I just saw the cover of The New York Times Magazine for today… Sunday, January 25, 2009. The headline reads, “What Is Female Desire?” and the sub head goes on to encourage us to read Daniel Bergner’s article entitled “What Do Women Want?” where “A postfeminist generation of researchers is discovering things Dr. Freud could never have imagined.“ As Roxy’s loyal Today.com readers know, I’ve been talking about what women want since I started this blog devoted to WOMEN back in mid December, so I see Daniel Bergner (A MAN!) and The New York Times Magazine as jumping on Roxy’s bandwagon. It’s another cold winter day in the Roxiticus Valley, perfect for relaxing with The New York Times, so I will read it and let you know the highlights of what a man thinks women want.
It may not have a beat that you can dance to, but I think you’ll all agree that Martin Luther King, Jr.’s “I Have A Dream” speech is lyrical and music to our ears. London and Maddie have the day off from Mendham Township Elementary School in honor of Martin Luther King, Jr., and both of them will be reading the speech and watching and listening to the video as part of a class research project. Please join London and Maddie, Rex and me in celebrating Martin Luther King Jr. Music Monday.
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Delivered on the steps at the Lincoln Memorial in Washington D.C.
August 28, 1963
I am happy to join with you today in what will go down in history as the greatest demonstration for freedom in the history of our nation.
Five score years ago, a great American, in whose symbolic shadow we stand today, signed the Emancipation Proclamation. This momentous decree came as a great beacon of hope to millions of slaves, who had been seared in the flames of withering injustice. It came as a joyous daybreak to end the long night of their captivity. But one hundred years later, the colored America is still not free. One hundred years later, the life of the colored American is still sadly crippled by the manacle of segregation and the chains of discrimination.
One hundred years later, the colored American lives on a lonely island of poverty in the midst of a vast ocean of material prosperity. One hundred years later, the colored American is still languishing in the corners of American society and finds himself an exile in his own land So we have come here today to dramatize a shameful condition.
In a sense we have come to our nation’s capital to cash a check. When the architects of our great republic wrote the magnificent words of the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence, they were signing a promissory note to which every American was to fall heir.
This note was a promise that all men, yes, black men as well as white men, would be guaranteed to the inalienable rights of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.
It is obvious today that America has defaulted on this promissory note insofar as her citizens of color are concerned. Instead of honoring this sacred obligation, America has given its colored people a bad check, a check that has come back marked “insufficient funds.”
But we refuse to believe that the bank of justice is bankrupt. We refuse to believe that there are insufficient funds in the great vaults of opportunity of this nation. So we have come to cash this check, a check that will give us upon demand the riches of freedom and security of justice.
We have also come to this hallowed spot to remind America of the fierce urgency of Now. This is not time to engage in the luxury of cooling off or to take the tranquilizing drug of gradualism.
Now is the time to make real the promise of democracy.
Now it the time to rise from the dark and desolate valley of segregation to the sunlit path of racial justice.
Now it the time to lift our nation from the quicksand of racial injustice to the solid rock of brotherhood.
Now is the time to make justice a reality to all of God’s children.
It would be fatal for the nation to overlook the urgency of the moment and to underestimate the determination of it’s colored citizens. This sweltering summer of the colored people’s legitimate discontent will not pass until there is an invigorating autumn of freedom and equality. Nineteen sixty-three is not an end but a beginning. Those who hope that the colored Americans needed to blow off steam and will now be content will have a rude awakening if the nation returns to business as usual.
There will be neither rest nor tranquility in America until the colored citizen is granted his citizenship rights. The whirlwinds of revolt will continue to shake the foundations of our nation until the bright day of justice emerges.
We can never be satisfied as long as our bodies, heavy with the fatigue of travel, cannot gain lodging in the motels of the highways and the hotels of the cities.
We cannot be satisfied as long as the colored person’s basic mobility is from a smaller ghetto to a larger one.
We can never be satisfied as long as our children are stripped of their selfhood and robbed of their dignity by signs stating “for white only.”
We cannot be satisfied as long as a colored person in Mississippi cannot vote and a colored person in New York believes he has nothing for which to vote.
No, no we are not satisfied and we will not be satisfied until justice rolls down like waters and righteousness like a mighty stream.
I am not unmindful that some of you have come here out of your trials and tribulations. Some of you have come from areas where your quest for freedom left you battered by storms of persecutions and staggered by the winds of police brutality.
You have been the veterans of creative suffering. Continue to work with the faith that unearned suffering is redemptive.
Go back to Mississippi, go back to Alabama, go back to South Carolina go back to Georgia, go back to Louisiana, go back to the slums and ghettos of our modern cities, knowing that somehow this situation can and will be changed.
Let us not wallow in the valley of despair. I say to you, my friends, we have the difficulties of today and tomorrow.
I still have a dream. It is a dream deeply rooted in the American dream.
I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed. “We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men are created equal.”
I have a dream that one day out in the red hills of Georgia the sons of former slaves and the sons of former slave owners will be able to sit down together at the table of brotherhood.
I have a dream that one day even the state of Mississippi, a state sweltering with the heat of oppression, will be transformed into an oasis of freedom and justice.
I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by their character.
I have a dream today.
I have a dream that one day down in Alabama, with its vicious racists, with its governor having his lips dripping with the words of interposition and nullification; that one day right down in Alabama little black boys and black girls will be able to join hands with little white boys and white girls as sisters and brothers.
I have a dream today.
I have a dream that one day every valley shall be engulfed, every hill shall be exalted and every mountain shall be made low, the rough places will be made plains and the crooked places will be made straight and the glory of the Lord shall be revealed and all flesh shall see it together.
This is our hope. This is the faith that I will go back to the South with. With this faith we will be able to hew out of the mountain of despair a stone of hope.
With this faith we will be able to transform the jangling discords of our nation into a beautiful symphony of brotherhood.
With this faith we will be able to work together, to pray together, to struggle together, to go to jail together, to climb up for freedom together, knowing that we will be free one day.
This will be the day when all of God’s children will be able to sing with new meaning “My country ’tis of thee, sweet land of liberty, of thee I sing. Land where my fathers died, land of the Pilgrim’s pride, from every mountainside, let freedom ring!”
And if America is to be a great nation, this must become true. So let freedom ring from the hilltops of New Hampshire. Let freedom ring from the mighty mountains of New York. Let freedom ring from the heightening Alleghenies of Pennsylvania. Let freedom ring from the snow-capped Rockies of Colorado. Let freedom ring from the curvaceous slopes of California. But not only that, let freedom, ring from Stone Mountain of Georgia. Let freedom ring from every hill and molehill of Mississippi and every mountainside.
When we let freedom ring, when we let it ring from every tenement and every hamlet, from every state and every city, we will be able to speed up that day when all of God’s children, black men and white men, Jews and Gentiles, Protestants and Catholics, will be able to join hands and sing in the words of the old Negro spiritual,
“Free at last, free at last. Thank God Almighty, we are free at last.”
Come join Music Monday and share your songs with us. One simple rule, leave ONLY the actual post link here. You can grab this code at LJL Please note these links are STRICTLY for Music Monday participants only. All others will be deleted.
Rex and I are still wishing people a Happy New Year, but I’d say there aren’t too many more days we can get away with that, and we’d better get our last handful of New Year’s cards out in the mail on Tuesday, along with a Happy Martin Luther King Jr. Day greeting for sending them out so late… the ones that slip are the people who have moved and changed their address, or new friends who haven’t been on our mailing list in previous years.
Just to prove to all of you that I’m not the only one who’s a little bit behind, the 4-H Prep New Year’s Party was rescheduled for tonight due to last weekend’s snow, so Rex, London, Maddie and I are off to wish all of our 4-H friends a Happy New Year.
I’ll probably end up posting this over on Rex’s Recipes for the New Year, maybe even with photos, after we get a chance to try it out… but in the meantime, I thought I’d share a recipe for Mary’s Old-Fashioned Buttermilk Pancakes:
1 large egg
1 cup Flour
1 cup Buttermilk
1 tsp. baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
2 tablespoons vegetable oil
1 tablespoon sugar
Combine all dry ingredients in a bowl and set aside. Combine all wet ingredients in a large mixing bowl. Add dry ingredients to wet, being sure to not over mix. (you do not want tough pancakes!) Makes about (20) 6″ pancakes.
Mary sent the recipe along to me after we were both snowed in over the weekend and we agreed that the wintry weather seems to bring out the inner Martha Stewart in all of us. Rex and the girls frequently make pancakes on the weekends, but their idea of “from scratch” means throwing a few chocolate chips into the Bisquick mix. Mary made it sound easy to pull together, not to mention using low fat buttermilk to make them less fattening than the kind from a box.
Do you have a favorite wintry recipe you’d like to share?
I had a few different thoughts on this week’s Music Monday pick for my Today.com blog about WOMEN… Mariuca has “Twisted” by Keith Sweat on Mariuca’s Perfume Gallery, which made me think of his “Make You Sweat” as part of my Winter Work Out theme… but my bones have been feeling rickety and old in the snow this weekend, so I haven’t been keeping up on my New Year’s Resolution of Fitness Not Fatness in 2009. Instead, I’ve opted for romantic… I unsuccessfully searched YouTube for a video Patti Scialfa’s “Come Tomorrow”…. a song she wrote about her relationship with Bruce Springsteen when he was still married to Julianne Phillips that has always been an anthem for Rex and me. I do have another romantic favorite with beautiful lyrics from Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band, so I hope you’ll enjoy “If I Should Fall Behind.”
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We said we’d walk together baby come what may
That come the twilight should we lose our way
If as were walkin’ a hand should slip free
I’ll wait for you
And should I fall behind
Wait for meWe swore we’d travel darlin’ side by side
We’d help each other stay in stride
But each lover’s steps fall so differently
But I’ll wait for you
And if I should fall behind
Wait for meNow everyone dreams of a love lasting and true
But you and I know what this world can do
So let’s make our steps clear that the other may see
And I’ll wait for you
If I should fall behind
Wait for me
Now there’s a beautiful river in the valley ahead
There ‘neath the oak’s bough soon we will be wed
Should we lose each other in the shadow of the evening trees
I’ll wait for you
And should I fall behind
Wait for me
Darlin’ I’ll wait for you
Should I fall behind
Wait for me
Come join Music Monday and share your songs with us. One simple rule, leave ONLY the actual post link here. You can grab this code at LJL Please note these links are STRICTLY for Music Monday participants only. All others will be deleted.
I woke up this morning and realized that I was supposed to be this week’s “Mystery Reader” in London’s second grade class at Mendham Township Elementary School, and that 1) I had neglected to send in any of the daily clues and 2) although I have worked from home on every single Friday for the past five years, on this particular Friday, Rex and I have a very important business meeting in New York City that conflicts with my Mystery Reader slot on Friday afternoon. At this point, I feel like the worst mom in the world to have let my daughter down.
It’s funny, this morning I was just reading an article in Cookie Magazine about Brooke Shields and how being a mom makes her feel normal, possibly for the first time in her life. Brooke goes on about how her daughters will always remember how she did things in their classrooms, but they won’t even notice that she was exhausted at the time, so she gets to the school for her commitments on little to no sleep, tired or not.
Since I haven’t pulled together all of my New Year’s Resolutions in time to get started on January 1st, I’m thinking of starting over on Chinese New Year. This year it will be celebrated on January 26th, launching into the Year of the Ox. One thing I’d like to be better about is “taming the paper dragon,” or dealing with all of the paperwork in my life. Without Rex, I’d be turning into one of those little old ladies they find buried in stacks of newspapers from the last ninety years!
I try to expose my two little girls, London and Maddie, to traditions from other cultures, particularly the ones that offer the most fun. I did a little research and learned that the Chinese lunar calendar is 2,640 years older than ours and never begins on January 1st, nor does it begin on the same date each year. It can begin any time between January 21st and February 18th, depending on the date of the New Moon in Aquarius. Each year is named for an animal. Every 12 years this cycle begins again. The Chinese say that the animal ruling the year you were born will influence your life. London was born in the Year of the Snake, Maddie and I were born in the Year of the Horse, and Rex was born in the Year of the Rooster… I wonder what that says about all of us. More details to come in time to celebrate Chinese New Year on January 26th.
I’ve provided a little chart here so you can look up the year of your birth. Go ahead and look up which Chinese year you were born in, and please leave a comment so we can learn more about our animals as we begin our celebration.
What kind of blog about WOMEN would be complete without a little Tina Turner, and this one is “Simply the Best,” dedicated to the love of my life… Rex!
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I call you, when I need you my heart’s on fire
You come to me, come to me, wild and wild
You come to me, give me everything I need
Give me a lifetime of promises and a world of dreams
Speak the language of love like you know what it means
And it can’t be wrong, take my heart and make it strong, baby
Chorus:
You’re simply the best, better than all the rest, better than anyone, anyone
I’ve ever met!
I’m stuck on your heart, I hang on every word you say
Tear us apart, baby I would rather be dead
In your heart I see the start of every night and every day
In your eyes, I get lost, I get washed away
Just as long as I’m here in your arms I could be in no better place…
Chorus:
You’re simply the best, better than all the rest, better than anyone, anyone
I’ve ever met!
I’m stuck on your heart, I hang on every word you say
Tear us apart, baby I would rather be dead
It’s the time you leave me I start losing control, you’re walking away with my
Heart and my soul, I can feel you even when I’m alone, oh baby don’t let go!
And you’re the best, better than all the rest, better than anyone, anyone I’ve
Ever met!
I’m stuck on your heart, I hang on every word you say
Tear us apart, baby I would rather be dead, ooh you’re the best!
Come join Music Monday and share your songs with us. One simple rule, leave ONLY the actual post link here. You can grab this code at LJL Please note these links are STRICTLY for Music Monday participants only. All others will be deleted.
Late Saturday night, January 3rd. It sure feels like the holidays are winding down, and I’m grateful that our family has had an incredibly relaxing vacation…hanging out at home, doing jigsaw puzzles, crafts and other family projects. I’ve been working out on the elliptical trainer in our basement, while London and Maddie bang out a rhythm on the new set of bright red drums Santa delivered for their girl band, the Butter Bites. Rex and I are ready to launch in to the New Year 2009 in earnest with a focus on our investment banking practice, and London and Maddie are ready to get back to school. I ran into a post about Napoleon Hill’s “Think and Grow Rich” over on Whatever Ebay , with a link to a free PDF of the book. An on again, off again rich boyfriend (known as Johnny Moneybags on my Roxiticus Desperate Housewives blog) gave me the book back in 1991 and it has changed my life.
Over on my Roxiticus Desperate Housewives blog, I just posted an old photo of Maddie at Yankee Stadium in 2002. She was about 3 months old and just cute as a button. Tonight, almost six years later, Maddie and her sister, London, were cuddled up in my bed for bedtime stories. I know it’s a cliche, but I was truly taken aback by how time flies and things change. When our family lived in Manhattan’s West Village, we made it to at least two and sometimes as many as eight Yankee games each season, with the little ones in tow. Then we moved out to the Roxiticus Valley (Mendham, New Jersey) and our priorities have changed. This year (well, last year now that we’re 2 days into 2009), the Yankees played their last game at Yankee Stadium, and we didn’t make it to a single game. I guess it started to feel like more of a hassle to trek out to the Bronx for a ballgame when we could be playing in our backyard instead. Maybe we’ll get back to it once the girls are a few years older, playing softball in the backyard and imagining themselves pitching a no hitter for the Yankees in the World Series. Or maybe that was just their mom’s childhood dream.
