I am Female

"You must take personal responsibility.
You cannot change the circumstances,
the seasons, or the wind, but
you can change yourself"
- Jim Rohn

Click Here For Success Tip # 021

I am female.  I may change how I dress, my hair, or any other outer part of me and I remain female.  Gender is part of who I am.  I was raised with two older brothers and treated like a boy, too.  My hair was cut in a pixie, I wore their hand me downs but I couldn't take my shirt off in the summer time.  I felt this was most unfair at the ripe age of 7.  I could dig a hole, play army but was banned from taking wood shop.  I could cheer on my brothers from the sidelines at track but couldn't run in the races.  When I graduated from high school, I entered engineering program at the community college and learned once again that women were discouraged from taking these predominantly male classes.  There were 5 girls in a class of 30.  I married, moved around with my husband's jobs, and loved being a mom.  Then I returned to college and was stunned to find out that the new ratio in engineering classes was 3 girls in a class of 30.  I became a computer tech and was puzzled over and over at the shock people showed on their face that I was a computer tech.  I think my favorite run in with this prejudice was working at a junior high school.  The first week of school one of the teachers called me to come to the classroom to see what was wrong with her computer.  When I entered the room, the teacher politely introduced me as the computer tech that would fix the computer.  A piping voice at the back of the room announced to everyone, "But you're a girl."  I looked down at myself and agreed that I was.  I was so thankful that the problem was minor and I did fix the computer.  I studied about being a woman.  Read several books on the subject.  I knew that being female was wonderful.  I was in counseling before I found out about the horrible feelings I had about women and myself.  I realized that being raised that women were less than second class citizens it would be difficult not to have negative feelings about my own gender if for no other reason it was my mother that repeatedly taught me that boys were more important than girls.  My father reinforces this by only asking about the males in the family.  We came to visit, my mother walked around me to hug my son and my husband.  I really thought I had put things in perspective.  That was why creating the wall for Innercleavage became the main part of my photography show.  Woman are amazing.

Innercleavage

 

In college, I took two wood working classes. I love working with wood.

My own little chair, sturdy enough for me to sit in it and short enough for our grandchildren to sit in it.