That Takes Ovaries!

by Rivka Solomon

  Dedicated to girls everywhere,

  and to those fighting for the human rights of

  women and girls around the globe.

  Contents

  Introduction

  Rivka’s Note to All Readers

  CHAPTER 1

  On the Spot: Impulsive, Gutsy Acts

  Preaching to the Convicted / KATHLEEN TARR

  Alps-ward Bound / FREZZIA PRODERO

  Hands On, Hands Off / BOBBI AUSUBEL

  Amen for Sneaky Women / CECELIA WAMBACH

  Fat Grrlz Kick Ass / BETH MISTRETTA

  Paying for It / MONIQUE BOWDEN

  Selling the Berlin Wall / RIVKA SOLOMON

  Educating Bill Clinton / BONNIE MORRIS

  Saving Mommy, or The Night I Lost My Childhood / D. H. WU

  Nothing from Nobody / TARA BETTS

  I Swear! / LOUISE CIVETTI

  You Can Take That Law and… / GWYN McVAY

  CHAPTER 2

  After Some Thought: Making Life-changing Choices

  Double Whammy / LYNDA GAINES

  Divine Perfection / ANITRA WINDER

  Cinderella, Ph.D. / IRIS STAMMBERGER

  Committing to Motherhood / REBECCA WALKER

  Returning Home / WILMA MANKILLER

  Courage at the End / MIREYA HERRERA

  CHAPTER 3

  For Ourselves: Taking Charge of Our Bodies and Sexuality

  Cupid’s Paintbrush / AMELIA COPELAND

  Smutmonger / CECILIA TAN

  Big Beauty / TESS DEHOOG

  First Pride / AMANDA RIVERA

  Loving w/o Limits / ROBIN RENÉE

  Good, Good, Good, Good Vibrations / JOANI BLANK

  Declawing Catcalls / JULIA ACEVEDO

  MTV, Bite Me! / SABRINA MARGARITA ALCANTARA-TAN

  Spreading My Legs for Womankind / MOLLY KENEFICK

  CHAPTER 4

  Danger: Risking Life or Limb

  Adventures in the Jungle / DENISE GRANT

  Slapshot off the Rink / AMY CHAMBERS

  Not Minding My Own Business / MARY ANN McCOURT

  Surfergrrl / ELAINE MARSHALL

  War Zone / ANONYMOUS

  Impossible Choices: From El Salvador to the United States / EVA

  Documenting It / RUCHIRA GUPTA

  Gorilla Dreams / MAITE SUREDA

  Triumphs of the Amazon Queen / KYM TRIPPSMITH

  CHAPTER 5

  Rebels: Individuals Taking a Stand

  Letting Justice Flow / ALISON KAFER

  One Moonshine Night / JULIA WILLIS

  Yay for Hairy Women! / MICA MIRO

  Painting the Town / SASHA CLAIRE McINNES

  Camping with a Ventilator / CONNIE PANZARINO

  A Room of Our Own / KATHRYN ROBLEE

  Davida and Goliath / JANE COLBY

  Taking Up Tools / ELIZABETH YOUNG

  Just Don’t Do It / ADRIENNE

  Transforming Hate / KRISSY

  Digging for Dough / AMY RICHARDS

  Stage Presence / PHOEBE ENG

  Remaining Whole Behind Bars / FAUZIYA KASSINDJA

  CHAPTER 6

  Doing It Together: Collective Activism

  Love Thy Neighbor with Avengeance / JESSICA BROWN

  High-School Gauntlet / RACHEL

  Synagogue Revolt / LOOLWA KHAZZOOM

  Diary of an Urban Guerilla / KATHY BRUIN

  Civil Disobedience: A Primary School Primer / DEBRA KOLODNY

  Nine Days to Change the World / TERRI M. MUEHE

  Women’s Rights Are Human Rights / RANA HUSSEINI

  CHAPTER 7

  “That’s Not Nice!”: Acting On Anger

  How to Stop a Thief / MARY GOING

  Eye on the Ball / KATHLEEN ANTONIA

  Mike Meets the Dykes / JUDITH K. WITHEROW

  Charmed, I’m Sure / AUDREY SCHAEFER

  Closing the Nasty Girl / ELIZABETH O’NEILL

  No Screwing Around / VASHTI

  Biker Babe / HILKEN MANCINI

  Driven / CHRISTINE MAXFIELD STONE

  That Takes Ovaries! Open Mikes

  Female Genital Mutilation, Sex Trafficking, and That Takes Ovaries! Fund-raisers

  Acknowledgments

  “If you obey all the rules, you miss all the fun.”

  —Katharine Hepburn

  “Well-behaved women rarely make history.”

  —Laurel Thatcher Ulrich

  “If you don’t take risks, you won’t know what is possible.”

  —Unknown

  Introduction

  What Is This Book?

  That Takes Ovaries! is a collection of women’s and girls’ real-life stories written in their own words. From courageous and smart to outrageous and foolhardy, these accounts capture the breadth of gutsy acts. It is a collection that embraces diversity with the voices of everyday females of many ages and cultural backgrounds, and also includes stories from a few better-known individuals and activists.

  This book contains more than sixty first-person narratives representing a wide variety of audacious deeds. It includes accounts of women and girls standing up to a gun-toting gangbanger in a fast-food joint, skysurfing out of airplanes, organizing a hundred high-school girls to take on the boys who harass them, jumping off a moving train to see the Alps, defying abuse in prison, diving into the middle of an ice hockey fight, staging a Lesbian Avengers action inside a conservative think tank, earning a living as a sex writer, making a would-be burglar cry, and telling President Clinton what to do—and having him do it! The stories tell how a fourteen-year-old led a revolt in her synagogue, a poor woman rose out of destitution and prostitution, a passerby confronted a crowd of catcalling men, a public health educator founded the country’s first women-oriented sex-toy store, a peacemaker met with guerilla leaders in a war zone, a girl was the first to wear pants to elementary school in the 1960s, a reporter started a mass movement against brutality toward women in the Middle East, a Catholic schoolteacher snuck in to see the Pope … and dozens of other sassy, spirited acts.

  That Takes Ovaries! places all its stories, from the seemingly frivolous to the obviously political, under the single umbrella of a larger philosophy: freedom and empowerment. What’s the link between the woman who boldly fights for social justice and the one who boldly has fun? Both are acting powerfully, because each is rejecting preconceived notions of how females “should” behave. Each storyteller is irreverently saying, “No way I’m accepting limits placed on me!”

  How Did This Book Come About?

  I had a party one night. The guests were more acquaintances than good friends. During the evening a man told a story about a woman who had done a totally brazen thing (though now I can’t remember what). When he finished, I casually remarked, “Well, that took ovaries.” The roomful of people fell silent, and then they burst out laughing, exclaiming “Great phrase!” I was surprised. I’d used the saying often enough in the past, around my buddies, and gotten back only nods, grins, or “Amen to that.” This time, using the expression with the general public, I saw its power.

  This phrase is great, I thought after my guests left. Not just fun and funny, it challenged the myth of the passive female—and that made it political. Even more, the phrase reflected a key sentiment behind the latest rising wave of young feminists (the Guerilla Girls, Riot Grrrl, Third Wave, and girls’ movements), that is, the attitude of playful brazenness in the push for gender equality.

  Besides all that, I concluded as I flossed before bed, “that takes ovaries” would make a great book title!

  By the time I climbed under the covers, I had decided to assemble a collection of ovarian acts where women and girls take charge, and maybe even have fun. I hoped my book-to-be could add to those already coming out that are a platform for girls’
vibrant voices and a celebration of womanly resilience. I envisioned a book that would excite women and men of all ages who want to see their sisters, mothers, grandmothers, aunts, and friends leading empowered lives; mothers and fathers who care about their daughters growing up self-assured and confident; and girls eager to be a part of the growing “girl power” movement. That Takes Ovaries! would be for everyone interested in challenging a culture still wrought with inequality and double standards—everyone hungry for unabashedly powerful females.

  Collecting the Stories

  The day after my party I whipped up a “call for stories.” I emailed the notice to friends and a few listservs (e-mail discussion groups).

  That Takes Ovaries!

  Seeking submissions of anything YOU have *ever* done—little or big—that was gutsy or audacious. It can be playful, serious, spontaneous, calculated, smart, sexy, and/or an example of leadership. Something that when you think about it today, makes you nod your head with *pride,* or even semi-disbelief, and think, “Wow! I did that!”

  Soon my e-mail in-box was full. Not only with cool, gutsy-gal submissions, but also with notes from women and men around the country saying they loved the idea of the book and asking when they could buy it. Apparently the phrase had struck a chord. When women got the e-notice, they were so tickled they promptly sent it to their girlfriends; my call for stories became a popular forwarding item. Before long I was seeing it sent back to me via a number of women’s listservs and e-newsletters to which I subscribed but had not sent the notice. In the end, three hundred stories came in and thousands of women on the Web considered, at least for a moment, their own bravery and brazenness.

  Defining Ovaries

  What does it mean to have ovaries? If I was going to edit this book, I’d need a definition.

  First, I tried to define the male equivalent: having balls. That takes balls, I surmised, is what you say about a man who has done something rather fearless, a guy we might envy for having the confidence to push the boundaries or break the rules. Actually, I thought, these were great characteristics for any person to have … but they’d be especially helpful to a woman. She’d need just these traits to live fully in a world that often tries to limit her. So even as I kept an open mind regarding defining ovaries, I also kept this balls description in the back of my head. Then I set about reading the stories. With each one, I gained a clearer picture of what other women thought the expression that takes ovaries meant. I merged the contributors’ ideas with my own until I reached a working definition.

  Something takes ovaries, I concluded, when it is bold, gutsy, brazen, outrageous, audacious, courageous, or in-your-face. Combined, this string of words encompasses the spectrum of what having ovaries is about. (For more ovarian synonyms, see the beginning of this book. Just reading it, your inner bite-me grrl grows stronger.) Having ovaries is a catchall phrase. It includes smart, brave, altruistic acts and silly, shocking, impulsive ones. So, it seems, having ovaries isn’t that far from the definition of having balls—except that we are female.

  By adapting the phrase that takes balls to that takes ovaries, we end the myth that equates only the male sex organ with innate power and fearlessness. By adapting the phrase, we claim our inherent strength and courage, too. Hell, we’ve been acting on our strength all along; the only new thing is that now we have a cool expression we can use to brag about it.

  The predominant culture may try to socialize girls into believing femaleness and femininity equals not-as-powerful, not-as-bold. (Even common put-downs targeted at guys who act less than macho instill this idea: You have no balls; Don’t be such a girl; and plain old pussy—simultaneously the slang for female genitalia and an insult.) It’s so pervasive, no wonder some girls have to fight to keep from internalizing the notion that being female means being less than.

  But the stories I collected show women and girls are actively fighting this view of themselves. In fact, the stories illustrate that for many contributors to this book, having ovaries specifically means having the courage to confront externally defined notions of what a woman is. Many of the stories are about defying the dominant culture’s preconceived idea of “femininity”—passive, pleasing, docile, cautious, dependent, either quiet or hysterical, irrational, dumb, always-nice-never-angry, and incapable of self-defense. Yes, women can be those things, too. After all, we are human and reserve our right to be hysterical when we want (so there!). But the stories in this book show that females—the beings who personify real femininity—are more than what others tell them they are. They are loudly and proudly whoever and whatever they want to be.

  In that same vein, coining the phrase having ovaries doesn’t mean women aim to mimic men who have balls. In fact, this would be difficult to achieve even if they wanted to. Everything happens within a context, and ours is a culture that imposes different roles and conditioning on boys than on girls. When trained-to-be-confident men, who already hold much of the power in society, act “overconfident” or “reckless” (connotations of ballsy), some onlookers may feel a tinge of trepidation and think, “This could be a scary thing.” When trained-to-be-cautious women act “overconfident,” yes, it could be a scary thing, too, but more likely it would be a breath of fresh air, as in: “Ah, finally, a woman who feels she has an equal right to be in charge.” And if a woman acts “reckless,” it would probably be along the lines of breaking the rules that have kept her down for millennia—like the conditioning that stops her from fighting back when assaulted.

  Even in a quest to be an assertive Woman of Ovaries, it is unlikely a woman would permanently give up her loving, gentle side, even if she abandons it temporarily. Certainly, losing this side would be undesirable. But be warned—and get ready to cheer!—because some of the women in this book do indeed temporarily abandon their niceness.

  An additional note regarding defining ovaries: In the context of this book, having ovaries isn’t about possessing certain sex organs or chromosomes. It’s about being female-identified and possessing a certain Attitude (with a capital A). All types of women and girls are welcome here, including females born without ovaries, those who’ve had ovaries removed, those who acquired new plumbing via medical intervention, and intersexed and transgendered folk who identify, or who have ever identified, as women.

  A final comment on terms: When I use “women and girls” and “we” in this book, I do so fully aware and appreciative of both the differences and similarities present in the vast group of people who identify as female. Women’s cultural diversity is to be treasured, and uniformity is not the goal. However, building coalitions amid female diversity and acknowledging commonality makes women more effective in organizing for mutual interests: chief among them, that every woman and girl be free to live her life to her fullest potential.

  Multiple Messages

  Meanwhile each female is a unique individual, and not all females receive the same socialization. Only by listening to one another’s experiences and stories do we learn about the multiple messages each girl gets about how a female “should” act in her particular family and racial, cultural, or economic community. Only then do we understand the complexity of how each community teaches its females to be strong in certain ways but to acquiesce in others. A girl may be encouraged to be opinionated … until a guy walks into the room. Or perhaps she’s raised to be powerful … yet tolerant of her boyfriend’s hitting her. Maybe she is taught by her community to be defiant … but to put up with things that an empowered woman surely wouldn’t—from smiling (instead of talking back) when harassed to stifling dreams and desires to not being proud of who she is.

  Even if a girl is raised by her family to be assertive, as soon as she steps out the door, or turns on the TV, she is bombarded with the mainstream’s definition of femininity. Besides the fact that it’s hard to resist the predominant culture, a girl could be punished for trying. Her assertiveness, though encouraged at home, might be labeled “loud, aggressive, bitchy” once outside.


  And there is one thing many subcultures and the dominant culture have in common: a tolerance of high levels of physical and sexual abuse against women. Most cultures view as normal a variety of offenses, from women being afraid to walk alone at night to a media industry that makes a fortune turning sexual harassment and sexual violence into entertainment.

  So although different cultural groups’ messages may dominate at different times, in the end most girls are repeatedly told to tolerate a devaluing of themselves.

  Good thing so many girls don’t do as they’re told!

  Who Are the Contributors?

  There are so many ways to be female—and this book embraces them. The contributors identify (sometimes in their stories, sometimes not) as African-American, Asian-American, Caucasian, Jewish, Latina, Middle Eastern, Native American, bilingual, bicultural, mixed race, heterosexual, bisexual, lesbian, workingclass, middle-class, and upper-class, mother, childless, single, coupled, polyamorous, able-bodied, living with a disability, child, teen, adult, and elder. Most are from the United States, but this book also includes contributors from Africa, Asia, Europe, Latin America, and the Middle East. A third of them are professional writers, folks who carefully crafted their submissions. But the majority are not. Many got the “call for stories” electronically forwarded from a pal and then hastily e-mailed their true tales to me on what I’d call a well-thought-out whim. Their narratives included much of the informality that comes with the medium of e-mail, and the wholesome rawness found in unpolished, authentic experience. It was both a pleasure and a challenge to edit them.