Mom to the Screaming Masses

Turning the Tables - on Yourself

Even though I no longer (gulp) need to attend therapy, I rely heavily on my sticky notes. It's kind of my own form of personal therapy, if you will. 

My therapist would write sayings and thoughts on sticky notes, things she wanted me to work on and remember. I keep them in my bathroom on the mirror, in my truck, and around me in various places so that I can see them and remind myself of various and important (to me) concepts and thoughts. A lot of people think it's silly and stupid. Some people make fun of me for doing it, but I don't care, because these constant, tiny reminders have helped me in many ways and on many days. 

I am very grateful for sticky notes of inspiration, I guess one might say. 

Once, in a session, I was muttering and complaining, as is always my habit, and I said something along the lines of, Why, oh why do I always have a lesson to learn? And I was asked to turn my thinking around - Cognitive Behavioral Therapy, good, juicy stuff - and, instead, ponder this thought

what if, instead of being taught a lesson, 

what if I was put into a situation to help someone else learn something? What if I was the teacher?

Impossible, I said. There's nothing that I can teach people. I can barely manage to get myself dressed most days. 

Maybe not right this minute, or during this really horrible phase in your life, she replied. But soon. Soon the time is coming. 

Before the job that I am currently in, I worked at a different job, one that I thought would be a really good fit for me. Instead, it was a horrible fit, and I cried every day. Now, granted, some of that was my mental status, but some of that was the outright cruelty I experienced on a daily basis. I wondered at the time why I had to experience it - what lesson was this job teaching me?

Maybe I was teaching someone at that terrible job something. 

Maybe when I went to the grocery tonight, and I wiped up the soap that had been spilled on the floor instead of walking around it - even though I didn’t spill it and it wasn’t my responsibility - my actions set off a thought in someone else. 

Potentially, my interactions with other people have made positive ripples and not negative, as I’ve so often feared. 

I really like my current job, and I work with people who are mostly younger than I am. When one of them left tonight, she called out, "Bye, Mom!" and it struck me, for just a second. I'm not her mom, or anyone else's mom there - of course not. But I bring food and give advice on vitamins and skin care and dating and boyfriends and such and maybe

I'm meant to be where I am because someone needs me. I will probably never know, but instead of being upset that I'm almost 50 and just now in college and working at a job with people half my age who are just starting out - maybe everything I'm doing in my life isn't all a mistake, and it all leads me to where I'm supposed to be. 

Just like my sticky note says. 

You are exactly where you need to be at all times. 

Change your thinking. 

It Happened JustLikeThat

I had therapy today. 

It was a normal session. It was light, breezy and very calm. She asked questions and I answered. I talked about situations I'd encountered during the six weeks since my last session (I'd missed and had to reschedule so it had been longer than typical) and she smiled at hearing of my responses. Several times she asked clarifying questions, and at one point she stood up and clapped for me, telling me that she was proud of me, for learning how to tell people how to talk to me and treat me and that I was dealing with my depression and anxiety like a boss and I had had a very good six months with few, although not zero, issues

and at the end of the session, she said

I have always loved our sessions, and I smile when I see your name in my appointment schedule. I enjoy talking with you and hearing about your life. You don't need to make another appointment. 

I looked at her in puzzlement. Was this her way of firing me as a patient?

She said, 

I don't think you need to continue to come see me. You can, of course, call me if you feel the need, and I'd love it if you stop in to say hi. But you don't need to have therapy on a regular basis any longer. 

PEOPLE.

After just about 22 months, I have been released from therapy. I don't know how I feel about this. Strange. Weird. Unfamiliar. Unsteady. Unsure of myself. 

I know that I've done a tremendous amount of work, more work than I even realize until I think about it. She's told me, over and over, how hard I have worked and how proud of me she is. She's told me that I'm one of her hardest working patients, and although I have that annoying tendency to belittle myself and say something like, "Do you only have two patients?" I don't, because it isn't fair or kind to myself to say that. 

I feel a bit like a wobbly newborn calf, afraid to stand alone. I know I can, I know I have the tools and equipment necessary to do so, I have definitely put in the work and the effort to keep myself straight and clean and happy. 

It didn't escape my thought that this happened on World Suicide Prevention Day.

Life is funny that way. 

Good, Bad or Indifferent?

I was asked yesterday if I thought I was a good person, and I actually had to stop and think about it for a hot minute. 

I mean, really, being good is so relative. And it's subjective. It definitely depends on the day. 

For real - do you think you are a good person? Is it hubris to say that you think you are (if you do indeed think you are a good person), and is it false humility if you say that you really aren't a very good person (if you don't think you are a good person)?

What makes a someone a good person?

I mean, I recycle. That makes me a decent person, I think. I care about the environment. I don't use paper or plastic cups or straws - I have reusable of both, and I've been known to give both to friends. I pick up trash when I walk past it. I pick up the fallen off the shelf groceries in the grocery store, and hang up the clothes that have fallen from hangers in the clothing store.

Unless it's the thrift store. EVERYTHING is on the floor there. Ain't nobody got time for that. 

I don't donate blood, even though I have a fairly rare type, A negative. (I had to get those dumb shots every pregnancy.) I would do donate, and I'd do it fairly often, but I have deep seated veins that roll and are difficult for the Red Cross peeps to locate and stick, and the last 5 or 6 times I went, I ended up being stuck by several different people, and I looked like I'd been in a prize fight after - and my iron has been so low for so long that I wasn't allowed. So, I don't donate blood. That could be a tick in the "bad person" category, I suppose. My dad is a super frequent donor and so is The Husband. 

I try to treat people the way I'd like to be treated, I told the guy who asked me. I try to put myself in his shoes and really think about the situation, and try to avoid leaping to conclusions. (This is easier said than done. Leaping is one of my most favorite activities.) At the same point in time, I'm working diligently on standing up for myself and not allowing myself to be treated poorly any longer - which can sometimes be thought of as being bitchy or self righteous. 

I'm nice to people - both old and young - but I can hold a grudge like nobody's business. You've wronged me once, man, and that's it. It's really hard for me to forgive. So I think that's a wash in terms of good and bad, right? 

I try to help the less fortunate, but I don't give money to those who beg at street corners. Not sure if that makes me a hypocrite, but I have spoken to people who work with street people, who say that the best way to help is to give to official channels. I keep a backpack in my truck with help stable foods (soft granola bars, pudding cups, beef jerky, small microwave cups of ravioli, cups of fruit, oatmeal packs in bowls with spoons), new socks, undershirts, and in the winter warm hats - and always water bottles. If I see someone on the street corner, I'll ask if they need a snack or clean socks. Most often, people say no, just money. But if someone is truly in need, and they want those items, I'm happy to help. So, that's a wash - not a good or bad. 

Hmmmmm. This is tougher than I thought. 

Are you snappy with people? Do you cheat on taxes? Do you fail to pay for something that the teller doesn't see at the grocery? Do you always, unfailingly, greet each and every person you see with a smile and a cheerful greeting? Do you keep a cheery disposition no matter what happens?

I don't know the answer - I had to think about it for a while, but I finally told the person who asked me that I felt like I was probably 70% good. And that was a hard figure to come to, because it felt like I was bragging. He asked me why I came up with that number, why it wasn't higher or lower. I don't know. Higher would have felt like bragging, lower would have felt disingenuous. 70% felt like a good, solid number. 

What percentage would you give yourself, and why?

4 a.m. Ponderings

Before I begin - a bit of housekeeping. Should you feel the need to leave a comment that is, shall we say, less than kind? Know that I don't read them. The moment I feel a comment going south, I delete. I'm too tired to deal with that any longer. I am. I have been playing with this internet stuff for sixteen years now, working seriously in a corporate capacity for six of it, and my tolerance level for bullshit is just gone. I pay for this space to have a safe space to unload my thoughts and my feelings and my stuff, and just as I pay for my house, I would never let anyone come into my house and take a dump on my sofa. If you don't agree with me, fine. Move it on. Get your own blog and rant and rave on it. You are not welcome here. I've worked too damned hard on me to let you try to take me down. 

Now. Back to me. 

I don't sleep much. (I'm writing this at 4:40, holla.) So I'm often awake, thinking deep and sometimes random thoughts, mostly how I might make different choices in things, how I might have lived my life differently, or remembering times I've embarrassed and humiliated myself - you know, playing back the "best of" reel that runs through some of our minds, ad nauseam. 

One of the thoughts I keep coming back to is that the schooling choice we made, many eons ago - to send the kids to a small, private, PreK-8 Catholic school - may not have been the best one for us. Sure, in some ways, it was the best one for some of the family. It was definitely the best one for one of my kids, and the best one for my husband, who is deeply religious and felt that this was the exact place the family belonged. I did want the small, family based structure that I thought it brought. 

But, for me, I think in the long run it hurt, because it didn't allow me to be me. I tried to fit in, as best as I could, but I didn't belong to any of the groups. I wasn't a "sports" mom, because none of my kids were super athletic - one of my kids was really good at soccer, but having lots of little kids to take care of meant that I wasn't able to devote my time to hanging around the soccer field and shooting the breeze with the moms and working on strategy with my kid. I wasn't a "room mom", because I had little kids. Also because, let's be real - I don't have the creativity or patience to do that kind of stuff. I didn't have the money needed to be a big time school supporter, wasn't able to spend time in the school volunteering because I had babies (although I do remember taking one field trip with a tiny baby in a sling, and the teacher was totally shocked that she never heard that baby even peep. Yeah. I was good with teeny tiny babies. It's when they become middle schoolers that I struggle, lol.) 

Mostly, I remember being frenetically busy and very lonely, at the same time. 

I tried to fit in with the different groups but I was on the fringes of every one, and I was just different enough that I stood out like a sore thumb. Not religious enough for the homeschool or religious groups. Too religious for the mainstream groups (this really just means I had too many kids, very few people can absorb the fact of a large size family.) Too loud for most of those quiet Catholic ladies, too outgoing for most - it was a long, lonely time that I think affected me more than I realized and caused me to try to close down, to change different aspects of myself that I thought were "suboptimal" were "no good", were too much, too far "out there" 

those parts of me that make other people uncomfortable or nervous or face it - the parts of me that are at war with the parts of them. The parts of me that they just.plain.old.don't.like. And let's face it, if you don't like someone, or if they make you uncomfortable - you aren't kind to them. 

My family was too much. My family was too loud, too difficult to take in, too much to invite over - I mean, for real - what if you had to feed ALL OF THESE PEOPLE? What if you had to LISTEN to ALL OF THOSE CHILDREN TALK ALL AT ONCE? It's not like I might have taught them to listen politely, or to take turns, or that I might have offered to bring food to mitigate the cost, or anything. 

So I tried to minimize all of it, to shrink, to close in, and by doing so, I think - and my therapist agrees with me - that I lost a valid and whole part of myself. The part of me that makes me happy. And it led to some bad thoughts on my side, and some bad choices, and you know what? 

I am not going back there. Not for anyone. Not for anything, not to make anyone happy, ever again. I am the only person I am trying to make happy in my life, because this is MY LIFE  and I am the only person who gets to have a say in it. 

ME. 

I like to have fun. I like to be funny. I like to laugh, to goof around, to be loud and to have color in my life. I love music and dancing. Do you know the movie My Big Fat Greek Wedding? My family is the Greek family. 

I love my family. I love my loud, happy, fun family. I love my loud, happy, dancing, funny, caring, smart self. And if you can't, or don't, want to see that? 

It's your loss. 

Dance, Past and Present

I know that I have mentioned a time or twenty seven that I took dance classes back in the day. 

Oh, haiiiii. I'm back. I am trying to only write when I have something to say, and because I have a lot of stuff to think about but not a lot to share, I've been radio silent lately. 

So, dance classes. 

I only took ballet class. Ballet, and when I was old enough, pointe class, and partnering. 

I really wanted to take jazz class, but the teacher of the class would not let me. She said that I wasn't good enough to join the class. And I was insecure enough and self conscious enough, and she was a big enough bully  - that I believed her. So for many, many years, I believed that I could not dance in any way other than classically. I didn't think I had any rhythm, and didn't think I was any good at any type of popular dance at all. I never danced in public at all. Not at weddings, not at parties, not in public at all. 

It wasn't until about ten years ago that I overcame my uncomfortable feelings and my fear of making a fool of myself and decided that I would just - throw caution to the wind and actually, you know, dance, in public, along to current music, in a group setting, and not worry about making a fool of myself. I think it was probably at a BlogHer conference and I remember dancing with a group of my friends and feeling so incredibly free and alive - and I loved that feeling and wanted to have it again and again. 

Now I dance all the time, no matter when and where I am. In fact, a couple of weeks ago, I even danced in the woods while I was on hike. (There was no one around, holla, which is good, because I probably looked like a crazy pants pyscho, but whatever. Life is short and I have have had a crazy rough time of it for a very long time now and I felt like dancing and I had some really good music on - Summer Rain, by Belinda Carlisle - and it was just, you know, what felt good.)

Lately, I've been taking Zumba and MixxedFitt - a cross between HipHop and Zumba, and at first I was super uncomfortable and thought I must look very awkward and stupid, but the more I do it, the more comfortable I feel, and this past Friday, I had my best class ever. I felt completely at home and after the class, the teacher complimented me on my dance skills. That was the best part of my entire day. I can't explain it - after years of thinking I couldn't do any type of popular dance, I was at home and thoroughly enjoying myself. 

I dance all the time. In the car, in the house, in the shower, in the store, at work, in public, pretty much wherever I am. I have no shame anymore. Life is too short. 

I recently read an article that said that dancing can reverse the signs of aging in the brain. Hopefully my brain will stay young with all of the dancing I've been doing, but if not, it's nice to feel good about myself after so many years of thinking I sucked at something that I love to do. 

Tying Random Streams of Consciousness Together

In no particular order, and then I'll try to connect them - maybe. 

• When I was younger, I took ballet. A LOT of ballet. Like, by the time I was 12, I was in class 4 nights a week for a couple of hours a night, and on the weekends I had rehearsal. It only got more intense as I got older, but I didn't take any other type of dance except for ballet. I really wanted to take jazz, but the jazz teacher didn't think that I was good and she made it really clear that I wasn't welcome in the class. 
• This colored the way that I felt about my dancing for a long, long time. Like, for most of my life. I have had self esteem issues for years and years, and any time that I tried to dance in public, I was super self conscious about my dance capability - I mean, after all, if I wasn't good enough to take jazz class, why did I think that I was good enough to dance in public? I was for certain sure that people were staring at me and laughing. So, for a long time, I just didn't. 
• Over the last several months, I've realized that the more often I exercise, the better I feel. If I make a solid effort to exercise at least 4 days a week, my mood stabilizes and stays elevated. 
• I have discovered that I love Zumba, MixxedFitt (which is a dance combo of Hip-Hop and Zumba), and, oddly enough - hiking. 

I can't adequately explain how much of a difference exercise makes to me, and how foreign this concept is to me. 

Several years ago, had you told me that I would be actively seeking out exercise, I would have laughed in your face - probably while eating a cupcake. I really did not enjoy exercise. Then I discovered boxing. I really loved boxing, and I still do. 

But then I became massively depressed, and exercise dropped off the radar again, and it because ridiculously difficult to even entertain the idea of putting on a pair of sneakers to get moving, never mind trying to participate in some kind of coordinated group activity. Once I started working with a very good therapist and doctor and (finally) followed many of the things I was supposed to do, and began to see some positive results, I decided that I would try to add the exercise component that both of them kept suggesting. I din't think it would make a difference, but I agreed to give it a try for at least a couple of months. What did I have to lose, was my thought process. 

I am not too proud to say that they were right and I was wrong. Exercise has made a significant difference in my mental outlook, the way I feel physically, my emotional tolerance and my, well, everything. I have tried to explain this to people, but I don't think that many really understand. 

So, I try to take Zumba or MixxedFitt at least three days a week at the Rec Center. In the beginning, I was really, really self conscious about it - I had the voice of that jazz teacher in my head telling me that I was no good, I shouldn't try, no one would want to see me. At first, I even apologized to one of the teachers, saying that I knew I wasn't any good, but I would work hard. (She gave me a funny look but was super kind about it.)

As I've felt better over the past several months, and worked with my therapist, my self-esteem has improved, and with it, my feelings in the dance classes. I thoroughly enjoy myself in them, and even though I know I'm not the best, I know I'm not the worst, and more importantly - it absolutely doesn't matter - and I'm enjoying myself immensely. (And? I'm actually better than I thought, now that I've lost weight, feel better about myself and I'm not so self conscious.)

I've also added in hiking at a state park. It's a heavily wooded area, which also includes a beach, and a lot of the trails are hilly, which makes for a great leg workout. There are several different trails, ranging in distance from 2-5 miles, and I've been really enjoying myself walking the paths. I try to go at least twice a week. 

I went hiking today, even though it was raining. In the past, I would have used the rain as an excuse to stay home and take a nap, but I really wanted to hike, and the thought of staying home actually filled me with bitter disappointment. I layered up with a sweater and a sweatshirt and a raincoat, and I took an umbrella. Being out in the cold air and the rain was invigorating and refreshing, and I walked for 4 miles. I don't listen to music when I hike, I just try to empty my mind and just - be. It's a kind of mediation for me. 

I hope I can keep up my exercise enthusiasm, because I am for certain that it's one of the things that is helping me feel so much better lately. And anything that helps me feel better? Well, I am all for that. :)

A Purposeful, Driven Life

Yes, I've taken liberties with the title of the book, but I haven't read the entirety of the book. Just bits and pieces, and although some of it stuck with me, what I want to ramble on (and on, and on and on, lol) about here really doesn't have to do with the book, per se, but just about me. 

Duh. 

For reasons, some of which are because it's good for me (mentally and physically), I have been trying to increase my exercise. Until recently, I would have said that I had a couple of preferred forms of exercise - Rowing and Zumba. Zumba probably squeaks out ahead, because I do love me some dancing, especially because Zumba is an awful lot like dirty club dancing that you can get away with in public, haha. Rowing I enjoy because I can get on the machine, put my music on and just - go. I often zone out and don't really think. Usually after I do either of these, I spend some time on the walking track in the pool and try to do fifteen or twenty laps around - it's  a resistance track and I can spend some time just meditating that way as well. 

When I was visiting my dad, we went hiking in the mountains, and I realized that I absolutely loved it. So when I got home, I found a good place to hike locally (no mountains, sadly, it's all ocean level here) and I bought myself some trail runners and I've been out a few times to walk. I don't listen to music, I try to clear my mind and just walk and not think. 

Easier said than done, especially for me, but it's led me to ponder on the concept of a purposeful, driven life. 

Which is different from a purpose driven life. 

A purpose driven life is defined by three questions:

• The Question of Existence: Why am I alive?
• The Question of Significance: Does my life matter?
• The Question of Purpose: What on earth am I here for?

I think over the past year+, i have pretty much pondered these questions to death :)

so I have moved on to the mechanics of things. 

How am I living a purposeful, driven life? And what, exactly does that mean?

I want to make the rest of my life count for something. I want to make a difference. I want to be helpful, to be a source of strength and encouragement, a place that a person can feel comfortable with. A person who will be remembered as having made a change in something (for the better, please, not for the worse.)

So I need to uncover the purpose. Yes, I have kids, and the purpose of my life has been, and will continue to be, my family - but I am not my family. My children are growing to adulthood and moving on with their lives, as they should, and I am happy for them and proud of them. My life doesn't and shouldn't end with that and the focus will shift to me in the near future. I just need to figure out where I want to move with it. 

Brokenness

I love to read, I will read most anything. I've never made a secret of it. I'd rather read than watch tv, and can often be found with my face buried in a book. Want to gift me and make me happy? Take me to a bookstore. Want to make me delirious? Take me to The Strand in New York City. It's seriously one of my most happy places ever.

Currently I'm deeply immersed inside a fascinating book. When I first started to read this book, I found it so interesting that I read it faster, gulping entire chapters as fast as possible so as to complete it - and a few chapters in, I made myself start over at the beginning of the book. 

I slowed way, way down, which is unusual for me. I began to reflect and digest upon what I was reading. 

The book is called Just Mercy, and it is the true story of Bryan Stevenson, who founded the Equal Justice Initiative, a legal practice dedicated to defending the poor, the wrongly condemned, and women and children trapped deep in the criminal justice system. The story is deeply compelling and utterly fascinating. I am nearing the end of the book, and I was profoundly struck by two separate quotes. 

My years of struggling against inequality, abusive power, poverty, oppression, and injustice had finally revealed something to me about myself. Being close to suffering, death, executions, and cruel punishments didn’t just illuminate the brokenness of others; in a moment of anguish and heartbreak, it also exposed my own brokenness. You can’t effectively fight abusive power, poverty, inequality, illness, oppression, or injustice and not be broken by it. We are all broken by something. We have all hurt someone and have been hurt. We all share the condition of brokenness even if our brokenness is not equivalent. - Just Mercy, by Bryan Stevenson, Chapter Fifteen

We are all broken by something. We have all hurt someone and have been hurt. We all share the condition of brokenness even if our brokenness is not equivalent. I just retyped that part because it was so important to me. I don't work with people in prison, or people on death row. i asked, for many years, to be allowed to do prison ministry. I felt as if I had a calling for it, but the people who handle that aspect of it in my life told me over and over that I wasn't "suited", I wasn't "strong enough", and that they would not let me be a part of it. So I chose, instead, to shift my energy and my spare time to my other passion, working with the homeless. Over the past two years, it has quickly become the most important and fulfilling part of my life. I feel sustained and whole the more I do  - the harder I work, the calmer I feel internally. 

I have personal reasons for feeling so strongly pulled to the homeless community that I don't want to go in to on this blog, because they aren't essential to the core of this story. But at the center of it, my brokenness is no different than theirs. I am the same as any of them, and in fact, I could be one of them, so very easily. I never want to forget that. I hope to have compassion and grace and extend mercy, to remember that someone else's brokenness could be more externally visible, but mine is internally visible and no less potent and in need of mercy and kindness. You can only show kindness when it has been shown to you. 

There is a strength, a power even, in understanding brokenness, because embracing our brokenness creates a need and desire for mercy, and perhaps a corresponding need to show mercy. - Just Mercy, by Bryan Stevenson, Chapter Fifteen

Hello, It's Me

 

Hi there. Remember me? To be honest, I am not even sure if I remember me. Some days, I don't even know who I am anymore. It's been just about three weeks since I wrote here, and I'm sorry. I didn't mean to leave this site and abandon my blog, but I just don't have time in my life to sit at the computer lately. I get up for work at 2:45, get off work at 12, do an errand or two, take a nap if I am super lucky, and then it's time to do house chores, make dinner and start the effort towards bed. If I sit down for a half a second somewhere, I doze off. It's totally ridiculous. 

And then it's the next day. And then the next, and the next. 

But, something cool did happen. 

My daughter had her white coat ceremony. 

She's in her third year of studies, and now begins her clinical rotations. 

Here she is reciting the nursing oath. 

Her first rotation is at the same hospital at which she was born.:)

I had my 49th birthday, and I survived. 

We had a small, intimate Thanksgiving, and we all enjoyed ourselves. The table looked lovely. 

It's been a couple of weeks of ups and downs, just like everyone's life. There have been a couple of what I might call Big Bads, things that have the potential to really change people's lives for the not so good - but, as my therapist tells me all the time - there's really nothing you can do about what's coming in the future, so let's not stress over it. It's enough to know that some of those things are coming, to be prepared for them, and then try, as much as I can, to let the anxiety go and just 

breathe. 

I have such a hard time just breathing. 

You all know this. 

Right now, though, I'm wearing an oversized fuzzy sweater and slippers, my 16 year old is cooking dinner for the first time, I don't have to work tomorrow and I will get to serve Homeless Breakfast in it's place (which is my most favorite time of the week), I will see one of my most favorite people, and I will take myself to lunch after. I have a photography job in the afternoon and was hired for another next week. I am in the process of reading a fantastic book (Just Mercy) and I have a couple of plans for my future that I am trying to clarify in my head. 

Tell me what's new with you. 

Just Get Out There and Do It

One hundred years ago, life was much different for women. In essence, they belonged to their husbands or their fathers. They really didn't have rights. They couldn't make decisions. I mean, they could decide what dress they wanted to wear, and what they wanted to serve for dinner. They could decide what to clips to wear in their hair, that kind of thing. 

A husband could beat his wife with no recourse. 

Most women didn't work out of the home, because their husbands didn't allow it. If women did work out of the home, it ceased after they were married. It wasn't "proper". Women didn't travel alone. Pants weren't worn, ankles weren't shown, bathing suits covered the body. It was expected that women had long hair, kept themselves covered and quiet. 

I would have stuck out like crazy one hundred years ago. Maybe. I dunno. I might have been too afraid. 

Tomorrow is Election Day in the United States. Although it isn't the BIG election, it is a super important election - although, really, every election is an important election. 

Are you planning to vote? 

There will never be a new world order until women are a part of it. - Alice Paul 

Alice Paul was an American suffragist and one of the main leaders and strategists for the Nineteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution which prohibits sex discrimination in the right to vote. Arrested and imprisoned multiple times in her pursuit of the right of suffrage in both England and the United States, Alice Paul worked tirelessly, along with many other women, to change the lives of women and to make history, to allow women to rights and the privilege to enter the voting booth, to cast our ballots as we see fit. In January 1917, discouraged by President Wilson’s continued opposition to the suffrage amendment, Alice Paul posted pickets at the White House gates—the first people to ever picket the White House. They stayed on duty in the face of threats, taunts, and physical violence. Using their banners, they asked, “Mr. President How Long Must Women Wait for their Liberty?” and “Mr. President What Will you do for Woman Suffrage?” Truly, she was key to the right to women's votes. 

The 19th Amendment was ratified on August 18, 1920, and women were given the right to vote, but not full equality, and Alice Paul wasn't through yet. She and the National Women's Party went on to work even harder for equal rights for women, and it was her passion until her death in 1977.

One of my daughters is 21, and I have been impressed and delighted to see her, over the past months, as she has asked, reminded, and cajoled her friends and schoolmates, to register to vote, to remember to vote, to educate themselves to vote. She's been my fiercest, most outspoken political child, and she's badgered all of us to know our stances. It's amazing. 

I have been heartened to see the number of people talking about voting, but equally unhappy to hear discussions from those who aren't even registered to vote, who say things like, "I don't know if I'm registered to vote. It doesn't even matter, I don't really care." 

PEOPLE DIED FOR YOUR RIGHT TO VOTE. 

Women didn't get the right to vote until 1920. African American males didn't get the right to vote until 1870. Native Americans were granted the right to vote, regardless of tribal affiliation, in 1924. (If I am incorrect on these dates, please let me know - I've looked and looked and everything I've found shows them to be correct.)

This election is so important. I don't talk politics here, I just don't. It's something I don't get in to, it's a subject I keep close and closed and private - but whatever your thoughts and beliefs, get out there and vote. You owe it to yourself. If you belong to any of the groups who have not been allowed to vote in the past, you disrespect your ancestors by neglecting your voting duty. 

If you are hesitant to vote because you don't know who to vote for, it's ok! Check out ballotpedia.org. It's a great site to help you discover the ins and outs of your particular ballot, and I found to to be very useful. 

If you need a nudge to get to the polling place, plan a treat for after. Take yourself to lunch, go for a manicure, get a fancy coffee beforehand, buy a new book to read while you stand in line. Bring your headphones with some really kicking' music, because you may be there for a bit of time. 

Just go vote!

I never doubted that equal rights was the right direction. Most reforms, most problems are complicated. But to me, there is nothing complicated about ordinary equality. - Alice Paul