3 Women I Admire & Why. Charlotte. Kate. Shirley. Bold. Beautiful. Badass.

This week in Comp II, the discussion is Interview Skills, and prior to lecture, I like to look up more recent information, which I will add to presentations as warranted. I like to ensure I’m giving students accurate information. Before class on Wednesday, I encountered a short video on YouTube in which a business owner posed a question they always ask in an interview: “Who are the three people you admire most and why?” He said the first response is often the one the candidate wants to impress with, but the answers are so exhausting to come up with on the spot that by the time the candidate gets to answer two, he or she tends to be more revealing about who they are and what they value. It gives the employer the opportunity to listen to the candidate and draw strong conclusions regarding who the person is, more so than if they’re simply answering “What is your greatest strength? What is your greatest weakness?”

In class, I chose two students at random to answer the question, and for me, that’s fun. For them, it’s horrifying, but I make it fun and drive home the point that they must be able to think on their feet, not show surprise at any question asked, and smile through it all. Not a creepy smile, but a genuine one – be calm, be thought-provoking, and make good eye contact so that when asked, “Who do you most admire? Give us three examples and tell us why for each one,” you are not caught off-guard but rise to the challenge.

After putting a couple of students on the spot, I prattled off my answer with a smile. The first three people who came to mind were Charlotte Perkins Gilman, Kate Chopin, and Shirley Jackson. I spend a lot of time with these three women, though each of them is dead. Now, I won’t say it that way in an interview; the potential interviewer might consider calling Laureate – or a paranormal show. What I mean by I spend a lot of time with these women is that each semester, my students encounter “The Yellow Wallpaper” by Charlotte Perkins Gilman, “The Story of an Hour” or “The Storm” by Kate Chopin, and “The Lottery” or “The Possibility of Evil” by Shirley Jackson. After reading these stories, we set them aside, deep-dive into the lives of the authors, and then revisit the stories. Meaning becomes very clear when you discover that each of these women was a ‘beast’ in her own right. What I mean by beast is that each of them was willing to write what flew in the face of society – they used their fiction platform to discuss their innermost thoughts, their pains, their experiences, and to urge other women toward freedom in life. Charlotte wrote “The Yellow Wallpaper” about her own post-partum depression and subsequent trip to a famous doctor who prescribed her “the Rest Cure,” which about sent her into insanity. She called him out in the story – used his actual name, and then, she mailed him a published copy. She discovered that work, not rest, was the answer to her recovery. And she wrote about her experience with the vision to save other women from a similar fate. You can find that in the piece “Why I Wrote the Yellow Wallpaper.” Amazing woman.

Kate Chopin, I love. A few years ago, I had a t-shirt made that said, “Be Like Kate.” It is red. Bright red. The intent is to goad people into saying, “Kate who?” Well, you asked, so let me tell you about Kate Chopin. Kate lost her father when she was 5, and she was raised in a household of strong women during a time when women were to simply be wives and mothers, caretakers of the home. She was born around 1850, was a teenager through civil war times, was labeled, “St. Louis’ Little Rebel” for her ‘Yankee’ leanings, and she did not want to have to live according to society’s claim on her life, though at 20, she married, and in 12 years found herself the mother of 6 and a widow with in today’s money around 2 million in debt. At this point, she tried her hand at running her late husband’s business, flirted with all the men, smoked cigarettes, talked loudly, and wrote what, in those days, was considered raucous. One of her stories, “The Awakening,” garnered much blowback from gentile society, and Kate backed off slightly from pushing her own agenda for the emancipation of women from societal constraints, but her work “The Story of an Hour” was already woven into the hearts and minds of women in 1894, and today, Kate is credited with being a part of the birth of the women’s rights movement. See? Beast. Love Kate. Unafraid to be herself, say what needed to be said, live how she wanted, and grab at independence with a vengeance … until she pushed too far. Only then was her work already living and breathing on its own. Amazing.

Shirley Jackson is my born-in-another-time sister; I understand her. She was abused as a child by a parent who did not love her, and told her she was ugly and fat and that she was a failed abortion. Great mom, huh? That was not my experience, gratefully, but Shirley did go on to marry a man who abused her – he treated her harshly, controlled the money, and flaunted other women in front of her. Shirley dove into writing and into her children. When you read several biographies and develop a well-rounded perspective of this woman, your heart aches for her – and you understand her young death at the age of 48 from heart disease. She was never fully accepted by those who were supposed to be family, by those who were supposed to love her, and she wrote things like “The Lottery,” which so many people interpret differently than I do. Because I “know” Shirley, when I read “The Lottery,” I hear her crying, “Don’t be trapped! Question everything! Don’t settle. Don’t let traditions drown you – stone you. Fight back!” Because see … she could tell me to do that, but she never did it herself. A trapped woman telling me not to be trapped. Wow … talk about powerful and emotive. She, too, was a beast, and if I could go back before her death, I would take her by the hand and lead her away from Stanley and into a world where she could have been free from abuse, anger, fear … all of the things that gave her writing those elements of horror that went on to inspire writers like Stephen King. And me.

Three women I admire. Three women who inspire me to also be a ‘beast.’ To say things that others are afraid to say, to bring up subjects that others let lie, to teach my classes differently from the norm. I want to be a difference-maker just like Charlotte, Kate, and Shirley. #goals. I am grateful for them, and I do not take for granted their struggles in this life and the power they took from their experiences, which they then turned into writings and released to the public. Here we are all these years later, still discussing each of them in college classrooms around the world. Incredible. To be a difference-maker like that … wow. I am inspired to take my own lived experience and not hide it. I use it as fuel to inspire and challenge others, to help them make changes they believe they are powerless to make. They can. I did. So, I tell my stories, too. I choose vulnerable. I choose honesty. I choose brave.

I want to “Be Like Kate” and Charlotte and Shirley.

Bold. Beautiful. Badass.

Maybe, though, I won’t say “Badass” in an interview, but then again … maybe I will.