Among the many inventions I’m grateful to have enjoyed during my lifetime, high on the list would be the dishwasher. Penicillin is my #1 invention, because without it I would have been dead at 15 months old! I bought my first dishwasher when I was thirty-two, and really fed up with washing dishes. No one I knew had a dishwasher when I was growing up in Britain. Even the rich people I worked for (as a nanny, cleaner, general dogsbody) didn’t have a dishwasher. Dishwashers were “one of those American things.” In fact, from the time I could...
The WomenSong Blog is my indulgence—a chance to write about women’s lives from the past to the present. I plan to write not only about women whose names are well known, but women with unheralded accomplishments. Many visitors to this blog will know that I have been interested in women’s history since childhood—since I created my first book at the age of eight. It was a task set in class, for each pupil to produce a “topic book” on something we were interested in. We had to not only research and write the content (though the word “research” was not used—instead it was called “Finding out”), and we created the cover in our art and craft lessons, finally stitching the pages and boards together. Finally we had to present our topic to the class. I loved making that book—and it opened a window for me. Though the women in my “Famous Women” topic book were all well known, as time went on, I became equally interested in women whose accomplishments had been forgotten or never acknowledged. So, as noted, this is my indulgence, a chance to write about the lives of women. I hope you enjoy the posts.
