Putting On Her Walking Boots

[image from google: libraryfortheartist.blogspot.com]

There was a free spirit
living inside her
but, raised in small-town
conservative
1960's Kelowna,
fed on a diet
of 1950's dreams,
she didnt know
about her
till she clawed
her way out,
some disillusioned
years later.

To the newspaper editor,
the magazine publisher,
the offer of free university,
or training to be
a missionary in Africa,
she said, primly,
"No, thanks,
I just want
to get married
and have babies."
She thought of it
as an escape,
had no idea
she was entering
a cage
from which
her entire psyche
would recoil,
no clue how long
it would take
to tunnel her way out,
no concept how difficult
that excavation
of the self
would be.

It was the culture
of the times;
she lived
just on the cusp
of change.

In the cities,
the times were a-changing,
rebellion and foment
was in the air.
The hippies were
growing their long hair,
burning incense,
playing cool music,
growing beards,
smiling moony smiles.
The Women's Movement
was on the rise.
Another five minutes,
and she would have been
in the thick of it.

But by the time
the beautiful hippies
were grooving
up and down 4th Avenue,
she was pushing
a buggy full of babies
along 3rd,
a parallel universe
just one block down,
trapped in
a  marriage
that so choked
her spirit,
she did not write
one word
for eight long years.

Impaled upon
her marriage,
her spirit was giving
its death rattle
by the time she heard
the "click"
of the Feminine Mystique,
gasped with recognition
and relief
at the words
of Gloria Steinem
and Ms Magazine,
began to see light
through the bars
of her cage.

She epitomized
the silencing
of women's voices
and creativity
when they are
oppressed,
and also
the rising
of one's spirit to
reclaim one's life,
one's voice,
one's art,
when one begins
to apprehend
the cost
is just too high
to be paid.

He sneered
"we were all right
till you started
thinking
you were a person",
kicking over a stack
of Ms magazines.
"You were all right"
she replied.
"Yeah. And I could be again
if you'd just keep quiet."

She put on a pair
of metaphorical red boots,
sang "These Boots Are Made for Walkin'"
and "Hit the Road, Jack", often,
and robustly.
Soon it was done.

She took her first walk
as a free person
through the fall leaves of
Vancouver's West End.
It was 1972,
and she was
right on time.