Letters from NYC

Shooting For The Stars!

My aunt was always an unusual woman. She always skirted the edge of what women in her family were supposed to do, without outright defying convention. She came from a world where there was one cardinal, 2 monsignors and 2 bishops. People used to tell her, it was as close to heaven as she would ever get, because of her dangerous dance on that edge. She belonged to a world where women listened, and obeyed the spirit and letter of everything their wise husbands told them to do. Widows and divorcees were to wear black, the color of mourning, forever.

I was never a part of that world. In fact, I was so far from it, having left home at 17, to seek knowledge and adventure, that to this day I’m still a woman under scrutiny and judgment. For some people, all I’m missing is my scarlet letter.

I do not wear black though I’m in the middle of a divorce. I am more intelligent and well rounded than all the degreed men in this family, and have an independent mind and many opinions, and no fear of voicing them. In many ways, my very existence is a threat to their very ordered, subservient and domesticated wives. These men are unaccustomed to women like me.

The frightening thing to me is I could have easily been a woman like my aunt. What happened to change that was just the mere power of observing a lifetime of these sentences being imposed on my fellow female inmates.

My training began, innocently enough, as a very young girl. I remember looking up and watching the veil as it was lowered over my eyes to keep my vision focused and limited to the things I was supposed to be and do. My sights were not be set as high as those of the men. No, instead my matronly wardens were supposed to instill in me a contentedness in my solitary occupation as future wife and mother.

Well, I rebelled, just as Eve did. Of course, like her, I’ve been paying for my emancipation ever since. The punishment comes in the form of snide comments or jokes at my expense. They come in the form of how I’m perceived and judged. They come in the form of condescending attitudes that are all stealthily deflected by me through wit or sarcasm. Each arrow, so far off the mark it doesn’t even register, on my armor.

Instead, the women quietly take note and learn, like many slaves of the past. They learn how to carefully lull their masters into security until their appointed hour arrives.

This week, while the men were in the living room, smoking their cigars or cigarettes and drinking their beers, there was a clandestine female conclave taking place in the kitchen. It was there that my aunt’s journals were read aloud, helping us all to understand where we and the oppression came from. It was also there that my experiences of incredible adventures, travels to far off lands, and my many different jobs fueled young women's imaginations with endless possibilities for their own lives.

While I only dreamed of aiming for the horizon when I was young, this week, these young women went beyond the horizon and chose to shoot for the stars.

Posted by Michele at April 21, 2005 12:45 AM