I played with the original 1959 Barbie instead of toy trucks but grew up to be an ASE certified diesel mechanic. I donned lacy white gloves and my pink Sunday dress to watch Disney princess movies at the Embassy Theater but grew up to wear leathers and race motorcycles at Willow Springs. I loved rearranging my doll house but grew up to build my own two-story garage. During high school I was a pom-pon girl and a drummer; I carhopped in short A&W culottes and pumped gas in long Texaco overalls. I can clean, cook, and sew, but I can also weld, wire, and plumb. I carry a purse and a firearm.
In the 1960s Little League was only for boys, so my girlfriends and I had to start our own baseball team at Franke Park. In the 1970s the military had no maternity uniforms, so I was medically discharged when I got pregnant. In the 1980s I trained male layout artists who hadn't my graphics degree or experience but made 25 percent higher wages because they "had families to support." Then in the 1990s I returned to military duty while my daughter played varsity softball and served as cheer captain. Today my three grandchildren stay home with my son while his wife brings home the bacon--a situation they planned while both were working her way through medical school.
We, like Sonja Foss, recognize this as a post-feminist era, and have moved on. Join us!
Rock on! And thank you for going through all that so I don't have to.
ReplyDeleteAs an aside - my nephew plays with his toy trucks and tool sets in a pink and purple "Dora the Explorer" tent.
In a world where "man" is still used instead of "mankind", where violence against women is staggering, where men can't express any emotion outside of anger, women still experience the glass ceiling, ad nauseum, the battle is definitely not over.
ReplyDeleteI believe women CAN do whatever they want and prepare themselves to do, but I also believe there are still some barriers to their achieving success at the same levels as their male counterparts, and not all of them imposed by men. Many women could do better, myself included.
ReplyDeleteFirst, the “glass ceiling:”
It’s still there, albeit with some bullet holes and a lot of crazing. But not all the bullets are coming from the underside of the glass any more. I believe men, despite their need to be "on top," recognize and even welcome a worthy opponent when they see one. A man can fight, lie, cheat and/or steal his way to the top, but women, besides knowing how to do all those things just as well, also know how to FINESSE, and that has become THE way to get ahead. Men wouldn't know finesse if it nibbled their 'nads, but they like a good fight.
Glass ceiling? Yes. But listen closely; you'll hear the sounds of male AND female footwear dancing atop it.
Personally, I could do more ... if I wanted to. I could change an air filter, fix the lawn mower, "manage" the mouse traps. The knowledge is readily available and, I'm sure, easy to learn. But I don't want to. It’s not because it’s "man's work;" it's because (a) I’m not interested and (b) let's face it, I don't really HAVE to. As my sister says (and she is a froofy, FROOFY girl), "That's what men/husbands are for."
Before you get the wrong idea, I’ve been a river rat since before I could walk, can bass fish just as well as and sometimes better than my dad (which is saying something), would much rather garden than club, and have one dress in my closet (just in case someone dies). I’ve absolutely no idea or interest in what's "in fashion," and not just because I can't afford whatever it is anyway. I wear makeup only on VERY special occasions, don't muck with my hair except to keep it out of my eyes, and hate shopping for shopping's sake only slightly less than I hate finding a mouse turd in the pantry.
My husband deployed to Iraq when I was seven months pregnant, getting ready to retire from the military myself and move our entire household from Maryland to Indiana, alone. I found out over the following 16 months that what you HAVE to do, you CAN do, even with an infant in tow. Four years later, people still ask me how I did it, and I still don't understand the question. How could I NOT do it? Who was going to do it for me? Was I supposed to just lie down and give up? Wail and weep because I was all alone? That’s not the person I was raised to be, regardless of whether I had balls or breasts.
If you’ve the desire or need to do something, find out how and do it. Of course, being able and being skilled are two different things. Kind of like my husband with laundry and cooking. He can DO those things, but he's never going to be especially good or innovative at either because he doesn't like cooking or care about laundry; as long as his clothes are clean and his belly is full, what does he care how long his clothes last or whether he eats the same thing every day? He's happier with my results than his, just as I'm happier letting him dig us out of a snowdrift or fix the silcock.
Keywords: versatility and preference. Our daughter's life skills toolbox will contain fishing and possibly hunting, cooking, laundry, basic mechanics, a little woodworking, food/flower gardening, wildlife identification, yard/housework, and 100 other things I don't have space to list. She’ll learn how to find information Mike and I cannot provide because we don't know everything. She’ll have the tools to do whatever she needs or wants to do -- whichever is more important. She’ll be able. What she does with that is up to her.
In the meantime, Barbie and her friends are still banned from our house. Why? Not because I'm a feminist, although they DO promote an unhealthy and unrealistic body image.
It's more because I just don't like them.
The more I get to know you, the more in awe I become :)
ReplyDeleteYou have such interesting stories to tell . . . have you written a book yet about your experiences? If not, you should!
ReplyDelete