Are We There Yet?
Gender equality has its own disadvantages
Although I’m not a die-hard feminist, you’d be hard-pressed to find a woman who feels stronger about the equality of women than I do.
I’ve always felt that anything that a man can do, I can do. If I want to, that is.
This belief has come back to bite me on the hindside many times – especially since I married a general contractor and an all-around do-it-yourselfer kind of guy. Proclaiming to my children, my husband and the powers that be that I am equal in mind, strength and ability has landed me smack dab in the middle of a concrete pour. Forced me into chore boots, work gloves and goggles. I’ve been coerced into running a dirt packer, talked into manning the scissors lift, and have on more than one occasion ended up on the wrong end of a shovel.
Quite frankly, it’s been nothing short of disgraceful.
I’ve since learned to keep my feminist opinions to myself and have opted for the easier life that I’m quite certain I have coming to me.
Yet some reputations die hard, and since my husband and his band of boys have seen me man the lawnmower and work the land, they don’t exactly feel as protective of me as I think they should. They don’t open my doors, remove the lids off the pickle jars, or place themselves between me and any form of danger.
A fat lot of good being a feminist has done me.
And that’s not the worst of it. Take last week, for instance, when a strong smell began to present itself from our basement. Having demanded that my boys treat me and all women equally, I didn’t even entertain the notion of having my brood of boys seek out the source for me.
Instead, I went on an all-out sniff-and-search session, all by my onesies. Knowing that the nose knows, I closed my eyes and let my snout lead me. Although I’m no bloodhound, I quickly determined that the smell was coming from none other than my sweet little Charlie’s bedroom. I checked under his bed, in his closet, behind his toy box and looked in each and every dresser drawer. Some may think me odd, yet you show me a woman who wonders why I would be looking for the source of a bad smell in a dresser drawer and I’ll show you a woman who never discovered a Roly Poly farm that didn’t winter well.
I sniffed the mattress, pillows and every inch of the carpet before I noticed that the smell seemed to pick up strength by the window well.
Let me start off by saying that it’s not every day a woman discovers a large and rancid rodent decomposing in a window well. And allow me to further say that it’s not every day that a woman wants to. One thing was for certain: this was not a pleasant encounter.
The first thing I did was scream. Feminist or not, it’s a woman’s right. I then waited patiently for someone, anyone, to come and rescue me. It became painfully obvious that I could have screamed myself to death in that room for all they cared.
So, I went to find my children to tell them that a rodent had met with an early demise in Charlie’s window well. I then told them that it was their job, as members of the male gender, to remove it.
I was met with “Eewww!” “Yuk!” and “Gross!” Naturally, they all went to check it out, but nary a one of them would remove it. Instead, they gazed upon it with disgust as they said, “Yep, sure enough, it’s a small dead animal.”
Being a woman with a creative mind, I then decided to use the rodent to get some work out of my little dears. “You can either unload the dishwasher, or toss out the pack rat.
“You can scrub the toilet or rid our land of that animal.
“You can clean the entire house, dust the furniture and wash the floors OR pack up the pack rat.”
My little band of charges cleaned like there was no tomorrow. It quickly became evident that they would rather do anything than remove the decomposing rodent. At the end of the day, I sat in a clean and dusted home that cost little more than 13 Wal-Mart bags and a quick trip to the dumpster.
As a smart and feminist woman, I handled it by first proclaiming to all that I am equal in mind, strength and ability. And then I promptly delegated the gruesome job to my husband.
Lori Clinch is the mother of four sons and the author of the book “Are We There Yet?” You can reach her at www.loriclinch.com.