Give yourself a break and don’t forget to count your blessings this holiday season was the message Rye author Lee Woodruff delivered to a large, mostly female audience at School of Holy Child’s fourth annual benefit for the school’s Maureen Alison McGrath ’78 Memorial Library.
By Sarah Varney
Give yourself a break and don’t forget to count your blessings this holiday season was the message Rye author Lee Woodruff delivered to a large, mostly female audience at School of Holy Child’s fourth annual benefit for the school’s Maureen Alison McGrath ’78 Memorial Library.
Woodruff applauded the school’s commitment to the concept of service. “At Holy Child, you manage to interweave the importance of faith, God, and sacrifice. Those are the ideas that really matter,” she said.
In her remarks, drawn largely from her 2009 bestseller “Perfectly Imperfect,” Woodruff imparted both holiday cheer and many funny asides to a receptive audience.
Particularly for women growing up in the ’70s, Woodruff said, the cultural message was clear but erroneous: You can have it all. “We were supposed to be wives, mothers, bring home the bacon, fry it up, and dance backwards in heels!”
And that pressure grows more intense during the holiday season.
“As daughters, mothers, sisters … in all of these roles, we are called upon to do so much,” said Woodruff. “But when we’re trying to figure out where we’re going wrong, it’s important to remember ‘we’re just one mom doing the best we can every day.”
She also spoke of the importance of faith, hope, and prayer during the long road to recovery that her family traveled after husband Bob Woodruff, the ABC anchorman, was gravely wounded in a 2006 IED (Improvised Explosive Device) incident in Iraq. He recovered enough to resume his reporting duties for ABC.
But Woodruff’s signature humor was what guests went away with. “I am not Catholic, but I have always wanted to be Catholic. I wanted all that pomp, the incense, the white dress. But no, we were Presbyterians, the ones who are busy tithing away so we have no fun,” she said.
As she wrapped up her remarks, she quipped, “I sometimes talk the bark off a tree.”
The event, which was held December 4 at Apawamis Club, was chaired by Dina Pfohl and Christina Webers. “Holy Child has an amazing group of women and we all come together for these events,” said the two Holy Child moms.
