Full of Grace....

Each year the date August 26 commemorates the passage of the 19th amendment, ratified by the states in 1920, giving women in the United States the right to vote. 144 years after the men in the newly formed union were given the right.

I got to thinking about strong women. How strong women had to be to have to wait 144 years to have her voice heard. Waiting in silence.

I have always thought that a strong woman, a truly strong woman was not particularly loud. You know the type, noisy, brash, outspoken. A woman who intimidates like a force of nature. An angry woman of sorts, full of all manner of histrionics, albeit a passionate one certainly. Not at all strong to me, the outburst showing a fear, a weakness. The noise a cover for insecurity. To me a strong woman's steely silence was absolute, impregnable, indestructible.

I have always found strong, silent women to be the ones I wanted to emulate. When I was a young and impressionable 14 year old I watched the Watergate hearings on TV and was mesmerized by Maureen Dean, wife of Nixon White House Counsel John Dean. She sat a few rows behind her husband, a vision of calm collectability as her husband was roasted on a spit before the House Judiciary Committee. Later I marveled at Pat Nixon's composure and grace as she walked with her husband as they left the White House cloaked in disgrace. She was silent and remained so despite what vile and cruel things she endured on account of her husband. She was strong and I wanted to be just like her.

Through the years I have admired a number of women, the strong silent ones. Thinking of them as mentors I worked at perfecting my own quiet dignity. Handling adversity with grace and dignity, to me, is the true test of a woman's mettle.

You see, to me, it isn't about being the loudest, having the last word. It isn't about beating down your adversary in front of everyone. It isn't about writing a tell all book and airing all of your dirty laundry to vindicate yourself. It isn't about striking out, striking back. It's about composure and silent conviction. It's about showing grace under fire, calmness when all that surrounds you is chaotic. Standing still, silently defeating what rises against you. Gracefully diffusng the adversity.

It's been said people suffer in silence. I think some of them find their strength there.

Indeed

Quality Time

I was thumbing through a book called the Five Love Languages by Gary Chapman this week. A friend suggested I read it so I bought a copy and thought I'd give it a try. I am not a fan of the self help genre usually.

As I flipped through the book a page of a chapter caught my eye. Quality Time. Reading further I came upon the statement, "...we are giving each other twenty minutes of life. We will never have those twenty minutes again; we are giving our lives to each other. It is a powerful emotional communicator of love."

That statement got me thinking.

I have friends that I don't get to spend a lot of time with for a number of reasons. Dear friends, valued friends, friends I love. My life, my family, take most of my time and don't allow me as much time with some that I'd like.

So I started to think of quality time. I remarked to a special friend recently that we do an awful lot with what little time we have. We squeeze so much into each conversation, cram in so many thoughts and feelings into a very short space of time. We have to, it's unavoidable. Reading that statement I realized that in that short expanse of time ... I am giving my life.

I think when you don't have a lot of opportunity to spend time with someone, someone you would very much like to spend a lot of your time with, you create an atmosphere that concentrates on what is important to both of you. Focus narrows, each word spoken important, each thought conveyed with sincerity. Small talk is pushed aside for deep conversation. Care is taken to make sure the other understands their importance, their place in your life.

Committing to friendship, investing emotionally in another person is, in fact, giving of ones life. In opening up, sharing and becoming involved personally with another we give from our lives. We give a precious part of ourselves, a small piece of a life lived.

How nice when the other person returns this in full measure.

Then it really is Quality Time.

Indeed.

A Reunion....

I attended my husband's 20th High School Class Reunion in 1998. My husband and I did not know each other during our high school years. While we grew up in the same city, we attended different high schools and had a completely separate circle of friends. I am older than my husband as well. There were perhaps a handful of people I would know at this reunion, most of them males.

This would be the first time his classmates would meet his wife so I was interested in making a good impression. My husband's class was a small one and it was part of a very close knit community. He was the captain of his football team, very popular and well liked. When you meet my husband you are immediately drawn to his personality. It's a big personality, it fills a room and people like to be around him. I knew that I would be spending a lot of this evening watching him enjoy his classmates and they, him. I would need to amuse myself as I wanted him to have fun and reconnect with old friends.

After cocktails, small talk and a lovely dinner the reunion found it's legs and people started to dance and reminisce. My husband, who hates to dance, was repeatedly drawn to the dance floor much to my amusement. When he wasn't dancing he was sitting and talking with someone. Where was I in all of this? Sitting at our table and smiling. Of course the classmates were friendly and polite but wanted to spend time with each other and not with me, someone they didn't know.

Sitting at the table, doing my best to not look bored (I was), I was approached by a petite, pretty brunette with eyes the color of dark chocolate. Her name was Ann Marie and she introduced herself and told me that I would know her older sister, Barbara. It was an ice breaker and a welcome one. She sat and we talked a while. I liked her immediately, she was such a genuine individual. We decided we needed drinks refreshed and went off to the bar. She turns and said...."Let's get the girls out dancing" and collected a few ladies along the walk to the dance floor. She introduced me around. Even though my husband had performed his perfunctory duties at cocktail hour, Ann Marie's introductions were more intimate.

After dancing off and on for a while, she took me around the room making sure I met all of her friends. I had such a fun time. My husband kept coming over to see if I was enjoying myself and Ann Marie would say to him..."Go back to the jock table"... and we would all laugh. I would have to say I had never expected to have that much fun in a roomful of people I hardly knew.

A few weeks after the reunion I received, in the mail, a photo someone took that night of the two of us, Ann Marie and me. With it Ann Marie enclosed a lovely note and wanted to stay in touch. She touched me so sweetly, of course I intended to keep in touch. We did keep in touch.

Ann Marie passed away last weekend.

She succumbed to a particularly aggressive form of Breast Cancer that had metastasized. She battled her illness for several years, bravely. When we got the news my mind went right back to the reunion. In the ten years since Ann Marie and I had seen each other, enjoyed conversation, parties and laughter... it was that reunion that my mind seems to have chosen to be the note that will play within me when I think of her.

I want to be remembered this way....in the way I will always remember Ann Marie. As soon as I think of her a smile appears...I remember her kindness, her sweet personality. I remember those beautiful eyes that betrayed her inner warmth. I want to be remembered as a generous soul, someone who extends herself first, someone who gives, simply gives. Just like Ann Marie.

These are the very words I wrote in a note to her daughter this week, and similar ones to her two sisters. Ann Marie was a special woman to a lot of people. I had the distinct privilege to have been just one among her many friends.

So to Ann Marie, I close my eyes and whisper....Rest well my friend. We will talk again dolce', we will talk again.

At the next Reunion

Indeed.

A Little Rain

Into every one's life a little rain must fall. That's what I was thinking this morning when I woke. It was a slow roll of thunder that woke me. I lay in bed , near an open window, listening to this thunder build and come closer and closer. Shortly afterward came the rain. A nice steady, slow summer rain.

Into every one's life a little rain must fall. I lay there thinking about the rain that fell on mine this week. Amidst the raindrops falling outside my window I thought about the ones that fell inside, inside of me. We all have weeks like this, I am no exception. Despite my usual 100 watt smile and happy demeanor, a little rain falls on me from time to time. Sometimes this surprises people.

I worked with a woman who once said to me, "I can't imagine anything ever goes wrong for you" I laughed and asked why? She said, "Because you're always so happy". She said it not with any kind of admiration, but a sort of accusation. You're always so happy. I almost felt I needed to apologize.

I am an incredibly happy person and mostly it's self generated. I choose to be happy, choose to not get mired down in the muck of bad feeling and unhappiness that life drops on us each day. That doesn't mean I am never feeling badly or unhappy. I means I don't let it get to me, bring me down. I rise above it, I let go of it and I smile. I always smile.

This week was an exception. I was not at all sad or unhappy....just a little bit blue. I felt something missing, felt an emptiness. You know this feeling.....I didn't know where to put myself. I was at odds, off center. I was not myself. Something just wasn't right.

It didn't intrude on my day to day comings and goings, It didn't keep me awake at night or distract me from my work. It did not stop me from enjoying a single thing...but it was there if I paused and let my mind wander. It was sitting there ... right at the edge of my consciousness.

If my friend from work saw me I'd have said to her "See? Into every one's life a little rain must fall". I would have then opened up an umbrella and went about the day smiling. Smiling because when the rain stops, and it always stops, the sun returns and shines down on the world. Making everything right once again.

Making it right once again.

Indeed