Playing the Woman's Card and Proud Of It

DEAL ME IN

In 1970, after graduating from college, I took my resume around to many employment agents. They all admired it and gushed, “You have such a wonderful resume for one so young. How many words per minute do you type?”

A few of them threw in this advice: “Enroll at Katie Gibbs. It’ll only take a year. Many girls move up from secretaries to management.”

My male friends did not have similar experiences. NOW had an action at the time where they’d send women and then men with similar qualifications to employment agencies and then they’d compare notes. Their experiences were very different. I remember giving NOW a list of all the employment agents who asked me what my typing speed was so they could investigate those agents.

I attended consciousness-raising sessions and learned that I wasn’t the only young woman who was asked by employment agents about my typing speed. FROM THE PERSONAL TO THE POLITICAL, the most misinterpreted slogan in political history. What it meant was yes, it happened to me. It also happened to hundreds of others. Maybe it’s a political problem demanding a political solution. Thus the personal became political. Nevertheless, it also remained personal. I remember how angry and frustrated I felt. It’s part of my story.

Many younger women who grew up after the women’s movement don’t remember those bad old days. They take it for granted that women can be accepted at medical school and law school, become engineers and CEO’s of companies, Senators and Congresswomen. And yes, even President of the United States. Yes we’re behind many other nations in that regard- England, Germany, Israel, Costa Rica, Chile, Argentina, and Brazil just to name a few countries that have had women heads of state. Nevertheless, maybe America is finally catching up and it's a momentous step for us. Yes, America has come a long way and I hope a longer way by electing Hillary in November. 

When Hillary Clinton was nominated by the Democratic Party  to be their nominee for President of the United States, I felt a lump in my throat. Then I felt a rush. Hillary has worked all her life for women to get equal pay for equal work, for women’s right to choose, for child care that will level the playing field for all women regardless of economic class. We can continue to call those issues “women’s issues” if we want, but they affect everyone in our society. If we want to continue to improve economic justice in our country, they’re vital issues.

Maybe those bad old days are on the way to becoming a moment frozen in history but maybe not. This may not be the case if Donald Trump and the Republicans win and turn back the clock on women’s right to choose, funding for childcare, equal pay for equal work, and many other issues. I'll hope for the best. Then I’ll do what I can to help get out the vote for Hillary and other Democrats. We’ve come this far and it would be tragic to get turned around now.  

Traveling to America - It Doesn't Seem Like the Country I Know Anymore

My grandmother came to America with her family in 1905. She was only eight years old at the time, but remembered this major event for the rest of her life and told me about it repeatedly until she passed away at the age of 86. Theodore Roosevelt was President then and my Grandma always spoke about what a great man he was and how her father-my great-grandfather- respected him. They were always grateful to the United States for taking them in.

How transformative it must have been for my relatives after fleeing the anti-Semitism and pogroms of Russia to sail into Liberty Island and see the Lady gleaming in the harbor, her poem by Emma Lazarus inscribed on the statue’s base welcoming them into America, a country of freedom and opportunity.

The last few lines of “The New Colossus” which Emma Lazarus wrote in 1883 are well known.

….Give me your tired, your poor,

Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,

The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.

Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,

I lift my lamp beside the golden door!"

Unless you're a Native American Indian, you’ve come to America from another country or your ancestors have – maybe your parents came or maybe in your case, it was many generations back. Maybe your relatives came very unwillingly as slaves or indentured servants but regardless, they came from another place and made America their home. We are a country of immigrants and it is a major source of our strength.

Admittedly, America hasn’t always unanimously welcomed every wave of immigration. In the 1850’s, the Know Nothings nominated former President Fillmore as their standard bearer to fight against the tides of Irish Catholic immigration. In the 1920’s, the Asian Exclusion Act of 1924 was passed and the Immigration Act of 1924 was passed as well establishing yearly quotas for immigrants from each country. During World War II shiploads of Jewish refugees were turned away. In more recent times, we’ve made it difficult for Mexicans and other Central Americans who’ve come here from poverty and violence desperately trying to survive. I’m not proud of any of these moments in our history.

Rather, I like to think of the America that has managed better than almost any other country on Earth to form a nation out of all the many peoples who have come seeking  here refuge and/or better opportunities. From 1880-1920 America received 20 million immigrants. Their descendants are now Americans. 

When I see people subscribing to the racism and xenophobia espoused by Donald Trump, I feel blessed that neither my grandmother nor mother is alive to see him receive the nomination of one of our major political parties. We have done so much better and we should continue to do so much better. I pray that we find a way out of this wilderness of hatred and listen to our better angels. I know that we Americans can.

   

The Statue of Liberty - May she continue to be the beacon of freedom and hospitality to the world.

 

Traveling in Chicago and Finding a Message of Peace

Few people visiting Chicago these days are looking for peaceful messages and I wouldn’t tell people to come here in search of any. With the recent murder of police officers in Dallas and the all too often murder of African-Americans at the hands of police, many of us are searching for peace. Fortunately for those of  us who live in the Chicago area there is one place to visit where we can find tranquility – the Baha’i House of Worship in Wilmette.

When we lived in Haifa, Israel in the early 1970’s, we could look through the back window of our apartment and see the Baha’i Shrine. The shrine itself was beautiful and its gardens were a rare sanctuary of peace in a world often torn apart by violence. I felt fortunate then to be able to see it from my window and envision a world in which inter-ethnic harmony was a possibility although a very distant one.

the Baha'i Shrine in Haifa

I can no longer see the Baha’i Shrine from my window, but I can drive a few miles and visit the Bahai House of Worship in Wilmette just north of Evanston along Lake Michigan. I think the building is even more beautiful than the one I remember in Haifa. Entry into the house of worship, the gardens, and the visitor center are free to the public. No wonder Victor Danilov lists it under religious museums in Chicago’s Museums, A Complete Guide to the City’s Cultural Attractions. 

the Baha'i Shrine in Wilmette, Illinois

The Bahai’s main belief is in the oneness of humanity and in the development of relationships among individuals, communities, and institutions that reflect that. Attainment of peace is their goal. They believe that all religions are one in a continuing progression of learning throughout the centuries. That’s a very small thumbnail sketch of their belief system. To explore it further, you can go to their website www.bahai.org.

In the Visitor Center

Indeed, the Baha’i have attained peace in the style of the building and in the visitor center where you can learn more about this religious group and its belief system. The real attraction for me is the gardens. Walking through them is a walk through tranquility itself. The entire shrine is surrounded by gardens that are beautifully manicured and painstakingly cultivated. For that alone, it is worth the visit. Do go there while everything is in bloom. It’s a massage for the soul. 

one view of the gardens at the Bahai shrine in Wilmette

Traveling in Chicago- The Museum of Contemporary Photography

Sometimes it “takes a village” and other times it “takes a photograph”. When we hear about an injustice, we may feel some concern. When we see it right before our eyes, it can be impossible to ignore. Few people will forget the image of the three-year-old Syrian boy whose body was washed upon the shores of Europe. Knowing how powerful an image can be, the Museum of Contemporary Photography displays photography exhibits depicting social conditions.

The Museum of Contemporary Photography (MOCP) www.mocp.org, ,a part of Columbia College, was opened in 1976. It is located at 600 S. Michigan Avenue and is free to the public. It is open Monday through Saturday from 10:00-5:00 and on Sundays from 12:00-5:00. This museum is small and it doesn’t take long to see one of their exhibits. I recommend a visit when you’re in the area. The images in its current exhibit are quite poignant.

I was fortunate to pay a visit to the Museum of Contemporary Photography in time to see their current exhibit Burnt Generation, Contemporary Iranian Photography. It is there through this weekend- through July 10^th- and definitely worth seeing. This exhibit of contemporary Iranian photographers is powerful. Although we have seen many Iranian movies that eloquently depicted the challenges in Iranian society, we had not seen Iranian photographs. Nevertheless, the movies had piqued my interest and I was interested to see this exhibit.

Many of the pictures are in black and white adding to the severity of the situation the photographer is showing us. Most of the pictures that aren’t in black and white are in very subdued tones showing a whole society caught in a very somber mood. The photographs are all taken by contemporary Iranian photographers of people in the generation-those born between 1963-1980 known as the Burnt Generation. They had experienced the Iranian Revolution of 1979 and the Iran-Iraq War and all the consequences thereafter. The social and political unrest that they endured shows on the people’s faces.

I especially admired the photos taken by Newsha Tavakolian. She took pictures of people in such private moments that I almost felt like I should look away.

Untitled

This other picture by Gohar Dashti is of a group but it had the same effect on me. Could we be that different from one another? I think not.

Untitled

Altogether, this was a very thoughtfully assembled exhibit. The MOCP’s next exhibit starting July 21^st will be open until October 9^th. Its title is “Petcoke: Tracing Dirty Energy.” I’m looking forward to seeing how they treat this timely topic.

Traveling In Chicago-Something Missing On a First Anniversary

As of today, Illinois has gone a whole year without a budget and many supports for low income people have been vanishing as a result. While it looks like Governor Rauner and the Dem. leadership may come to an agreement on a budget for the next fiscal year, many services for the poor have been cut or eliminated.Who knows how long it will take us to restore everything that was lost.

Therefore, I was thrilled when I found a vendor selling Streetwise, the weekly magazine for and about the homeless. He was the first vendor whom I had seen in months. Gladly, I bought an issue of it from him and asked where all the vendors had gone. “I don’t know,” he said. “I’m here every day.”

           He may be here every day, but a lot of the social safety net has disappeared in Illinois in the past year. We’ll probably see many more homeless on Chicago’s streets and be panhandled more often as more people become desperate. In such times, it’s great to see Streetwise vendors selling their papers.

           Streetwise is a magazine about issues relating to homelessness. The organization trains and employs the homeless. Vendors go through a month training program to learn about customer service and other aspects of business. The issues sell for two dollars apiece and $1.10 of that goes directly to the vendor for his or her income. Last week’s issue focused on restaurant reviews written by Streetwise vendors. Each reviewer was given ten dollars to write the reviews. The restaurants were all ones with meals for ten dollars apiece or less, places that vendors may frequent. There were also articles in the issue about current events affecting the poor, the homeless, and those at risk of becoming homeless.

           The homeless are the other 1% in America. At any given time, that’s how many people are homeless here. While some of the homeless are quickly identified, many more homeless people defy the stereotype we have of them and look just like you and me. Thus their condition is invisible to most. And it could happen to almost anyone.

           When a person becomes a vendor of Streetwise, it may be that person’s first chance in many a year to re-enter the job market and slowly extricate himself from the downward spiral of homelessness and despair and to do it with dignity. The Streetwise organization also has a Transitional Jobs Program and supportive services.

          If you want to learn more about this worthwhile organization, donate money to it, or volunteer with them, you can visit their website at www.streetwise.org. 

Walking the Trail of Woman's History

With Hillary Clinton presumably becoming the first woman to run for president from either major political party, it’s good to refresh our memories about all the efforts that came before to make her candidacy possible. The Evanston History Center gives walking tours of the historic points in Evanstonian women’s history and I am very glad that I joined them for that walk on Saturday June 18^th. Most of the Evanston History Center’s historic tours begin at the Evanston History Center, 225 Greenwood Street, Evanston, Illinois but this one began on the lawn of the Frances Willard House.

The Frances Willard House

Besides learning more about Frances Willard, I learned about the women’s history of Evanston. Evanston grew up around Northwestern University, a college that was associated with the Methodist Church and preached abstinence. Women were welcomed in Evanston as both college students and career women as early as the 1860’s.  Northwestern University became the third university in the United States to become coed in 1870 after Oberlin and Antioch.

Because of the atmosphere created in Evanston encouraging women to have educations and careers, many dynamic women moved to Evanston in the late 1800’s. On the walking tour, we saw the houses of many who had lived in Evanston and made important contributions to women’s history. We were told that the Evanston History Center has many documents about these women’s lives that are available for reading there. I plan to go there and research this in more depth as the other women whose houses we also saw on the walking tour are too numerous to mention here. 

With Hillary Clinton presumably getting the Democratic nomination we see how far we have come and how much further we still have to go. I have to say, however, that we got there behind numerous other countries that have elected women heads of state long before this. Some that come to mind are Germany, England, Costa Rica, Chile, Argentina, Brazil, Israel, India, and Pakistan just to name a few. And this history tour reminded me that it didn’t happen here in the United States or anywhere else by accident. Women have been working on it for more than a century. It’s about time.

Traveling in Chicago - The Chicago Botanical Garden

This week more than ever, a visit to The Chicago Botanical Garden seemed like a great idea. The carnage in Orlando and the venom that has been spewed since against immigrants especially Muslims goes on and on. I could talk about acceptance – of the LGBT community, of Muslims, and of other immigrants- but you’ve heard it all before. I could talk about sensible gun control, but I’ve done that before also. Pres. Obama made his sixteenth impassioned plea for gun control probably to no avail. Sometimes it feels good to just take a break.

I can’t think of a better place for a break than the Chicago Botanic Garden www.chicagobotanic.org located at the Edens Expressway and Lake-Cook Road in Glencoe, Illinois. It’s listed as a major museum in Chicago’s Museums, A Complete Guide to the City’s Cultural Attractions by Victor Danilov. Every time we go there we see new gardens and more in bloom. Admission to the Botanic Garden is free but the charge for parking is $25 per car. It is open daily.

Going there in June there is so much blooming. Instead of deluging you with more words, here are some of my favorite pictures. I fervently hope that all of us individually and America as a whole has a better week ahead.

rose garden

rose garden

English Garden

In the sensory garden

walk to Spider Island