The orange door held my eye as I looked out the small window next to the bed. Last night Jon and I stayed in an AirB&B in Hudson NY.
I had been to the town a few times about 20 years ago. Back then the main street was mostly empty storefronts, with a few antique/junk shops and an old diner.
Now the old diner is retro and the storefronts are filled with expensive shops and B&B’s. “I don’t suppose you have any decaf coffee”, I asked the woman at the Verdigris Tea and Chocolate Bar. One woman just said “no”, the other looked me up and down and kindly offered to make a decaf latte or espresso.
Later we stopped at a gas station and I got Jon his light and sweet decaf coffee for the ride home.
The town is being gentrified, close enough to NYC to bring people with lots of money, but still real enough, just a block off the main street, to be an interesting place to visit.
Last night I fell asleep reading She Said, by Jodi Kantor and Megan Twohey. But only because I was tired from driving, a day at the Zoo and a good dinner with a glass of wine.
Usually, the book which is about breaking the Harvey Weinstein sexual harassment story keeps me up. Reading it is like watching All The Presidents Men or Spotlight, except with more outrageously, fascinating details.
Kantor and Twohey are my new heroes.
Reading how they got this story, which two other journalists before them couldn’t, gives me hope. It’s also opening my eyes to how money and corruption really works. And it shows the power of language, how it can be used to manipulate and coerce or to tell the truth.
It’s hopeful to see how they were able to tease the story out and get at the truth. And how that truth helped start the #MeToo movement which has already changed, for the better, how many people think about and understand sexual harassment and assault.
Jon asked me if reading the book makes me angry.
There are definitely things in the book that I’m angry about. But mostly I find the book exciting and even empowering because Kantor and Twohey were up against the kind of power and corruption that seemed impossible to crack.
Reading about the kind of corruption Weinstein was involved in makes me understand a little more how someone like Donald Trump gets away with the things he has not just as president, but throughout his adult life.
And it gives me hope that some journalist out there is doing the same kind of investigative reporting on Trump as Kantor and Twohey did on Harvey Weinstein.
Reminds me to get back to work on my Tiny Pricks embroidery! 😉
Yes, Fran!
PBS had a wonderful, in-depth interview with these two S/heroes! When you hear them detail all the work that went into this investigation, you think “What a story”! And then realize every woman has experienced some level of this throughout their lives. Hope and change is a slow process….
I found the detail amazing too Cheryl. I do hope that it makes a long term difference and it we don’t just forget it.
Saturday night I saw a documentary on Harvey Weinstein and how he harassed and assaulted the many women who trusted him or were incredibly naive hoping that he could help their careers. The amazing thing was how he treated his employees and how long they stayed with him. Working under him was so incredibly stressful that it is hard to understand how they didn’t all have breakdowns. They put up with so much and he instilled so much fear in so many people. Power corrupts, but I don’t think the man has a soul. He had a strange relationship with his brother too. They named Miramax after their parents, but I have to wonder what kind of parents they really had. Harvey was a monster who felt insecure as a child. I suspect he never grew up and much of his behavior was a result of arrested development stemming from his childhood. He was incredibly unattractive which I think also contributed to his need for power whether it was over women or men. I hope he spends the rest of his life in prison. After the film was a panel discussion with some of his victims, the director and a psychiatrist. It was an interesting evening to say the least.
It sounds it Jane, thanks for sharing it with us.