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Mar. 2nd, 2006 11:49 amJust call me Dr Grump. I am having a bad week. No, you don't want to know the details.
I am going to tell you the family story I *always* tell in bad weeks when asked for family stories. It fits Women's History Month, as it is about Linda Phillips, who was a composer and music critic and judge. If you have heard it before, too bad. (now you have the measure of my grumptitude)
Linda was also my father's first cousin, which is why she was always "Linda" to me. Despite being my father's first cousin and us calling her by her first name, she was sixty years my senior. She trained as a pianist and had the beginnings of an amazing career, then she married, and her husband said "You may play for guests in the parlour, dear."
Linda was a wonderful wife, but her husband had the ill sense to die very young, leaving her with a daughter but no income and with no career as a pianist as a consequence of "you may play in the parlour".
Linda was tiny, but indomitable. She could silence a whole room by looking across it. Most of our family was in awe of her. She used this inner whatever-it-was to get a job on the Herald-Sun. There were not many women who were journos back then. By not many, I mean hardly any. Before World War II. Before Second Wave feminism.
She became the Sun's music critic. She worked hard, but most of her articles didn't make it to print. She asked the editor immediately above her "What's wrong with my pieces. Tell me and I will fix them"
He showed her a drawer filled with her typerwritten articles.
"Women can't write," he said. "You got the job because you have a child and your husband died and the editor wanted to give you sympathy-money."
Linda furious was a sight. She was tiny to begin with, but when she was angry, her eyes would look huge and luminous. Everyone around her would feel flea-sized. She never raised her voice. She never needed to raise her voice.
Linda, furious, went to see the senior editor. Before she went, she raided the drawer where her editor kept those rejected manuscripts.
She dumped the sheets of paper on the senior editor's desk, saying "Tell me what's wrong with these. If they are irredeemable, I will find another job. If they can be fixed, then I will fix them. If there is nothing wrong with them, I want to know why they are not being printed."
Nothing was wrong with them.
Linda's work was never hidden in a desk again. That is not the end of the story, however.
The end of the story is the day Linda's editor walked up to her in the corridor and, looming over her, said "Congratulate me, this is my last day. it's D-day. I'm leaving."
"D-day?" Linda asked. "I don't think so." She smiled sweetly up at him and made a sign with her right hand. "You're going, and I'm staying. That makes it V-Day."
Linda was given an OBE, eventually, for her services to music, and died at the age of 104. I wish I had inherited her temper - it would be handy on grump-days.
I am going to tell you the family story I *always* tell in bad weeks when asked for family stories. It fits Women's History Month, as it is about Linda Phillips, who was a composer and music critic and judge. If you have heard it before, too bad. (now you have the measure of my grumptitude)
Linda was also my father's first cousin, which is why she was always "Linda" to me. Despite being my father's first cousin and us calling her by her first name, she was sixty years my senior. She trained as a pianist and had the beginnings of an amazing career, then she married, and her husband said "You may play for guests in the parlour, dear."
Linda was a wonderful wife, but her husband had the ill sense to die very young, leaving her with a daughter but no income and with no career as a pianist as a consequence of "you may play in the parlour".
Linda was tiny, but indomitable. She could silence a whole room by looking across it. Most of our family was in awe of her. She used this inner whatever-it-was to get a job on the Herald-Sun. There were not many women who were journos back then. By not many, I mean hardly any. Before World War II. Before Second Wave feminism.
She became the Sun's music critic. She worked hard, but most of her articles didn't make it to print. She asked the editor immediately above her "What's wrong with my pieces. Tell me and I will fix them"
He showed her a drawer filled with her typerwritten articles.
"Women can't write," he said. "You got the job because you have a child and your husband died and the editor wanted to give you sympathy-money."
Linda furious was a sight. She was tiny to begin with, but when she was angry, her eyes would look huge and luminous. Everyone around her would feel flea-sized. She never raised her voice. She never needed to raise her voice.
Linda, furious, went to see the senior editor. Before she went, she raided the drawer where her editor kept those rejected manuscripts.
She dumped the sheets of paper on the senior editor's desk, saying "Tell me what's wrong with these. If they are irredeemable, I will find another job. If they can be fixed, then I will fix them. If there is nothing wrong with them, I want to know why they are not being printed."
Nothing was wrong with them.
Linda's work was never hidden in a desk again. That is not the end of the story, however.
The end of the story is the day Linda's editor walked up to her in the corridor and, looming over her, said "Congratulate me, this is my last day. it's D-day. I'm leaving."
"D-day?" Linda asked. "I don't think so." She smiled sweetly up at him and made a sign with her right hand. "You're going, and I'm staying. That makes it V-Day."
Linda was given an OBE, eventually, for her services to music, and died at the age of 104. I wish I had inherited her temper - it would be handy on grump-days.