Everything You Do Matters

This summer another icon has died, Gloria Steinem. I and all other women owe a great debt to those who have had the courage and dedication to stand up for our rights for equal pay, eaual opportunity and reproductive choice.

When I was a teen, the women of my mother's generation and her friendship circle in our new development in New Jersey, had no credit, so they couldn't buy a car or a house They rarely had education beyond high school and some not even that. They were homemakers, and therefore were not paying into social security and had no future financial viability for old age beyond what their husbands supplied, and as the experience of that group showed, that was not a reliable resource. At least 3 of the dozen women in the circle (a cul de sac of the new style of development of the 1950 s) were left by their husbands with three or more children of school age still at home. They had to find some kind of employment though they had no work experience outside the home. This was a very tentative way to live and a very dependent one.

My mother was lucky in that she had a good marriage and a reliable and devoted husband, so she was cared for until she died at the age of 75.

I, however, had other plans and half a dozen children and a life of homemaking wasn't one. My first dream was to finish high school and get a job as a secretary. At the time, that seemed a glamorous and possible goal. My high school, Merchantville, had a career process for students in the business track. Businesses in Philadelphia interviewed students at graduation and we were able to get jobs. My first job was as a clerk at W. B. Saunders Publishers on Washington Square, Phila., Pa. in 1963. I ran addressograph and graphotype machines to print labels for the Book of the Month members postcards. I loved having a job and met so many young women my age from various high schools. We went out to lunch in the local delicatessens on payday and we made plans!

One of them, Jeannette, went to Mexico with me when we were 18. Our horizons were broadened by this experience, both as workers and from working in a big city. My job offered me tuition to advance my office education at Pierce Business School, across the street from the Philadelphia College of Art. PCA is where I really wanted to go, but, I went to business school and became a secretary, then I got married and went to Europe.

When I got home from Europe, the Women's REvolution was in full swing. I got into college through extension school attendance and got a bachelor's degree and a career as a teacher - not a big leap in the world of women - teaching - but a big leap in the world of working class girls like myself. It was the making of me.

Going to college taught me how to go to college and I got three degrees and a divorce and my own apartment and my own income and a secure future. The Women's Movement gave me confidence and a road map.

I didn't have to stay in an abusive marriage to be supported, and I even bought my own house!

Thank you Gloria Steinem! Thank you Bella Abzug, and Betty Friedan, and the army of women whose names I will never know for supporting my dreams and ambitions and my independence.

wrightj45@yahoo.com