Jo Freeman
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Rose Madeline Mula: If You Can’t Stand the Heat
Rose Madeline Mula Writes: “It was with considerable trepidation, therefore, that I entered the kitchen of my hostess, the legendary actress, Joan Fontaine, one long-ago Thanksgiving morning, to offer my assistance. Acting was not Miss Fontaine’s only talent. Not by a long shot. She was also a hole-in-one golfer, a prize-winning fisherwoman, a hot air…
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An Undocumented Childhood by Rose Madeline Mula
Rose Mula Writes: Some people never leave home without their American Express card; I never leave home without a camera. Digitized pictures of the twenty-five countries and forty-plus states of America that I’ve visited since my first tour of exotic New Hampshire constantly flash on my computer monitors and digital frames throughout my home, helping…
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Julia Sneden Wrote: Love Your Library
Julia Sneden Wrote: My mind’s eye can still see the face of the Children’s Librarian, although I have long since forgotten her name. We will be wise to continue to back up our knowledge of history and literature and art and science with hard copy. She kept up with my reading level, suggesting writers and…
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Julia Sneden Wrote: If The Shoe Fits … You Can Bet It’s Not Fashionable
Julia Sneden Wrote: My mother was a mini Imelda Marcos. She kept upwards of 40 pairs of shoes well into her 80’s, and was crushed when she had to give up high heels following a heart attack at the age of 89. Her sole criterion in buying shoes was style, not comfort, and she was…
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Joan L.Cannon Wrote: A Family Inheritance: More Than ‘Things’ … Emblems of Our Lives
Joan Cannon wrote: As one advances in years, one accumulates possessions the way a caddis fly larva accumulates grit. The glue that makes us carry it all along with us is in a way self-secreted as well. However, it’s psychic rather than physical — emotional rather than material. Perhaps the most obvious example is a…
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Julia Sneden Wrote: Old Dogs, New Tricks
Julia Sneden wrote: At the age of 37, I started a new career as a kindergarten teacher. My first day on the job, the lead teacher, who was in her 70’s and scared me every bit as much as she scared the children, watched me writing a note. “You’ll have to change the way you…
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Joan Cannon Writes: Finding the Right Excuse; Committing Words to Paper Because …
Joan Cannon Writes: Think of the poets and novelists and playwrights whose words sink into the consciousness of thousands and even millions and remain there, as emblems, guides, beacons of hope or warnings of disasters, and the excuse (as if one is needed) presents itself. Maybe there’s information or a revelation for some unknown viewer…
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Joan Cannon Asked: What is a Book Club? An Old-Fashioned Book Report? A Program Given By an Author? What Is the Accepted Practice?
Joan L. Cannnon wrote: A year or so ago, I was invited to attend a tea given by the combined membership of all the book clubs in the town where I now live. A presentation was scheduled for the proprietor of the much-loved local independent book store cum gift shop. She is a legend in…
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The Likelihood Function Studied: Early Menopause and Osteoporosis
Women who started the menopause early were found to have a higher risk of fragility fracture and of mortality. The mortality rate was 52.4% in the early compared to 35.2% in the late group. The fracture incidence rate was 44.3% in the early group compared to 30.7% in the late menopause group.
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Who’s Your Best Friend? A spouse or a daughter or both? Perhaps a sister or a daughter-in-law?
As they age, a new study reveals, women’s attention shifts from their spouse to younger females, assumed to be daughters, reflecting, perhaps, a shift in reproductive strategy from mate choice to personal reproduction to grandparental investment.
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More Than Just a Pretty Program: Birdsong on Masterpiece Classic
The novel came 13th in a 2003 BBC survey called the Big Read which aimed to find Britain’s favourite book. It has also been adapted three times under the same title — for radio (1997), the stage (2010) and television (2012).. Now it’s being presented on Masterpiece Classic.
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Silver: A State of Mind
“The women interviewed and photographed here possess one of the most distinctive outward signs of aging — silvering hair. This shared badge provides an ideal entry into the topic of aging as dilemmas about gray hair lead to other deeper issues about the kinds of personal challenges we all face.”
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Worth/Mainbocher: Demystifying the Haute Couture
Worth essentially introduced the concept of haute couture as an art form. He considered himself an artist and his garments works of art. Mainbocher’s designs built upon Worth’s artistic principles, modernizing them to apply to a more practical, American lifestyle.
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What’s At Stake At the Debate About Health Care; How Consumers Could Be Affected
“The main effect of throwing out the mandate would be that the older population who does not get health insurance through their employer would be paying more to be insured. And an estimated 15 million people who would be insured under the law now would choose to go without insurance.”
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The Wage Gap Persists In Nearly All of the Most Common Occupations for Women and Men
“It is shocking that important occupations such as teaching assistants or nurses, psychiatric and home health aides — stressful and responsible jobs that are critical to the well-being of our society — are likely to leave a woman unable to support her family even when she works full time and year round,”
