And she's pledged to a sorority! She one of the newest members of Delta Delta Delta a/k/a Tri-Delta, and she's basking in the warm glow of sisterhood. She asked me if I was okay with Greek life before she rushed, and I said I was, because (in part) sororities seem fundamentally different from fraternities. The instances where sorority girls are injured during pledge season are vanishingly small - especially compared to the awful stories coming out of fraternities. Groups of 18 - 21 year old guys are all about booze, sex, and acting like the Vandals at the gates of Rome. Girls the same age are all about making each other picture frames and talking out their stress. I truly believe there's a creative power in sisterhood.
My mother was in a sorority, though it may have been a pale echo of being one of four sisters growing up. Her experience was cut short when she got married between her junior and senior year and moved into Air Force Base housing, but she recreated her sororal ties later in life, thanks to the large number of her high school and college friends who got on Facebook. Over the past decade, she went to many get-togethers, weekends and reunions. She loved her husband and valued their closeness, but she saw the special value of sisterhood.
The Smithie was a bit skeptical of Youngest's plans to go Greek, until I pointed out that life in a house at the all-women Smith College was functionally a sorority (absent the dues and the designated colors.) They held meetings, hashed out issues, raised funds, made friends and got to know one another in the way women can in a single-sex environment. (I'm going to assume men find some of the same revelations when they're in their own organizations. I obviously have no personal experience.)
I do, however, have the experience of joining a sorority as a full-grown adult. I was asked to become part of Jungle Red Writers in late 2010, along with Deb Crombie, and she and I made our debuts here in January 2011. Honestly, I agreed because I knew and liked the women involved - at least superficially - and it seemed like an easy way to keep a regular social media presence. I had no idea nearly nine years later this place would feel like a genuine sisterhood, and that my dear friends would become such an integral part of my life. Like my mother's college buddies, like the Smithie's housemates, like Youngest's Tri-Delts, my sorority has been a consolation in times of trouble, a cheerleader when things go well, and an endless encouragement to achievement and creativity.
We even have our own color - although I suppose we ought to consider a mascot and flower to really be Greek.
Dear readers, what are the sisterhoods - and brotherhoods - that have kept you company on the road of life?
