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Dear Kay,

I was at the Farmer’s Market near MDK World Headquarters the other day, at the food court where you can get Cajun or Indian or a bushel of tomatoes for lunch. I sat down with my bulgogi near a table of women.

There were four of them, and they looked to be up to absolutely nothing. No rush at all. Sitting with their Diet Cokes, cooling their heels. Vacation mode. Capri pants and fun tops.

All of a sudden, they started laughing. I couldn’t hear what they were saying, but I could tell that one of them had said something funny. One wiped her eyes with a paper napkin, another ground the palms of her hands against her face in an apparent attempt to keep from laughing her eyeballs out, and another actually stopped laughing because she’d run out of breath—then started laughing all over again.

It was so great that I started to laugh, too, two tables away.

I sat until they gathered themselves up—boxes of leftovers, tote bags—and headed toward the door. I loved them so much.

Women together. It got me thinking about what feat of logistics allowed this group to have that laugh together. I think of the everyday resilience that has kept them going. Somebody’s knee hurts. Somebody’s got grandchildren with stuff going on. Somebody wonders what might have been. They’re heroic, getting through each day until they’ve accumulated seventy or eighty years of days. They’re Grown Ups.

So what does this have to do with Eleanor Roosevelt?

Everything!

She was the ultimate Grown Up. Her struggles were public, and her triumphs were often controversial, yet they never got the best of her.

Talk about a trajectory. Roosevelt was born into wealth and political power, but suffered the loss of both parents by the time she was ten. She married her fifth cousin, Franklin Delano Roosevelt, a bad pairing. The scrutiny she bore was extreme for the age—she was the subject of endless criticism as she remade the role of First Lady. But what intrigues me the most is what happened in her later life, after the death of her husband.

She kept going. Full speed ahead until her death in 1962 at the age of 78, working for human rights, women’s rights, common decency and respect for all. We should all aim so high. And find such resilience.

You can see the full episode of “Eleanor Roosevelt: A Restless Spirit” here.

Love,

Ann

Portrait of Eleanor Roosevelt from the White House Historical Association.

27 Comments

  • Was anyone ever more quotable than Eleanor Roosevelt? I admire her so much – thank you for the link!

  • Your description of these women sounds like my friends when we get together. It’s a good feeling.

    • If you knit, make mittens from her pattern.

      • I know my comment is coming years after yours, but I want to thank you for mentioning Eleanor Roosevelt’s mitten pattern. My mother was in the women’s White House press corps, who were regularly invited to tea with the First Lady. She worshiped Mrs. Roosevelt, as did many of her colleagues, who were treated with respect and encouragement.
        I found the pattern and look forward to making the mittens as a testament to those women on whose shoulders we attempt to balance. Thank you.

    • I have lunch with a group of friends each month. We have a great time, sharing our stories, building each other up and laughing! We go home renewed and refreshed. We are a support group for each other but best of all, we are sisters joined by love.

  • So well said, Ann. What you’ve shared reminds me that I’ve been meaning to reread Noelle Hancock’s memoir My Year With Eleanor, chronicling her decision to heed the advice of Eleanor Roosevelt and do one thing a day that scares her in the year before her 30th birthday. She really followed through and it’s an inspiration and also funny, qualities that (gratefully!) seem to go hand in hand in life more often than not.

  • I have a group of good friends like this, thank God, love them dearly.

    • My friends and I meet once a week and we put the world to rights, over breakfast and once a month a few others that can’t make it every week, join us and we have lunch together. We always have a good laugh and enjoy the time we have together x

  • I’m looking for the “like” button. Thank you for this upbeat post and reminder of a woman who made a difference in spite of all those who said she couldn’t/shouldn’t/wouldn’t. Each one of us has that capacity.

    • I loved this post, too. I’ve been reading MDK for years, and every once in a while something Ann or Kay writes really resonates with me. This post did so, particularly. ♥️

  • Very nice piece, Ann. Well written, meaningful. Thanks.

  • Her father once left her waiting for him outside a bar and forgot she was there. Her mother teased her looks, calling her Granny. Her husband, well, it was sure complicated and painful. She found happiness where she could, and a lot of the time it was by working, and a lot of the time it was by hanging out with friends who really got her. Also: she knit in public. #kaysfactsaboutER

  • Forgot one of my fave ER facts: she had her own house! #valkill

    • My first real-life heroine.

    • Near Rhinebeck I think? (I know Hyde Park is). We can all make a pilgrimage.
      Bonus – my late MIL had coffee with Eleanor Roosevelt near Washington Square Park, while she was a student at NYU. Late 1940s. Apparently they talked over my MIL’s run for sorority office and women’s roles.

  • #capripantsandfuntops

  • Agreed. We need friends

  • A special reminder of how much we can appreciate women, especially the ones who can laugh, feel camaraderie easily — and work together. Eleanor was my guiding star — a great woman who gave other women the courage to move ahead. Thank you for this well-written, succinct salute to Eleanor Roosevelt!

  • I’m a great admirer of this incredible woman. Thank You so very much for bringing her to the attention of many

  • These days, I often think of something my mother used to say: “If you didn’t laugh, you’d cry.” Eleanor Roosevelt died when I was little, so in my mind she was always a Person of Good Works, and rather remote. As I’ve grown older she has become more interesting to me. In fact, I have read a couple of good books recently of which she was the subject. One was a novel, White Houses, by Amy Bloom written from the perspective of Lorena Hickok, her Very Good Friend. The other was a biography of Eleanor and her cousin Alice Roosevelt Longworth, (“If you can’t say something nice, come sit here by me”) called Hissing Cousins. Both were excellent.

  • You just made my heart so glad. Thank you!

  • Keeper!

  • My daughter’s name is Eleanor, and Eleanor Roosevelt is partly why. So, so inspiring. I can’t wait to take my Eleanor to ER’s house again when she’s old enough to appreciate. (She cried throughout our last visit to Hyde Park, but we’d had a two-hour lunch at the CIA first, and that’s a lot for the under-one crowd. Plus we only made it to FDR’s house that visit, so….)

  • A couple years ago, one of my friends was writing about what a wonderful time we had all had on a “fiber outing”, our annual road trip to Oregon Flock and Fiber. Her words described SO PERFECTLY the way I feel about my friends — I don’t know how I’d make it without them! Here’s what she wrote: “And just to be in the company of such loving friends who come together like a fortress to support one another through sickness, surgeries, and great loss, but are still able to create Fun ….. Playfulness …. and Joy; we are Awesome Women !!!!”

  • My hero! I have a picture of her knitting during a meeting at the UN in my office!

  • What an amazing human being she was. She dealt with so much criticism yet kept her head up and kept working for the good of us all. A lesson about courage and grace. Bless her.

    • This is my first ever “leave a comment” I couldn’t let this go by without saying ; thank you for sharing this with us and may we apply this strength and wisdom displayed by Eleanor in our daily lives. Kudos to you!

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