With women like this

I have always known strong women. Not just strong women; smart women. I have responded to them depending on how I felt about myself and my life at the time. I sometimes felt able to keep up and other times (often within the same hour), I gave in to self-pity and doubt.

I have always defined strong women by the long list of attributes you would expect: well-educated, well spoken, talented, funny, blah blah blah. I see things so differently now that I hang with a more diverse group of women. I have spent all of my professional life in educational institutions ranging from elementary to college campuses.

These moms have MBA’s, MFA’s, PhD’s, MD’s and most importantly, BFD’s. Nobody cares. We all pick up the kids, they go to Kids Club, or the babysitter picks them up. Nobody cares. Some of the mom’s work, some don’t, some work part time, some volunteer all over the place, some workout daily and some actually do it all (the latter, we just are a bit jealous of). Bottom line, nobody seems to care about this stuff.

The point is, I have spent years mostly being around people from work and then moving on to spending social time with a few. When people are at work, there is a hierarchy that cannot be ignored. The hierarchy isn’t just the obvious organizational flow chart. It is also the people we feel are good at their jobs, people whose work we value or people who we don’t get along with (and therefore send us to Borders to buy “How to Deal with Difficult People”) You don’t get to choose these people. You either work with them or figure out a way to move, relocate or quit.

Now I am around women that I see as amazing and strong and I have no clue what kind of employee they are. They are just women I have met and connected with. I am so glad to be in a situation that gives me to opportunity to have a life changing experiences. I’m 42 and that is pretty cool.