When I was in middle school, the priest at our church agreed to allow girls on the altar as servers, or altar boys, during Mass. I was thrilled I might have the chance to be the first girl to serve in our home parish.

My dad, however, said the altar was no place for women, and I was crestfallen as I watched other girls serve. My dad thought his girls could accomplish anything they wanted; however, there were limits to what women should be allowed to do.

In my lifetime, I’ve watched women hammer away at that glass ceiling, and we lost one of the best, Sally Ride, to pancreatic cancer this week. Most Americans know why she’s in the history books – she was the first American woman to fly in space.

But Sally Ride was more than a notation on the history timeline. After the space program, she started her own company, Sally Ride Science, where middle-school girls were introduced to the excitement science offers.

She made sure chemistry, physics and science were presented in a fun and educational way to girls across the country. The positive impact she made on young women is just as important as the historic Ride made in that space shuttle.

Despite the gains my gender has made since women gained the right to vote in 1920, it’s sad that many women fail to appreciate the females like Ride who cracked open the glass ceiling for them.

Elizabeth Stanton and Susan B. Anthony fought long and hard for women’s rights in the early 1920s and went to their graves without ever stepping into a voting booth.

Love or hate their politics, Gloria Steinem, Betty Friedan and Bella Abzug were activists in the 1960s and 1970s who railed against the myths and stigmas associated with being a female.

Here in our own community, there are countless women who’ve pushed for positive changes. In the late 1800’s, Polly Ryon was instrumental in expanding her father’s lands, turning the George Ranch into a successful business.

In our lifetime, Viola Randle and Frances Smith both served as mayor for the city of Fulshear back in the 1970s when many women felt they had to wear pantsuits and imitation ties to be taken seriously.

Some of our public schools are named after local outstanding female educators like Antoinette Reading and Cora Thomas. Jane Long Elementary and Susana Dickinson Elementary honor women who hold a place in Texas history.

Numerous female judges, attorneys, doctors, dentists and teachers hailing from different races and cultures leave their positive mark on this community through their civic efforts.

But let’s not forget the trailblazing women who quietly work behind the scenes. They might not be orbiting the earth in a spaceship, but these women are running our food and clothing banks, personally reaching out to others in need.

They might not be heads of major corporations, but they are standing up for abused children in the Fort Bend County judicial system.

These women might not have an office in Washington D.C., but they’re helping battered and physically abused women get back on their feet.

There are men performing the same courageous acts, and we owe them our gratitude. Women, however, owe the females who came before them and chipped away at society’s prejudices.

Thanks, Ms. Ride, for your contribution to NASA but especially for encouraging young girls to reach for the stars. Because of some brave female pioneers, they really are there for the taking.

This column was originally published in The Fort Bend Herald.

Paint brush. Check.

Drop cloth. Check.

Carpet cleaner, soap and water. Check.

It’s painting time over at my son and daughter-in-law’s new place, and the two grandmothers volunteered to paint our grandchildren’s rooms.

Decorating and how-to articles make painting look so simple. Why with a gallon of paint and a little elbow grease, they promise, anybody can turn boring harvest wheat beige walls into a bold, artistic statement or a calming oasis.

But there’s a whole lot decorators leave out in between deciding to paint and sitting back in the La-Z-Boy enjoying another episode of “Duck Dynasty.”

First there’s picking out the paint color and paint finish. Sherwin-Williams has over 1,500 paint colors, including 169 warm neutrals. I’m not exactly sure what the big difference is between a warm neutral and a cold neutral or the subtle difference between powder blue or blue cruise but choosing takes hours.

There’s also the choice of the type of finish – eggshell, satin, flat, or whether you want the primer mixed in with the final paint color.

Once you decide and lug home two heavy gallons of paint and all the supplies – a roller, roller pads, trays for the rollers and the trim work, a couple of paint brushes and a drop cloth – you can begin the thankless task of prepping the room.

Some people clear the room completely, but I take the lazy way out and pile all the furniture in the middle of the room and then cover the mountain with a drop cloth. I spend a lot of time climbing over and around beds and dressers but I convince myself that’s the easiest route.

Once the furniture’s out of the way, it’s time to protect the woodwork with blue painter’s tape. I used to think I had a steady hand and didn’t need the tape. After years of putting on eyeliner, how hard could it be to follow a piece of baseboard and not get paint on the wall or carpet?

It’s practically impossible. So I learned to use the tape, and that task takes about an hour, scooting along the baseboards and then climbing up and down the ladder to tape off the ceiling.

And let’s not forget the drop cloths. Some of us think we’re not going to drip any paint and skip this step. That would be a mistake because paint splatters are difficult to remove from the carpet and the tops of furniture one was too lazy to move out of the room.

Once all that preparation work is finished, then it’s time to actually paint. I start by rolling paint on the wall because it’s the most satisfying part of painting a room.

The new color appears immediately and you can actually see progress, unlike the painstaking job of trim work that takes forever.

Once all the painting is finally finished, it’s time to clean up. I used to faithfully wash out all the rollers and pans. But when I discovered disposable pan liners, inexpensive rollers and cheap drop cloths, clean up is now a breeze.

The last step is going back and wiping up all the paint splatters, a big job for me because I drip paint on the carpet no matter how many drop cloths I use. I also splatter paint all over the ladder and my clothes, the windows and the doors.

So the next time I read an article on how easy it is to transform a room with a simple gallon of paint, I’m going to sit back in the La-Z-Boy, look at my already painted harvest wheat walls and smile.

The best paint job is the one that’s already finished.

This column was originally published in The Fort Bend Herald.

“We need your help.”

That was the frantic phone call I received while at a high school journalism camp in downtown Austin. Three of my broadcasting students needed someone to interview, and they were desperate.

Finding a quiet spot, we discussed what they needed. They were in an intensely competitive class, and all week, they’d been receiving scathing reviews. It was time for the final project, and they were adamant their video be the best.

We decided to search for a college student, perhaps working in a coffee or gift shop. While heading toward Sixth Street, we walked in front of the University Catholic Center, and we could see students talking with a priest in the foyer. My students decided to go in, anxious, but determined to get their video.

However, I was reluctant to enter the building. For the past few months, I’ve had difficulty attending church services. Not because of a lack of faith but because I felt someone I admire had been unfairly treated by my home church.

I know that in business – and running a church is a business – some decisions aren’t popular with the populace. Many of us spoke up but nothing was resolved. Weeks went by and my frustration turned to anger.

In some faiths, decisions are not supposed to be questioned, but reform and change doesn’t happen unless people stand for what they believe. Doctrine is seldom the issue – it’s the way people interpret the words and the way others are treated that causes rifts.

My faith in God was as strong as ever; my faith in people, however, was shattered. For six months, I avoided attending services and looked at other faiths and denominations. My heart was heavy because of the distance I was putting between myself and the church.

I hid my feelings as my students approached the group, nervous but hopeful. The young priest smiled and listened as we asked for an interview. He hesitated, saying he had quite a few things to do.

But when one of the teens explained how they were tired of getting picked on, The Rev. Jamie Baca immediately agreed to help them.

UT student Daniel Gonzalez works at the parish, and he also agreed to be on the video, even though his girlfriend was waiting and he’d been working since early in the morning.

Daniel helped the students set up their equipment and then Father Jamie came in, sat down and told them to ask away.

The interview took longer than five minutes, but the two weren’t in a hurry. They talked about their backgrounds and how much they enjoyed working with college students. Daniel told the students about struggling with coming to Mass once he arrived at the university.

Their words were honest, and as I watched my teens film, the smiles returned to their faces. We left the church with ample footage, and the teens eagerly headed off to edit their video.

That evening, the anger and disappointment I’d been feeling melted away as I sat in Mass for the first time in months. Instead of feeling distanced from a church, I felt immense gratitude for having met Father Jamie and Daniel.

People will always be motivated by greed and goodness, pride and piety. There will be those who do what they do for personal gain. But two strangers reminded me that people doing the right thing are usually right around the corner.

I need to remember to have faith that God will place them in my path.
 
This column was originally published in The Fort Bend Herald.

“You beat everything, you know that,” is the exasperated phrase Deputy Barney Fife used whenever his boss, Sheriff Andy Taylor, played a joke on him. This week, one of America’s founding television fathers, Andy Griffith, passed away at the age of 86.

“The Andy Griffith Show” has played almost continuously on television since its beginning back in 1960. TAGS is the often-funny television show about Andy Taylor, the sheriff of friendly Mayberry and the people in his and the town’s life.

But the show is much more than a sit-com, and a large part of that is due to the excellent writers and the high standards set by Griffith.

Born in 1926 in North Carolina, Griffith began his acting career on Broadway and later in films. He was featured on “The Danny Thomas Show” as a small-town sheriff who gives Thomas a speeding ticket.

The character was well received, and “The Andy Griffith Show” became a reality. Originally, Griffith was to be the comic and fellow actor and friend Don Knotts would play the straight guy.

But Knotts’ comedic talents were quickly realized, and the two switched roles for the betterment of the show. Throughout its long run, Griffith allowed other characters to have the limelight but he remained the central, stable character of the show, and my generation loved him.

We baby boomers grew up with TV dads Andy Taylor, Jim Anderson and Ward Cleaver who dispensed sage advice. By today’s standards, these shows might seem hokey, portraying an America that existed only in Norman Rockwell paintings.

But the timeless lessons Andy Taylor taught his son, Opie, still ring true, such as the episode “Opie and the Bully.” Andy finds out his young son is being bullied for his milk money on the way to school every morning.

Instead of filing a lawsuit against the family, Andy tells Opie about the time he was bullied and how he had to stand up for himself against the bully, swinging like a “windmill in a tornado.”

There’s no way to stay dry eyed when young Opie looks up at his father, asking for reassurance that the fight really won’t hurt. That’s a tough situation almost every parent has faced.

Andy also taught us another life lesson when Opie claims to have a friend, Mr. McBeevee, who walks in the trees. Opie’s story is preposterous, and Andy thinks he’s lying. But when Opie asks his father to believe him, Andy finally does for only one reason – he trusts his son.

Andy taught us a lot about friendship. Even though the bumbling Barney deserved to lose his job dozens of times, Andy found ways to boost Barney’s self esteem and regain his faith in himself. Those timeless lessons cross racial, gender and cultural lines.

Many episodes ended with Andy, Barney, Opie and Aunt Bee relaxing on the Taylor’s front porch at the end of the day. Andy would be strumming his guitar as they quietly sat together, seemingly without worries or fears.

For the 1960’s, that scene was far from reality – protesting hippies, assassinations of political leaders, the turbulent Vietnam War, economic woes and fighting for civil rights filled the nightly news.

Perhaps we used Andy and Barney to escape, and many of us still use the show to hide from life. Whenever I’m having a tough day, I pop in one of my well-worn DVD or search for Andy Griffith on YouTube, sit back and escape to Mayberry for a half hour with these cherished friends from my childhood.

Andy, one day, we’ll see you down at the fishin’ hole.

Thank you for the memories.
 
This column was originally published in The Fort Bend Herald.