Isabel Rhoten

I think about the women in my life. Women I know intimately and women on the fringes. Single women and women with children. Women in charge of business, in charge of households, in charge of both. Hard-shell women with soft interiors. Women with signature scents. The scorned women I read about in the news. Women with strong laughs. Women with music in their eyes. Women who appear in films, who appear on billboards, who appear in dreams. Women who taught me in classrooms. Women who taught me in clubs. I think about women who live without men, who live without reservations about living without men. Women with gardens. Women with toolboxes. Women with mace in their bags. I think of women who support women, who advocate for women, who advocate for me. They bring me to tears, these women. They bring me to my pen, to the edge of my paper. I want to write about them all. Still, I am uncertain about the kind of woman I want to become. I am uncertain about the kind of woman who will become of me.