I'm fresh back from the ACCU conference (http://accu.org/index.php/conferences) and full of ideas to take my programming to the next level.

One thing that happened at the conference was the Speakers Dinner, and during the dinner they had an auction to raise money for Bletchley Park (http://www.bletchleypark.org.uk/).

One of the items at the auction was a small tapestry, hand woven by a 91 year old lady who used to work at the park during the war.  She had visited the park recently with her daughter and, as they like to do, the people at Bletchley Park interviewed her to find out her story.  She told them that she worked in the Japanese ciphers section decoding Japanese messages.  On hearing this her daughter said, "but mother, you don't understand Japanese!", to which she replied, "yes I do."  The daughter was surprised, and asked why her mother hadn't told her this in the past to which she replied, "You're only 68 years old.  Why would I mention it?"

For me it’s a beautiful story that captures the modesty of how women tend to quietly get on with what needs to be done without making a big fanfare about it, which is probably one reason why we don't hear as much about what women have done in the history of computing as we should do.

Fast forward to the auction, after a small flurry of bidding one of the women delegates put a bid in for the tapestry.  I'm sure I wasn't the only one in the room that loved the symbolism of one generation of women in computing passing on the baton to another generation of women via something that, (perhaps in my sexist view,) was a very female artefact and couldn't bring themselves to bid against her.

As a result I feel that the tapestry may not quite have received the amount that it could have and I would like to try and make amends for that.  

I would like to invite men in computing to join me in donating to Bletchley Park.  It's a great cause and it's a key part of our history that enables us to do what we love today while also earning a living.  It would be such a shame for us to lose that.

And I would like to raise a few more fivers in recognition of the beautiful tapestry that this 91 year old woman created and also as recognition of what she personally contributed to our industry. 

But more than that, (and this may still be the drink talking!) I would like to send a message to our female colleagues that we may sometimes say the wrong thing, we may sometimes forget that we're not in the playground any more, we may sometimes not listen to you as long as you'd like, and sometimes we may not even look you in the eyes.  But we really do appreciate you and we really do want you in computing.  And if one day, maybe if one of us has done something really dumb, you start to question whether you should stay in the industry or should go, please, please stay.