The Day I Learned the Secret to Happiness and a Long Life
At the 1990 concert, Circle of Friends, Cris Williamson performed in Berkeley, California, celebrating fifteen years since the release of her album, Changer and the Changed. During the concert, she said, “when women did things they did them a little bit differently—and that it would be useful for the world.” I wish that I had been at the concert, but I only know the statement from the CD. Still, I return to these words often–and make them in the present tense: when women do things they do them a little bit differently–and it is useful for the world.
Last night, driving home from Gainesville, I rolled these words around in my mind beneath that big dark sky with the moon shining on me.
I went up to Gainesville to meet with some of the awesome women that are part of the Lesbian Feminist Activist Oral Herstory Project. Sinister Wisdom has published two compilations of the work that the women in the project are doing–Sinister Wisdom 93 documented southern herstory and Sinister Wisdom 98 was dedicated to landykes. We have a new issue coming out in April 2017 on art and culture and these ambitious wimmin have other ideas in mind. They continue to conduct oral herstory interviews, recording them, transcribing them, archiving them. They have an extraordinary commitment to documenting the herstory of lesbian-feminism. I feel so proud to be a small part of their work.
Rose Norman in Alabama has been my primary contact on this project, but I know that she works with lots of other women and is a part of the Womenwrites retreats that happen in Georgia twice a year. Yesterday, in Gainesville, I got to meet three other people who are part of this awesome lesbian-feminist cabal.
Gainesville is two hours north of where I live now. It was a gorgeous drive up there. I listened to the new Melissa Etheridge album. Once up there, we met in the Civic Media Center, a rad community space with books, posters, and a general positive collective feel about it. We went to the feminist bookstore, Wild Iris, a dedicated bookseller for Sinister Wisdom. We saw a new concert space that Fay, the owner of Sisterspace in Washington, DC, is opening as a jazz club. We went to dinner at a delicious Thai restaurant. The women I met with regaled me with stories and ideas, my two favorite things in the world! Rose is working on a history of a lesbian community. Everyone had fun stories about Florida and the south and lesbians. It was all round a great day.
I’m keeping the best for last, though. At dinner, Corky revealed the secret to happiness and a long life: ballroom dancing for an hour every day. There is something magical about the combination of the movement, the music, the partnered dancing. I continue to think there is just plain something magical about women. When we do things, we do them a little bit differently. It is useful to the world.
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