I'm going to set the stage here. It's the September long weekend. I've been back working in schools for about 6 days. The kids have been back to school for one day and then have 3 days off. We are coming off a second summer living in pandemic times.
As a family who feels it is important to ensure our health care workers do not get overwhelmed by cases, our immune compromised community members feel safe and our children under 12 who are ineligible for vaccines are protected by our actions, this summer still felt restricted. Or maybe it was just less care-free than the glorious summers before Covid-19.
Continuing with stage setting my husband is off Friday, Saturday, Sunday, Monday and Tuesday to go kiteboarding. Yes this has been on the calendar for weeks. And I do think that everyone needs to have something they love to do that fills their soul and for him this is it.
On Sunday I am helping my son get ready to bike over to a friend's house to play. I help him find his bike lock and hat. I give him some money so they can go get slurpees. Remind him to play outside more than inside and tell he to be home by 5. I have already gotten groceries for lunches for the next week and am prepping meals and doing some baking. I have fed both dogs and cleaned the kitchen.
He can't find his helmet and when I get it out of the storage bench my beautiful sweet 10 year old boy says to me..." Mom you are the best! You just do everything around here." and he bounds out the door. For a moment I bask in the glory of feeling seen and acknowledged and appreciated. Then I realize holy sh#t there is some work to be done around here!
This pandemic has been brutal for women. Yes I know it's been hard for everyone (except the people who believe Covid is a hoax, the anti-maskers and the anti-vaxxers and the spreaders of misinformation). But women have been handed even more balls to juggle and the patriarchy continues to make us feel bad for not living up to the task of doing all things for all people during a pandemic.
The numbers are out there and feel free to go down that rabbit hole but in summary more women lost their jobs due to the pandemic, more women left their jobs to take on the role of care provider and home school educator for their children, and more women in front line healthcare positions, childcare providers and front line service positions contracted the virus and have suffered health consequences from it. Domestic violence against women also increased with the assumption that abusers were experiencing more financial stress which resulted in increased drug/alcohol consumption and women locked in behind closed doors with their abusers had no where to go.
Add that women are still performing more than three times the amount of unpaid care work as men, according to the International Labour Organization (ILO). Even when men were working from home.
And I could go on and on but I'll leave it at that. Because I'm efficient and I have a ton of stuff to do today. Paid and unpaid.
Every day I see examples of the patriarchy and I want to fight for change. I need to dismantle this archaic system of power that keeps sexism, misogyny and inequality alive and well. But I'm so freaking tired. Which is just how the patriarchy wants us to stay. Overwhelmed and overworked and feeling bad about our inability to do all the things we are tasked to do that we don't have any fight left in us. I think of running a horse to the point of exhaustion during the day so it can't run away even if you leave the gate open. And that tired horse also doesn't lead any other horses to the open gate either.
Not even sure the gate is open. All I know is I've been a workhorse since I can remember and then for the past 19 months of this pandemic my load has significantly increased. Leaving little time and absolutely no energy to look out of my own trench to consider a different path leading to greener pastures. Resentment, guilt, anger, frustration and fucking despair all showed up too which has added a "fun" aspect to life.
What now? Well here are three steps I'm taking to fight the patriarchy when I'm too tired and overwhelmed and burnt out to fight the patriarchy.
1. Start small.You can't take on the whole system today sweet one. So move from the big picture to the small picture.
2. Start in your own home. When I realized that my son could see that I do everything around here (which is not the actual truth but I am actually the doer of the majority of daily grind household functioning tasks), I could see how this was setting the stage for how he would view women and women's roles. I don't need to go out and change the opinions of random men...I could start with the men that live in my house. And it starts with conversations about who does what and why and how it needs to change.
3. Stop doing something. Or maybe it's better to say stop doing everything. This is going to be my favourite step I can tell. Whoever has been expecting me to do everything can stop...even if that person is me.
That's all I have time for today. Off to do stuff and not do other stuff until the people (in my house at least) understand that it's all up to everyone.
Slow and steady lovelies,
Dyan
Comments