I Overheard Two Women Gossiping

January 28, 2009 on 6:00 am | In Character, Women  Email This Post

On a recent Sunday afternoon I was having my favorite salad (spinach salad - hold the dressing) at one of my favorite restaurants, when I couldn’t help noticing two well-coiffed and dressed women having lunch (salads and pizza) at the table directly to my right side.
 
I was not intentionally trying to listen to what they were saying - I promise you! - it’s just that every now and then, the noise lulled and I could hear one of them say, “Yes, she is so nice/smart/talented, etc.”.  I don’t believe they were talking about the same woman each time, but I was so impressed that two women “gossiping” over lunch were - brace yourself - saying nice things about another woman or women!

When we got ready to leave, I went over to the table and admitted that I could hear some of what they were saying - although I wasn’t really trying to - and that I was immensely impressed that having had the opportunity to be critical or catty, that they were both speaking so nicely about others.  I further said, “You two must be really nice people!”

They smiled at me - with distinct surprise - and one of them immediately said, “You must be a nice person too to stop and say this to us.”

Wow- a real “karma” moment. 

Why don’t you look carefully around you and take the opportunity to compliment folks you see who are doing the “right thing.”

 

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Baby Boomer Women Are Committing Suicide..Why?

October 28, 2008 on 12:39 pm | In Depression, Feminism, Marriage, Motherhood, Women  Email This Post

I was at first stunned - then not - to read that research from Johns Hopkins School of Public Health points toward white, middle aged women as being particularly prone to depression leading to suicides.  I’m a middle aged, white, female baby-boomer, so this caught my attention, especially since the researchers seemed clueless as to what would be behind this spike.

Having talked to women for over thirty years on the radio, I think I know.  We middle-aged, white females from the sixties were sold a bill of goods by the originally well-meaning women’s movement.  The bits about equal pay for equal experience and competence were kind of a no-brainer.  The bits about men, marriage, sex, babies, and home-making being negatives in our lives - because, of course, they were oppressive and demeaning - also seemed obvious at the time.  So, with the introduction of consciousness raising (that is, learning to mistrust, not need, and even loathe men) and women’s studies programs (which conceived of elevating women by making them perpetually angry victims), we were on our way to a collision course to today: depression and suicide.

Women who dared to buck the feminista trend and actually marry and make babies, kept close to the sisterhood by not being very sexual, loving, or sensitive to their husbands - or just kept them as shack-up studs - and put their babies in day-care.  They did all of that so they could work at their careers full-time and have financial power.  The thinking was, what if “he” took off with some bimbo or died on them?  Money is power and safety!  They also did all of that so they could feel like “somebody.”  I still have women tell me today that they only allow themselves to feel good when they have a successful career; the loving appreciation of a husband and children are swept aside like so much emotional dandruff.
 
These white, middle-aged, female baby-boomers starved themselves of the fulfilling emotional meal of actually being a hands-on mom in addition to being their husband’s girlfriend.  Many of them are now divorced, and their adult children hardly spend time any time with them.  The kids learned how to spend time without Mom because she was so “busy, busy, busy” while they were growing up.

I’m not surprised that so many of these women are depressed and suicidal.  Feministas lied to them that they could and would “have it all:” they only had to sacrifice the loveliest parts of their womanhood.

I’m not among them, because I caught myself entering that depressive state.  I’ve been there…done that.  Saved by a marriage and a child!

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