Yep, it’s Dad’s fault. Every night we’d eat dinner in the kitchen, always with homemade dessert, then 1/2 hour later the doorbell would ring and Dad would be asked by the neighborhood kids to come out and play. He had two rules. Play fair, and everyone plays, no matter age or gender. So I grew up mistakenly believing everyone was equal.
In seventh grade I wanted to learn how to carve and wire a lamp, instead of making a gross seven-layer jello parfait. I was not allowed to do so because girls were not allowed to take Shop. Involved in sports in high school, I wrote my thesis (Horses Sweat, Men Perspire and Women Glow) about the inadequacies of Title IX because when they resurfaced the boys’ gym’s wood flooring, they took over our cement and linoleum gym and we sat twiddling our thumbs in portable classrooms for six weeks.
Then I read George Bernard Shaw’s infamous quote: You see things and say; ‘Why?’ But I dream things that never were and I say; ‘Why not?’
For over thirty years I’ve operated on that premise. Yes, that’s Dad’s fault as well. He transformed nationally known entities that were not living up to their potential. I followed him in that pursuit and had successes and failures at work and in a varied “career” as a volunteer. Change doesn’t sit well with most people. Bureaucrats hate change because it makes them work harder so they hate politicians for making change occur. Politicians hate change brought on by public pressure.
I’ve worked for many years for little pay or recognition to: help that local theatre get back to its mission and reach out to the community; go out into poorer regions in support of childhood education; create a no kill society where “excess” pets don’t go to the local shelter to die; and assure that our public parks meet the needs of all responsible users.
In turn, I’ve been vilified, slandered, libeled and had my property damaged by people who just say “no” and practice the politics of personal attack. And this is just in the past week for positive solutions I tried to implement ten years ago in a community I moved from shortly thereafter. Fifteen years of varied volunteer work of increasing responsibility and now I’m called a liar and a thief by people who should know better. Bullies.
The people who resist alternative solutions to increase revenue through marketing and development strategies, refuse new ideas to increase productivity and relevance to the community have no recourse other than naysaying and personal attacks. I live this every day and understand the mentality.
But my 3:00 a.m. brainstorms keep me going, and writing ideas down and dreaming of implementing them in the morning have saved several organizations. Years ago a legislator drafted a bill for his district that was forwarded to my committee. He wanted it acted upon post haste. It was a seemingly innocuous bill that would allow persons under the age of 18 to participate in Revolutionary War reenactments in his community. The pressure was on and only I knew that the way the Military Code was written, these youngsters could be involuntarily conscripted into the National Guard given a statewide emergency. So it’s partially thanks to my creative ideas that twelve year-olds are not now serving in the US military in Afghanistan and elsewhere.
Positive solutions to complex problems. Naysayers only say no and contribute nothing to the debate, then take credit for their heroic efforts. Often they win, because it is in the interest of entrenched stakeholders to maintain the status quo at all costs, even if it means losing their museum or childhood education organization.
Now I’m married to a wonderful man who is my opposite in many ways, but with my right-brained creativity and his mathematical genius I believe we can creatively solve a lot of problems together. Daily life gets in the way, of course, and three square meals. World peace? I don’t know. But I’m a glass half-full kind of gal and always looking toward the future and the challenges it brings. Cheers! Dee
