Herland Sister Resources

National Elections

November 2nd, 2004
Registration Deadline: October 8!

Almost 76 million of us didn’t vote in 2000 - and with a less than 600 vote margin deciding the presidency in that election, we know, now more than ever, that everyone’s vote counts! Deadline for registration in Oklahoma is October 8th.

Herland is proud to present Jamie Anderson in concert at Herland on Friday, October 15, 2004, at 8 pm.

Touring nationally since 1987, Jamie Anderson is known for her solid songwriting and engaging stage presence. With a voice as smooth as Shawn Colvin and a sense of humor as wacko as comic Suzanne Westenhoefer, Jamie has entertained in hundreds of coffeehouses, concert halls and festivals all over the U.S. She’s performed on the main stage at the National Women’s Music Festival, the Kerrville Folk Festival, at colleges, pride events, folk festivals and at almost every women’s music festival. She has seven recordings, including the newest one Listen. Her songs have been featured on the Dr. Demento radio show, Car Talk and many stations all over the world.

Witty, charming, and sometimes topical, Jamie can run you through the entire gamut of emotions in one show, guiding listeners through the joy of families (”Forever Family”), the pleasures of love (”I Wanna Drive”), pride (”When They Know Who We Are”) and a good reason why you should never break up with a songwriter (”I Miss the Dog [More Than I Miss You)”. A song she wrote with Sue Fink, “A Family of Friends,” has been sung by choruses in the U.S and Canada, sometimes with Jamie as their guest artist. Jamie wishes her cat would stop trying to collect songwriting royalties for “When Cats Take Over The World.”

In the rare time that Jamie is not touring, she teaches songwriting at Duke University and other places. She has a chapter in Songwriting and the Guitar, a book that also includes Paul Simon, The Indigo Girls, James Taylor, Joni Mitchell and others. Jamie has also penned several articles for Acoustic Guitar magazine.

Tickets are on a sliding scale from $10 to $15.

“As a writer, Jamie takes the archetypical forms of folk music and story telling and turns them on their heads! A fresh (in every sense) and original artist.”
– Catie Curtis

“For me, folk music tells a story about folks, simple truth-telling and magical mythology that invites the listener to lean in to the larger circle of life. Jamie Anderson is in that circle and she is singing some wonderful songs.”
– Holly Near

Herland’s Fall Retreat at Robbers Cave was a dream weekend. About 46 of us enjoyed ourselves in the beautiful pine woods of Eastern Oklahoma. The weather was perfect, the pileated woodpeckers made a show for our birdwatchers, and all of the dogs were perfectly behaved and totally lovable, from a husky the size of a wolf down to Joleen, the 8-week old speckled doxie pup. Most of all, the musicians were wonderful, both on and off stage. Thank you Nancy, Millie, Lisa, Mary and Louise.

A lot of folks are going around talking about the great feeling of love abounding all weekend, which sounds a little hokey but it’s true. A little lightning bug story kind of exemplifies it: This little fella blinked behind the performers in the pavilion during most of the concert; at first we were charmed and then worried for it. Sure enough, it was caught in a spider web. Our Texas songstress Nancy Scott rescued it, and painstakingly picked every bit of the sticky web off the tiny little bug. And after resting a little while, by golly, it flew away. So it’s still hokey. But it’s true, and it was wonderful.

The U.S. lesbian and gay population spends an average of $1.4 billion each day, totaling $500 billion a year, and Boycott For Equality is organizing a one-day nationwide economic ‘walkout’ on October 8, 2004 to make that point clear.

Boycott For Equality is an Atlanta-based non-profit formed to promote the boycott, scheduled this year for October 8. For that day, GLBT Americans and their straight allies are encouraged to withdraw from the economy in three specific areas:

1) Do not purchase anything. Do not generate sales tax or business revenue.

2) Don’t work. Take the day off - do not generate payroll taxes, income taxes or add to the economy.

3) Do not use cell phones. Dropping out of the communication network is a way to measure the impact of your presence.

The one-day event is designed to highlight the contribution that lesbians and gays make to the domestic economy and tax base, at the same time they are denied the full legal protections and civil liberties afforded heterosexual Americans.

“We want to remind those in our nation who don’t always see the impact of our community in terms of dollars and cents that we do have real market power,” said Boycott for Equality Co-Founder Dale Duncan. “We were inspired by Don’t Amend founder Robin Tyler’s famous quip, ‘If being gay is a disease, let’s all call in sick to work’ and decided to put those words into action.”

Up to 27 million Americans identify as being primarily lesbian or gay, yet no Federal law provides protection from discrimination in the workplace and many State and Federal laws prohibit access to the rights and responsibilities of marriage.

According to the Washington D.C.-based public relations firm Witeck-Combs Communications, the US Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual and Transgender (GLBT) population contributed an estimated $500 billion to the U.S. marketplace in 2003. “This event brings into focus the economic cotribution of GLBT citizens,” said Duncan. “And people understand money. The response so far has been tremendous.”

Boycott for Equality reports that some major groups which have endorsed or encouraged Boycott for Equality Day include the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force, Don’t Amend: The Equality Campaign, The Advocate magazine, Civil Marriage US, DC Diversity, Equality Illinois and Wyoming Equality.

Additionally, comic Margaret Cho’s web site, loveisloveislove.com, has listed Boycott For Equality Day as one of the “12 Things You Can Do” to promote gay and lesbian equality.

October 8 falls on a Friday, and the following Monday is National Coming Out Day, Duncan explained. “It seemed like a great time to make our presence felt.”

For more information, visit this month’s Herland Voice website of the month: www.boycottforequality.org.

The OKC Lightning Women’s Football Team will be hosting tryouts for the 2005 season beginning in September. The 2004 OKC Lightning were the Champions of both the South West Division and the Southern Conference of the National Women’s Football Association. The NWFA is the largest full-contact women’s football league in the world with more than 40 teams in 23 states nationwide.

All women interested in playing full-contact football are invited to attend. You must be at least 18, have your own health insurance and be available for practices, games and away-game travel. A one-time $35 tryout fee and signing of team and league waivers will also be required. Anyone interested in playing or in learning more about our team should attend. You do not need to know anything about football as long as you have the desire to work hard and to learn the game.

Tryouts will be held at Taft Stadium on Saturday, September 25 and Sunday, September 26 from 10:00am to 1:00pm. Registration begins at 9:00am. Taft Stadium is located at 27th and N. May Avenue in Oklahoma City. Follow-up tryouts (if you missed the tryouts in September) will be held on Saturday and Sunday, October 23-24, November 20-21 and December 17-18. The location for these tryouts is yet to be determined.

For more information about our tryouts, contact Kim Mitchell at (405) 524-1509 or MsMoose44 (-at-)aol.com. You can also visit our website at www.okclightning.com.