Abby and Maggie

[Melimelo]

I can't remember the episode where Maggie knows Carter is supposed to propose to Abby..but he actually changes his mind.
Did Maggie say something that made him change his mind?
Did Abby know Carter was going to propose and was she going to say yes?
Why did Carter not propose and how long after did they split up?
I have been having mental blanks about all of this and I am trying to remember if Abby was for or against marriage when she was with Carter.
Also did Abby's brother Eric do something embarrassing at Carters family's house?
I just can't remember the Abby/CArter thing very well probably because I was pregnant and had a baby and missed a lot of those episodes.
I really want Abby and Luka to get married and I am trying to remember if she has indicated in the past as to whether she would re-marry?
Anyone available to answer my questions?
Thanks in advance. mel

[Noora]

wow, lots of carby questions..
Didn't Carter and Maggie talk together in the car? Carter had that 23 hour speech..
And then.. I remember somehow that when Carter came and was gonna propose her, he went to somewhere (shower?) and while he was..there somewhere... Abby saw the ring in Carter's pocket and was schoked or something. And later I think Carter proposed her in the roof.. Abby just said that he was crazy! (well he was!)

Well.. that's how I remember..

[larue]

Carter was taking Maggie to her bus and they were caught in a traffic jam. Maggie's discussion at the time had something to do with him accepting Abby for who she was and not trying to change her. And then Abby followed up with the same sort of sentiments during their dinner alone together in that restaurant....not believeing that you could really change a person. That's when he slipped the ring back into his pocket. Later, he was in the bedroom and she lifted his jacket from the table and the ring box fell out and she saw the ring. A couple of episodes later Carter discovered that she had quit smoking and was seeing her AA sponsor again. They had an argument and he told her that he knew she had seen the ring....and why was she making all of these changes. This was shorlty before all of his angst and leaving for Africa. I think she was as confused as the audience about why he had basically broken up with her. It was a wierd time....and especially for me because I was really wanting her to ba happy with him...never saw the possiblity of Luby II on the horizon. Dang (kicking myself for being so stupid.....)

[Melimelo]

Thanks guys ...I was right ...the writers didn't do a very good job with that storyline...Oh well it got Abby back on the road to Luby in a round about kind of way.
Sam had her time with Luka..then sent him on his way too.
I thought Carter might have looked at Maggie and had a vision of what Abby might be like in the future and backed off a mile hence -no proposal.
I would also hate to think that Abby would have said yes to Carter ,considering we know she has said no to Luka (Different circumstances).
I will keep hoping for a wedding.

[Cornflake Girl]

It started in 9.15 A Boy Falling out of the Sky when Abby found out Eric was alive, Carter said he wanted to marry her one day and Abby basically ignored him and never answered. Here's the recap from TWoP, if your interested in reading what happened; www.televisionwithoutpity.com/articles/content/a3629/index-13.html

Carter rolls his eyes. "Oh, right, your life sucks, now and forever, there's no one you can love..." he mocks her. "You don't want me to love you!" she insists. Carter would prefer to make up his own mind. "What do you want?" she asks. "I want you to stop being afraid. I want you to stop being so careful. I want to marry you!" he shouts. Carter? The dry cleaner called. Your straitjacket is ready. Taken aback, Abby snipes, "Oh, you're proposing?" She's mocking him. "You're crazy," she adds. "Well, then I'll fit right in!" he shouts, exasperated. Then they swap amused glances.

Then in the next episode Abby finds the ring, A Thousand Cranes;

But guess what? He asked me to marry him." Then she leaps out of her seat to grab the phone, as if she hadn't just said anything important. Maggie's jaw drops with joy. Abby actually smiles, but she insists that Carter didn't really mean it. "We were on the roof, and it was freezing, and there was a helicopter flying around and he was kind of...shouting it at me," she says with a private grin. Looks like Carter might've gotten it a bit more right than he thought. The look on her face is one of a woman who's cherishing the weird and wild memory. She tucks her hair behind her ear as she dials. "Every girl's dream," she giggles. Maggie impatiently and happily asks what Abby said. "Nothing," she replies. "He didn't really mean it. It was just...something that happened."

"Abby's good," Carter says. "We're both good. You don't have to worry about that." He grins smugly. He has forgotten the tequila already, I guess. Maggie beams that Abby told her she and Carter might get married. "Is that what she said?" he brightens. "No, she told me you proposed," Maggie giggles. "I know she's work -- it runs in the family -- but she's so worth it." Carter smiles. Then he blushes. Then he goes into this fairly unromantic spiel about how he spends twenty-three hours of the day rehashing all the reasons she blows more goats than a bored farmer, and in the final hour he realizes he has at least spent all day thinking about her, and that apparently eclipses all the bad stuff and the bestiality. "There's something about her," he declares. "Something about her that makes me want to..." here, he laughs, "love her." Yeah, you want to love her, but do you? Can you kiss her like she's soft and sexy as a tree trunk, and still love her?
Maggie has paused in her knitting to admire the ring. "Marriage can be a great thing," she says dreamily. "'Can be,'" Carter says, amused but a little uncomfortable. "What the hell do I know? Mine failed, for many reasons," Maggie snorts. "You sure as hell don't want my advice." But she puts down her knitting anyway, because you can't shut up a Wyczenski. "But I would think that with that kind of commitment to somebody, you have to be ready for anything," she muses. "Or nothing," Carter offers. "You never know what's going to happen." Maggie looks at him. "Or, you do," she says pointedly. "You mean the drinking?" Carter asks, shifting uneasily in his seat. Maggie babbles that it took having a baby to make her stop smoking, but that she never did stop drinking. "Maybe Abby will be stronger," she says unconvincingly.
Maggie asks whether Abby and Carter have discussed having children. Woman, they've barely discussed marriage. Abby doesn't like to discuss anything unless there's a woe-is-me angle. "I know that she worries about passing on the disease," Carter says. Maggie throws down her knitting again and stares contemplatively out the window. "She and Richard never communicated, ever, I don't think," Maggie decides. I totally thought she was going to bust Abby on the abortion here, but she doesn't. Maggie babbles that Richard had all these lofty expectations of Abby that he set because he didn't understand her -- like she's actually super-lowly, and doesn't deserve to have people who believe the best in her. That's a supportive mother. Carter looks like he wants to throw up. Defensively, he insists that he's not walking into this thing blind. "I just don't want you to want to fix her," Maggie says. "Abby doesn't need to be fixed," he says. Oh really? Since when? "Or heal her, or change her," Maggie continues. Carter swears that he isn't trying to do that, but he's not convincing anybody. "She's an amazing person," Maggie says. You just know there's a "but" coming. Shut up, Maggie. You absolutely suck at promoting Abby's supposed finer qualities. "An amazing person with certain weaknesses," she continues. "And you'd be lucky to have her, even with those weaknesses. But you have to love her, even if she never changes anything." Carter has turned ashen, and he's sweating bullets that could pierce flesh. Because he doesn't love Abby -- he loves what he wants Abby to be. End it now.

"So you think this is a keeper?" Carter asks abruptly. "The restaurant?" Abby asks, confused. He shakes his head. "Us," he says. "You and me." She blinks, possibly because she can't believe how unromantic that statement was. I'm not sure what she was expecting, though, considering that his other grand romantic gestures involved either quarantine or an outburst on the hospital roof. "Are you okay?" she asks, squinting. Carter leans back in his seat and spits out the absolute dregs of his romantic urges. "I've spent a long time looking for a relationship that would stick," he says. "Sometimes it was the wrong person, sometimes I guess I wasn't ready. Or in the right place. But I think I am now. I really think I am now." Note that he doesn't say, "And I really think you're the right person." He just says he's in the right place. Abby gazes at him expectantly. "Are you?" he asks. Rolling her eyes a tiny bit, Abby opens her mouth. "I really want this to stick," he interrupts. What is she, a pan of brownies? Abby leans forward a bit more. "Me too," she says, earnestly. Carter beams and reaches into his pocket. "I know that, uh, we've had a rough time, and that there's still a lot of stuff we have to get through," he adds. "But I think we're doing okay. I think that we're..." he laughs. "We're growing, we're...changing." With this, he shoots her a pointed look. "Do you?" he asks, a centimeter from whipping out the ring, but waiting to make absolutely sure she passes the test. "I don't know if people ever really change," Abby says, confused. "But I know what you mean." Carter's face falls. "You do?" he asks. "I think I do," she says, now looking a tiny bit perplexed. Carter jolts into action, sliding the ring box back into his pocket. "Mmm-hmm," he says. "Well, let's see what's for dessert."

During the end of the conversation, Abby had picked up Carter's coat to fold it, and the ring box dropped onto the table. Now, with him in the other room, Abby grabs it and stares at it, eyes big as saucers. Then she opens it and momentarily loses her breath. It all clicks, and she realizes that somehow, Carter changed his mind about proposing that night. This is a sad harbinger of another self-pity binge, I fear, but hopefully they'll delay it until May sweeps so we can have a quick holiday from her mental issues. "Who was that?" Carter calls out. Guiltily, she jumps, but she can't take her eyes off the ring. "Maggie," she answers shakily. "She wanted to thank you for the ride." Suddenly, she slams the box shut and trembles. As the kettle whistles, she shoves it back in Carter's pocket, pale.

www.televisionwithoutpity.com/articles/content/a3630/

Things just went from bad to worse after that and I really don't know why they stayed together longer if they totally wanted different things...

[daniella]

It's better this way... we ( and Luka and Abby for that matter) wouldn't have Joe otherwise...

Now, I think that Abby and maggie interaction is good... we can't see that Maggie trys to have a relatioship with her daughter, dispite the disease... Abby is so hurt about what happenend when she was groing up ( about being responsible at such a tender age, with a small brother to raise... ) that she can't treat Maggie better than the wya she does... she tries tough and sometimes, she does it, but other times... she doesn't have time or will to do it...

I thin that theuir relationship grow after Luka... and baby Joe...

Dani

[Noora]

About Maggie.. How old is she actually?

[cece2087]

Sally Field is only like 17 years older than Maura, but Maura looks younger than she is and so I bet Maggie had Abby as a young twenty-something. So she's probably in her early 60s.

[maggie]

Sally Field looks a lot younger outside of ER - I think they deliberately make her look older to fit the show.

[larue]

Man....do you really think she looks a lot younger out of ER?? I saw her on the Tonight Show not too long ago and was dumbfounded at how freaking old she looked. Her facial structure will always look younger but her neck! It was the first time ever that I wanted to encourage someone to seek plastic surgery.

[genna]

well she is 60- i'd defo be wanting to look like her at 60! i loved the resolution in the abby/maggie relationship and the way abby didn't want her around but then didn't want her to leave....felt like a resolution in a major chapter of badness in her life! would have been cool to have eric around though!

[maggie]

i agree, if i look like her when i'm sixty, i won't complain in the least. i think she still stunning, and so what if she's not perfect? better to be natural than Joan Crawford or Dolly Parton, filled with plastic. it's the imperfections that make everyone unique - if we were all barbie dolls, what fun would that be?

[strawberriesnsugar]

i agree, if i look like her when i'm sixty, i won't complain in the least. i think she still stunning, and so what if she's not perfect? better to be natural than Joan Crawford or Dolly Parton, filled with plastic. it's the imperfections that make everyone unique - if we were all barbie dolls, what fun would that be?

I totally agree. For example, look at Maura and Christa Miller (Jordan from Scrubs). They are both 40+, and Maura looks beautiful. Christa looks like serious plastic, it's awful.

[carsley]

i think carter must have chenged his mind when maggie said that abby's never gonna change ..

that means he didn't like her the way she was ...
for the first time i say this, SCREW YOU CARTER!

[Rach :)]

omg magda did .... did you just .......just say screew you carter *speechless*