When you’re lucky enough to have lived a long life, as I have done,
your role is to remind us how far we have come. –Gloria Steinem
A Long Way, Baby
women only in dresses
men in work overalls
dinner on and at the table when he gets home
meat, potato, vegetable
tv trays and foil banquet dinners
metal lunch pails with handles
blood-won strong unions
Lawrence Welk and Geritol
RCA Victor dog with gramophone
vinyl 33, 45, 78 rpm platters
wooden cabinet stereos
reel to reel tape decks
cassette tape players
8-track players
silent movies with keyboard
or captions, Charlie Chaplin
Buster Keaton, Little Rascals
black and white nickolodean
three channels,
(cheap!) cigarette commercials
Ed Sullivan
Indian Boarding Schools
Magdalene Laundries
Jim Crow and redlining
draft and delinquency conscripts
Vietnam War coffins televised
bra and flag burning
freedom fighters assassinated
The title is part of a slogan for Virginia Slims cigarettes, “We’ve come a long way, baby.”
I am today’s host of dVerse’ OpenLinkNight. I’ve chosen to write to the optional Gloria Steinem quote, shown at the top of the post.
Tao-Talk 
Lisa, that’s a great piece; the vintage stuff like vinyls and cassette tapes… we’ve indeed come a long way. ☺️👍
I haven’t had a good luck with Wi-Fi issues today. The tech didn’t come for five days straight. The crashes became less frequent, though, so I’m still online.
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Yasan, thanks so much, and hoping wifi continues to improve for you.
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You’re most welcome, Lisa. I hope it continues to improve. 🙏☺️
Have a very wonderful day! ☺️
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The good the bad and the ugly. Nostalgia is cheap, reality sobering. (K)
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We have come a long way, but you’re right, the reality that some want us to go back to the worst parts and see nothing wrong with it is sobering.
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Frightening, actually.
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Yes, i know that slogan
Bravo great list poem
much love
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Gillena, happy you know it. Thanks so much <3
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I remember when Virginia Slims came out with that slogan and how insulting it was to second wave feminism and all women…as though tobacco companies enriching themselves by marketing cigarettes specifically to women was somehow “liberating”. But maybe sales were slipping since we now knew that smoking causes cancer. “What can we co-opt next?” seems to be a central theme in corporate America. And how is infantilizing women as babies empowering?
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I actually think the message were the up and coming smokers, young teenagers. I bought into it without question as smoking was the norm in my fam — but women’s lib was not.
We know that corporations are evil entitities with personhood. Did you hear about the toxic air that NYC residents were breathing in after 9/11? City covered it up for 25 years!
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RCA Victor dog with gramophone
vinyl 33, 45, 78 rpm platters
wooden cabinet stereos
reel to reel tape decks
You’ve brought us back to a long list of historical happenings for which the oldies are familiar. Thanks for the memories Lisa!
Hank
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My pleasure, Hank :)
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So many memories!
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J, a drop in the bucket :)
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That creative writing illustrates just how long a way we’ve come, Lisa. Now, the goal is to not go backwards. You know, Gloria was such an influential person, and I hope the younger generations take a few moments to dig into her life story and appreciate her being a positive agent of change for our society.
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Bruce if you get Netflix, check out the new doc where she is interviewed. I learned so much about her from it.
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I do, and I will.😊
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:)
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We’ve come so far but, still have a long journey ahead of us.
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Lisa I love how this captures the vivid texture of 20th-century history – blending nostalgic comforts🙌
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Ange, it was a stream of consciousness that I hoped would have some kind of message beyond my lists. Thank you <3
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A great poem Li.
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Sadje, thank you <3
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You’re most welcome 🙏🏼
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a trip down memory lane Lisa seen through a lot of smoke! (I too joined the ranks though the UK has different brands of toxicity) how far we’ve come and why and where we are going remains an enigma
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It was somewhat different in the UK; we had our own struggles. I agree, we have come a long way, Lisa, but we still have a long way to go; as Laura wrote, where we are going remains an enigma.
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Yes we do and yes it is.
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Ah, the good old days, eh?! 🧐😉
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:) As always, this that and the other. How many of those things you recognize is a gauge of your age ;)
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I get a nostalgic feeling for a place where I did not yet exist or was too young to understand… I love when poetry does that. And thank you for hosting tonight.
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Reelika, happy you experience that. It keeps things fresh, I think. You are welcome on the hosting; my pleasure.
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Your poem was a blast from the past, Li. My mom used to smoke Virginia Slims, so that added to the nostalgia for me!
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