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SheCourage: That Takes Ovaries' - Rivka Solomon, Profiled

- interview by Jianda Johnson

Bravery. Courage. Chutzpah! and... Femininity? Womanhood? Girls? More often than not, that last little bit doesn't get thrown in with lion-like qualities. Though the "mother lifting car by power of love and adrenaline" scenario does come to mind when prodded, it's certainly not the first image to come to mind when one things of motherhood or feminine power. Enter Rivka Solomon, who, with her latest tome "That Takes Ovaries!: Bold Females and Their Brazen Acts," is rewriting the script before our very eyes with the help of a handful of brave, modern-day goddesses. Read on:

- What was the breaking point that made you collect all these stories, and kept you putting it together through all the peaks and valleys of the process?

Are you asking what motivated me to spend 4.5 years collecting these stories, editing this book and now organizing the open mics? Well, two things. First, I just thought it would be fun.

You know, how totally cool to get hundreds of stories from women and girls about the gutsy, bold, audacious, outrageous things they have done! I get a real kick out of seeing a woman, any woman, being bold. I mean, isn't it a rush to see a little girl walk into a room full of people and take charge? Or witness a teenaged girl take on some outrageous risk, and pull it off? It is just exciting to be around that stuff.

But I also compiled and edited this book for another reason. This book is about risk takers, women and girls who have pushed the boundaries, jumped over barriers, sailed around obstacles — often having fun while they did those things, often standing up for their own or others rights as they did those things. And, basically, I wanted to encourage that.

I wanted to celebrate female risk takers in a wide range of activities (in the world of work, in the world of playing and having fun, in the home, on the streets). I wanted to affirm women and girls who are already risk takers in their lives *and* I wanted to encourage others, readers who might not live their lives that way, to take the bold new step of being a risk taker.

I wrote this book because courage is infectious. I thought that if some reader who might not be living such a bold life now saw how another girl does something gutsy (like grabs the hand of a child molester groping her butt or tracks down wild guerrillas in Africa — two totally different stories in the book), then she might think, "Hey, if *that* woman can do something so outrageous, so adventurous, so courageous, then so can I!"

So in short, I wrote this book because I wanted to celebrate the fun, bold things women do, and also I wanted to do whatever I could to encourage even more women and girls to be risk takers. I feel that if women live more boldly, not only will they have more fulfilling, fun, adventurous lives, but *also* the more willing they'll be to take risks in standing up for themselves and for others. And the more willing they will be to challenge "the system" and the sexism, racism, ablism, anti-Semitism, homophobia we live with (and usually try to just ignore) on a daily basis.