November 6

1}  I'm thankful that I am a woman living in the US in 2012.  Having degrees in History and Social Science I have read, studied and written papers about the struggles of women throughout history.  I also know women around the world today are still fighting for basic human rights.

2}  I'm thankful for the right to vote.  If you are not a white, property owning man you need to make sure you do not squander your right to vote.
{BLOG WARNING...History Nerd alert!}
We live in one of the free-est places in the world and yet a mere 50 years ago black men and women in certain parts of our country would face death when they headed to the polls.  The 15th Amendment passed in 1870 allowed black men to vote, so they had the federal law behind them, but they had to face state laws and angry mobs to cast their votes.

My grandmother was born before women had the right to vote, she was 16 when the 19th Amendment was added to our Constitution giving women the right to vote {passed in 1920...less than 100 years ago}.  I had the privileged of talking with her in 1999 about women voting {I didn't grow up near her}, I asked if she was excited to vote when she was old enough, her exact words that still shock me, "Nice girls just didn't do that!"...

3}  I'm thankful for clean, hot, running water.  What does that have to do with voting?  Nothing besides the fact that I can drink a glass of water before I go vote, I can even take one with me if I want, and I can take a hot shower before I go cast my vote today, and that is a privileged that those first women voters probably didn't have. {From Home Things Past:  Sears Roebuck was selling showers by 1915. By 1965 a study of one thousand American middle-class homes found that 85% had both a tub and a shower.}.  
And today, in the year 2012 780 million people on our planet lack access to clean water

I am so very thankful that I was blessed to be born in this country in this time.  And as a mother of a girl, I remind her often that she is very blessed.