Tag Archives: Women

National Women's Day, Success, Surge, Women

Surge.

Early this morning I waited outside in a wintery mix for the doors to open at Apple. Through the glass walls the tech teams got ready for the day in a meeting that began with an International Women’s Day video played on the big screen; Michelle, Hillary, Malala, Maya Angelou flashed across the vast room. The employees clapped through the clips. I didn’t need to hear the audio to feel inspired.

At the end, this sentence hung on the screen until the doors opened:

WHO IS THE WOMAN THAT MOST INFLUENCED YOU IN YOUR LIFE?

I was a half hour early in panic mode so gratefully this focused my attention on something besides my blank, un-chargeable brand new iPhone 14. Who indeed?

Whether I go backwards or forwards in time, women have been the indelible, invincible marks on my life. From a grandmother who endured health challenges while holding up households, to one who became a Senator. To a mother who chose art over secretarial school. To my daughters who have strong careers and choose their lives, their way. To my future daughter-in-law who is the backbone of her job.

And my women friends and family: Writers, lawyers, negotiators, mothers, doctors, influencers, curators, designers — to name just a few of their remarkable talents.

Do I have to pick one? I am surrounded and always have been. And by men like my son who supports us all with grace and honor. My mother once said to me, when I balked at a PHD: “What did I burn my bra for?” We argued, for years, that I got where I did because of that bonfire that was her, and now I had to do my own blaze.

My phone had experienced a ‘surge’ and I learned how to reboot from a nice techie who took thirty seconds to identify and fix the problem. We conquer, one step at a time, in our surge of failures and successes. Cheers to you all, past, present and future.

Proud of them all.

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Small but Mighty, Sunflower, Ukraine

Small But Mighty

Yesterday, I wore a big sunflower pin, lovingly crafted by my cousin and worn in solidarity with Ukraine.

On the ferry into Seattle an employee rushing by me stopped dead in her tracks, put a hand on her heart and said in what I can only believe was a Ukrainian accent, “Thank you.” I put my hand on my heart and said “I can do so little.” She showed me her Ukranian flag pin under her uniform. We silently stared at each other and tears ran down our cheeks.

An hour later at The Rack, a small woman bustled over to unlock a dressing room for me. As she was turning away she saw the sunflower on my jacket and stood stock still. Silently lifting her hands she showed me her arms. They were covered in goosebumps. Another accent, another thank you, we bent towards each other to air hug, our arms full of clothes, my face wet.

And then, another woman, stopping me and asking where she could get on of these pins. I said, “from me, give me your phone number and name.” She explained her friend and neighbor had just flown to Ukraine to try to get her parents out. I placed my hand on my heart. For the third time in as many hours that day I wept.

I cry for my helplessness, unable to begin to imagine what it must be like: to be here — watching what is happening — or there, running for your life. I weep for the venomous destruction of life. I wear this pin with anger, too.

My cousin is buying all the yellow and blue felt she can find today. We are rolling up our sleeves this weekend.

I have more work to do; a phone number to find out if the family made it out, for starters. I secured the attendant’s name at the cash register and plan to drop a pin off at the manager’s office for that little woman with the big heart. I will fill my pockets with pins and look for the employee on my next crossing so I can hand her a sunflower, and anyone else who asks.

Three woman I would never have known if not for three pieces of felt, needled together and pinned over my heart, to voice solidarity and recognition.

Never underestimate the small but mighty gesture.

A quiet tea amongst the disquiet.
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Choices, Diet, Dieting, fat girl, Women

Taking Steps.

It takes me exactly 3,500 steps, according to my FitBit, to walk over and down the hill to the french bakery, Rosallini’s, that in my opinion pulls the best coffee between Ballard and Green Lake. The walk puts a hefty dent in my hard-won 10,000 daily steps. However, I only indulge in a pastry there about once a week. When I order my lattes I breathe in the butter-filled air, gaze into the pastry cases, and plot out the next treat. This appreciation-not-deprivation makes the equation of exercise and calories work for me.

This morning, as I tried to make my hot coffee match the length of the New York Times, two women sidled up to the bar next to me, deeply engaged in conversation. I began to hear “ten pounds” and “diet” and “no carbs.” They were talking over each other, competing pounds lost and gained. Do women really talk like this anymore to each other?

I had just finished reading my health writer idol Jane Brody’s article, For Real Weight Control, published January 28th, that addressed just this issue of extreme dieting.  She supported the idea — with data and fact and personal experience — that we have to change habits to control our weight, not take away eating. The deprivation vs. moderation argument that has become personal to me.

When you have lost as many bits and pieces as I have including a length of colon, time is precious and so is my food. It matters what I eat and how I eat and silver lining time; this has become a lesson for me. I feel better if I eat thoughtfully and every four hours. Generally, my portions are small plate. I still have two pieces or more of chocolate at tea time. There is no food martyrdom, just a consideration that what goes in has to be good for this battered flesh and bone, aging despite all the diets in the universe. Once a fat girl who hated her body, I now am grateful it is carrying me into the next decade.

It was a close call at the bakery this morning — whether I was going to lean over and let fly some unfiltered and unsolicited opinions and offer this link — or whether I was going to sit this one out. Super close when I swiveled, put down my paper and saw two beautiful, thin women were having this conversation. And it is January, ladies — not the month to punish ourselves.

I won’t pounce on you at the bakery; I hope you will click on and read the article linked above. But I will send you healing vibes as I eat my vanilla bean eclair in a few days with a creamy, steaming 12 oz latte.

Get informed. Love the body you live in. Take a walk with that friend who is obsessed with dieting. Hug them.

Then enjoy yourself.img_4917

Painting by Todd Young, owned by Beth Slattery

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#NEDAweek2018, fat girl, NEDA, self image, Women

Yo. Fat Girl.

 

How appropriate that this is NEDA week — National Eating Disorder Awareness week.  February in Seattle has me brushing hail off the jonquils and bundled in sweaters, prevented from long walks and sunshine infusions by an unrelenting steel gray and dripping sky. Premier weather for writing. And being depressed. And therefore, eating.

I crave mac&cheese and chocolates for breakfast and bread, bread, bread. So a few gal cousins and I began a sugar and alcohol cleanse the day after Valentine’s day (trust me, this weather has called for a lot of Bourbon). The headaches we endured the first week reminded us that sugar begets the craving for more sugar. This has been a good idea, though painful. But it also reminded me of the old days, the extreme dieting, the endless carb-starves and calorie counting.

I have made references along the way in my writing and on this blog that my body weight and self image took a hit for most of my life. I believe that my degree of eating disorder was instilled in me very early on because of how others thought I should look. And even when I initially shed some of the weight in eighth grade by growing five inches, the person in the mirror will always be fat. That is what happens when family, friends and peers — not to mention the media — sets standards that the average young girl cannot meet.

Every time I think I have gotten beyond this self-image issue the fat girl stands up: I had a series of abdominal surgeries ten months ago, right before my oldest daughter’s wedding. The dress I had purchased barely zipped on her wedding day. Spanx (never actually wear them) were out of the question due to my incision areas. I felt sick for days in anticipation of what those pictures would look like. The fat girl wanted to hide in the bathroom when the dress went over my head. She never leaves me, logically or illogically.

Today I seek transparency, like the warrior survivor #positively.kate who writes the most amazing truth every day on her blog and instagram. The NEDA website is an incredible resource for support or information: I took the quiz, and learned I could use some help. I know. I always will. But I also know after fifty-nine years that I am spectacular in many ways and eating disorders do not define me anymore. Hey, I was tumor-free for the wedding and I WAS THERE, saggy stomach and all.

Once that girl lives in you, you just have to call her out. I looked in the bathroom mirror, my daughter waiting on the other side of the door in her wedding dress and said,

“Yo, Fat Girl. I love you.”

Olive2:18Seattle

Olive, February, 2018. Seattle, WA.

 

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Feminism, Women, writing

Kick Butt.

I remember the day my grandmother taught me how to curtsey. She was somehow in charge of me on bridge day and I was dressed to be shown off, squeezed into an uncomfortable wool jumper, the white blouse underneath bunching up around my middle. I knew I fell short on many levels, but determined, she gave me a quick how-to before her guests arrived. Holding my plump hands in hers she positioned me in front of her and demonstrated: slide one foot behind the other, dip my knees together, look her in the eye.

I remember feeling a little sick to my stomach. At home I ran barefoot in the wheat fields. Why am I learning this I wondered. The year was 1965 and I had personally witnessed my mother throwing away her bra. “You can do EVERYTHING I couldn’t” my mother told me as she dropped it in the bin with a flourish. But I also knew, like my grandmother’s even, back-slanted handwriting, that today’s lesson held the key to being a lady, a term my mother scorned but the little fat girl secretly worshipped. I stood by the front door with my grandmother that day and executed a perfect curtsey to each guest. They cooed in admiration. This felt just fine.

So began my conflicted relationship with being a woman that frankly has not abated fifty-two years later. Does it ever abate with any woman my age? I write my essays on being white, middle aged and full of words. I question retiring from life when the kids leave for theirs. My essays and blog posts are sprinkled on the internet weekly and after publication I am full of heavy dread each time I turn on my laptop. Who will be offended? Can I live what I say and say what I mean?

But then we have the elections of 2016 and I face that I have been coasting along, letting other women do the heavy lifting. How to hone feminism and fifty and language to shape the next generation now keeps me awake at night.

“Look what we did for you!” was my mother’s favorite line when she pushed me to college, graduate school, begged me to get a PHD. This year I assure my oldest daughter as she plans her wedding, “You don’t have to do anything you don’t want,” and I know my mother would be proud. Then I order my daughter monogrammed stationary. Because, honestly, I am still doing a little curtsey with a pen in my hand, bridging the worlds that raised me.

If I want my daughter to keep the path for equality and feminism open despite the elections of 2016, for her to be the next female president (why not?) or know her, I need to trample the have to’s and remind myself and other women daily that women can do anything. So here goes another blog, and some more words, and the choice of honesty.

You will still be a lady if you kick butt. Even more of one now in 2016. And you need to.

Thanks for cutting the path, Mom. Stomping on it right now for you and all of us.

lilacs1964

Gathering lilacs at Moose Hill. Alexandra Dane, 1965

 

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Hillary Clinton, Not Okay, Vote, Women

Not Okay. Again.

Last week I was making a return at a Nordstrom’s store situated in the northern suburbs of Seattle. All was very quiet on Thursday afternoon at 4:30 PM on the third floor. I was the only customer in sight. My back was to the escalators and while exchanging information with a very young saleswoman I heard it. Right behind me.

“In my day we didn’t stack women’s underwear on tables for everyone to see,” he growled. I could feel him a few feet away. Those little hairs on our neck? They really do prickle when adrenalin flows.

I smiled at the gal, got very still then heard closer behind me,

“Seriously, you bitches need to do something about this.”

I looked her in the eye, did not turn around and said, “Does he come here often?”

She continued to smile and said without missing a beat,

“Oh, thanks goodness, I thought he was with you. No. Never seen him before.”

I laughed too loudly and said “Ah. No.”

And that’s when I felt a very new feeling. I wasn’t scared. I was completely enraged. Expansively enraged.

He moved next to me, fiddled with some pamphlets, commented on our vaginas. I folded my hands around my bag and turned to face him. I was seriously sweating and ready to deck him. This was not ok. Again. The language, the attitude, coming into our space — ladies lingerie for god’s sake. Like a bad movie rerun after all the news, the endless pussy jokes, the locker room talk from Donald Trump. Not. Okay. At. All.

Then he swiveled, circled the sales counter, got very close to another saleswoman and started to talk in a low voice. Not breaking her smile, my saleswoman asked for my signature, then answered a phone call.

“Yes, I did. White male, pony tail, white shirt, back of the lingerie department. Thank you.”

I looked at her in total respect.

“What did you do? I asked, keeping an eye on him.

“No need for phone calls,” she smiled. “We just have to press a button.”

I was flooded for love for this young woman, her professionalism, her smile, her calm. And deeply saddened that standing in our women’s sanctuary we had to protect ourselves. Again.

I looked her in the eye and said,

“You are awesome.”

As I headed to the escalator two men took got off and split to either side of me and headed to the back.

Not ok. Again. But here’s what is happening since Donald Trump opened his mouth: Women are not scared, we are really, really angry. We are people, not objects of filth, voyeurism, sexual predatory behavior and let me emphasize, this behavior is not acceptable anywhere. Not in a bus, not in a house, not in the street, not at my feet.

Know the difference between OKAY and NOT OKAY. Or you might get smacked by a sweating writer with a bag full of books and bras. And I guarantee it will hurt.

pussy

 

 

 

 

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