This week marks the fifth anniversary of this, my Luna Moth Woman blog. To celebrate, and in keeping with March as Women’s History Month, I will honor a woman who embodied the feisty feminist spirit that is Luna Moth Woman, the late great Molly Ivins.
First, some background on Luna Moth Woman. An alter ego superhero conjured in my first Other Worldly novel, Alienable Rights (2020), by an equally feisty feminist, Rowan Layne, upon learning of her extrasensory, extraordinary auditory ability. Because Rowan can actually hear better than moths, which are first on the list of animals with auditory skill exceeding human capability.
In Alienable Rights, Rowan researches the Luna moth to learn various other details, such as the disturbing reality that they have no mouths and don’t eat, but also discovers it’s the only moth to have the honor of appearing on a US postage stamp, back in June 1987.
Which brings me to the photo accompanying this post, because the Luna moth has now been honored again by the USPS, last summer when I was too busy getting settled in New Mexico to know it. Consequently, it was last month when I first saw this special stamp, not mere standard postage, but instead of the more expensive “non-machinable” variety. Which means it’s for atypical square envelopes that, as a paper crafter who makes greeting cards, I’m well familiar with. Rowan is also a paper crafter, which has a certain symmetry.
Another similarity? It dawned on me this week that Mary Tyler “Molly” Ivins, 1944-2007, who is greatly missed and surely needed in these trying times for women, would have made an ideal Luna Moth Woman. Not only was she a curly redhead, this Texan was six feet tall and fearless. The ultimate in snark and sass. And, like myself and Rowan Layne, she was a newspaper columnist, albeit a highly famous one, renowned for her witty and sharp political satire.
Another uncanny tidbit that I hadn’t previously known is Molly was born in Monterey, California, and Monterey Bay just happens to be the locale for the alien spacecraft arrival scene in Alienable Rights. She was, however, raised in Texas (in a Republican household), and while I and Rowan Layne did not grow up in the Lone Star State, our parents did. Plus, like Rowan, I’m a graduate of the University of Texas at Austin, though Molly was an impressive Ivy-leaguer, attending Smith College. But Austin is where she lived, and unfortunately she died there of breast cancer at the too-young age of 62.
Molly Ivins was an American newspaper columnist, author, and political commentator who was hilarious and brilliantly insightful when it came to critiquing political figures in both Texas and nationally, and in “speaking truth to power.” Of her delightful laugh-out-loud books (all of which I own), my personal favorite is Shrub, a spot-on roast of George W. Bush. Indeed, Molly is credited with coining the nickname for the former president, son of former President George H.W. Bush. Hence, the Shrub.
She was described as an “unapologetic liberal,” and a “Texas populist,” which Molly defined as: “Listen, a populist is someone who is for the people and against the powerful, and so a populist is generally the same as a liberal—except we tend to have more fun.” But it’s her take on Republicans that is nothing short of prescient when it comes to what we’re all experiencing today, especially in terms of the war on women:
“There’s a weird Republican schizophrenia. They want welfare mothers to work, and working mothers to stay home.”
“It’s like, duh. Just when you thought there wasn’t a dime’s worth of difference between the two parties, Republicans go and prove you’re wrong.”
My favorite all-time Molly Ivins quote, however is, “I prefer a man who will burn the flag and then wrap himself in the Constitution to a man who will burn the Constitution and then wrap himself up in the flag.”
Today mark’s the birthday of another fierce female fighter for truth and justice, one who well knew the Constitution and interpreted it wisely, the late Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg. She is also greatly missed, and was born the same year as my mom. Both embody the spirit of Luna Moth Woman, albeit in a more petite form.
As is said often in my Other Worldly novels, it’s time for Rowan, and for all of us, to kick some Luna Moth Woman ass. And in these exceedingly insane and inane times, we could use more witty words of wisdom from sages like Molly Ivins. Therefore, I’ll close with, “You’ve got to have fun while you’re fightin’ for freedom, ’cause you don’t always win.”