I gotta be honest here
I consider myself a pretty strong woman. I have fought against the odds a lot of times and if my heart was in the fight, most of the time I won.
I led a divorce against my ex-husband when it seemed the world was against me. That world included my family who thought I was nuts for walking away from a marriage to a financially well heeled man. I had no money of my own and my future looked damned bleak. But having grown up with an alcoholic father had not trained me to be married to an alcoholic spouse.
After the divorce I set my course and fought upstream until I reached my goal. I discovered how to live happily. I relied on the only person who seemed to have faith in my abilities, me.
I tell you this because I watched Senator Clinton these last couple of weeks as she campaigned. She campaigned on, even though her chances of winning the nomination grew smaller by the minute. She would step up to the microphone and smile as she tried her best to convince the world that she could, in the end, be the victor.
As strong as I feel I am, I could not do what she was doing. When all the walls you run into are brick, how do you keep your composure? How do you keep smiling and going?
I don’t know how she did it and maybe I even wonder why. I’m sorry, but if I were in her shoes, I’m afraid I would be crying instead of smiling.
I don’t know how much of her continuing determination was her own or that of her husband. I don’t know if she pushed herself or if she was pushed. But no matter, her persistence was somewhere between amazing and questionable, yet she could smile through it all.
I led a divorce against my ex-husband when it seemed the world was against me. That world included my family who thought I was nuts for walking away from a marriage to a financially well heeled man. I had no money of my own and my future looked damned bleak. But having grown up with an alcoholic father had not trained me to be married to an alcoholic spouse.
After the divorce I set my course and fought upstream until I reached my goal. I discovered how to live happily. I relied on the only person who seemed to have faith in my abilities, me.
I tell you this because I watched Senator Clinton these last couple of weeks as she campaigned. She campaigned on, even though her chances of winning the nomination grew smaller by the minute. She would step up to the microphone and smile as she tried her best to convince the world that she could, in the end, be the victor.
As strong as I feel I am, I could not do what she was doing. When all the walls you run into are brick, how do you keep your composure? How do you keep smiling and going?
I don’t know how she did it and maybe I even wonder why. I’m sorry, but if I were in her shoes, I’m afraid I would be crying instead of smiling.
I don’t know how much of her continuing determination was her own or that of her husband. I don’t know if she pushed herself or if she was pushed. But no matter, her persistence was somewhere between amazing and questionable, yet she could smile through it all.
posted by pissed off patricia at 2:29 AM
20 Comments:
Thanks for sharing some of your story PoP, our brave and wonderful friend. (someone buy this woman a drink, it is almost 6pm somewhere!)
This is true. For whatever reasons - some of them vain and some of them valid, she did keep going.
I put up something about not dancing on her grave - I mean we have to move ahead, although no doubt there will be many who mock and deride her beyond belief today.
We just have to move ahead at this point.
Every shark under the sun is going to come out against Obama, we must be united as Democrats and Progressives.
She fought the good fight and I wouldn't have been disappointed if she had won.
We now have a candidate and we need to refocus and get the job done of getting him elected.
The primaries are history it is now time for the real job of taking our country back.
Thanks for sharing, PoP. I'm so glad you fought on and found Mr. PoP [and Fred] -- heaven knows you deserve them.
xxx
As to Hillary-- yes, whatever her motives and goads, she fought on and on against enormous odds. She, too, deserves to reach further goals in her future and I wish her well.
As Fran says, all the sharks will be out today gloating their asses off. I hope she has a few more smiles in her stash. She's going to need them, I imagine.
i know where you are coming from.
i would have been feeling more kindly towards clinton this morning, given the strength she's shown IF at the end of her great speech she would have graciously conceeded instead of makeing it look as if she is strong arming obama and the dnc and the obama supporters.
obama knows the amount of people that voted for her quite well. to arm twist by not conceeding was a cheap unneeded ploy.
I have never thought that she should drop out of the race, for unity, or whatever else it's been called, even though I have been in favor of Obama since my primary. I very much admire her strength, and obviously she has a shit ton of support. I am from Arkansas, and remember a lot of bigoted people saying what a bitch they thought she was as first lady of the state. It always made me like her. My first gut reaction to the whole presidential race was that she as Presidential nominee and Obama as Vp would be an excellent ticket, and Obama, being the younger, could be president after her. I liked Kucinich's political positions best though. I am glad it worked out like this in the end. Obama gives the young people hope and we need that more than anything, and I was heartened to hear Obama mention healthcare first thing in his nominating speech.
You are a strong lady and I think it a shame that a woman (or a man) has to smile throughout to be in the public eye, but that is the way it is in politics. I couldn't do it either.
Sherry is right. If she is harangued today, it will be mostly because of last night's speech. I think that she is able to continue smiling because she's too well trained as a politician for her face to register emotion from the heart. I'm sure it always checks in with the head first to see what emotion is most beneficial to the situation.
If the election turns out to be eerily similar to the last two, I sure hope the Obama team puts some of Clinton's tenacity to good use. No more giving up for some bullshit notion of good. McCain gets in, we're fucked.
I think this post shows why most of us could never run for any kind of higher office. Honestly, who wants to deal with that bullshit and have to be that calculating, making nice, this that and other thing? Plus, the expected lack of public swearing.
I couldn't do it either. But I suspect that, away from the crowds, she is crying. Hopefully, 'cause otherwise she wouldn't be human.
I wish she would stop smiling and reflect some of the battle scars of the past few months. That she maintains her upbeat attitude, particularly on the night when the numbers convincingly say she lost the nomination, seems insane to me. The primary season has come to an end. We have a good, inspiring candidate. Now is the time for Clinton to work for the party and not for herself.
I was just telling my sweetheart last night - we NEED these politicians, 'cause I certainly don't want the job, and noone else that I know wants the job.
That there are those who ARE attracted to the $$ and power is a good thing, and our job as citizens is to hold their feet to the flames to make sure we get the govt and laws that WE want out of them.
Like FDR said about the New Deal: "I agree with you completely - now go out and MAKE me give it to you!"
Our biggest mistake after Nixon was impeached was going back to the kids and the house and the pool and the barbeque - trusting that those who replaced him were honorable.
What a great post, PoP. I can't even imagine how painful it must be to stand in Hillary's shoes right now, and I don't want to. Women have waited so damned long to be in a position of power--THE position of power. But it's just not meant to be at this time, and she will realize that. I hope she gives a gracious concession speech today, and that she fires up people for Obama.
Which is worse? The abusive marriage between Hillary Clinton and her supporters, or the abusive marriage between Hillary Clinton and the Democratic Party?
she was still asking supporters to go to her website and donate yesterday!
since she and bill are deep in debt, my man and i believe that much of her hanging-on has to do with money woes. plain and simple. she wants to collect as much as she can before leaving the building.
we need to get all the focus on the election now.
you lose, you lose. she fought a good fight. she lost. it's tough but she's tougher. she couldn't be where she is in life if she wasn't.
i expected her to concede because that's how it's done.
jockey for planks and position after the concession speech.
i can't stand the thought of 4 more republican years.
I think that Barack, Hillary and Bill would be a marriage made in hell, so I hope he does not offer the VP spot to her. I do hope that she will be offered a cabinet position.
good post. yes, of course, hillary should, and will concede. i think she wants to concede on her own day, not on obama's day.
i'm acutely tired of all the hostility aimed at her and her supporters. all the misogynist remarks by the media and bloggers. a lot of people talk abt voting for mccain over obama. BOTH obama and clinton need each other, to show unity. that doesn't mean a VP slot, but i think it does mean he has to mollify her in some way. there's a reason this primary season came all the way down to the 2nd-to-last primary. they are both formidable.
Congratulations on your successful journey. Do not count Hillary out yet though!
It does feel good to say that but Hillary can still make this a miserable road depending on whether or not Obama knows how to placate her.
Anyway I keep pointing out that McCain is running on change to but his idea of change is the same lies with a different disguise. The more he distances himself from Bush the more like him he is!
I have been seeing McCain off and on all day and that sneering, grinning, smirk, or whatever he calls that sinister smile is getting down right alarming and he is sounding more and more like a mad man. I fully expect him to self destruct when he does get his wish for one on ones with Obama at town hall meetings.
I wondered what exactly was Hillary running on lately, too.
But maybe it really is just in her nature to never. ever. give. up.
How else can ya explain her marriage to Bill?
And I don't mean that in a nasty way.
I completely believe that a marriage and what those 2 married decide to do or not do in their marriage-- (whether it be my own, my neighbor's, David Vitter's, Larry Craig's, or Bill and Hillary's)-- is their own business. Period.
But how has Hillary put up with so much from Bill in terms of cheating?
I adore my husband. I love him with every bit of my being. But if he cheated on me, I would divorce him.
I would have to.
For myself.
And for my children.
But Hillary has refused to walk away-- no. matter. what.
Maybe she is simply just unable to ever give up or walk away from anything.
And THAT particular quality might just be exactly what is needed for a cabinet position.
Like perhaps as head of our new national healthcare system?
Well pop you've been through the mill. Here's my two cents; what you went through was a complete physical, emotional, psychological and spiritual battle. What Hillary went through, as well as putting other through, was well calculated, and I cannot say she fought a good fight. She is an icecube, she was groomed for this, a well polished politician inside and out. Somewhere along the line,I do not know where, she lost touch with the human feminine aspect. This is an unfortunate message to send to young women; people like Hillary and Diane Feinstein missed the entire concept of women's liberation: we didn't want to be just like men, we hoped to be on equal terms with them yet with our powers of feminine compassion which most (generally speaking) men lacked to use as a powerful tool to heal and nurture. So, the lesson, or one of the lessons should be - as a woman, when you sell your soul to power and the corporates,at the price of your yin, you become yanged out.
It was hard to stay up after her speech ended with Tina Turner's "Simply the Best." I still hadn't packed for my trip, and we were leaving early; but, I really wanted to hear Obama speak.
So, I told myself, "Well, at least she didn't play MC Hammer's "You Can't Touch This."
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