Life is a New Draft for Every Day

Rolling in the deep of Women's History month, I can't resist.

There was the "Virginia Women: Their Lives and Times" lecture at the Library of Virginia, an event attended by 36 women and 6 men about a two-volume set by that name.

Editors Sandra Treadway and Cindy Kierner explained that they'd intentionally chose women that readers wouldn't know, the better to pique their interest.

Of course Dolly Madison was there, but not the Dolly of myriad social graces we usually hear about.

Instead, this essay dealt with how the North Carolina-born Dolly spent her life denying it and trying to pass herself off as a Virginian. True, her parents were Virginians, but the essay addresses the question of why she felt it preferable to be thought of as a Virginian.

There was Jane Webb, a free mixed race woman living on the Eastern Shore who spent much of her life shrewdly and tenaciously fighting the courts to ensure that her children were free as well. Virginia wasn't the best state for following the letter of the law about freed blacks so she used the law to protect her family at a time when few blacks could read, much less write legal documents.

But the most fascinating woman by far was Grace Sherwood, a woman tried five times - five! - on suspicion of being a witch, specifically, the witch of Pungo. And why did the men think that, you wonder?

Because her husband had died and she didn't remarry, so then she was a property owning woman. Because she was assertive and known to be crabby. Because - gasp! - she occasionally wore trousers. In other words, just the kind of woman that colonial men wanted to do away with.

And the best part of that story is that not only is there a statue of her in Virginia Beach now, but when Tim Kaine was governor, he pardoned Grace.

It takes a feminist man to reach back and right a 17th century wrong.

There was also TheatreLAB's production of "My Name is Rachel Corrie," a one-woman show about the Seattle born and raised activist (who says she ended up just like her mother expected: scattered and deviant and too loud) who died in 2003 in Palestine protesting the bulldozing of innocent people's homes.

The issue is real, obviously, and Rachel's concern for the kind of evil being powered by American dollars in that part of the world resonated with truth, but at intermission, the couple nearest me were discussing how manic the first act was and whether it was even convincing.

I was convinced, but also distracted by how frequently actress Kaelie James rearranged her hair, so it was a relief to see it in a ponytail for the second act.

Granted, it's a heavy subject (Pru had declined my invitation, saying she didn't want her evening entertainment with political commentary because it was too depressing), but given that the script was an amalgamation of Rachel's journal entries and emails, it was a powerful one, too.

The entire row behind me didn't return after intermission, and once it began, I saw two guys nodding off, jerking their heads up repeatedly, a shame really because they probably missed the final point of what a tragedy it is that so many people consider Israeli policy and Jewish people the same thing.

And then, just to rip out hearts out completely, the play ended with film footage of Rachel in a 5th grade speech, passionately making a case for feeding hungry people in the middle east regardless of their religion. In fifth grade.

But by far my biggest project in celebration of Women's History month was about books.

I'd recently seen a video of a mother and young daughter going through a bookcase of children's books, removing all the ones with no female characters, then all the ones with female characters who had no speaking parts until the shelves were decimated and it got me thinking.

I've got a bookcase the length of my living room wall - 23 shelves in all - and I had no earthly idea how many of the books I owned were written by women or about women.

So I set out to find out, pulling titles and authors that had XX chromosomes.

There were the usual literary suspects: Charlotte and Emily Bronte, Edith Wharton, Harper Lee, Dorothy Parker, Sylvia Plath, Katherine Anne Porter, Ann Beattie (inside "Secrets and Surprises" I found my ticket stub to see Diana Ross at the Capital Centre..score!), Willa Cather, Muriel Spark and Anais Nin, among others.

There was the feminist element: Ellen Goodman, Marilyn French, Susan Jacoby, Charlotte Perkins Gilman, Gail Collins and Erica Jong, as well as the food contingent: Judith Child, M.F.K. Fisher, Betty Fussel and Ruth Reichl.

Long a fan of non-fiction, there were plenty of memoirs, biographies and autobiographies: Diane Arbus, Vera Nabokov, Sally Hemmings, Coco Chanel, Carrie Fisher, Georgia O'Keefe, Katherine Graham and Peggy Guggenheim. Not all written by women, but all written about a woman.

Dust flying, I pulled out books on art, photography ("The Female Focus: Women Photographers") and punctuation, a graphic novel, hell, even "Our American Sisters: Women in American Life and Thought," from my first women's studies class in college.

A few did double duty, like "Secrets of the Flesh: A Life of Colette" by Judith Thurman or "First Mothers: The Women Who Shaped the Presidents" by Bonnie Angelo.

I'm not going to say I sorted through every single book in my collection because I didn't (why is it a deadline always rears its head when I'm in an organizing mood?), but I dug through enough to come up with nearly five shelves of nothing but female-centric books.

And, quite frankly and surprisingly, that's a little embarrassing. Out of 23 shelves, I only have enough tomes to fill five shelves representing the blood, sweat and tears of a woman's mind or life?

Time to preach. Ever Since Eve (also a title on my shelf), there's been an imbalance. The Possible She (yep, another one) is still just out of reach.

We may be scattered, deviant and loud, or even assertive, crabby and trouser-wearing, but that, ladies and witches, is exactly why we still need Women's History Month.

5th Floor, Going Up

It was Martha Jefferson Randolph redux.

But when the Virginia Historical Society posted on FB today, "Do you need something to do on this cold and rainy day?" it occurred to me that I did need something to do.

So for the second time, I went to hear Cynthia Kierner talk about her book, "Martha Jefferson Randolph: Daughter of Monticello."

Unlike that lecture last June at the Library of Virginia, here, this one began with VHS president Paul Leavingood reminiscing about how long the Banner lectures have been going on.

"Some of you may remember going to these talks back when they were on the fifth floor of Thalhimer's. We've come a long way, baby."

A lecture and a lingerie shopping trip, now that's an afternoon from a different era.

Kierner began by apologizing for the lack of visuals.

"I don't want you to think I'm a Luddite and can't do a Power Point presentation, but we're having some technical difficulties, so there won't be any pictures. They say a picture's worth a thousand words, so my talk may run a little long because I'll have to say those thousand words. But I talk fast."

So she began going through the story of yet another wildly dysfunctional 18th century Virginia family, the kind where strong women shore up weak men and the history books ignore her.

Or they did until women started writing them.

She mentioned how Thomas Jefferson had worried that his daughters would marry blockheads and that while Martha's husband, Thomas Mann Randolph, wasn't a blockhead, he was a poor businessman.

Since I'd heard the basics before, I took note of her picture-less observations, things like, "In a cookbook glossary for her daughters, she defined grits as coming from wheat. Even I know that's wrong and I'm from New Jersey."

When she spoke of Martha's husband, she said, "I have to describe this portrait to you because I paid a lot of money to the Virginia Historical Society to use it in my book. But it's for a good cause."

Her point in describing the portrait was that the artist was unskilled at drawing hands so while Randolph's hands look deformed, it's the artist's fault and not pictorial reality.

The lecture ended, as did the last one, with her talking about the truism that "well-behaved women seldom make history," which may or may not apply to Martha, depending on how you want to argue that point.

After a quick trip to the grocery store (for sauerkraut) where sure enough, the shelves were cleared of all milk except skim (latecomers will no doubt have to settle) in anticipation of snow, I came home to find a message from a friend requesting my company for lunch.

I chose the new sandwich place near VCU, Boo's Brown Bag, because I'd heard they were cooking their own meats.

Nothing like turkey or roast beef someone else has taken the time to cook for me.

The place was bright and open with a half dozen tables for eating in, a big picture window for watching the street theater of the lower Fan and a reappearing Quickness rider picking up to-go orders for delivery.

My friend had saved a table with a view and I scoped out the menu.

I'd arrived late enough that they had sold out of turkey, so instead I chose the yellow fin tuna sandwich because I never pass up tuna salad made with fish from the water rather than a grocery shelf.

In fact, for years I patronized Christie's in Carytown solely for their albacore not-from-a-can tuna sandwich.

I liked that Boo's sandwiches come with chips and one of nine sides, things like beer-battered fries, coconut black beans and baked cinnamon apples.

But hearing that the veggie of the day was sauteed green beans, I chose them.

My sandwich showed up with a thick layer of fresh-tasting tuna on thick Weiman's wheat bread toasted and the green beans were outstanding, not overcooked and seasoned nicely.

Friend raved about his grilled chicken and roasted tomato salad with cranberries, walnuts and shredded Parmesan with a housemade roasted tomato vinaigrette.

I was happy to see that Boo's had not ignored the sweet-dependent among us, offering an array of locally made goodies, including stuff from WPA Bakery in Church Hill and Sweet Temptations by Teresa.

The pound cake with lemon frosting was dense with a rich, buttery frosting I could have eaten by the spoonful.

While eating, I watched the parade of soggy humanity go by, amazed, given the driving rain, to see a guy go by with no hood, no hat, no umbrella, and understandably miserable looking.

But even soaking wet, he had his ear buds in.

My guess is that's just the kind of blockhead TJ was worried about Martha falling for.

Maybe we haven't come as far as we thought, baby.

Avoid Blockhead Suitors

I'd have been awful as a founding daughter.

Take Martha Jefferson Randolph, for instance. Daughter of Thomas Jefferson and wife of Thomas Mann Randolph.

The woman had thirteen pregnancies and eleven children. Basically, she was pregnant every two years from the moment she got married.

In that respect, it must have sucked to have been Martha.

Today's noontime lecture at the Library of Virginia was "Martha Jefferson Randolph: Daughter of Monticello," given by author Cynthia Kierner who wrote a book of the same title.

As I've said before, I like my history with breasts.

In a break from the usual eventual focus on T.J., the book and talk approached Martha with the eye of an historian of southern woman.

Because, blasphemous as it sounds in Virginia, all roads don't necessarily lead back to Jefferson.

Not that being his daughter didn't have perks for Martha.

She went to convent school in Paris while Dad was Minister to France.

At a time when few Southern women were educated, she wrote and spoke four languages (Kierner asked for a show of hands of who in the room could do the same. Zero hands shot up).

Her social skills were said to be fit for any court in Europe. Her niece claimed she had a "perfect temper."

Cosmopolitan and used to an upscale social life, Martha was considered an exemplary woman.

I bet the definition of what that means has changed in the past couple of centuries.

Even so, before her marriage at age 18 after a two-month whirlwind courtship, her father openly worried that she might "marry a blockhead."

Turns out her beloved wasn't the best land or money manager, but ole Martha kept both his plantation and Monticello running as well as could be expected considering how in debt they both were.

That's when she wasn't off in Washington at the White House making Dad look more wholesome after the whole Sally Hemmings unpleasantness.

Which brings up Kierner's whole point. Well-behaved women seldom make history, it's been said.

And yet Martha, the exemplary women, made quiet history without exhibiting any improper actions or habits.

I can admire her, but I sure wouldn't want to have been her.

And I'm guessing that the heavily female audience (so large it went into the back room) felt the same.

You can only ask so much of a woman.

Martha's strength was doing so much more than any modern woman would consider doing.

Exemplary womanhood must be so much more easily attained when you're not squeezing out babies every other year.

No doubt about it. I'd have been an epic failure as a founding daughter.

Hell, I'm still working on acquiring that perfect temper.