Thoughts on JFK Assassination

I wrote this piece on 11/22/13 and posted it on Facebook. I decided I really should post it here too, even though it's a bit tardy…

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I had only recently realized that teachers had conversations that weren't about students. Back in October I had been surprised to hear them talking about the World Series and to hear them laughing at the Yankees for getting swept by the LA Dodgers. Now it was November and they were huddled in groups again, talking in their teacher voices. This time they weren't laughing though. In fact, some of them were crying. It was November 22nd, 1963. 

President Kennedy was cool. He was young and handsome with a gorgeous, fashionable wife. Because of him and his plan to send us to the moon, we got to study "new math" and learn about engineering and science. The Weekly Reader promised us that we could travel to space, and have flying cars, and never have to cook because we would have automatic meals prepared by a robotic chef. 

Suddenly the future looked less fun than we had imagined, though. Our teachers told us that Kennedy had been shot and we should go home early. 

Mothers would be home, of course, waiting to greet their kids in their pretty Donna Reed dresses, ready to comfort them with Campbell's soup, Jell-O, Nestlé's Quik. They would then set them down on the Hoover-vacuumed carpet to watch TV until the Dads came home from work. 

We didn't have a TV. We didn't have carpeting, either, and my Mother wasn't too happy to see the five of us tromping in sooner than she expected. She was busy with a one-year old and a five-year old, and was probably hoping they would take a nap so she could have her ciggie and coffee in peace. We were quiet, though. We trooped into the living room, dropped our book bags, and picked up our books to read. It was as quiet as church in there. 

When my Dad got home, we turned on the radio and learned that Kennedy was dead. My Dad was a professor at Notre Dame. He said that people had spontaneously gone to the church on campus and prayed. 

I don't remember much else from that day. It seems like life returned to normal pretty quickly, and soon we were back to playing dolls, making up stories for the dolls to grow up and be famous politicians, or at least the tragic wives of politicians. At school we went back to learning Venn diagrams and multiplication tables. Music lessons continued. We moved to the right side of the tracks and bought some rugs. The Yankees lost the World Series again and didn't win again until 1977.

People talk about the loss of innocence that day, but I was too young to lose my innocence then. That came later when MLK and RFK were assassinated. Today, in 2013, I may no longer be the naive girl I once was, but I'm still inspired by space travel, flying cars, and robots. President Kennedy wasn't perfect but he inspired a generation of nerds and we still love him for that. 

A Passionate, Adventuresome Heroine

In honor of Ada Lovelace Day, I'm blogging about a woman in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM). I chose Megan Smith this year. Megan is a VP at Google[x], the branch of Google that is bringing us Google Glass and the driverless car!

Megan joined Google in 2003 and led the acquisition of some of Google's flagship technologies, including Google Earth, Google Maps, and Picasa. 

Before joining Google, Megan was CEO of PlanetOut. She also worked at General Magic and Apple Japan. As a student at MIT, she was part of a team that designed, built, and raced a solar car 2000 miles across the Australian outback. She earned a BS and MS in mechanical engineering from MIT, where she now serves on the board. She completed her MS thesis at the MIT Media Lab. 

I chose to write about Megan Smith, not just because she's awesome, but also because I love her post here, which is based on her keynote speech at this year's Grace Hopper Celebration of Women in Computing. The keynote was called "Passion, Adventure, and Heroic Engineering."

I love the fact that Megan applies passion to her work at Google and elsewhere. We should all be passionate about our work! And I love the fact that she sees STEM work as an adventure. 

Another thing I love about Megan's post is that it mentions the fact that we women were in computing, before so many women disappeared en masse in the 1990s and 2000s. I get irritated when people act like women in the computer field is a new thing. Most tekkies have heard of Ada Lovelace and Grace Hopper.

But there were also the code-breakers at Bletchley Park, and the women in the US who calculated ballistic trajectories during WWII, six of whom were recruited to become digital programmers for the ENIAC, and many, many more recent examples. 

(Why did women disappear? It's complicated, so I won't answer that question here. I cover it briefly in my talk here, though.)

To get back to Megan Smith, let's talk about Heroic Engineering. Wouldn't technology be a lot better if the developers of the technology all saw themselves as heroes? We aren't just making stuff work. We are solving global problems. Megan Smith knows this. She co-hosts Google's Solve for X, a forum to encourage and amplify technology-based "moonshot" thinking and collaboration.

By the way, I blogged about some of my other heroines for previous Ada Lovelace Day celebrations, including Melissa Hathaway and Radia Perlman. 

I also put together an entire page about heroines when I made a list of professors whom I would like to see teach a Udacity class. 

I look forward to reading many more stories about women heroines in STEM as people post them in honor of Ada Lovelace Day! 

Generational Differences

"Generations in a Family" photo by Alan Oppenheimer

Last week I attended a fantastic conference on "Generational Differences in the Workplace" organized by the Oregon Department of Human Services and others, and taught by Figure 8 Consulting. The workshop was educational but also surprisingly moving. We learned about unconscious biases, cultural agility, self-awareness, self-management, and the gifts that people of other ages offer us. We talked, we listened, we learned, and we opened our hearts to people not like us.

Per our instructors, this is the first time in a long time that there have been four distinct generations in the workplace:

Birth year	Generation
1920-1945	Traditionalists
1946-1964	Baby Boomers
1965-1983	Generation X
1984-2002	Millennials (Generation Y)

Of course each individual is unique, and stereotyping should be avoided, but it is helpful to broadly categorize the characteristics and working styles of the different generations. That way we can work together better. Here's what I learned in the workshop about the different generations:

• Traditionalists just want to work hard and get the job done. Their motto is "no whining!" They are digital immigrants (as opposed to natives) but able to work effectively with technology anyway. They don't like it when younger people just do the technical work rather than teaching them how to do it.
• Baby Boomers are creative and like to be valued for their individuality. Nonetheless, they do like to work in teams and they value diversity. They like to work hard and to be in charge. They are comfortable with technology. In fact, they take credit for creating a lot of the technology we use today (although Generation X said that too). Some Baby Boomers feel over-worked and under-appreciated. Some of them said they feel like "the sandwich generation" because they are taking care of their elderly parents while also helping their kids and grandkids.
• Generation X workers are fiercely independent. Many of them grew up as latchkey kids, so they know how to work alone. They are very efficient and want to be able to just go home if they finish their work early. They need to know why they are doing something, and don't like to be told "because that's how it's always been done." They like it if managers and clients can just tell them the expected end product and then get out of the way so they can get the job done! Many of them are raising small kids and appreciate flexible work hours. Of all the groups, they are statistically the least likely to be divorced. This is the group that taught us the importance of work/life balance.
• Millennials are digital natives. They love technology and are good at using it and creating it. They like to multitask and to collaborate. They are efficient, resourceful, and able to use their social networks to find answers to problems. They can work anywhere and often work during their off hours. They like instant feedback and appreciate clarity. They want to be mentored but like it when older people "cut to the chase" and don't explain too much.

Near the end of the workshop, the proctors divided the class into generational cohorts. The task was to talk about what events defined us (whether it was Sputnik, the 1960s sex/drugs/rock-and-roll revolution, the Challenger space shuttle explosion, 9/11, etc.). We were asked to also discuss our key characteristics, how we like to work, and what we like and don't like about working with the other generations. We were told to find a spokesperson because after we met in our cohorts, we got back together and shared our thoughts with everyone else. It was fascinating to see how the cohorts worked.

• The Traditionalists stayed in the room and didn't finish all the tasks because they reminisced about events for so long.
• The Baby Boomers went outside into the sunshine and immediately formed a circle. Nobody told us to form a circle, but we just did it spontaneously. If we weren't so task-oriented, we probably would have started singing Kumbaya. :-) We complained about the Millennials, saying that they talk too loudly, are always on their phones, and often dress inappropriately. Our Baby Boomer spokesperson changed this to say "Whereas we appreciate the social graces of the Traditionalists, we think the Millennials are lacking in social graces." I loved that. We avoided insulting anyone.
• The Generation X folks didn't form a single group. We had learned that they are very independent, so it was interesting to see that they worked in a few small groups instead of one big group.
• The Millennials were fun to watch. They were very energetic. They were a very diverse group, with fewer white people than any of the other groups. Unlike the other three groups which took notes on paper, they took notes on an iPhone. That got a big laugh! There wasn't a dry eye in the house, though, when their spokesperson told us how much they appreciate the other generations.

The young man clasped his hands, and paused for a few seconds, and then told us earnestly, "You can trust us. We recognize that you fought for our civil rights and equal opportunity. We know the importance of what you achieved and we can carry the torch now."

I still get tears in my eyes just thinking about it. Maybe they don't dress appropriately sometimes, but who cares? What matters is that they can carry on. To quote Ted Kennedy, "...the work goes on, the cause endures, the hope still lives, and the dream shall never die."

A personal story of individuality and leaning in

Recently there's been a lot of talk about "leaning in" since Sheryl Sandberg, COO of Facebook, published Lean In. I find myself thinking about times when I've leaned in and remembering my 9th-grade Civics class. 

There's also been a lot of talk about face-to-face teamwork since Marissa Mayer infamously brought all the telecommuters back to the office at Yahoo. Today this terrific article by Froma Harrop questioned the link between creativity and teamwork, and reminded me again of my Civics class.

The Civics class was a toxic mix of political correctness and American jingoism, taught by an ex-marine. The school administrators thought it would give the wrong message to divide the Civics classes by ability, so we were all mixed in together, honors students with juvenile delinquents, future business leaders with future drug addicts, me thrown into the same class with my twin brother who had recently been kicked out of Benedictine boarding school. 

The photo shows us about that time, with our siblings. I'm in the middle. My twin brother is at the top left. My younger brother is at the bottom right. Note that he's looking angelic. Don't believe it for a minute! He was no more angelic than my twin brother, just better at not getting caught. :-) 

Our Civics teacher didn't like me. Now I admit this might have had something to do with the “Spiro Who?” t-shirt I wore, making fun of our illustrious American Vice President, Spiro T. Agnew, who later resigned in disgrace after he was charged with tax evasion. 

The Civics teacher disliked my twin brother even more, though. My brother often came to class stoned, which didn't help. He also had a little mechanical frog that he liked to hop across the wooden floor, causing everyone, even the good students like me, to giggle. In addition, he had a tendency to argue with the teacher every chance he got, somehow weaving Marxism or Malcolm X or Muslim theology into discussions that the teacher had expected to simply extol the virtues of American culture. My brother may have been a stoner, but he was also very smart.

When the time came for our final project in the Civics class, the teacher divided the class into three groups. One group would work on team projects doing things like writing scripts for a movie, composing patriotic songs, building papier-mâché cities, anything that in the teacher's mind didn't require too much intellectual ability. Another group would visit the local prison and do a group presentation on their experience. Finally, the individuals in the crème de la crème group, mostly made up of honors students, would each write a research paper on a topic of their choice.

The Civics teacher had been talking about this final project the entire semester. I had already developed a topic and started researching it: “A Hero's Journey: Comparing WW II veterans with Homer's Odysseus.” As you can probably tell, my favorite class was AP English (although my English teacher would be surprised to hear that, considering how much grief I gave her when she made us read “Romeo and Juliet” multiple times, each time using a different literary criticism technique. I loved “Romeo and Juliet,” actually, but my reaction to it at the age of 15 was heartfelt, not analytical.)  

Well, you can guess what happened in the Civics class. The teacher assigned me to a team project of all girls. Our job was to write a movie script about the Women Air-Force Service Pilots (WASPs). He didn't even give us a choice. He assumed we would be interested in the WASPs, which none of us were, especially since the boys made fun of us whenever the topic came up. (I am more interested in the WASPs today, but back then, no.) 

My brother had been placed in the top group, the group that got to write individual research papers. How unfair was that!? The teacher must have recognized that my brother was more capable than he let on, but then took out his irritation with “the twins” on me anyway. Either that or he simply assumed I wasn't smart because I was usually very quiet, despite the occasional giggles at my brother's antics.

At home, my Mother encouraged me to go talk to the teacher. I didn't want to, but I also didn't want to do the team project. My Mother said I should write a project proposal for my research paper. I hesitated, but then she brought out the big guns. She pulled out her favorite books from the bookshelf, books by Joseph Campbell, Carl Jung, Hermann Hesse. The proposal turned into a professional-looking 5-page paper with references!

The next day, I brought in my proposal. The teacher was shocked at first but then thrilled! He let me do the project and I got an A. I leaned in and showed that I could work as an individual, all while ignoring my brother's increasingly bizarre behavior as he partied more than he studied, eventually writing his own paper on how LSD could revolutionize American politics. 

Leaning In with Lucille, Madeleine, and Sheryl

This will be the strangest review of Sheryl Sandberg's new book, Lean In, that you will read! Why? Because, due to simultaneous recommendations by Systers, real-life sisters, and my female book club, I found myself reading three books at once.

• Lean In: Women, Work, and the Will to Lead, by Sheryl Sandberg
• Listening for Madeleine: A Portrait of Madeleine L'Engle in Many Voices, edited by Leonard S. Marcus
• Love, Lucy, by Lucille Ball

This blog post is my attempt to synthesize these books. Sheryl Sandberg may have the bullhorn right now for a few fleeting Internet seconds, but she's not the first person to demonstrate that women can be smart and successful.

What do Lucille Ball, Madeleine L'Engle, and Sheryl Sandberg have in common?

• High IQ
• High EQ
• Leadership abilities
• Writing skills
• Talent
• Wisdom
• A sense of humor
• Hard workers
• Good story-tellers
• Courage
• Passion
• Honesty
• Financial success
• Assertiveness
• Extraverted, out-going personalities
• Good at running meetings
• Wives
• Mothers

In what ways do Lucille Ball, Madeleine L'Engle, and Sheryl Sandberg differ?

• Unlike Madeleine and Sheryl, Lucille Ball came from humble (rural upstate New York) beginnings. Her father died when she was young. Her mother supported the family by working in a dress shop. As a teen, Lucille moved to New York City where she failed in acting school and took up modeling instead. She didn't give up her dream to be an actress, though, and started to find good roles, but in B-rated movies. She moved to Hollywood after getting better known, and became one of the most popular and influential comedic stars in the United States. She was also the first woman to run a major television studio, Desilu Productions. Sandberg would have liked her.
• Unlike Lucille and Sheryl, Madeleine L'Engle wasn't beautiful, at least not physically beautiful. Her friends and colleagues describe her as big and gawky, with thinning hair. Per a story in "Listening for Madeleine," her publisher once arranged for a professional shopper to help Madeleine update her wardrobe for a book tour. Without this help, she might have dressed like Mrs. Whatsit! 
• L'Engle is the most religious of the three women. She declines to call herself a Christian writer, but her writing has religious themes. Although Lucille Ball talks about her strong Protestant work ethic, and was a follower of Norman Vincent Peale, she doesn't mention faith or going to church in her "Love, Lucy" book. Sheryl Sandberg has a Protestant work ethic also, although she is Jewish (according to Wikipedia). She doesn't seem to talk much about religion, which is fine. There's no reason she should.  
• Compared to Lucille and Madeleine, Sheryl Sandberg is very serious, although there's lots of humor in "Lean In." According to her family, "Sheryl never actually played as a child. She really just organized other children’s play.” (Time Magazine) Hopefully she did read, though. I wonder if she loved L'Engle's A Wrinkle In Time when she was a girl? Most smart women did.

Who would be the best lunch partner?

1. Madeleine L'Engle was a great conversationalist and a good listener, and she liked to go out to lunch. She wins the lunch contest. 
2. Lucille Ball would be a fun (and funny) lunch partner.
3. Lunch with Sheryl Sandberg would have to be a power lunch. I would need to come prepared with well-researched, challenging business questions. I wouldn't ask "What is the culture like at Facebook?" (Sheryl says in "Lean In" that this typical question irritates her because it's so easily answered with an Internet search.) I also wouldn't ask, "Will you be my mentor?" This typical question also irritates her when it comes from women she doesn't know. She says that mentor relationships should develop naturally between coworkers who know each other's challenges and potential.

Which woman should run for president?

• The recent Time Magazine article about Sandberg says, "There is always chatter, especially among Californians, that Sandberg, who’s a big Democratic fundraiser, will return to the public sector." I'm sure she would face backlash from the far-left anti-corporate crowd, from minorities and others who say she only represents privileged white women, and from Hillary-hating misogynists, but a lot of men and women would love to see her leadership abilities in the White House. I would probably vote for her!
• Lucille Ball is probably already President of an All-Stars Comedy Club in heaven. RIP.
• Madeleine L'Engle is probably President of the Best Writers of All Time writing group in heaven. RIP.

In conclusion, what one message do all three women offer to other women?

• Lean in and assert your power! Sandberg says this explicitly. The other two women were living examples of the message.

And that concludes the strangest review of "Lean In" that you will read, if you really did read it. (Admit it. You skipped to here to see if you could get by with just reading the conclusion, didn't you? :-)

Makers: Women Who Make America

With a website called "The Makers of Things," which mine is, in case you hadn't figured that out from the blurred-together characters in the domain name, it would be a shame not to review the fantastic "Makers: Women Who Make America" documentary that premiered on PBS February 26th, 2013. If you missed it, you can still watch it at PBS.org or the film website.

"Makers" tells the story of the women's movement in the US from 1950 to today. It's about three hours long with three distinct parts that can be watched individually. The film is educational, inspirational, and entertaining. I loved the use of music from the times and the fashions from the 70s and 80s. But mostly I was very moved by the fight that my elders took on. I've encountered sexism, but in general, I was able to assume equal rights as my birthright, thanks to the work of the activists and trailblazers in the film.

The film tells a positive story, with a good arc. Right overcomes wrong. The underdogs fight adversity and come out ahead. One of the most interesting aspects of the show is the discussion near the end about young women today. Many young women don't want to be called "feminist" and the show does a good job of explaining why. It also introduces the audience to young activists and writers who embrace the term, though, including Amy Richards and Shelby Knox. 

I like the fact that the film talks about the women's movement and class. It was interesting to learn that many working-class women and women of color weren't interested in the movement at the beginning. They felt that it focused on issues only relevant to wealthy and middle-class white women who felt stuck being homemakers, whereas the working-class women were already holding down jobs and raising families. The movement also didn't welcome lesbians at first. But by the late 1970s, lesbians, working-class women, and women of color had joined forces with millions of other women in what Diane English in the show calls, "The biggest social movement in the history of the planet earth." 

My only criticism of the show (and it's not really a criticism but more of a "feature request") is that it should do a better job talking about women in STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math). It should have mentioned not just Rosy the Riveter, but also the Digital Rosies (women who calculated ballistics trajectories on the ENIAC computer during World War II). It should have also mentioned Grace Murray Hopper, an American computer scientist and US Navy admiral who developed the first compiler in the 1950s and may have been the first person to use the term "debugging" in relation to computers, when an actual bug (a moth) caused problems for the Mark II computer at Harvard University.  

When the "Makers" show got into recent times, it could have mentioned many women in STEM and computer science, although it was great, at a minimum, to see Marissa Mayer, CEO of Yahoo, and Sheryl Sandberg, COO of Facebook. The show makes it clear that women fought hard to get to the board room, and today belong any place where they can continue making the world a better place. 

There's still much work to be done to ensure equal pay for women, to protect women's reproductive choices, and to inspire more women to speak up, but at least nobody calls me "Girl Friday" or pinches my butt, just because I can type fast. I can use my typing skills to write books, write software, configure networking devices, and blog.