Tag Archives: women

and so the balance shifts

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I turn 30 in a couple of days. As with most things, it’s snuck up on me mainly due to the wonderful things happening in my life that keep me busy from day to day – among them, two dear friends getting married this weekend and a new niece welcomed into this world on Jeff’s birthday. For reference, see some of the happy faces of joy from the past week.

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But I did just want to say one thing about today. It’s June 7, 2016, and for the first time in our history, there is a woman who is going to be a nominee for a major party for President of the United States. I watched her speech in Brooklyn tonight, eyes welling with happiness. I thought of the future children I’ll hopefully have and how they might possibly be born when there’s a woman president. Jeff mentioned that it’s all Eleanor will have ever known (our new niece.)

In her speech, Hillary mentioned that her mom was born on June 4, 1919, the very day that the US Senate passed the 19th Amendment, giving women the right to vote. A movement that is credited as starting in Seneca Falls, NY, only 115 miles east of where we watched our friends get married this weekend.

Women have had the right to vote less than 100 years. And look how far we’ve come in those 100 years. The cultural progress we’ve made in the past 100 years is astounding if you look at how long societal barriers lasted in every aspect of our world. It’s so humbling to think that these women couldn’t vote – there are women alive who remember a time before voting was allowed. There are many people alive who had mothers who couldn’t vote.

And now, look where we are. At the cusp of history again. I look at all that’s going on – the feminist movement, the focus on accountability for sexual predators, women’s right to chose, and beyond, and I see a world that’s finally moving towards equal. There’s a long road ahead, but it’s being paved every day by woman like me and you who are standing up and righting wrongs and saying YES to having it “all” and saying NO to sitting on the sidelines.

I know it’s not what everyone wants. Such is the discourse of this great country. But tonight I’m so proud to be in an America that’s about to finally, finally vote for a woman to not be less than.

We are enough. And so, the balance shifts.

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that’s why Rosa sat on the bus/that’s why we walk through Ferguson with our hands up

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selma

I saw the movie Selma two nights ago and I’ve been thinking about it ever since. I’ve been thinking about Eric Garner and Michael Brown and all of the other senseless killings that have happened and will happen since people marched in Selma, Alabama.

2014 has been a year of awakening for me and those around me in the world of feminism and racism and bigotry. It’s always been there – that we know. Every year there are senseless acts of violence all around us that have to do with all kinds of isms that make me feel so dispirited about the human condition. But this year, I know I stood up more and said, “No you don’t know what it’s like. Let me show you.”

I walked home from the movie theater at 10:00 pm after seeing Selma. I had my headphones on low because it was 10:00 pm, and I live in Hollywood, and I am a woman. Maybe if I was a man I’d do the same, I don’t know, but I only know my own experience: as a woman, I have to be looking out constantly for what’s around me. I check in front of me and behind me, side to side, I keep my head up and keep my eyes alert.

I know my own neighborhood, and I never felt unsafe on the fifteen minute walk home, but all women can attest that not only do you notice the faces around you (check out this post for a perfect explanation) because there could be danger anywhere, but also because of the little voice in the back of your head where you hear the questions people would ask if you were assaulted or worse: “Well, what was she wearing? Did she have headphones in? Why was she walking alone? Was she even looking around her? Did she have her phone out?”

I take this experience of walking home alone at 10:00 pm in a crowded city in yoga pants with headphones on, and I think about what it’d be like to be African-American, or any minority or anyone that looks different and think about the fact that they live with that every day. Every minute. Day or night, sunshine or not.

They think about what they look like. Who’s around them. What will be said if something happens to them. “Well what was he wearing, a hoodie? Who wears a hoodie? Were his pants on low? Did she defend herself with words? Did he reach at our around his waist or anywhere in his jacket or his shirt or in any way do a otherwise normal human action that would indicate that maybe he had a gun? Did she speak directly to the cop instead of getting on the ground immediately, hands up, despite not actually having done anything illegal?”

It’s tiring, you guys. It’s tiring to live in a world where the media tells women that they should be confident in a mini skirt but not too confident, because boys can’t help themselves, after all. It’s tiring to see another person pulled over because they look “off” to a police officer. It’s tiring to know that kids are getting shot for having fake guns (that we tell them it’s OK to own) and that they’re getting shot for having no guns at all. For walking in the street.

It’s tiring for people to blame it on the fact that they talked back to a cop (I mean, let’s be real, who hasn’t? Erin and Shane can back me up that cop in Meijer circa 2003 was being a jerk). It’s tiring to hear people blame it on the fact that maybe he had a little marijuana on him, or she was friends with drug dealers, or generally was a “bad seed.” Victim blaming is hateful, despicable, and ignorant.

We’re on the edge of 2015. Selma happened 50 years ago. 50 YEARS AGO. How are we still here? That’s not to say we haven’t made progress, because obviously we have. That President Barack Obama was elected is just one small testament to the fact that we’ve been fighting and working as a people to make changes. But we have so much further to go. Women deserve to be treated equally. Minorities deserve to be treated equally. EVERYONE deserves to be treated equally.

It’s easy to give up. It’s easy to say “Not me, I have a life and I’m doing that and ignoring the rest.” But as I heard on the radio this morning: to give up is a luxury. Because there are people who can’t ignore what’s going on, myself included. Because we live it, every day. I take the minuscule times a day I feel less than because I am a woman, and I can’t help but think enough is enough.

Enough is enough, you guys. Let’s make 2015 count. All (wo)men created equal. All men created equal. Let’s stand up in 2015. Let’s make changes. Let’s question authority and establishment, and status quo. Let’s finish what Jimmie Lee Jackson, and Martin Luther King, and Rosa Parks, and Viola Liuzzo started. #marchon

all of them started with the word “sorry.”

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About a month ago, I watched this video of Lily Myers reading her poem called Shrinking Women.

I haven’t stopped thinking about it since. As a young woman, I have had four professional jobs out of college. At all four of them, at one time or another, I have had a female boss. I have had strong willed bosses that are classified as “bitches” when they advocate for themselves and their staff, and other bosses who don’t live up to their management potential for one reason or another. Through it all, I have seen how standing up for your staff, being maternal while firm, is a hard line to walk as a woman.

More than anything, I have seen how often women say “I’m sorry.” Because I am a strong willed woman who knows what she wants and says it, I often have been labeled as bossy (sometimes by my bosses themselves!) and can be seen as abrasive or “bitchy.” So when I watched that video, I felt like I was lucky to have grown up with strong females around me who tell you to go out, get what you want, and don’t think twice. They taught me not to use being a woman as an excuse, and to stop whining already.

And yet, the line that stuck me was when Lily talks about how when she asks questions, she qualifies them with, “Sorry,…”

I have caught myself continually writing, “I’m sorry,” into emails and other correspondence, professionally and otherwise, before asking a question, asking someone a favor, or simply asking someone to do their job. I have stopped doing this as often as possible unless I should actually be sorry for the thing I am asking someone to do.

It’s hard. Do it today. Every time you start to write, “Sorry” see why you’re writing it. Are you asking someone to do something because you screwed up? Are you asking them to do something sucky, like count the number of clear push pins on a bulletin board? Or, are you asking them for something that is part of their job, part of their role, or just something you know they’ll know?

You don’t have to be sorry to email me and ask me a cooking question, or how to use Photoshop or WordPress or a camera, or if you can come over this weekend to borrow something from Jeff (like a drill or a table) or me (like a headlamp or a dress.) You don’t have to be sorry to ask me if I can send you a file for work, or respond to your email, or check my documents to see if something has be mailed that should have been mailed.

Watch Lily’s video, guys. And stop saying sorry. You owe it to all the women (and men) out there to stop acting like your need for knowledge, information, or tools is something to be sorry for.

La Fin.

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Finished: The Red Tent, by Anita Diamant.

redtent

4 of 5 stars. The second half of book felt a bit rushed, but the story was beautiful, the characters rich, and the scenes amazing. I loved hearing a biblical story through the eyes of a woman. It is interesting to read of midwives, of women as sisters and wives, of lovers of their own gods, of lovers of their shared husbands. It was a story that all women could relate to, and a story that teaches us all about the miracle of motherhood.

You should read it.