I don't want to be Penelope!

Ever read something and suddenly imagine yourself juxtaposed into the same pair of shoes? Over cafe this morning I am gleefully reading Of Cities and Women (Letters to Fawwaz) by Etel Adnan, when I stimble across the following passage....

Penelope is thus to Ulysses what Job is to God: the object that waits, and which by waiting, "divinizes" Ulysses.

And, ever since, in a collective imagination that is brought to date constantly, the woman is that which waits, she waits to grow up, she waits for puberty, waits for her fiancee, her husband, her child, her old age, and her death. She waits for the children to come and go, for them to grow up, for them to marry, for her husband to go to work in the morning and come home at night. She waits for the water to boil, for the war to be over, for the spring to return. She waits to be kissed, taken, rejected, forgotten. She waits for the moment of love, the moment of vengeance, of oblivion, and again, of death. She is the flower awaiting the bee, and the valley awaiting the storm. She is born practically seated, and Penelope does nothing but sit. She is pure waiting. She weaves and unravels her work. She is the one to be Sisyphus. and for the waiting to be perfect, she must produce nothing lasting with her hands.

There you have, In Monteverdi and his poignant accents, the best exponent of woman's fate.

I think I am going to switch to cafe corretto this morning.