Insights on Ironing

Because my father died when I was seven, my two brothers and I were living on Social Security. We had to learn to work around the house and do serious chores. Looking back on this, I decided that this summer I would iron all of my hundred percent cotton shirts. It is like riding a bicycle, you don't forget how to pull fabric tight in order not to end up with embarrassing creases.

While I was doing this, I thought back to what happened to the women with whom I went to college. I had a friend who went to law school, but she's the only one I knew who did that. I can't remember a woman from my class who went to medical school but I do know that one of them married a guy who implanted the first artificial heart.

So many of the women I went to school with were incredibly intelligent. If they been allowed to, they could have become anything they wanted to. However, there was no such thing as women's liberation.

I knew many women who after getting their bachelors degree went to Katharine Gibbs secretarial school so they could be secretaries to powerful men. The rest I could imagine ironing shirts, doing housework and having coffee with their friends. This really stinks. It was really wrong. When my mom got a job and then retired, the University replaced her with a 22-year-old kid who made $10,000 to her $5000.

I have a daughter who's in a therapy masters program. Another daughter is a resident in OB/GYN. Thank goodness they didn't come of age in 1966.