My crisis of faith is over. My heart has won over my wallet. I need to give a little back - not b/c I want validation from women that follow me in similar career paths or outside of my professional circle but b/c I owe it to the women ahead of me that ploughed the way and made it easier for me. The women ahead of me made incredible sacrifices that has made my success possible. I need to pay it forward.
I have always been an Obama supporter - but have had a phenominal amount of respect and admiration for what Hilary has achieved - especially on behalf of women. She has shattered a glass ceiling.
There are times I wonder at the ludicrous choice I made to become "invisible" by forming my Remington Steele firm to hide my gender and establish myself as serious player. Most attorneys go out of their way to advertise - I have gone out of my way to make sure there is nothing about me anywhere. It is what I needed to do to shatter my glass ceiling. And now that I have established myself - I am slowly becoming visible. I am the most senior attorney that does what I do in the entire Chicago area. All the other women that were my contemporaries and behind me have dropped out along the way...
When Hilary made the comment about the sisterhood of the rraveling pantsuits - it did make me cry a little. I joined that sisterhood in 1997 and have not worn a skirt/dress to work since.
My first law firm was 12 attorneys - all men and me. The managing partner use to make comments all the time. One day when I wore a suit with a skirt - he made comments all day long. This same partner was being sued by his former assistant for sexual harassment - he thought it was a joke. The firm settled by making an 80k payment to the assistant.
In any event, the next day, I confided in a friend at work how uncomfortable it made me feel. He responded by saying - well you have to admit - you looked hot - we all enjoyed the view that day.
I was stunned and felt so violated and betrayed. The X was actually very sweet and understanding that day. He contained his anger, did not try to fix unfixable things - just listened and supported me. I switched to pants the next day and never switched back - not even at formal occasions. Well I did wear a long formal dress once - but showed absolutely no leg.
The truth is that after that whole pre-Anita Hill days sexual harassment case that I did fight I decided to leave engineering. I wanted to work in an environment with more women. So that is why I went to study environmental law. It was quite an interesting twist that I ended up in an even more male dominated environment where very few of the legal remedies are avalable to me - unless I want to be blacklisted.
I think sometimes I get tired from the work and sometimes I get tired of being a woman at work. And there have been times when I really just want to walk away from it all. During my post-D period - I was so ready to walk away - and The Nutty Partner of all people persuaded me to stay. I remember walking into his office and telling him - I was tired and I was done. Every other woman I knew had dropped out and I wanted to do the same thing.
There are a lot of really great men that have helped me along the way. It is just the small percentage of weird ones that make life difficult.
The truth is that the world is changing and as I rise within my profession - that kind of stuff is going away...
I am tired. No doubt about it. This vacation is long overdue.
Life is good. I just need to recharge completely so I can stand back up again - not till I have just enough energy to crawl a little further and topple over again.
