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I fell into a void the past couple weeks, and this post is excruciatingly late. It's going to be harder than I thought to keep up a regular writing habit when life resumes its usual routine, although the last week has hardly been typical. We moved and I got involved in a time-sensitive work project that had me working through lunch and well into the evening three days in a row last week. Even just typing that sounds gross. I have no aversion to hard work, but lately I find it really icky to toe the line of conflating your self-worth with the amount of time you spend working. So that's not what I'm doing here. Just describing a hopefully temporary situation.
Back to the prompt, though. When did I first realize the world is sometimes like that really bad babysitter who never got asked back because she drank your parents' liquor, let you stay up late watching an R-rated movie that gave you nightmares, and put you to bed in your grass-stained playclothes without brushing your teeth? I never had a babysitter like that because my parents hired only vetted members of The Baby-Sitters Club I might have been watched by a non-family member a grand total of once ever, but it sounds legit. And sometimes the world is like that, too. Bad things happen all the time, and collectively we look the other way because it's easy or convenient or provides instant gratification.
I'm sure the world sent a lot of signals that didn't compute in my kid brain. Messages about racism, sexism, classism, you name it. The specifics of most of those lessons are lost to time, but I do have a crystal clear recollection of the first time I learned that some people think girls aren't as capable as boys, and shouldn't be allowed to hold certain roles, just because we are girls.
It was 1989, a Saturday afternoon in Florida. Ninja Turtle action figures were a hot commod, and I was stoked when my mom bought me an April O'Neil action figure. I'd still love to have that rad yellow jumpsuit in my size, but I digress. I couldn't wait to go play with the two boys next door, who had loads of TMNT action figures.
Up in their messy bedroom, toys spilling off the bottom bunk onto the floor, we sifted through the pile of Turtle paraphernalia. "I'm Donatello. And Rafael. And Splinter," said Brandon. "Then I'm Leonardo and Michaelangelo. And Bebop," claimed the brother, whose name I forget but was probably something generically douchey.
"Who can I be?" I asked.
"April," they both insisted.
"But, just April?"
"Well, duh, you're a girl. You can't be the other ones."
I think I knew that was horse shit, but I was a shy kid and I'm sure that whatever happened next was one of two things: a) I cried and went home immediately or b) I cried silently while doing whatever they told me to do until it was time to go home.
That I still vividly remember the scene to this day shows that it wasn't something I accepted and moved on from - it stuck in my craw and still pisses me off to this day. I wonder how much it subconsciously influenced choices I've made throughout my life? Were there times when I forced myself to do something I wasn't sincerely interested in doing just to prove a girl could do it? I liked to take (mild) risks and loved gross-out humor as a kid (...some things never change). Would I have felt the same way if I wasn't, deep down, trying to prove that girls can do anything boys can do?
Do I still, even at age 35, do things that I could ask Andy to do, that he could do more easily, just so I don't seem like an incapable priss? Honestly, probably yeah. Is that entirely a bad thing? No. But should any woman feel she has to do things just to prove a point? No. How many other women face these questions, jump through these mental hoops every day?
Being in a male dominated construction workforce (avg. 100 to 1) I learned equal work for equal pay. At home I know even if I can do it myself it's good to ask for or accept help.
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