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A NEWSLETTER THAT WILL TEACH YOU LUMINOUS HUMILITY
Patricia wants you to be the safest, most confident woman on the ter planet.
I’m opening this newsletter with the promise that you’ll feel a little more cultured by the time you finish reading it (though I secretly fantasize that you’ll never actually close my letters).
It was on a November 22nd that Charles de Gaulle was born. In 1890. It was also on a November 22nd that John Fitzgerald Kennedy died, taken down by classified files. That happened in Dallas in 1963.
So, when the first transatlantic Concorde flight was scheduled to connect Paris to New York, the airline’s PR team couldn’t think of a more symbolic gesture than having it take place on a November 22nd (1977). It took off from Charles de Gaulle Airport and landed at John Fitzgerald Kennedy Airport. Pretty clever.
Now, yes, I’ll admit this newsletter severely lacks in sorority. But let me just say, this isn’t the opening ceremony of the Paris Olympics. Still, I do have enough active neurons to realize the imbalance.
So here’s a look at other November 22nds when women demonstrated exceptional achievements (to be fair, we’re exceptional every day). In 1989, Margaret Thatcher (who did plenty of other, more questionable things) inaugurated the first conference on climate change. And where are we, 35 years later? Stuck between emerging powers refusing to discuss any limitations and aging powers determined not to fall behind. So, no gold star for Margaret, but it’s worth mentioning that a woman was behind this inaugural conference.
