Biosophical thoughts

Autumn is arriving in Portland. Margie and I talked about the Biosophical Institute, an organization that was critical to her growing up, out, and away from her mother’s anxieties, into a world of ideas and possibilities. As the linked article says, “New York was a magnet for social idealism.” I’m not sure what “social idealism” is, but if such a thing exists in magnetic form, Margie and I are iron filings. 

“I heard about the Institute from the brother of a high school friend of mine,” Margie recollects, “and at first I went there for the dances. I was sixteen, so Spinoza was not what I was looking for, but dancing and friendship were languages I could speak. Then I became interested in the Institute women because they were so different from my mother. Edith Montlack was a pianist and a visual artist, and there were other women whose lives were attractive to me but also frightening. Bohemian women, independent women, women who thought, we said, ‘like men,’ as if that was the gold standard for thinking. I was part of that group till I was in my mid-twenties.

“I married a fellow I met at one of the dances, and we moved into the Hotel Dauphin at Broadway and 67th Street. The Institute had the entire fourth floor of the hotel, and it had a large meeting room at one end, and lots of small rooms for couples who agreed not to have children so they could devote themselves to building the group.

“We didn’t stay at the Dauphin longer than six months, but we stayed connected with the group. It was a critical time for me, a time when I saw that I can choose my values and not just accept what’s given to me. I saw women who think and read, who can hold their own in challenging conversations with men. I remember once Dr. Kettner, who was the founder of the group, kissed me on the forehead. I don’t know what I said to provoke that, but I think it was a blessing. I think I took something from those role models that I found there, and it served me well after my divorce. I went to college when my youngest was only three and the two boys were barely in elementary school. I was a good mom, and I graduated Magna Cum Laude and got a full scholarship to graduate school. I’m not sure I could have done that if I hadn’t had those years in the Biosophical Institute.”