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The women in your life roar with influence




“Whatever you choose, however many roads you travel, I hope that you choose not to be a lady. I hope you will find some way to break the rules and make a little trouble out there. And I also hope that you will choose to make some of that trouble on behalf of women.” — Nora Ephron

I am a woman. I am doing my best to live life as who I am, and even that is not always easy because I, like most everyone else, am changing.

And so, as I think about a month when women have been celebrated, I wonder why there’s a special month for women or Blacks or anyone else. It always comes back to the truth — you men, especially white men, have never not been celebrated, so everyone else is being given an opportunity to not be forgotten.

Instead of looking at the women in history we collectively appreciate, why not look within our own lives? I mean, Susan B. Anthony and Sojourner Truth are important names, but so are names like Liz, Carolyn, Carole, Margaret, Betty, Lucia, Sharon and Donna. It has been a lot of fun to think of all the women who have helped me become who I am, who support me as I continue to evolve. Of course, there have been men, too, but for today it’s about the women.

What about in your life? Was it a parent, grandparent, aunt? Or was there a neighbor who taught you kindness and compassion or taught you to be tough in the face of adversity? I hope you’ll sit for just a minute and think of the women who crossed your path and helped you become who you are today.

They matter. They matter in our personal lives, and they matter in our communities.

From before I was born, women have been helping me get through life and have been positively affecting the communities in which I have lived. There was a group of women in the church where I grew up who mothered me, fed me, advised me and protected me at one time or another.

When I hadn’t eaten my dinner, they would give me ice cream. When my parents were going to be out of town, they gave me a bed and food and a different perspective. They were my “other mothers.” Did you have “other mothers?” Have you been an “other mother?” I think we all need those people (especially women, this month).

Carole and Carolyn lived down the street when I was a teenager, and from them I learned about vitamins and healthy foods — things my mother could tell me that I would never hear. They trusted me to babysit their children, helped me make money, and really helped me feel better about myself. They were “strong women” in my life.

Did you have “strong women” like that? Have you been a “strong woman (or man)” like that? What a treat to know we can make a positive impact on a young person’s life!

I’ve worked with women who weren’t people I wanted to celebrate, but I can look back and know they felt they had to make a name for themselves, even if it meant making me feel lousy and less valued than I needed to feel. I hope I’ve never been that kind of “power-hungry woman.” I hope we each remember how painful it was to be treated poorly by that kind of “power-hungry woman” (or man) as we decide how to treat people in our work places or schools or homes.

Women are humans, with feelings, aspirations, and wisdom. Women’s intuition is talked about for good reason — it’s real and to be valued. I am equally grateful for the work of women I’ve never known who helped us reach a society where women are more properly recognized for all they bring to the table besides a delicious or burned meal. Or are we really properly recognized?

Some things are still harder on women:

• For every dollar a man earns, a woman earns 82 cents.

• One in five women have been raped, while only one in 71 men has.

• Seventy-one percent of human trafficking victims are women and children

• Women perform more than two and a half times the domestic tasks and care that men do

In light of the #MeToo movement, it’s easy to think that celebrating women means bashing men, but that isn’t the case at all. Just as we can’t undo the harm we’ve allowed to Blacks, Hispanics, Native Americans, and Asians, we can’t undo the harm that has been done to women.

And just like we recognize the importance of doing better in our treatment of groups of people who look, live or worship differently than we do, we recognize the importance of doing better in not allowing women to be manipulated into doing things with a man so she can attain a successful place in business or in society. When we know better, we do better, or we should.

My point is, I value every woman in my life, and maybe you do, too, but society does not. Thanks to women like my great-great-grandmother, we women have the right to vote in the United States, but even then, it is not made easy for us, depending on the color of our skin.

I am glad to have the men and women who walk beside me, who do their part to elevate women they know and don’t know. I am especially proud of a son who will not stand by while a woman is spoken to badly.

I continue to not reap the benefits many men do because while I’ve found my voice in some areas, I haven’t found it in other places.

I’ll keep pressing forward and hope that my children will be able to look back at the ways I have worried less about being a lady and more about helping others, especially other women, on this magnificent road of life.

p.s. Thank you to Gayle, Emily, Ginger, Carlene, Betty Belle, Molly, Vanessa, Susan and so many others who have helped me limp along at times and dragged me kicking and screaming at other times. Surround yourself with women who will lift you up, treat you with respect, and love you honestly.

Susan Black Steen is a writer and photographer, a native Tennessean and a graduate of Austin Peay State University. With a firm belief that words matter, she writes and speaks to bring joy, comfort and understanding into each life. Always, she writes from her heart in hopes of speaking to the hearts of others.

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