The Civilized Life in Sarasota: WRC's Renaissance Luncheon

Lots of happy, chatty women abounded at the Women's Resource Center's Renaissance Luncheon last week at the Ritz Carlton. A crowd of over 500 women seeking to redefine balance in their lives by listening to keynote speaker, Anne-Marie Slaughter, the author of the controversial article in The Atlantic, "Why Women Still Can't Have it All".

This is what I got out of her talk....That instead of using the terms "men and women" in the work/home dialogue, we should use "breadwinners and caregivers". I like that. At any given time, men and women equally should be able to embrace either of those roles. After working for 37 years, seven days a week, literally, my husband chose to sell his company and is currently the sole caregiver for his 97 year-old father, instead of putting him in a nursing home, and I am the breadwinner. I was able to be a stay at home mom and community volunteer for many, many years during the first 25 years of our marriage and we were both happy I was able to do so. Wouldn't it be nice if the current workplace embraced that idea? Both men and women can be both breadwinners and caregivers at any given time of their work life cycle and not pay a price for it in a career trajectory.

After Anne-Marie's talk, there was a panel of local women discussing their lives and the whole breadwinner/caregiver thing. Those on the panel were Lorna Alston, Wendy Mann Resnick, and Flori Roberts, who was the honorary chair of the event.

The luncheon was very well done and very pretty. The lighting was lovely and not usually something you see at a luncheon. That kind of extra thing is normally reserved for an evening event, so it was quite a visual treat! The centerpieces were charming - tiny dress forms in blue tulle with scales hanging off both sides, indicating the balancing act we all perform. I liked how as you entered the grand hallway in front of the ball room, you walked past posters of clients the WRC had impacted.

Barbara Ackerman was the event chair and Kathy Leon was the emcee of the day. Representatives from the two community foundations, Veronica Brady and Jocelyn Stevens, did a very nice job of doing an "ask".

The food was quite good and the starter soup was interesting and different. I like it when they shake things up like that. The dessert, a choice of chocolate cake with chocolate buttercream or vanilla cake with raspberry jam, was supposed to resemble beach rocks and was both thematic and tasty! Almost everyone at our table had half of each one.

And in other Ritz valet news....I left the luncheon just as the panel started, as did many others, and I only had to wait 10 minutes to get my car. Yay!!

Others seen in the crowd were Teri Hansen, Scott Anderson, Leanne McIntire, Rachel Schaeffer, Gila Meriwether, Joy Naylor, Janet Hunter, Eva Slane, Peggy Abt, Donna Gerdes, Sally Yanowitz, Barbara Zdravecky, Jan Chester, Laurin Ripley, Karee Valek, Isabel Norton, Pam Daniel, Phyllis Anderson, Elaine Briggs, Kathy Coffey, Pat Johnson, Barbara Freeman, Donna-Lee Roden, Dr. LB Wish, Marilyn Bezner, Annette Dignam, Felice Schulaner, Kirstin Fulkerson, Dottie Garner, Leslie Glass, Elizabeth Van Riper, Diana Kelly, Kim Bald, Ann Thompson, Ellen Berman, Judy Zuckerberg, Anne Weintraub, Salena Whilhoit, Brenda Terris, and oh so many more.