Showing all posts tagged Hillary Clinton

In Books, Culture, Nurture, Parenting, Personal Growth, Relationships, Writing

Your Little Corner

Author Julianne HarveyPosted on
Your Little Corner

I honestly don’t know what to say anymore. People are being slaughtered weekly with assault rifles in our neighbour to the south and those in power have zero interest in doing anything about it. The president lies, every single day, and on top of that makes racist, misogynist and offensive comments and faces no real consequences for any of it.

My rage is on a slow boil and has been for a long time, but it’s wearing me down. I feel bruised, deep in my soul, and hopeless that nothing is changing. This is not the world I want my kids to grow up in, but I can’t fix these massive problems.

What I can do is focus on my own little corner. You have one too. The people and the pets and the hobbies that you love reside here. You can look after them (and this includes your own beautiful self). You can grow a flower or bake a delicious cake. You can watch a movie or a TV show that helps you escape the horror of the world or gently ushers you toward a fresh outlook. You can read a book that has the power to transform you.

I’ve been making my way through Hillary Clinton’s book, What Happened, and as excellent as it is, I had to stop reading for a bit as what could have been was simply too raw. (Side note: If you don’t like HRC, you are welcome to your opinion, but I don’t want to hear it right now. She is being unfairly bashed online constantly and I’m not allowing that nonsense on my watch).

For a break from real-world pain, I picked up a People magazine borrowed from the library and put it down immediately after reading the headline “Taking Down a Hollywood Predator” with Harvey Weinstein’s mug front and centre. No thanks. More suffering in the form of patriarchy gone wild with power and abuse. I needed something else to inch back toward hope in humankind.

Thankfully, the brilliant Celeste Ng’s newest novel, Little Fires Everywhere, was in for me on the hold shelf. I raced to the library to get it, having just finished her debut, Everything I Never Told You, which broke my heart but in such a healing and redemptive manner. If you haven’t read Celeste Ng, please put these two books at the top of your TBR pile. Her talent is awe-inspiring.

This brings me back to my little corner. I’m finding it really, really, really challenging to write blogs right now. Everything I want to say is too raw and unfiltered – too brutal for human consumption. I start to type it and I can’t get it to sound right. So I backpedal and feel like I’ve failed. I know I’m not adding anything meaningful to the conversation. But maybe that’s okay. Perhaps what I’m meant to do in this god-awful time is just to say, “I’m here too. I’m hurting, just like you. Let’s look after ourselves and our loved ones.”

Anne Lamott tells a story in one of her books about planting a certain type of tulip that only blooms for a few days each spring. She was complaining to a friend about it, saying, “What is the point of all that work to only enjoy the flowers for 4 or 5 days?” Her friend’s answer? “The point is those 4 or 5 days.”

I’d like that lesson to patch up my hope so I can keep going. It doesn’t seem like enough. But when it’s all we have, perhaps that will have to do. I’m going to tend to my little corner while you tend to yours. Maybe, just maybe, it will temporarily brighten up the world and help us find the solutions we need for harmony, peace and optimism again.

In Culture, Identity, Parenting

Gender Equality Progress

Author Julianne HarveyPosted on Leave a comment
Gender Equality Progress

I think it’s time to talk about Hillary Clinton. This isn’t a political post, but it is a discussion on gender roles, which feels like the best part of the U.S. election process so far.

I grew up in a conservative, evangelical Christian environment. I was taught that the husband is the head of the home and that the wife’s role was to submit to his authority. This seemed unacceptable and unhealthy to me then and I feel exactly the same way now as a forty-three-year-old woman.

It simply does not work. Most of the women in my childhood model said all the right and demure things about being submissive while finding inventive ways to manipulate, control and manage the outcome of any situation. It was a system that bred resentment, distrust and outright abuses of power.

When I fell in love as a twenty-three-year old, I made damn sure to find a man who did not subscribe to this “the man is the head of the home” dictate. Jason was (and is) open-minded and flexible in his worldview; a fact that has led directly to a more balanced way of life for our two children.

Gender Equality ProgressAva just turned thirteen and is a budding activist for gender equality. My heart swells with pride when I watch her stand up for the rights of girls and women to be anything and anyone they choose – rights that boys and men have taken for granted for centuries. Ava says all of the words I was too timid to express when I was her age. She inspires me to speak up and be braver now.

This “Smile for Joe” hashtag gets me all riled up. The idea that a man believes he can tell a woman what to do with her face when she delivers a victory speech (in 2016 for shit’s sake) simply demonstrates how deep this unconscious bias runs in North American culture. Why should a woman have to smile? Is it to demonstrate how easygoing and sweet she is so that men feel more comfortable. No way. Not any longer.

Then there are the young women who decided they won’t vote for Hillary because she’s a woman and they feel they are “expected to.” This baffles me. Don’t vote for her if you don’t like her politics – I can respect that. But to say it’s too obvious because you’re a feminist shows that you don’t understand just how hard women have had to fight for their rights to get you to this point. And we are still fighting. We all still have work to do.

I’m hopeful that we are making progress. The little things matter when we are talking about gender equality. Language is important. I love that Hillary is running so these issues are front and centre. If no one would criticize a man for saying or doing something (i.e. not smiling in a speech) then the same must go for a woman.

We are all in this together but I do think we are moving in the right direction and that makes me happy (even if I don’t smile in public over it). Let’s keep going. One day these posts won’t be necessary at all.