That was an eye-opening moment for me. My next thought as I stared into her magnificently evolved soul was, “No wonder it takes us so long. We tend to expect the next generation to make the strides.” Geraldine Ferraro who died yesterday didn't. Neither did Ann Richards, Liz Carpenter, Barbara Jordan, Molly Ivins, Lenna Guerroro, some of the Texas female political icons of my generation, and now they're gone - but not forgotten.
It just so happened that around that same time I was invited to join the Austin Women’s Political Caucus, and although I cringed at the thought of becoming my mother (politically involved), I quickly not only joined, but agreed to become their president, eventually becoming President of the Texas Women's Political Caucus. Fueled by Ann Richard’s run for Governor (I was on her Capital Council), we soared. We raised lots of money, printed t-shirts that said "A Woman's Place Is In The Dome," and walked to the capital with Ann on her inauguration day.Those were high times. But I came crashing to the ground in the summer of 1991, at the 20th Anniversary Celebration of the National Women’s Political Caucus in Washington, DC (I was on their steering committee). After floating in the euphoria of having breakfast with Betty Friedan (just the two of us), a 30 minute conversation with Gloria Steinem, and introducing Geraldine Ferraro to my wheelchair-bound, 86-year-old mom who went with me, at the closing session of the conference I heard that in 20 years, the number of women elected to the US Congress had increased to what seemed to me a very small percentage. Everyone was cheering and I was crying. How could this be!
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