My father was an unusual guy.
A big-time civil engineer who loved poetry, a tough guy with impeccable manners, a preacher’s son, a skilled marksman who came to regret every squirrel he shot as a kid.
He was also a World War II hero who never talked about it, father of four daughters nicknamed Mike, Pat, Jac and Jo.
A tough taskmaster who rarely gave advice, Dad told me something decades ago that has stayed with me all my life.
“Sometimes there are questions which will have no answers,” he said.
That’s what I was thinking about Wednesday morning when I woke to news of Donald Trump’s huge victory.
Voters once again had failed to elect a highly qualified woman as president of the United States — in favor of a narcissistic, crude, rude, clown-car driver of a candidate.
And I was left with more questions without answers, including why decency and democracy aren’t worth more than the price of an egg or a gallon of gas?
And, will I ever see a woman in the Oval Office?
‘It’s the blonde’
For the 1964 presidential election, I was 13 days shy of being 21, then the legal age to vote. As usual, two men were battling it out. It was a time in America when a woman’s career was basically confined to classrooms, offices, hospitals or airplanes.
Three years later, when women were being hired to replace young men going off to Vietnam, I got a back-door break and became a reporter. Although I did not burn my bra or march in the streets, I embraced the birth of the women’s liberation movement in the 1960s and looked forward to leaving the minefield women faced of less pay, longer hours and tearjerker “women’s stories” assigned by male editors.
In 1972, Shirley Chisholm, a Democratic congresswoman from New York, would become an early trailblazer, making history as the first African American woman to seek a major party presidential nomination.
But it wasn’t until 1984, when a woman named “Gerry” — U.S. Sen. Geraldine Ferraro — would find a place on a major party ticket, chosen by Dem presidential contender Fritz Mondale as his veepmate.
Mondale had tipped the national press corps that he’d narrowed his choice to two women, one a blonde (Ferraro) and the other a brunette (San Francisco Mayor Diane Feinstein).
Three words from an impeccable source gave me a brief exclusive national scoop.
“It’s the blonde.”
In a Time magazine interview, Mondale later talked about what Ferraro endured on the campaign trail.
“We went down to Mississippi, and some old farmer said, ‘Young lady, do you make good blueberry muffins?’
“And she said, ‘Yes. Do you?’
“She had to keep her cool. She had to be nice about it. And yet she was undergoing a revolution.”
The ‘revolution’ will not be rushed
It would be nearly a quarter of a century — and a new millennium — before another woman would make it that far. When Vietnam War hero John McCain selected Alaska Republican Gov. Sarah Palin as his running mate in 2008, I initially lent some support to her candidacy — and got shellacked for it.
With her big glasses and red lipstick, Palin was emerging as a possible new quintessential female role model — a hunter with a college degree, who didn’t always wear highly tailored outfits and liked talking about her five kids.
“Hmmm. Maybe … I am not a feminist after all,” I wrote at the time.
“What fault is there in admiring a woman who is against abortion — even though I believe in freedom of choice?
“What’s wrong with huge respect for a woman who chose to give birth to a Down syndrome child knowing full well what was in store for her and her family?
“So what if she’s a Republican?”
It didn’t take long for Palin to go poof. She proved a mighty embarrassment to McCain, who lost to Barack Obama.
‘More work to do’
Then in 2016, Hillary Clinton became the first woman to finally make it to the top of a major party ticket — only to lose to Trump.
“Where do I begin?” I wrote that November.
“That I’m furious the chances of a woman being elected president in my lifetime are actuarially now slim to none!
“That a man who embraced the dark side of humor, racism and fear was able to lure an army of frustrated rural Americans to a place they rarely frequent: the voting booth?
“When Clinton delivered her concession speech, she reminded all of us ‘not to grow weary and lose heart for there was more work to do.’
“’For there are more seasons to come,’” she said.
And now, I’m 80, and once again, we are approaching winter in the wake of a gargantuan failure to elect a good and qualified woman, Vice President Kamala Harris, to lead our country.
On and on it will go, as pundits and experts analyze why the Democratic Party just stumbled again on America’s political battlefield.
And maybe, just maybe, they’ll come up with an acceptable answer to why a woman has yet to become president.
But remembering Dad’s advice so many years ago, I won’t be holding my breath.