Over the weekend, I had the opportunity to attend a dance performance by Memphis-based Collage Dance Collective, the Collage Ballet Conservatory, the Jones Haywood Dance School, and Duke Ellington School of the Arts.  It was a much needed dose of art as resistance and art as soul uplift. My favorite piece was entitled “Rise.”  Choreographed […]

Yesterday, the amazing Maya Sequeira (who will resume her blogging activities in just a few weeks) and I went for a mid-day walk here in DC.  We didn’t wear coats.  Why not?  Because it was over 70 degrees on a day when the historical average temperature is in the 40’s.  One could view this as […]

Yesterday, I published an extensive look at Betsy DeVos, her background, and the host of potential problems that come should she be confirmed as the next Secretary of Education.  I realized, however, that there wasn’t the context to evaluate DeVos against any norms or to think about why we, as feminists and Americans, should place a particular […]

Things are heating up around Trump’s nominee for Secretary of Education, Betsy DeVos.  Republicans had slated her confirmation hearing to take place on Wednesday, but agreed to postpone it until January 17.  Leaders pushed the hearing due to concerns raised by Democrats that DeVos had not yet supplied information regarding potential conflicts of interest to the bipartisan Office […]

When I was home in Wisconsin over the holidays, I was surprised to find how many of my relatives didn’t know about the Women’s March on Washington.  Some had vague ideas of what it was, but others had completely blank faces when I brought it up.  And when I offered words of encouragement that they should […]

Yesterday, news broke that reporter and anchor Megyn Kelly was leaving Fox News to move to NBC. Now, Fox is left without a big-name, female, prime-time anchor, and without anyone who has any history of being willing to stand up to Trump.  This is politically notable for obvious reasons, but it also has implications for […]

Over the New Years weekend, I was lucky enough to spend time away with a group of women who are out there in the world kicking the proverbial asses with gusto.  As might be expected, talk turned to resolutions and plans for the year on more than one occasion.  As might further be expected, that […]

2016 has been a doozy.  As countless memes* commemorate, many of us ended up feeling far more beleaguered than we imagined possible.  And it wasn’t just the election.  It has also been the horrifying and heartbreaking international news, the mounds of famous/inspirational people deaths, and the never-ending stream of hate crimes and police brutality suffered by […]

The news from Aleppo has been horrifying for far too long.  And now, we are confronted with what may be the final moments.  Not a detente, but instead the total extermination of the men, women and children — the families and the rebels, the doctors and the holdouts — who are still there.  We must […]

Because my Great Great Grandmother, Gorina Stensby Wheeler, saw her husband trade her daughter into marriage in exchange for livestock. Because Gorina had the courage to leave that husband, move to a new state, and set up a new life for her and her remaining children — all at a time when women Did. Not. Do. Those. Things. Because Gorina […]