Tulips for International Women's Day

On Saturday, I needed to pick up a few groceries, so I went to the grocery store that has the better floral section.  I was hoping to find a pot of jonquils or daffodils, but I don't usually find them here.  I found cut tulips, but most of them had already opened.  And then I found a pot of tulips that still had their best days ahead of them--and they're purple, one of my favorite colors in tulips.  I added them to my cart.

It was only at the checkout register that I realized I had gotten a pot that was celebrating International Women's Day.  How had that holiday come and gone already with so little fanfare?

Come to find out, it hadn't--it's today, March 8.

The beautiful thing about this pot of tulips is that I can move it around the house with me.  On Saturday, I put it on the TV stand so that I could enjoy them as I watched the Hulu adaptation of The Handmaid's Tale.  I didn't plan it that way, but it seems appropriate viewing for this week in a larger month that celebrates women and their history.

On Sunday morning, I moved them to the front bedroom where I write.  I was struck by the way the shadows played with the actual shapes.

I also noticed the label on the pot.  A women-owned tulip farm--I didn't realize I was supporting such a thing by buying spring flowers, but apparently I did!

The paper that wraps the pot with its words like "feminine" and "sweet" and "solidarity" and "resilient" and "workers"--is that supposed to be saying something about the day?  Who creates such paper, with these words that both do and do not go together?

We might ask ourselves why we still need to set time apart to pay attention to women. Haven't we enacted laws so that women are equal and now we can just go on with our lives?

Sadly, no, that is not the case. If we look at basic statistics, like how much women earn compared to men in the very same jobs, we see that the U.S. has still not achieved equality. If we look at violent crime rates across the past 100 years, we discover that most violent crime rates have fallen--except for rape. If we look at representation in local, state, and federal levels, we see that members of government are still mostly white and male.

And that's in a first world country. The picture for women in developing nations is bleak.

Yes, I realize that buying a pot of tulips is not enough--not nearly enough. So, today, let us get started, let us continue, let us make progress. And let us remember all of those who need us to make progress at a faster rate for their very lives and the lives of their daughters are at stake.