How to see the world like Jane Austen

• Feast countdown = 48
• Current craving = Chocolate gelato from Paulo's Gelato Italiano & Desserts
• Current craving distraction = Discussing politics with friends

A good friend recently bought me the DVD set of A&E's Pride and Prejudice mini series, including all 5 hours of witty, breathtaking repartee.  It's my favorite movie by a long stretch, given that I've watched it probably a dozen times, mostly during high school while sighing and rewinding certain scenes with Colin Firth alongside girl friends (see below).  Not to hype it up or anything, but it's worth all the hype.



The original story of Elizabeth and Mr. Darcy always stirs up something new for me each time I read or watch it.  It's a timeless classic for a number of reasons -- the personification of pride and blind prejudice, the difficult process of breaking down first impressions and misconceptions, true love in the form of quiet sacrifice and persistence, contrasts of shallow and meaningful relationships...  On the other hand, I am also reminded that it is a distinct time piece hearkening back to a difficult era, particularly regarding women and men.  Without directly assaulting people's sensibilities or openly asserting her opinions, Jane Austen pushed carefully against social norms with the use of satire, irony, and sometimes wrenching examples of injustice.  Remember Charlotte Church, who married out of desperation for financial security?  Or the Bennets' unfortunate estate dealings, since they had no son to inherit the assets?  As difficult as it may be to believe now, her writing was progressive for its day.

Like many people, I look back at the mixture of historical injustices and revolutions that corrected for them, and I wonder about the issues today where most of us are blind.  Across the developed world, we have already started moving toward equal rights for homosexuals, and we continue to refine our treatment of women and minorities, but what areas are we missing altogether?  What injustice sits right under our noses but we ignore it, to the chagrin of future generations?

In the United States, I start thinking of areas where we are too comfortable or agnostic with our actions now -- such as criminal punishment and prison conditions, treatment of animals and meat preparation, handling of illegal immigrants at our borders, and care of the environment and our consumption levels.  Who is today's Jane Austen, gently pricking at our sense of rightness?

I said before that we are already acting on many salient issues "across the developed world", yet it is undeniable that so much of the world lags painfully behind on social justice.  Nicholas Kristof and his wife Sheryl WuDunn won't let us forget it in their new book, Half the Sky.  Their stories highlight women who are treated far worse today than in Jane Austen's 1800s England.  The reason I bring this up is not to detract from the next generation of issues, but rather to emphasize how important it is to act on them much sooner, because we see how big of a lag effect already exists.  Many developing nations are beginning to see the incredible waste of excluding women from the economy -- a realization that is pivotal for empowering women and extending them greater rights -- and they are just picking up a battle that has been waging for centuries.

I challenge myself to think 100 years in advance while observing the world in 2010, and to do my part to speed up the journey to broader social justice.

Resumes vs. Risk-taking

• Feast countdown = 49
• Current craving = Pumpkin bread that my roommate just baked
• Current craving distraction = Gum + the healthcare vote

It's a perfect stormy night backdrop for this post, as I listen to rain pounding and thunder shaking my little house in Midtown Atlanta, because I am about to reveal my latest life shift... (dramatic lightning strikes)... 

In two weeks, I'm picking up my life and moving to Rolla, Missouri to work on the Tommy Sowers congressional campaign.  The 8th district is about to become home.

Since graduating college two years ago, I've become increasingly hungry (bad word choice) for work where I can serve the public and see the results of my efforts.  I have to stop myself and ask, what are you working toward -- a pretty resume or a meaningful life?  What will you look back on as success?  What is worth the daily struggle?  Because otherwise, I am likely to fall into the easy pattern of living for comfort, for prestige and awards, and for nods of approval at family gatherings and dinner parties.  In the words of Abraham Lincoln, and recently quoted by President Obama:

"I'm not bound to succeed, but I'm bound to live up to what light I have."

While I don't equate my own small actions with these two great men, I still view this adventure as a course correction toward that same end.  I will embark on a seven-month journey to elect an incredible leader to office -- someone, I believe, who will take on the plights of one of the poorest areas in the U.S. and fight for their voice and well-being.  I relish the chance to talk with these local folks about their concerns and values.  I look forward to moments of discomfort when I meet people very different from myself and who view the world at another angle, because it will challenge me and expand my understanding of this country.  

This whole campaign will expand my understanding of the political process, where ideology meets polling games and sound bites.  The grittiness of it will surely become tiresome, but I treasure it all the same when I look around the world at countries like Somalia and Myanmar, where government elections are a ruse and leaders serve their own interests unabashedly.  Ours is a messy process, but it ultimately empowers people who seek out the truth.  I look forward to the day when the world's most forgotten and oppressed can make their leaders work for them.  (Women of the world, take heart.)

In similarly rambling fashion, I can't help but revert to cheesy symbolism at this last moment -- I just looked out my window to find the storm subside into a fully arched rainbow.  I don't know the last time when I saw a rainbow touch down on both sides like that.  It reminds me of promises, of hope, that good often emerges when we least expect it, and that the St. Louis Arch is calling my name :)  I am ready to take the risk for a more difficult and more fulfilling ride.

Ethiopia: Still so far to go

I came across this article by Johann Hari of The Independent today, and it literally forced me to squirm in my seat.

Nurame was in her bed when she was woken by an angry mêlée. In her family's hut there were grown men – an incredible number, 10 or more, all in their 30s, all standing over her father, shouting. They reached for her... She had heard whispers that, when a girl is considered ready for marriage, a man will seize her, and rape her, and then she must serve him for the rest of her life. "That was the culture," she says. But it wasn't her culture: like all the other little girls, she didn't want it. "I started screaming and tried to run out of the hut," she says... She was taken back to his home, held down in front of his family, raped, and taken to be married the next morning.

...In Ethiopia, Nurame's story happens every day.  In 2003 – the last year for which statistics are available – the National Committee on Traditional Practices of Ethiopia found that 69 per cent of marriages begin like this, with the triple-whammy of abduction, rape, and a forced signature.  


The article goes on to explain how one brave woman from Ethiopia, Boge Gebre, is working tirelessly to change mindsets, instill justice, and empower women.  Her organization is Kembatta Women Standing Together (KMG), and its efforts have "slashed the rate of bridal abductions by more than 90 percent" in the Kembatta area.  Just by holding forums where men and women sit together as equals and raise their concerns, the organization is radically altering the culture there.  It's truly an amazing story of accelerated change -- literally over the course of a generation in some areas -- but the road to widespread justice and equality is still a long and hard one.  Awareness is just the beginning.


Young girls in Hobich-Haka display bold placards at a KMG workshop declaring their refusal to be cut.


(If interested in supporting KMG, the UK's Sport Relief foundation is collecting donations, or you can contact KMG directly.)

The lioness mindset

• Feast countdown = 50
• Current craving = Cheese pizza, no frills
• Current craving distraction = Watching The Godfather (part II) with friends

I listened to a clip of NPR today about innovative women, and although the topic largely centered around environmental sustainability, I latched on to a different message -- that the feminine qualities in all of us have a unique strength and ability to improve society.  Annie Leonard briefly talked about her new role as a mother and how it revealed a power deep within that she never knew she had.  Much like a lioness and its cubs, she explained her new fiercely protective and dominant nature, ready to lash out at anything that threatened her young.  In an interesting twist, Leonard then challenged her audience to harness these feelings toward social leadership, by adopting a more communal mindset and driving progressive change.

As humans, why do we limit this maternal strength and sacrifice to our immediate loved ones?  What would it look like if we became "protective mothers" of the world's most helpless?

Throughout history, women have been pivotal in binding communities together and leading progressive movements to help the downtrodden (think women's movement against child labor in early 1900s).  This presents us with a powerful platform to encourage interdependence, empathy, and service.  While I may not agree with claims that women are inherently more nurturing or sensitive than men, I do believe that society has reinforced these gender roles, and in doing so, unknowingly developed a channel for women to lead with these strengths.


Aside from reinforcing women's confidence in themselves, I hope this message does much more in the way of inspiring compassionate, vehement, community-oriented leadership.  Every person neglected by family and government, who falls to the lowest rungs of society, must become our next big cause.  What greater joy than to empower, protect, and strengthen those unable to fend for themselves?

When in need of inspiration, click on the Discovery Channel sometime and watch the lioness in action.

The straw that broke the camel's complacency

• Feast countdown = 51
• Current craving = Greek Scramble at Thumbs Up Diner (a sinful blend of feta, spinach, and eggs)
• Current craving distraction = Fiddling with blog color schemes

The Goal: To sponsor an international sister in need by giving up dinner each Sunday for a year.

For the next 52 Sundays, I will skip dinner (nighttime snacking included) and direct the weekly savings of roughly $7 toward Women for Women International's sponsorship program.  The program will pair me with a woman afflicted by war, and through my donations and letters of support, the hope is that she can work toward a life of healing and sustainability.  Sunday supper has now been replaced with a feast of giving.

Before I go any further, please don't mistake me as a) another extremist dieter with hidden motives or b) one of those people who "just forgot to eat lunch again".  That couldn't be farther from the truth, as my well-stocked fridge and good friends at Chick-Fil-A will attest, and not to mention my talent for tracking waiters across the restaurant out of the corners of my eyes.  No, I love good food and have a reputation for all-day snacking, so this new challenge will take an extra kick of will power.

So why would a food-lover do this?  For three reasons: to make room in my budget for giving, to prove that anyone has capacity to give, and to put my drop in the bucket of good deeds that collectively can change the world.  I realized that, aside from rent, food costs continually take first place among my monthly expenses, and it wouldn't be hard to cut one meal while also cutting more coupons, all for the sake of supporting another.  This is not meant to be a platform for my own self-righteousness -- plenty of people make sacrifices much more monumental than mine.  Instead, I want this experience to help similar people see how simple and practical it is to give regularly and to offer someone a leg up in the world.  I want to help bridge the gap between caring and doing.

For me, I crossed that bridge after a long buildup period of reading and listening.  I read Greg Mortenson's latest book, Stones into Schools, about the most desolate communities in Central Asia that crave schools for their girls and women.  I watched Nicholas Kristof's Reporter documentary, set in the Democratic Republic of Congo, on finding individual women's stories that put a face on the larger problems and inspire readers to care.  I read articles from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation that emphasize women as a key component to breaking the cycle of poverty in developing countries.  Finally, I read and watched Lisa Shannon's story of running long distances in order to raise awareness and funding for the war-torn women of Congo.

The words and images followed me for weeks, weighing on my heart and leaving me restless to do something, until I ran into the literal one-for-one solution -- giving up my meal so that another woman can eat, be whole, and empower others.  Among all the causes to support today, Women for Women International is one that truly creates myriad ripples and touches whole communities.

I hope you will join me each Sunday night as I take time to reflect, distract myself from food, and hopefully share stories from my sponsored sister over time.  (I won't be paired for another 4-5 weeks, so look forward to the next several posts where I pine for Girl Scout cookies and Mellow Mushroom pizza.)  In all seriousness, I'll need your support in the coming weeks, and nothing would make me happier than knowing I have a team of folks going through the same challenge, or simply offering words of encouragement.  Come feast with me next Sunday night!

(If interested, read more about becoming a sponsor with Women for Women International)