The XX factor

It's a depressing tale. You probably figured that out from the title, but perhaps you hoped it might be bleak but not unremittingly bleak. You would be wrong. It is bleak and it is unremittingly bleak.

Women have broken barriers that were nearly impenetrable when I was a little girl, but the story is still the same: unequal, unequal, unequal. Things have shifted but the reality is the same and that's hard to understand and still harder to face.

Nevertheless, it must be faced if one ever hopes to see a world where men and women sit at the same table with the same menu and the same service. And one does hope.