Imbolc and the waning Megillah Moon
Monday gratefuls: The Ancient Friends: Paul, Tom, Mark, Bill. Women. Diane, Mary, Kate. Marilyn. Tara. Eve. Sarah. Anne. BJ. Women’s History Month. Chili. The writers for Billions. And, Vincenzo Cassano, Sisyphus. The golden age of television. Covid. Covid relief bill.
Sparks of Joy: Dr. Thompson. Rigel snuggling. Vaccines.
Women’s History Month. Starts today. Women hold up half the sky. Mao. Without women there would be no humans to hold up any portion of the heavens. At all. Glad to know this month exists. A lot we don’t know. Read The Creation of Patriarchy by Gerda Lerner. 1986, but still explosive.
Hard to imagine today, but a central issue of the student revolution of the early 1960’s involved the doctrine of in loco parentis. A college or university would act in the place of parents. But, only for women students. Sexually segregated dorms, curfews, clothing restrictions. Got rid of that one at Ball State.
So much. Women expected to take all the responsibility for the consequences of sexual activity. Whether it was a reasonable decision or not, I took this seriously at the age of 26 and had a vasectomy. It did not seem then, nor does it now, that only one partner bore responsibility for reproduction.
As a direct result of that decision, Joseph entered my life, so for me it was a resounding success. I did try to have the vasectomy reversed, my first time ever in the hospital after polio. And, it worked. Sort of. My little guys were not very energetic. It had been 7 years of r&r and I guess they didn’t see any point in going back to the hard work of swimming all the way to the goal.
So many fronts. Child rearing. Domestic chores. Glass ceilings. Internalization of the oppressor. Domestic violence. STD’s. Unwanted pregnancy. Ratio of men to women in so many professions, workplaces. Or, in lower paid jobs, women to men.
The work far from done. The U.S. still has not had a female President. The Denver Post reported yesterday that the number of women on corporate boards in Colorado has moved toward the national average. Not far enough.
I see hope in our granddaughter, Ruth. Smart, politically aware, no bullshit. Yet, knows how to sew, cook. Women have come much further than men in this ongoing revolution. We males have so much work to do.
Generation Z, Ruth’s generation, has come of age in 45’s despicable term in office. They’ve seen the patriarchy in its unapologetic form. At its ugliest. Will they remember? I believe so. The country almost took a turn, may still, toward a crude reversion to male dominance. Reactionary politics, MAGA, always include returning to an era of privilege. For men. For white men in the U.S. For those who believe only a special minority can rule, should rule.
Every male heart needs close examination, by men. Especially those of us lucky enough to be born white. We need to peer into the dark recesses of our assumptions about women, about people of color, and put them aside, forcefully. I do not believe we can purge them, that is become pure feminists or anti-racists, but we can know them and choose not to act on them. We can do that.
