I:

Sally Draper has her feminist awakening at Smith College through reading Betty Friedan, engaging in political activism and joining consciousness raising groups. She agitates for the creation of a women’s studies program.  She celebrates Smith getting the nation’s first female college president. Even as Sally gets involved in activism, she is also a strong student who graduates *cum laude*, majoring in Psychology and minoring in English. Sally builds her writing skills through work for the school newspaper and literary magazines.  She wins a prize for a poem she wrote about trying to understand her mother.

She moves to the Village after graduating in 1976 and spends a few years writing free-lance for various women’s magazines, including *Ms., Cosmopolitan, Playgirl*, and *Glamour*. Later, she is especially proud of covering the 1977 Women’s National Convention for *McCall’s*. During these days, she sleeps around quite a bit (including some minor celebrities), drinks heavily, and does cocaine. Don and Henry are both happy to fund her lifestyle and don't ask too many questions.

Grateful for the insights therapy has given her, she goes back to school in 1979 to get a master's degree in psychiatry. While studying at Penn, she meets Eric Grassi, who is getting an MBA. They marry and move to NYC, where he prospers in the Wall Street of the 1980s and she develops a practice attending to the neuroses of the Upper East Side. She gains a reputation for attending to the rich offspring of narcissistic parents. She has a couple of kids, who eventually go off to boarding school and are not especially close to her. She no longer does cocaine but still drinks a lot. Despite the usual Wall Street egomania, Eric is an attentive and loving husband, so Sally inevitably has several affairs, including one with a moderately famous novelist who includes a character modeled on her in his next book. Already ambitious for the spotlight, she networks hard in liberal politics (she sees Stan and Peggy occasionally) and the usual charities. In 1991, she pulls some strings (the writer is a Smith alum) to be quoted in a *New York Times Magazine* article on dealing with difficult parents.

Here is my take on Sally after her mother's death in the spring of 1971 and her HS graduation in June 1972:

Part I:

Sally Draper has her feminist awakening at Smith College through reading Betty Friedan, engaging in political activism and joining consciousness raising groups. She agitates for the creation of a women’s studies program.  She celebrates Smith getting the nation’s first female college president. Even as Sally gets involved in activism, she is also a strong student who graduates cum laude, majoring in Psychology and minoring in English. Sally builds her writing skills through work for the school newspaper and literary magazines.  She wins a prize for a poem she wrote about trying to understand her mother.

She moves to the Village after graduating in 1976 and spends a few years writing free-lance for various women’s magazines, including Ms., Cosmopolitan, Playgirl, and Glamour. Later, she is especially proud of covering the 1977 Women’s National Convention for McCall’s. During these days, she sleeps around quite a bit (including some minor celebrities), drinks heavily, and does cocaine. Don and Henry are both happy to fund her lifestyle and don't ask too many questions.

Grateful for the insights therapy has given her, she goes back to school in 1979 to get a master's degree in psychiatry. While studying at Penn, she meets Eric Grassi, who is getting an MBA. They marry and move to NYC, where he prospers in the Wall Street of the 1980s and she develops a practice attending to the neuroses of the Upper East Side. She gains a reputation for attending to the rich offspring of narcissistic parents. She has a couple of kids, who eventually go off to boarding school and are not especially close to her. She no longer does cocaine but still drinks a lot. Despite the usual Wall Street egomania, Eric is an attentive and loving husband, so Sally inevitably has several affairs, including one with a moderately famous novelist who includes a character modeled on her in his next book. Already ambitious for the spotlight, she networks hard in liberal politics (she sees Stan and Peggy occasionally) and the usual charities. In 1991, she pulls some strings (the writer is a Smith alum) to be quoted in a New York Times Magazine article on dealing with difficult parents.