Li Longo--My Feminist Journey

To Be, or Not To Be. All I know is, I am a feminist.

If you went back to my high school, perhaps even to my grammar school, and asked who was most likely to grow up and be a feminist, I’m pretty sure my name would get the most votes. Right next to the “Class Flirt” and “Most School Spirit” awards my classmates bestowed upon me, this one would have been treasured. I was born in 1964, grew up wishing I’d been old enough to be part of the Civil rights movement. Idolizing Martin Luther King, President John F. Kennedy and his brother, Robert Kennedy.

Growing up as I did, in a true blue democratic political family, my grandfather had no doubt, it would be politics or law for me, he would proudly tell the rest of the family, I could convince the birds to sing and  argue with the “best”.  I have a clear memory of one such argument with my father. I wanted to take typing in high school. “Why?” he asked, “You are going to have a secretary, not be a secretary.” 

And so it was that from a young age, I was told I would be a leader, not one of the led. I was expected to honor that responsibility, to serve my community, care for my family and remember it was my duty to take part in public service.

I entered early adulthood, earned my degree in Accounting and had some fun doing it. My friends and I made good money, we enjoyed our lives, going out, and how we loved to dance. We would go clubbing, and in the summer rent houses at the beach, in the winter travel to Vermont to ski, and basically enjoyed were the hip young Yuppies the ‘90’s were all about.

At some point, I must have let my membership to NOW expire. I remember how proud I had been when I first became a member, and I don’t remember when I decided the “war” on women had ended and I no longer needed to be a card carrying NOW member.

I remained a feminist, and after liberal, it is the most common word used to describe me by myself and others. I was liberated, and loving it. It was the mid-90’s, we had just elected President Clinton, life was good.

Two years later I met a man. And I chucked it all, my job, my home, my family, to go cross-country, live in a tent and climb as much as we could in the 6 months we had. It was a wonderful time, quite possibly the happiest of my life. My family was stunned, but I was happy. This was a new kind of liberation for me, it was just the two of us, and we were young & strong, living to no one’s expectation but our own. Our days were filled with adventure and everything seemed possible.

We made it to California and after another month, it was there our paths diverged, his back to his native New Zealand, me, to San Diego, to get a job and then travel to New Zealand and see if there was anything more for us. Two weeks after he left I found out I was pregnant. So there I was, 30 years old, in San Diego, staying with a climbing buddy, no job, no money, just my Jeep, my climbing gear, my tent, sleeping bag and backpack. Next thing I know I’m in the Jeep, driving back East, 4 days, 4,000 miles, to my sister’s house in New Jersey.

I remember telling my dad, and he was so supportive, and my ex-roommate, who said she was happy for me, and said she knew I was doing exactly what I wanted, that I had “always wanted a baby, never a husband”.

Telling the father was one big decision, but I did tell him. He wanted me to come to New Zealand. He wanted to marry me. But suddenly, I wanted more than anything to take care of me and my child on my own. I stayed in New Jersey, got a job and got ready to be a mom. 

After her birth, my daughter and I did travel to New Zealand, and we spent a happy time there with her father and his family. After a while we came back to the US, settled in and since then, except for a few disastrous attempts at dating, it’s been just her and I.

During our attempt at making it work, her dad said something so interesting, I never forgot it, “I am always afraid you are going to leave me”, he said, “You don’t need me.” And I knew he was right, and told him so. “But I want you, isn’t that better?” He didn’t think so, and he left and within two years found himself someone a bit more needy than I.

Back on my own turf I returned to work, only to discover that a working mother is very different from the working party girl I had been. No more dancing at the Meadowbrook until 3am and then breakfast at the diner before a shower, coffee and off to the office.

Nope, now when I was up all night it was with a screaming toddler. Sure the first few months we stayed with my dad and step-mom, but once we were in our own apartment, and then our first house, it was just me & Sierra.

After a year working at a CPA firm, I realized something had to give. So I left the firm with 5 clients, started my own consulting firm. Twelve years later, I’m still here. When I left the Managing Partner at the firm told me my concept “would never work”. Well, it does work. My daughter has gone to work with me for the last 12 years. We have clients who have watched her grow into the tall teen she is today, and they love seeing her. When she is sick, I stay home, and my clients understand. At one time, I had three bookkeepers for clients, all worked from home.

Not all jobs require us to be at the office in suit and pantyhose, bra & heels. Who decided that working together in a office was the most productive way to accomplish tasks? Women have accepted this phallo-centric work ethic for decades. Arrive at 9 AM, leave at 5 PM, Monday through Friday, and if you want to make partner, arrive at 7 AM leave at 8 PM. Sure it works for men, most of them don’t deal with all that working mothers do, though more & more I see in my friends men willing to share the days off with sick children, or personal days for plays, award ceremonies, and unfinished English projects.

Now I am seeing even more, there is a subtle shift in awareness. The whiff of womanity is in the air. Across the nation the tigress is stretching her limbs, getting ready to strike. 

The GOP thought they could use our bodies for political pandering. They were wrong. 

They thought they could attack Planned Parenthood and force their vaginal probes into us as a way to take away our constitutional rights. They were wrong. 

They thought they could cut funds to education, close libraries and give our life savings to Wall Street. They were wrong.

On August 26^th, feminists nationwide will strike. We’ll be sending a powerful message to legislators, and an empowering message to daughters all over the world. It is time to change the paradigm.