Women's Writes - Works

As a general rule, I don’t.
Don’t what?
Just…don’t.
Whatever you were about to ask.
Make you a sandwich.
Dust the office.
Vacuum and clean the toilets.

“Thank you for shopping at King’s”, the checker intoned, bored and ready for quitting time. She ran a few items over the scanner for the customer in front, and tossed them in a sack. “$10.72.” Clarisse waited while she counted out the change. Now it was her turn. “Thank you for shopping at King’s. If you didn’t have a royal experience, please fill out the comment card at Customer Service to let us know how we can improve.” She didn’t look at Clarisse as she ran her groceries over the scanner. “Oh, cabbage. It’s a two for one today…our cabbages and King’s sale. Would you like another one?”

When a shark kills a woman on a beach, they choose not to close the beach and tell the tourists to stay home, stay safe. I saw the movie, and I don’t remember a single time when someone shrugged and said “Sharks will be sharks”, and everyone went back to what they are doing while blaming people who became shark chow for their own failure to wear appropriate shark repellant bathing suits. That would make a rather short movie, right?

Music. Discordant, loud, like an out of tune accordion. Stops. Drums, no rhythm, just noise. Stops. A bright light flashing. Stops. More noise – rock music mixed with classical. A chorus of gospel chimes in. Bells begin to ring. Each music style gets louder, tries to drown out the others. A country guitar begins to twang, getting louder, drowning out the other styles, which one by one cease in a gasp, a whisper, a choke. Country picking, stomping, fiddling continues, but becomes bored with its own sound, getting quieter and quieter and stopping suddenly as a tentacle lifts and slaps, gasping off into silence.

Mom was in full voice tonight. She was giving her opinion on everything…the weather, the president, the women at the gym, the freshness of the fish at the store…like always, she had plenty to say. Autumn was glad. She preferred Mom give her opinion on external things, things none of them could control, rather than turning her tongue on her daughter.

Dear Grandma. It’s been a long time since I’ve written you a letter. You deserve better. I shouldn’t stop writing just because you’ve died and I’ve grown old. You gave me so much, and I think it’s time I said thank you. It is because of you that I am who I am…and, I guess, when you think about it, it’s because of you that I am.

My upbringing included a share of the household chores. I don’t mind that; I think it’s good for children to learn how to do the things they’ll need to do as adults. But the situation always seemed sort of…wrong…to me. I had household chores. My sisters had household chores. My brothers…well, they did sometimes have to feed and water the livestock, but I had those chores, too. And household chores on top of it. My mother was a big believer in a separate role for women than for men, and that no good would come to women who stepped out of that role. I was expected to get married, have babies, and spend my life taking care of my husband and my children. What I wanted didn’t really matter in the equation, because I was a girl…and would be a woman soon.

Woman.
Ask Google. What are words for woman?
Google says:

She started to open the door, but he slid out of the driver’s seat, lying half in, half out of the car. Now what could she do? There was no way she could get him back in; he was a large man, and she was a small woman. She pushed and tugged, but it was no use. She started to panic. This wasn’t a busy street; the odds of someone else coming by were astronomical. It was unusual for her to met anyone else; only about once every few months or so. It had to be tonight…

Your trophy is not on your wall;
It’s on your arm.
You hold tight to the waist
As you work the room.
Smiles and knowing leers
Prove to you you’re a man.

Once I had a dream.
I would…fly.
I would create things,
Go places,
See things,
And do things.
I would be everything
My grandmother wanted to be
But couldn’t
Because she was a woman.

“No, I’m a goldfish. A genie granted me one wish, and I told her I wanted to be a human woman for just one night. I was tired of drinking nothing but water. I will turn back into a goldfish as soon as curfew arrives.” She turned her back on him.

The funeral had been…surreal. People Dawn hadn’t seen in years coming up to console her. For what? She hadn’t seen her mother since she was eighteen. Mother never called, and Dawn never called. They didn’t have anything to say to each other. They each nursed their own wounds and didn’t share their pain with anyone. Until the day Mother reached out to Sheila, her best friend that she drove away five years ago, told her never to come back. Sheila arrived at the house to find Mother hanging from a hook in the kitchen. She was too late. All she could do was be with her as the ambulance took her to the hospital where she died.

Nevertheless, she persisted.
They told her no, you can’t vote.
Nevertheless, she persisted.
Now she can vote.

DR. K: And in conclusion, my research has demonstrated that there is clearly an unconscious bias when reviewing female resumes. The tendency to call back those with male names while rejecting identical resumes with female names is so far above the level of chance that there is little reason to doubt the unconscious sexism. This bias is compounded when the name on the resume suggests that the woman is a person of color. When resumes are reviewed blind, the disconnect between the number of men called for interviews and the number of women called for interviews disappears, and people of color are as likely to get called for an interview as white males. My suggestion is that all human resources reviews are conducted blind until such time as society has been able to adjust these biases. In this way, we will be able to determine if the reason women are more poorly represented in certain fields is an inherent feature of being a woman, or if it is a culturally determined obstacle placed in the way of women. This would also have the effect of helping to rectify the often unconscious bias against people of color.

I am the beneficiary of patriarchal culture.
Men put me on a pedestal.
Men worship at my feet.
Men work long hours to feed and clothe me.
I do not have to work for myself.