sexism Archives - Owl Medicine: Shamanic Healing

A Sign – Photo: L. Weikel

The Respite

For once in a very long time I have essentially no idea what’s gone on in the outside world today. Not only did I refrain from reading anything on my phone, I also avoided watching any of my usual fare that keeps me up to date on the latest facts and figures of how our world and nation is coping with this unprecedented transformation. The respite was unintended but probably essential.

Yes, I know. There are many people who eschew the media and distrust it and the hyperbole with which much of what’s going on ‘out there’ gets discussed. But I’ve come to find some sources that do not so much inflame as explain. And I find doing my best to understand what’s going on so I can make reasoned and well-informed decisions for myself to be at least somewhat comforting.

I like knowing the truth, even if it’s not easy to hear it. The thought of being fed a bunch of lies just so I will supposedly feel good makes me want to rip my hair out. That’s because I detest lies. Lies rob us of first-hand experience of what is. And what else is there to life but first hand experience of what is?

Lies would have us believe that what we’re experiencing isn’t what’s right before our eyes. That’s maddening. That makes the part of our brain that makes sense of things constantly whir in the background, stuck in a whirling rainbow of a processing loop as it tries to make sense of something incapable of logical resolution.

Alternative Programming

Instead of paying attention to the current state of affairs, instead of feeling helpless as I watch people ignore science and instead choose to believe happy talk that’s calculated to have them act against their own best interests (yet again), Karl and I chose to watch two vastly different programs.

The first show we watched was the first episode of Mrs. America, which can be seen on Hulu. It has a pretty amazing cast – but I’d resisted watching it when I first heard about it because it is about Phyllis Schlafly.

I was tempted to just binge watch right into the second episode, but being reminded of the dumbfounding sexism that’s been part of our society for so long was demoralizing. The events depicted in that first episode were from when I was around 13 years old and the Equal Rights Amendment was in the process of being ratified by the states. I remember feeling that it was a no-brainer. I couldn’t imagine it not being ratified.

And thus it began. The backlash we’ve been living with ever since that time when women got this close to being recognized as equal to men. And therein lies one of the utterly maddening truths of my lifetime.

A Bit Better Feeling

There’s no question we’re hooked on the limited run program, Mrs. America. But we decided we needed to drop back to one of our absolute favorite programs that helps us reclaim faith in humanity, Call the Midwife, on Netflix.

If any of you haven’t yet started watching this treasure, I urge you to do so post haste! There’s never been a better time to give yourself the gift of watching this warm and wonderful program.

First of all, I believe there are eight or nine seasons. So you have a deep reservoir to dive into as this pandemic wears on. Plenty of time to get to know the characters, revel in their triumphs, and lament their frailties, all the while knowing (as you will, once you start watching) that somehow or another, even if things don’t turn out the way you hope for a particular character, something redeeming can be discovered in the ashes.

Call the Midwife lets us hang on to the thread of hope. Hope for humanity and hope for ourselves.

Just tonight, the two episodes we watched were set in 1962. The Cuban missile crisis was in full swing and it was fascinating to see the reaction of the English. I was only three when that occurred, so I have no memory of any of the anxiety that swept the world. But the parallels to how life-changing it would have been had nuclear weapons been unleashed to the devastation the entire world is watching unfold now was eerie.

Transformation

We’re most definitely in the midst of major transformation on many different levels, not only in our many societies across the world, but also in our own selves.

In some ways, I feel like I can’t escape the messages, even when I actively opt to escape for an evening. That tells me that the time for hiding our heads in the sand are done. Over.

The respite I had today demands to be repeated. The respite feels as important to the transformation as the bigger, deeper, more obvious ‘work.’ It must be respected as essential as any activism or awareness.

I wonder what May will bring to us.

**Remember to do your Perelandra EoP Biodiversity Project sometime tomorrow (the 1^st day of the month), if you’re joining me, and many around the world, in that brief but powerful effort.

(T-575)

Disappearing

Over the past several days I’ve had a recurring experience, albeit in different areas of my life and involving completely different people and encounters.

But I was struck today by the thread between all of these situations and I didn’t like the feeling.

Of course, it could just be unique circumstances adding up to me feeling that there’s a pattern here. Or, I really am disappearing.

It’s not only been creepy. It’s been infuriating.

A Pattern in Our Society

And yeah, I’ve read articles about how women who reach age 50 or so tend to just start blending into the wallpaper of other people’s awareness. Most of those articles seem to emphasize invisibility in the context of men and being noticed by or considered attractive to men. And while I’m not making it my life’s mission to actively become a hag, I’d also say I’m assiduously not into primping. Never was. Never will be. And lucky for me, I guess, Karl knows that too.

But there is evidence that the invisibility arises within other contexts as well. Contexts in which it’s patently stupid and an obvious loss to both society in general and in whatever industry or profession women work throughout their lives. Everyone loses when women are rendered irrelevant and unseen, muted and ignored, simply because they’re no longer of child bearing age.

And I have to say, I never thought I’d experience this attitude being directed toward me. I guess I thought I was immune because I’ve never cared one way or another about ‘looks,’ beyond, you know, basic personal hygiene and wearing eclectic clothes.

And then there’s the hair

And I haven’t changed in that regard. I’ve also not given one shit about going gray. Indeed, I love my gray hair – and the thought of putting poison on my head and letting it seep into my scalp, so close to my precious gray matter, makes me recoil in organic horror. (Why would I go out of my way to avoid ingesting gmos, pesticides, and other stuff that’s bad for you and then deliberately let poison soak into my scalp?) Because I’m afraid to be my natural self?

Dumb. (For me.)

Yes, I’ve watched people close to me feel compelled to color their hair by the realities of our obnoxiously youth-worshipping society. You know – so they won’t become invisible. Because ‘old’ equates, for women, to ‘invisible.’ And I understand their fear in the corporate or professional world, but it makes me wonder: how do we change that culture if we continue to acquiesce to it?

Which is another reason why I refuse to do it.

But all of this is superficial. All of this is yackety yack about the packaging, and making the product (me – or us) look like something it is not.

Why? The Perennial Question

And I guess that’s what has always been at the foundation of my refusal to consider that I might actually be disappearing. I’m only starting to hit my stride! And my confidence in myself and in what I ‘do’ has been earned. By years of doing. Of experiencing. Of enduring.

Why the hell should I feel compelled to gussy myself up like some 30 year old when I’ve been there already? I’ve raised three kids (with Karl), headed my own law office, worked for a major feminist legal advocacy organization, made dinner every night, and managed to get to most soccer games, musicals, plays, and track meets. Doing all that wore me the hell out.

And I know, I know, it’s a tired old trope, but damn – men (who have not in the main had to ‘do it all’ in order to think they were bad-ass, but only had to ‘do their job’) can become gray and a little thicker around the waist and they are considered distinguished. Not me. Not us. If we don’t color our hair and Goddess-forbid do even more heinous things to our bodies, we become dismissible. We’ve ‘let ourselves go.’ We need to look in the mirror.

The Crux of This Post

Up to now, this post is not addressing what I initially set out to write about. Because what I experienced this week was an invisibility of a different kind.

It may have been related to how I look. But I don’t think that was it.

It was simple disrespect. It was being blown off. Why? I have no idea.

Not only did I feel like I was becoming invisible this week, but I also felt like I was standing behind a glass (soundproof) wall. People may have seen my mouth moving, but they sure as hell weren’t listening. Even when I repeated myself, over and over. Gently at first, thinking they perhaps hadn’t heard me. Then more forcefully because, damn it, I meant what I said the first time, but having to repeat it sixteen times made me a little cranky. Like – stop poking me.

And what I was saying might have been important. It just may have had some validity or at least been worthy of consideration. Otherwise, I wouldn’t spend my time saying it. Time and a lot of hard-earned experience (a lot of which has turned my hair gray, I might add), are pretty much all I have to give.

I’m not saying everything I say is correct, necessarily, nor a pearl of wisdom. Whether it was my opinion on where to stop or what to eat, or a question with a bit more heft.

If you ask me something, then at least respond as though it has registered.

You know – so I don’t feel as though I should pantomime my response or act it out in interpretive dance.

Otherwise? I realize I’m disappearing.

And I may or may not go gently into the night.

(T-1049)