natracare org. sanitary napkins

Yesterday afternoon and last night (Tuesday, May 9th) I worked on my postings for this week, focusing on Mother’s Day.

One posting will be a review of Jocelyn Crowley’s book Mothers Unite! In this book, Prof. Crowley writes about several women’s groups who support women with children who may or may not want to return to the work place.

While there is no specific story like Taylar Cordova’s viral message about receiving no tip on a bill for $187.43, the book does discuss work-related issues that would fit in with women’s struggles, especially (single moms’), to support themselves and their children. Please click on the Internet link or the byline link to read the whole story. Worthwhile reading, even if it didn’t just happen today!

This Waitress Got a $0 Tip on a $187 Bill — And Her Facebook Takedown Is Going Viral

By Brianna Provenzano

If you or someone you love has ever worked as a server, now’s the time to brace yourself.

A Facebook post by a waitress who got completely stiffed on a $187 check is going viral for highlighting the plight of service industry workers who rely on gratuity to pay their bills.

Taylar Cordova, whose Facebook profile lists her as a server at P.F. Chang’s China Bistro, took to social media to vent after a particularly needy table left her a fat zero on the tip line of their bill.

My second posting will be about a single mom I met at the fitness club last month, where I swim during the winter months. She and her adult daughter are both competing in sports events coming up here and abroad. Coralie Torres and her daughter were at the pool around 7:30 am, before work in order to work out, with Coralie (Cora for short) teaching her daughter swimming techniques. They have a tight relationship and I wanted to write about that relationship for Mother’s Day. It will post Sunday morning.

Coralie Torres (left) with daughter Coral.

Lastly, my classmate Mary Lou Meyers, sent me a poem about women of our generation, who came of age before the women’s movement. It resonated with me, because of the way we grew up, before we knew how to speak up! Having worked my way through college, mostly as a waitress, and also when my two older children were in grammar school, I used to come back from work hungry and tired, but too tired to eat and collapsed in bed, so I know how difficult waitressing is. And as Taylar noted, because of tipping, the salary for waitressing can be as low as $2- $3.oo an hour.

I am posting that poem today, with Mary Lou’s comment to me below the title, instead of waiting until after Mother’s Day, because I think it is relevant to the story I just read about Taylar Cordova, so here it is below. The last paragraph really hit home for me. (I put it in bold for emphasis.) Thanx, Mary Lou. Note: Word Press would not keep the spaces in Mary Lou’s poem so I added dashes to show the breaks.

Kotex or Context by Mary Lou Meyers

Mary Lou’s comment to me: “I thought you might get something out of this, the stark naked truth of our adolescence.”

Kotex or Context?

The protective napkin between the ribbon of Truth,

dissolving the fundamentals we learned in school.

If we had any doubts we bled out each month,

when we were side-lined, half-court combatants,

missing days on applications.

Illuminating our stay on earth,

resigning ourselves to second place.

In between was the lady-like substance,

the free Charm School my emigrant mother enrolled me in,

precariously balancing a book on my head,

but how the formulas dissipated instead.

How easily we were sold on it, learned self-control,

gave precedence to men, who didn’t give passes

to women who wore glasses

or beat guys in tennis matches.

We featured a knight sweeping us off our feet, quite a feat

when you consider some muscular limbs accustomed to hiking.

How everything we did had to be blown out of proportion,

but how we chose not to undermine the boy,

who called us nicknames, the same one,

who dipped our braids in the ink well when we were young,

who thought it was his due for putting up with you.

A male student at Rutgers wiped windows with a feminine napkin.

What about the notorious “Panty Raid” at Douglass?

Passion Puddle was a one-way street, a repeat of what’’s a guy to do

on a blanket with stars twinkling, certainly not retreat.

Co-mingled with our flesh and bones we were so arranged to blame

ourselves without an even exchange.

But I swam my laps,

later filled in the gaps with the sealing wax of Poetry.

How many hours spent devoted to the craft of seduction,

instead of an armament to withstand the ravages of men;

make-up to prove something we were not quite up to;

Screen Magazine was the proving ground,

you could find it easily sitting on the privy.

Equality was a rousing stirring mandate,

but there were more than pitfalls

we became controversial if we took a stand,

knowing our place as wife and mother, understanding grace.

How pitiful we were, but long marriages were made of it,

anchored in place to make a go of it!

P.S. Ironically, I could not download a photo of differnt kinds of sanitary napkins because of “security reasons!” So I went to the Internet and downloaded a photo from natracare’s website. They carry organic, plastic free, perfume free and chlorine free products, which fit with my Earth Day Every Day “periodic” postings.” Of course, in our day, there were belts & pins, not sticky tabs. But that’s another story…..ellensue

Every Day is Mother’s Day in my book of living your truth
and supporting other women seeking their truth!