The Princesses of Summer

The smoke is thick and the battle lines divided, but every time there is a span of quiet in the sky, a patch of blue outlined with a fluff of white appears, and I remember my days of summer.

We were young, and we were pretty.  No, better than that.  We were gorgeous and proud of it.  We wore Yankee Clover, Blue Grass and White Linen.  The young warriors in our lives admired from near and far, and we rejoiced in their appreciation.

Today, the Yankee Clover has turned to dust, and the Blue Grass is beginning to wilt, and there is a brown fringe on the frayed edges of the White Linen.  The warriors have aged, many have fallen along the wayside, and when they are remembered, it is with a tinge of joy that we shared moments of our days in the sun together.  Those who share our lives may wear the mantel of age, but unlike armor, theirs fades with a smile, and the touch of our hands causes it to disappear until, pray God, we next meet.

We are no longer gorgeous, but in all humility, some of us are not so bad either considering that while we (forgive me, Hillary) stayed home and baked cookies, also managed to enter the market place and supplement the family income.  Granted that our undistinguished careers must be considered insignificant in today’s aggressive society, the reality is the girls of summer labored long and hard for the usual 40 hours a week mostly in suburban low paying environments, while also running errands, arranging orthodontic visits on lunch hours and scheduling teacher’s conferences somewhere in between.  There were no au pairs in our households, and we didn’t picket or demonstrate or even network.  Mostly, because we were working long, hard days, and also, because it was a labor of love for those whose lives we were privileged to share.

We worked harder if there was a daughter to educate to insure that her chance of education was equal, if not better, than her brothers, and most certainly than her Mother’s.  Somewhere, however, there was a giant chasm growing that we were not aware of until we had stepped into it and been swallowed up.

The chasm of anger.  The bitterness toward the male animal who fends his way to fight for his family and his livelihood.  In today’s climate of accusation, it is probably appropriate for my own Mea Culpa now.  Yes, I was one of those girls of summer.  I was the one who wore Blue Grass.  The men whistled, and they wined and dined me, and I believed life would ever be as frothy as the pink tulle dress I wore for my wedding.

But I was never sexually harassed.  If there was a difficult encounter, I would walk another road.  I didn’t have time to waste.  The goblins that lay along the path for the girls of summer came disguised as other characters.  Yankee Clover never survived a family that wouldn’t accept a Greek immigrant as a daughter-in-law.  Can Irish matriarchs be accused of sexually harassing another female?  Of course not, no demonstration material there.

White Linen wasn’t run over on her way to a NOW meeting.  No, she was caught unaware by the ravages of breast cancer that never had a political agenda until years later.  And at best then just a quiet whine not the foghorns blowing in the night we hear for other more celebrated causes.

So, the girls of summer will fade quietly and never really be acknowledged as part of today’s increasingly powerful female lobby.  Sometimes, however, in the quiet of the night, as I watch the demonstrations on TV and hear the speeches and listen to the accusations, I feel a touch of sadness. Perhaps if there had been more knights in armor, perhaps if the perfume had not been Poison or Charlie, perhaps, just perhaps, there might not be so much anger.   And just possibly, some  incredibly wonderful memories, and maybe, just maybe