It’s international women’s day so I went out to lunch with the woman who has inspired me the most, my Mam.
She had 5 kids and in the 80s when my Dad was not working she went out to work and he became the stay at home Dad. When having a gang of kids and a husband with so many illnesses he was eventually given a disability classification, she found she wasn’t coping she went and sought out counseling and took on parenting classes and certified to give to classes to other parents who were struggling.
We have had some spectacular falling out over the years, she’s not always agreed with my choices but she always loved me and tried to be there for me, to encourage and support me.
I am very grateful that we are at the stage in our relationship that we talk together as women and no longer just mother and daughter. So I rang her up this morning and we went for lunch to celebrate international women’s day and to talk about life and the world entire.
Some of her words of wisdom.
“Ireland is a young country, we are not 100 years old yet as a nation and a society, we are growing and hopefully soon we will reach the sort of maturity that brings with it acceptance.
Acceptance of the choices grown adults make about their lives and with that making sure they all have the same rights and access to what ever serves they need. And why shouldn’t gay people get married, it’s about love, why shouldn’t they have a blessing and a ring and a cert just like everyone else?
That this acceptance will hopefully throw away the restrictions due to gender, people can do so many things, people need to be given the opportunities to do those things, to develop their talents and never be told they can’t because they are a man or a woman.
Hands have no gender and working together we can make the world better for the generations to come, but it has to start at looking at and naming inequality. Women have to work harder then men to prove themselves and that is not fair and it holds women back. It is moving forward, there is change but we have to make sure we work to make it happen.
And to change society it’s not about talking to people ‘in power’ it is about conversations with people, everyday people, talking about why things are the way they are and how they could be different I have seen a lot of change in my life time and I hope to see a lot more.”
She likes to say I am more like my Dad then her but honestly some things I certainly got from her, I didn’t lick it off a stone!
Why write this today and not on Mother’s day, cos this is about the woman I know who happens to be my mother, a woman I respect and admire who is my friend and more then just my Mammy.