19 Comments

This resonates: She wasn’t telling us we had to choose something different. It was a prayer that we would have a choice at all. But in my case (im older than you, and my Mom was 48 when I was born) it was a demand, and in hindsight it’s very apparent all the woman wanted was better for me than had been afforded to her.

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Thanks. I'm definitely grateful for that message and that push, which came from both my mom and my dad. Thanks for reading and commenting.

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Thank you for thinking deeply. And for this post on women and feminism. I was in college when Title IX passed and I was the first woman writing for the school newspaper in its 103 year history, so I interviewed the woman coach. Also when Roe v. Wade happened. And the Battle Between the Sexes with Billie Jean King. I was also a single mom at the time. I joined the women's movement the day I first heard of it, in March 1971. (I literally asked where I could join up. ha). I'm a proud feminist forever. (Still longing for the ERA to pass...)

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That is awesome, Sandra. Yes, I tell my students all the time the things that would be different if the ERA had passed. Alas.

I love the image of you asking where you could join up! Glad you found a place!

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I felt such nostalgia for Laverne and Shirley reading this piece. I feel similarly - the impact they had on me was way bigger than I could’ve ever imagined. Thanks for helping me see this, too.

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Thanks for reading and commenting, Laura! To write this, I re-watched that opening theme song and it was crazy how vivid my memories of it were. The bottling factory. Putting their glove on the bottle and watching it move down the conveyor belt. The two of them on the bicycle at the end. Memory is powerful! Also, how much information used to be conveyed in the opening sequence of shows.

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Totally, Robyn. I remember all those shots so well. And -yes - how much we were taught about women in 30 seconds or less 💜

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Born in 1950, I was right there with second wave feminism, kept my own name in 1972 when married, knew I wanted a career more than motherhood, battled sexism getting PhD and first jobs. But my sister-in-law, 10 years older, followed the straight motherhood track, maybe a part time job when kids gone, that my mother's generation had followed. And by the 90s and early 2000s when I was teaching women's history, I saw the same thing as you. I remember trying to get across that the first wave of feminists had won many of similar battles that those of us in sixties had to fight for all over again, so they should never take for granted those rights. Yet even the students who saw themselves as feminists said, "oh, we will never go backwards, abortion is secure, etc etc". Breaks my heart.

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Sadly, we can't take any of those steps forward for granted. They can always be undone, as we've seen. I can report that this generation of young people I'm currently teaching embrace the hell out of feminism. And their feminism is much broader. Like they understand that if you're a feminist, you also have to be against racism and homophobia and transphobia and ableism. They get that feminism has to be inclusive.

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That is very good to hear, just hate that the country and world had to get to this state of affairs to achieve that understanding.

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You and I are the same age--this resonates so much. I would add 1970s Sesame Street (seriously!) as also providing diverse female role models.

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Thanks, Monica! Oh, my gosh, Sesame Street would have to a whole separate essay. So important to my early childhood. Yes, the women like Olivia and Susan and Maria (did you know, I had Little People versions of Olivia and Gordon?). The diversity. The exposure to cities and urban life! I was fascinated by the ideas that people walked their dogs (let alone their llamas) as a kid growing up in the country where dogs just ran free. I remember making my parents buy a leash so I could "walk" our dogs around, which, no surprised, they hated.

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Yes! I had the Fisher Price Sesame Street set--I ADORED it. Maria working in a fix-it shop was so cool.

And I'm still a huge fan of Mister Rogers Neighborhood (in fact, just this week, I'm planning on attending a webinar that the Fred Rogers Institute is doing on Compassion Fatigue), which also had some wonderful role models. I credit Lady Elaine with teaching me about speaking truth to power (and I still want to live in a Museum-Go-Round).

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I loved Mister Rogers, too, though I have to admit, some of the puppets scared me a little bit. But I can still sing the song, "You Can Never Go Down the Drain," which was so important for soothing a very real worry I had as a small child.

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I lost it at some point, but as an adult, I had a bracelet that said "You can never go down the drain," which I loved.

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That is AWESOME!

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While I, of course, deeply love this entry I need to warn you that we are going to have a very stern conversation about you having a night of cocktails reminiscing about television shows WITHOUT ME.

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You didn't read carefully. We were NOT talking about TV shows at all, which is why I couldn't understand why the theme song popped into my head. Also, you're always busy or I'd have you for cocktails and to talk about TV every night.

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You’re 100% right. I totally read WERE not WEREN’T.

Silver Lining: We already know the main topic of discussion the next time we hang out!

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