I once picked up a worm and held it squiggling and squirming to my sibling’s face. Of course she screamed until she noticed that I was having fun with it and she insisted on playing with it. “No!” I obtusely declared to my little sis. “This is a boy’s territory. Worms are not meant for little girls or ladies.” (Not that I knew any difference in those days.)
Today, of course, I’d gladly hand the worm over, knowing that the poor critter is basically sexless and apolitical and that the nicer gender should have its day (or generation) to do what used to be men’s business (excluding the men’s room antics).
Today, I see that many roles that used to be considered for one gender and taboo for the other are finally becoming removed. I have dishpan hands from too much Palmolive yet can still handle the shotgun unwaveringly pointed at waterfowl from my trusty blind. In the next blind, a longhaired lady knocks down a gander, although I find her goose calling higher pitched. Somehow it nicely complements my baritone-based voice. Sort of like Johnny Cash and June Carter in camouflage and brandishing 12-gauge shotguns.
Another role I see the walls coming down in is in the construction industry. I feel proud of the posters depicting women with welding masks and wearing coveralls, finally someone who can artistically weld objects with hands that formally embroidered moccasins. Soon, we’ll see the baby carriage give way to road-building bulldozer drivers with bangs.
I have nothing against the fairer sex, in fact I live with one and I feel that in today’s world we must all come together and break down all barriers that we once felt were our right to maintain and sustain a mentality that prevented our growth as a people.
Perhaps one day, all roles will be reversed and daddies will be nannies and mothers will be big mommas with clout. Thinking back to the days when all shared the same workloads, where sweat was shared chopping wood and gathering our natural foods. Even children were treated like little adults, all had a role to play, and gender was just an inconvenience that was hindered by new awareness that played constantly on television and in books that were obviously written by men for men. I have nothing against men’s books; I tend to find that the pictures are great and the writing also short and sweet and easy to understand.
I could never really understand all the romance novels, which I can say I never read, ergo the complete non-understanding on my part. I could still appreciate the cover, however, which seemed to be rather titillating at first glance. But my roving eye caught a glimpse of the complications of romance within the pages. I still have no real sense of romance, but I can safely say that romance wasn’t really my main objective.
Gradually, the role I play today to something of an overall person who can do anything, (except herd sheep somewhere in the Rockies a la Brokeback), someone who can say that my life has evolved with the times to accommodate the changes in our overall lifestyle, someone who doesn’t really care about the lines drawn in the sand about who’s who in the battle of the sexes. I have to say that it used to be that the work of a woman is hard to do for a man. But when it comes to doing a man’s job, women are increasingly taking over the kingdom of man (when a house used to be a castle) and wielding the hammer more often. I just hope that the toilet seat remains up forever, in defiance of our social changes.
