Mirror, Mirror by Betsy Ashton

What do you see when you look in the mirror? If you're a woman, do you see the young lass you were? Do you see wrinkles and age marks? Do you see your mother looking back at your through your own eyes? I see all this and more.

At one time, I was a young lass. We were all young lasses, but for me that was a few decades ago. I had long, and I mean, long dark hair, was skinny as a fence post, and flat chested as the proverbial pancake. At some point along around the end of the 70s, I cut my hair and permed it to a shoulder-length mop. Yes, this was me circa 1980.

I remember that young woman. I liked her. She had spunk, sassiness and the guts to pose in a bikini. She's still inside me, but the outer shell is a bit changed.

I look in the mirror today and see a few character lines. I do NOT have wrinkles. My hair is white, mostly, and permed. When I compare the me of now and the me of then, I see the same eyes and smile. I kinda like both. Today I see a woman who is pretty darned sure of herself, who has spunk and sassiness, and the wisdom to avoid bikinis like the plague.

I also see my mother looking back at me. Mini-Mommy, as she was know to all my friends (she was barely 5'1" where I was 5'8"), had the greatest giggly-laugh. She loved nothing more than a funny joke, a good book, and terrific conversation. She taught me to listen, think, and then speak, a lesson I generally tend to ignore. I don't often think before I run my mouth, but that might be a topic for a different blog post.

The point here is, we are all of our experiences. We are our mothers. We are our sisters and cousins. Part of our young-lass self still lives inside the older and hopefully wiser current self. Both selves make us who we are today.

The naysayers, those who would diminish our value through put-downs and bullying, have no place in our circles of friends. We need to look in the mirror for a different image, the one where we are fearless inside. The classic Facebook meme to the left is what we should see when we look in the mirror. Brave. Strong. Willing to look the world in the eye and roar.

I like the young-lass me. I like the worldly me. I like the me my mother helped form. And I like the lion me.

Which one are you?

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Betsy Ashton is the author of Mad Max, Unintended Consequences, and Uncharted Territory, A Mad Max Mystery, now available at Amazon and Barnes and Noble.

On Being Brave by Betsy Ashton

Facebook meme

This past weekend I went to Roanoke Regional Writers Conference, one of my favorite conferences. I've been four times out of the six years it's been held. I've spoken on panels in the past. I will teach a course in the future. It's local. As a result, I know about 80% of the participants and nearly all of the panelists and instructors.

Every year this is a reunion of NYT best selling authors, small press authors, indie authors and yet-to-be-published writers. I probably talked to everyone of them before we left yesterday for our homes. I asked them what they feared most when it comes to writing.

After dozens private conversations and a couple of panels, I reduced our collective concerns to a scant few.

As a group, we feared loss of focus. That's a broad topic. For some, loss of focus fell within the end covers of their manuscripts. They can fix that with a good set of beta readers and distance. All agreed they needed to step back and the the manuscripts rest.

For others, loss of focus involved time management. We all concurred that, while we have to have that all-mighty presence on SOCIAL MEDIA, Facebook, Twitter and the rest are giant time sinks. The successful writers (not those making a living from writing, but those who balanced their time) carved out a certain amount of time each day for social media.

Two years ago a YA writer said she spent one hour three days a week responding to every Tweet that came in for her books. Because the audience was teens, she could get away with, "OMG! Thank you for reading my book. I'm so happy." Followed by a smiley face. She had a file on Word with about six responses. Copy. Paste. Done. And when her next book came out, her fan base was ready...

We all worry about what our obsession with writing and marketing might be doing to our families. The best balanced authors made the entire family part of the process. One's daughter wore t-shirts with her YA book cover on them. Another sat with his entire family at the beginning of the year. They blocked out family time on a huge calendar he hung in his office. He could use the rest of the days writing and marketing his books.

Almost to a person, we were afraid of rejection. Not the kind that come querying agents and/or publishers, but the kind that comes when you pick up the phone, cold call a librarian (for example) and pitch a writing workshop or book signing. We all were afraid they'd say no. Some did; others didn't. But those who didn't pick up the phone sat home waiting for it to ring. Or playing games on FB. Or tweeting and bleating about their lots in life.

Driving home, I vowed to be even braver this year than last. I will call more libraries. I will contact more book stores. I will contact service organization. I will contact active living retirement communities. I will be out there as often as I can.

I will not take too much time away from my loving husband, my life partner, and my partner in writing. He's the most important part of my life.

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Please check out my novel, Mad Max Unintended Consequences, available through Amazon and Barnes and Noble in paper or e-book formats.

Women of the World - Unite!

By Glenys O'Connell
There are really good topics for Roses blogs this month but once again I'm rambling off in another direction, this one close to my heart.
Here in Canada 2012 marks the 83rd Anniversary of the Day Women Became Persons.
To my daughters this sounds crazy. "But we've ALWAYS been people, Mom," is their response.
It seems that so many of us who benefit from the brave work of the women who went before us seem to know very little of that work.
Historically, the British North America Act of 1876 claimed that women were not 'persons' as far as the law was concerned relating to property rights ownership, voting, and other rights enjoyed by men.
For years after this, despite challenges from women seeking public office, the right to own property, etc., women were still considered chattels. In other words, we were pretty much owned by the men in our lives - for better or for worse!
It wasn't until 1929 that the British Privy Council - Canada was still a member of the British Empire as the Declaration that led to the Commonwealth wasn't signed until 1931 - announced that women here were, indeed, persons with all the rights that entailed.
And yet, while we've 'come a long way, baby', we're still hitting the glass ceiling at work, finding ourselves earning less than men for the same jobs, finding it harder to get credit, doing the lion's share of childcare and housework...the list goes on.

So, while my daughters will hopefully never have to work in the women's lib groups that I did back in the 70's, or be turned down for a job or promotion because 'you might get pregnant and leave', or not be allowed to take out their own mortgages or have control of their own money, we've still a way to go to true equality.
And we must always remember the brave women throughout the world who stood and took the kicks and blows, who went on hunger strike, risked their lives protesting, or even threw themselves under the King's horses. For women in some nations, the brutality and inequity continues to this day.
By now you're probably wondering what got me into such a tizzy that I wanted to write about this.
Well, someone sent me the little essay below. It's mostly about the terrible treatment of suffragettes in the United States, but it's a story that has been played out in many other nations and a  history none of us should forget. We must guard our freedoms. I don't know who wrote it, but it carried a notice to feel free to share:

 The 83rd Anniversary of  Women as “Persons”…
 It is the story of women who were ground-breakers.
These brave women from the early 1900s made all the difference
 in the lives we all live today. It was not until 1920 that women    won  the right to go to the polls and vote. The women were innocent and defenseless but when, in 1917, women picketed in front of the White House, carrying signs asking for the vote, they were jailed.
And by the end of the first night in jail, those women were  barely alive.
 Forty prison guards wielding clubs and their warden's blessing
 went on a rampage against the 33 women wrongly convicted of
 'obstructing sidewalk traffic’.
They beat Lucy Burns, chained her hands to the cell bars above her head and left her hanging for the   night, bleeding and gasping for air.
They hurled Dora Lewis into a dark cell, smashed
her head against an iron bed and knocked her out cold.
Her cell mate, Alice Cosu, thought Lewis was dead and suffered a heart attack.
Additional affidavits describe the guards grabbing, dragging, beating, choking, slamming, pinching, twisting and kicking the women.
 Thus unfolded the 'Night of Terror' on Nov. 15, 1917, when the
 warden at the Occoquan Workhouse in Virginia ordered
 his guards to teach a lesson to the suffragists imprisoned there because they dared to picket Woodrow Wilson's White House for the right to vote.
For weeks, the women's only water came from an open pail.
Their food -- all of it colourless slop -- was infested with
worms.
When one of the leaders, Alice Paul, embarked on a hunger strike,
they tied her to a chair, forced a tube down her throat and poured
liquid into her until she vomited. She was tortured like this for
weeks until word was smuggled out to the press.
 All women who have ever voted, have ever owned property, have ever enjoyed equal rights need to remember that women's rights had to  be fought for in Canada as well.
 Do our daughters, sisters, cousins and nieces know the price that
 was paid  to earn equal rights for women here, in North America?
 2012 is the  83rd Anniversary of the “Persons Case” in Canada which, finally, declared women in Canada to be “Persons”!
 Please, if you are so inclined, pass this on, at least to all the
 women you know, so  that we may remember to celebrate the rights that were won for all by these heroines .

 Knowledge is Freedom: hide it and it withers; share it, and it blooms.

If you want to read more about Canada's 'Famous Five' here are some links:

Emily Murphy

Henrietta Muir Edwards

Nellie McClung

Louise McKinney

Irene Parlby

Glenys O'Connell writes romantic suspense with strong heroines who are willing to fight for the things they believe in - whether it's truth, justice, or true love! You can read some excerpts of her work here