"WOMEN'S MONTH"

" March is Women's Month"

March has been named the Women's Month internationally.
We here in San Luis Obispo, have gotten together with my women's group and organized several chats, workshops and meetings to exchange stories and talents.
Today I went to the local library ( it was raining hard) and we got together about twenty or so women of all ages and some four men, at the community room.

First spoke a very nice young woman from Cal Poly, she choose to share a story about her grandma who came from Ireland in the early 1900's , she arrived in New York at 16 alone by boat, to live with her brother who had emigrated earlier.

She shared that the grandma was the first woman in her family to graduate from High School, how she married and moved to a farm with her husband, how she had six children, drove a tractor, milked the cows before dawn and never got sick in her life.
When she was 90 and a widow, she lived alone in the farm and a group of volunteers from "meals on wheels" came to her home to explain to her that they delivered food to the old people living alone.
She thanked them but declined helping them, because she told them "she was too old to drive a delivery truck!"
It was a cute story of a hard working woman, who never asked for anything, but gave all until she was over 100 when she went to sleep and never woke again.

The second story was shared by a 46 year old teacher, she told us of her aunt a pilot during the second world war, she was a teacher in the air force and also a athlete in the Olympic games in Germany.
She took out of her bag, several objects that belonged to her aunt and it was awesome to hold in my hands her running shoes, her "wings" and see a picture of this incredible woman.

The third story was from a grandma who spoke about her mom, who was the first one in her family in Wyoming to graduate from college, she showed us pictures of her mom and passed the original college diploma from 1910


The fourth story was from a man, he spoke about his wife, how they met, their courtship, their marriage, their children and shared some poems she wrote when they were engaged, the poems were full of hope and love.
He told us that he misses her so much since she died and how he values her even more now that she is gone.

The fifth story was told by a woman of sixty, who celebrated her mom, who was sitting next to her and of about 90.
She told us how when her mom was young, women had no vote, no rights and how she admires her mom so much for her activism and the excellent example she gave her.
She finished by placing a tiara on her mom head with the words "queen" we applauded and laughed with her.

Then a grandfather celebrated his granddaughters for their activism and involvement in the community, the girls he said, go to the local hospitals, bringing magazines to the patients and also plant tomatoes in the community garden ( we have a park here, where we have a community vegetable garden, where anybody can go and plant and harvest veggies, specially tomatoes, My grandson Zachary and I used to go over and water the tomatoes and he loved to pick the cherry tomatoes and eat them giggling ).

After that it was my turn, I celebrated my mom, I said I always admired her for her intelligence, beauty and big heart. But when in September 11, 1973 she went to the national stadium, where the political prisoners were kept by the military government, in her Red Cross uniform and she sat in her little chair and interview the women political prisoner, she took their messages and passed them to their families, and made sure their human rights were respected, she transformed herself in my heroine!

The next story was very peculiar and funny, a little old man got up and said he wanted to celebrate the two wives of the prophet Mohamed!
Most jaws dropped, as we were all talking about women in our families, but he continued..
He told us that when Mohamed was 25 years old, he was very poor, but very honest and that one day he got a marriage proposal from a old rich widow who had observed him being honest, anyway the story continued, with camels and caravans, and desert etc.
I was checking on the faces around the table, and nobody knew where the story would lead.
He spoke of how his three sons died and the three daughters lived, how the prophet married his last wife who stayed with him into his old age and how she was instrumental in teaching women after she became a widow, in any case it was a colorful story and the host had to take the mike away as he went over the allowed time.

When I said goodbye to everyone, I thank the old man in Arabic, and he was very impressed.
I drove home in the rain, and the house is quiet as all my kids are gone today, I am in bed, it is raining hard outside, I hear the hail hitting the windows and I am warm in my bed.
A big hug,

Sonia Paz