This Woman's Work
#29: My Thoughts on Her Journal
Ruth Benedict, one of the first women to attain recognition as a major social scientist, wrote in her journal in 1912:
"To me it seems a very terrible thing to be a woman. There is one crown which perhaps is worth it all - a great love, a quiet home, and children. We all know that this is all that is worthwhile, and we must peg away, showing off our wares if we have money, or manufacturing careers for ourselves if we haven't. We have not the motive to prepare ourselves for a 'lifework' of teaching, of social work - we know that we would lay it down with hallelujah in the height of our success, to make a home for the right man. And all the time in the background of our consciousness rings the warning that perhaps the right man will never come. A great love is given to very few. Perhaps this makeshift time-filler of a job is our lifework after all."
posted by VivaGlam! at 8:34 PM
2 Comments:
hmmmmm... can't immediately comment on that... but hey, glads, its not a question of the "right guy" but rather if you're the "right one" for him... but that's just experience talking... :)
11:31 PM
Is this Lee???
You just can't stick to our "Gucci Stardust" script, eh? You'll make a very bad actor. (Yes, worse than Joey Tribianni).
I personally think it's actually the right fit. It's those two components being brought together by the Creator and Architect of all, and not just the right guy or the right girl taken in isolation.
Don't worry. I'm not pining for a guy. (But if Prince William gives me a call, hey, I cannot promise that I will not faint.) I'm just learning to be softer now, consciously tempering my careerist drives to actually allow myself to be a woman from time to time. (Not that those two are mutually exclusive... but come on, you know what I mean. I used to be so proud to have received a comment that I think like a man. You catch my drift?)
1:38 AM
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