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Health & Fitness

Ride Sally, Ride!

Fifty shades of hooey - why women are taking a bad rap!

This is my last significant task today, as I close up shop and leave for a few days vacation, to celebrate a somewhat momentous birthday. (Forty-six for the 3rd time is always a big one!) My thought was to slap myself on the back and enjoy a few champagne toasts with my family, applauding what I’ve accomplished as a woman of a certain age.

However, the media does not want me to do this. Both the male and female players in the media world, and especially Abigail Adams’ revered LADIES, be they print or broadcast or some interactive combination of the two, and/or its social media brethren, do not think much of us women today and of our achievements.

I have not become a Member of Congress, though our numbers there are pitiful. We just ain’t being represented. I have not become the CEO of a Fortune 500 company, though our numbers there are equally puny. Everyone is constantly telling me that due to my apathy and that of my sisters, it will take 200 more years (give or take a few) to get back to the equality I fought to achieve when I burned my bra in the 60’s. (Funny, in the 60’s that seemed awfully uncomfortable to me, now it seems like nirvana.)

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Presumably, while Fifty Shades of Grey evokes the erotic antics of Anais Nin “back in the day,” women have become no savvier in the world of male domination.

This is bunk.

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Let’s take politics first. Three women come to mind who ran for public office without thinking about what they were doing: Meg Whitman for California Governor, Caroline Kennedy for United State Senate from New York and locally, in my geographic area, Stacy Lawson for Congress. Party affiliation was not an issue in their demise. The issue was that none of these three women had a responsible track record for voting at all, until they decided to jump into the race they fancied. This was not cool and they were quickly spotted, though millions and millions were spent in the process. They were trounced and they should have been. Contrary to some opinions, political office is not a sport for spectators who are looking for something fun to do. I would suggest that some smart genius create a Wii game to this end and make a bundle. (Smart woman that I am, I will demand a percentage.)

I’ve voted in every election since I can remember, and I follow the issues, and I really care about my town, county, state and country - and I would be an absolutely lousy politician on any and every level possible.

And, on top of that, I don’t want to be an elected official.

I want to be exactly what I am, who I am, doing what I do. Like some women want to be astronauts or equally important, the reviled “stay at home Moms.”

Can you image that?

OK, next up, business.

I don’t want to be the CEO of a Fortune 500 company. I’ve got my advanced degree and my school of hard knocks experience, but I don’t want to supervise 5,000 + people. I’ve raised three children – it’s about the same, I think, though my kids can’t sue me if I say something they don’t like. (Oh dear, I hate fostering ideas with money so tight these days ……)

I am a BIG player in my little business and I am just fine with that.  I start work every morning as soon as I am conscious, and I stop working as soon as I am unconscious, and, while it’s been a tough road to hoe these past years since the never-ending great recession, it’s my road. And there’s no stop sign in sight.

I think there are millions of women just like me. They are happy, vital, tough, inventive, frustrated, multi-tasking commanders of their own forces.

We need to switch the dialogue around and look to the real leaders in this country - the little folks that could and can. And do.

Female and male. Equally fighting the good fight.

And ready to claim victory.

Wise up media people and claim the next great story!

 

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