“Hidden Figures–Don’t be delicate. Be vast and brilliant.” April 22, 2017 Gratiana Lovelace (Post#1058)

Last weekend when Liesbeth Lap shared this Shinedown music lyric quote and a beautiful dancing lady illustration (see below) on Twitter, the image and quote moved me.

On one level, I like the sentiment about women being strong and independent.  We live in an age when women have more freedoms than my mother or grandmother had—though they were both women of uncompromising spirits.

And yet, we live in times that also challenge us/women at every turn—
with the beautiful people issues of magazines, when beauty is a cultural and generational (a 1520 beauty at right, Venus by Titian who would be considered “plus sized” in modern times) construct that is ever changing, or reminders to women of the “gender pay gap” compared to men’s salaries, etc.  It sometimes seems like one step forward, two steps back.

 

And then we have wonderful inspiring examples of women empowering themselves and each other—even to the moon and back, in the 2016 film “Hidden Figures” (see Wiki excerpt below):

“Hidden Figures is a 2016 American biographical drama film directed by Theodore Melfi and written by Melfi and Allison Schroeder, based on the non-fiction book of the same name by Margot Lee Shetterly about African American female mathematicians who worked at the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) during the Space Race. The film stars Taraji P. Henson as Katherine Johnson, a mathematician who calculated flight trajectories for Project Mercury and other missions. The film also features Octavia Spencer as Dorothy Vaughan and Janelle Monáe as Mary Jackson, with Kevin Costner, Kirsten Dunst, Jim Parsons, Glen Powell and Mahershala Ali in supporting roles.”

Hidden Figures | Teaser Trailer [HD] | 20th Century FOX

These ladies of NASA weren’t delicate.  They were being vast and brilliant!   And their examples shine in my heart–and make me want to dance like the lady in the illustration above.  Will you join me?