Pat Taub is a family therapist, writer and activist and life-long feminist. She hopes that WOW will start a conversation among other older women who are fed up with the ageism and sexism in our culture and are looking for cohorts to affirm their value as an older woman.
In the new heart-warming Indie film, “Other People, “ we watch a close-knit family gather around their dying mother in her last year of life. The film captures the discomfort and awkwardness with which most American family’s deal with death and dying. There is a powerful hospital scene where the mother screams, after vomiting into [...]
Pat Taub
This week’s post is written by a treasured male friend with whom I have exchanged online dating escapades. I’m hoping that WOW’s largely female readers will benefit from this male perspective. Please feel free to offer your responses in the comment section below or on the WOW facebook page. After eighteen months of online dating, I now [...]
Pat Taub
Increasingly contemporary women, post menopausal and older, are referring to themselves as “Crones,” harkening back to the era of women’s spirituality–a time that preceded patriarchy and Christianity. This era is often called “The Age of the Goddess.” It was most predominant in ancient Crete where a peaceful women-lead [...]
Pat Taub
Finally the publishing industry is catching on to the fact that America’s swelling aging population isn’t aging like their parents and grandparents and want literature that reflects this new way of growing old. Older women and men want to be affirmed and not negated in their old age. Ashton Applewhite’s new book, This Chair Rocks: A [...]
Pat Taub
Americans quickly forget their history. Contemporary feminism didn’t spring forth like a Phoenix from the ashes. As we celebrate the anniversary of the passage of women’s right to vote, let’s pause and honor the women who dedicated their lives to this cause— the indomitable Suffragettes. They paved the way for 21st century feminists, [...]
Pat Taub
Some 25 years ago I heard a lecture by Jean Shinona Bolen, the San Francisco Jungian psychiatrist and author of books on women and the goddess. In her talk Bolen commented, ‘The best kept secret in most women’s circles is that the happiest woman in the group is the 67 year old grandmother.’ At the time I couldn’t image being “happy” [...]
Pat Taub
I spent last weekend glued to the nonfiction best seller, All the Single Ladies, a brilliant Feminist study by Rebecca Traister. It deconstructs how single women from Civil War heroines like Clara Barton to leading Suffragettes to today’s young women in their 20’s and 30’s have delayed or rejected marriage in order to escape its restrictions [...]
Pat Taub
Perhaps the aspect of aging I find most difficult is losing dear friends–friends I had planning on spending time with into my dotage. In this post I’m paying homage to them, grateful for our close connection and for the invaluable lessons they gave me. Diana died just a few months shy of her 60th birthday; Zoe was 63 and Ray was 69. [...]
Pat Taub
For a minute, let’s put aside our carnival election cycle dominated by Trump’s windbag comments and Hillary’s obfuscations. Let’s get real. Let’s focus on our environmental and moral crises and ask ourselves, “What responsibility do we, as elders, have in creating social change?” It’s easy to become overwhelmed in the face [...]
Pat Taub
There are countless remarkable women who came before us who deserve our attention and respect, but history often obliterated them. The current special exhibit at the Portland, Maine Art Museum (Women Modernists in New York) is helping to correct this omission by resurrecting four early 20th century women artists, who, aside from Georgia O’Keefe, [...]
Pat Taub