I call this woman Eve, she is the face in the window at the hardware store in my town, she seems to take the weather and snow and bitter cold in stride, I wonder how long she has been in the window of the annex – it is not being used by the main store – and what, if anything, she is selling, she looks very cheerful and yet quite out-of-place.

I named her Eve after my mother, a remarkable woman in a troubled life,  in many ways a sacrifice to the ways in which women used to see their lives and the world used to see them. I suppose my mother would have called herself a feminist, although she was, like me, very shy of the labels available in politics,  even then. She was more complex than that.

My mother always worked, she started her own small store for a while, she was as troubled as she was ambitious for herself and her children. It seemed she was stymied by her own fears and hesitations, and by men at every critical juncture of her life. Her marriage to my father was not a happy one, whenever she got close to building a life of her own, she was undone, usually by him, sometimes by her fear at reaching too far or pushing too hard in a world where women were expected to do much less.

Just when her small and classy gift shop began to be successful, my father switched jobs and decided to move, pulling her away from her family and friends and life of nearly 60 years. When she built another life in the new placed – she was nearly shattered by the move – he decided to move again. He never supported her work,  never encouraged her or helped her out, they fought bitterly, and even though I often wondered why she didn’t just leave and strike out on her own, but she often told me it just wasn’t done, there were no models for that, her immigrant family would have been horrified, her friends shocked, she just never could do it. At the end, my father was injured in an automobile crash and my mother took care of him for some years. The two of them locked in a final and awful embrace of a different kind. By this time, they could barely stand to be in the same room, although they almost always were, their lives ended in conflict and bitterness.

My mother was eventually consumed by rage and frustration and regrets, it was hard to watch it, she came to hate every day of her life, she never stopped blaming my father for suffocating her, I never really knew if it was all his fault, or if she simply couldn’t muster the strength to speak up for herself, refuse to move another time, shut down her shop, give up her job at the art gallery, quit her job as the hostess of a hip restaurant, stop protesting her life and figure out how to live it. I suppose seeing this gave me the gift of creativity, of a fierce desire to live my life in a meaningful way, to avoid a life of regrets and recrimination. From the time I was able to speak, she told me I was a wonderful writer, a great story-teller, she loved my stories, encouraged me in the most elemental ways, even as her neediness and unhappiness caused her to do the greatest harm.

My other and I had a very painful relationship, she was, at the end, almost impossible to be near. Looking back, I see how much she loved me and how much I loved her, I wish we could have ended in a better place.  I think I took from her life – there was always a creative, independent streak in her – the importance of encouragement. I think if anyone had supported her, her life would have taken a different direction, she would not have been so unhappy and angry, so frustrated. The encouragement of other people became so important to me, and then when I met Maria I realized I needed encouragement as much as I needed to give it, it did, as my mother had hoped for herself, transform my life

When we talk of women, the talk is often political, “The War On Women,” reproductive issues, equal pay and opportunity, women in power.  The lives of women have become yet another great polarizing issue in American life, yet not for me, I always feel clear about women, they are the future of the world, they will soon be making the decisions they need to make about their lives, it is a great force in the world that is not stoppable, especially by men, the time is coming near, it is destiny. If there is hope for the future of the world, it is in women rising to true power, everywhere I look it is beginning to happen.

For me, women and their lives are personal things, not political things. Anytime you express an opinion in our country, people are quick to label and tag you and put you in the right drawer. It’s a part of life here, it makes politics a cesspool. I just think of my mother.

I see so many women in need of support and encouragement to live their lives and be fulfilled.  so many stymied, controlled and frustrated by the men in their lives This is not always true, it is too often true. I have a visceral reaction whenever I see men – at home, in Washington – telling women what to do, how to live their lives. I always want to say, “wait, don’t you know that doesn’t work any more, they won’t stand in the window smiling any longer?” I see many men changing, looking for ways to support the women in their lives, not obstruct them. I see the women in Washington – both sides of the spectrum – showing up yet more angry and clueless men how to reach across to one another and accomplish something. It makes me hopeful, a light in the grim and angry world of politics.

I am grateful I live with a woman who would never permit me to tell her what to do, even if I tried. It is so good for her to build her own life, make her own decisions,  I often see something of my mother in Maria, how different her life would have been if her powerful creative impulses had been recognized and supported, she could have done anything she wanted, been anything she wanted – just like Maria is doing. Ultimately, my mother could not imagine a world in which she and a man were partners, not adversaries, in which she could control her fate and live her life, it defeated her as much as my father. That world is changing.
I think if my mother were alive today, she would have seen many other women take control of their lives, look for love and meaning, find support for the risks and ambitions so many women are willing to take. She would have loved women like Maria,  they would have loved her. “Your mother never accepted her life,” her oldest friend told me after she died, “she could never fit in, like the rest of us, she wanted more than we did. I always told her, Eve, stop complaining! None of us are happy.”

Perhaps my mother would not have lived in such loneliness, misery and anger if she lived now. She tried so hard to go to college, her parents told her she needed to get married and have children. She set out on the path others have chosen for her.  It sealed her fate and mine.

My mother taught me that life is often more difficult for women, I see that is still true  – I think of Eve in the window, trapped in that dress, that smile, even in a bitter winter. She was a creative person with a wonderful mind, she ought to have lived the life she wanted, she came close, so many times, she told me near the end that she cold never figure out how to get the support she needed, from her husband, from men.

It is Maria’s birthday tomorrow, I am going to buy her some socks – red socks, colorful socks. She does not like expensive gifts, she always squawks when I buy her things. I think she will love the socks, but I know the greatest gift I could possibly give her is the gift of support and encouragement, to look her in the eye, day of her life and tell her she ought to live the life she wants, be what she wants to be, I am here in every possible way to support her in any way that she wishes, her life is hers to live.

I will my the Eve in the window, it is interesting to see her, I will be relieved for her when she is gone, hopefully off into a different life.