BY PAMELA JO BOWMAN – MESA, ARIZONA – My daughter is away at school. Today was her first day of classes. I felt I could call tonight and not seem completely overbearing. We had a delightful conversation. She emailed me her blog address. I checked it out and felt pride not as a mother, but as a woman. She gives me hope that her generation sees the value in themselves and each other. So, to the class of 2011, our future rests in your eyes.

Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz
1648-1695

Turn your eyes toward yourself
and you’ll find in yourself and in them
not only occasion for love
but compulsion to surrender.

Meanwhile my tender care
bears witness I only live
to gaze at you spellbound and sigh,
to prove that for you I die.