My Daughter's World

My Princess, Dressed for Soccer

My daughter is a princess.  In fact, it is one of my nicknames for her. A girly girl to a tee – she has not worn pants in nearly two years.  Will hardly touch anything that is not pink or purple but she isn’t delicate. She isn’t shy. She will take that girly girl ensemble and go straight into the sand and the dirt, the soccer field, the woods. She believes that she can be anything – often at the same time. She told me that she wanted to be a mom and a teacher and dentist and maybe a doctor. And she and I both believe that she can be anything she wants to be and that she can do that in a pink tutu.

The dialogue, the tone, the message on women has changed. You can be girly and strong and smart.  You can choose.

I shuffled to some old music this morning from the Angry Girl genre. At different points in my life, this music felt poignant and important and this morning it just sounded angry and a bit disconnected. Then, I was listening to NPR (not a regular occurrence but sort of like vegetables after too much pop culture candy). They had a segment on 15 year old girls in Afganistan. They were talking about what they wanted to be – brain surgeons, doctors, teachers. The reporter then talked about how hard it would be for these girls. There is only one college space for 5 interested in their country. That family pressure to get married at 18 will derail them.  But half way around the world, we are hearing their dreams. That is at least some progress.

At the end of the segment, they said that this was part of a series on 15 year old girls and that if you were a 15 year old girl or had been, join the conversation on twitter. I looked it up. #15girls has all these stories of girls in Afganistan, Brazil, El Salvador, and some closer to home. I just loved that feminism was a dialogue. I actually hesitated to use the word feminism here. That word conjures up the angry, irrational, polarizing images as compared to the quiet methodical dialogue that we have shifted to.

I heard Chelsea Clinton speak a few weeks ago. She talked about how 20 years ago her mother made a speech in China that was deamed controversial because she said that women’s rights were human rights. Chelsea had a wealth of stats on women around the world and their challenges.  The places where we have made progress and the places where there is still a ways to go.  Our discussion on this topic is not led by the extreme but by intelligent, methodical, compassionate and articulate women and men.

Our archtypes are approachable, sincere. It is everything from Malala to Hillary Clinton to Jennifer Lawrence. It is a mainstream everyday discussion and my daughter’s world will be a little different than mine. And mine has been pretty good. There have been some odd moments. At my first job, I was offered less money then my male counterparts by a female boss and then told it was "a raise for doing a good job" when it was corrected. I was once selected for a diversity program in one of the large corporations I worked for. Let's review - I'm a white, educated woman from the Northeast.  I don't know how that can be considered diversity. But still . . .

Our grandmothers fought for the right to go to college or to work. Our mothers faced the pressures of working in a world where childcare was not as readily available, accessible and affordable (The affordable is a topic for another day). And we have more choice. We have more support. Some of the brightest and most talented women I know get the right and freedom to make choices that work for them and for their families both by working and by opting out. Their husbands are also awarded the same freedom. We have made progress, from the loud and angry, to calm, methodical and deliberate.

Every once in a while it is amazing to realize the things that feel momentous that will just not be part of my children's world. My children will never know a world in which only white men can be President. My children will never know a world in which marriage is restricted, limited and qualified.  There will always be more to fight but I have to say - that is pretty amazing.

My princess can be both a princess and a warrior or a princess super hero as she often calls herself. Makes you want to lean in and out just a bit more.

Thanks for reading.