I’ve been duped.

I’m looking at the calendar and thinking that since it’s June 18th, that ten days since I last wrote isn’t all that bad.  And since I can’t remember the last time I was this angry, I suppose it’s quite convenient that I have a place to get a few things off my chest, just like I used to.

Unfortunately, I vaguely remember having fun relieving myself of the small but annoying aspects of my simple life.  That would not be the case at this point, however, and while I’ve worked my way through my semi-private temper tantrum this evening, a few things have dawned on me.

The entire time I was working at my not so illustrious career, the fact that I had this load on my plate most likely contributed to my professional demise.  Not that I need an excuse to understand it, mind you.  I’m just floored thinking about it.  I’m floored thinking again about something I’ve realized for years and years:  that women just have to suck it up.  They have to deal.  They have to be the glue and the duct tape and the plaster or whatever it takes to hold the structure everyone depends upon in place.

I knew this.

But somehow, I managed to eek out whatever I found solace in to manage.  And in that effort, I managed to find that solace in things that needed to be taken care of:  my home and family.  I enjoyed my gardening.  I loved to cook.  I even found comfort in cleaning my house.  The big joke was that Martha Stewart actually lived in our house.

And then I gave it up for my job until I gave my job up for myself — or what was left of me.

So now that I’ve joined the portion of society that gets credit for being functional by getting dressed and going to work again, I’ve decided that it’s no longer comforting or pleasant to engage in the domestic tasks mentioned above.  I don’t want to pick up.  I don’t feel like doing the laundry or dusting.  I don’t crave time thinking about which print would look best against that wall in my bathroom that is in desperate need of something hanging on it.

And do you know why?

Because nobody else cares.  No.  Body.  It’s all been just a giant placebo to allow me a diversion so I could keep an even keel.  Stay the course.  Avoid flipping out.

I’m disgusted.

But I think I like my new job.

I just need a couple of posters so I can make some signs to protest the on-going crap women have to put up with when they work.  I’d love to squeeze between their accusing content and walk the streets until a desperate reporter from a failing paper decided to write my story even though there’s nothing spectacular about it.  Just because.

I’m completely convinced I’m getting in line to be a man in my next life — but only if I can guarantee that I can have a wife like me.


Posted

in

, , ,

by

Comments

6 responses to “I’ve been duped.”

  1. Amy

    ((((HUGS)))) I know you found joy in your few years off doing things for YOU and do the things you enjoyed and found new passions and explored your deep hidden ones you never had time for. You were very functional and it was what you needed.

    I am guessing you might be the only woman at the school leadership level and now you have to lay the law down and take names …. 😉 Don’t take anyone’s shit … and isn’t there a summer vacation coming up, or it is year ’round?

  2. I went to bed and woke up feeling like you do, I just don’t know how to put it into words. The words just spin around in my head. I feel like I have no one that really “gets me.” Or even wants to. I’m tired of planning and doing for others and I only have one male in my life (not including the dog). So, that’s why I found myself here, hoping you had recently shared some thoughts, so I’d feel like I had a friend.

    PS (please don’t clean up for me too much. Heck, I’m staying there for free and can handle it, really. One on my kids is a major slob, the other one stinks, and my MOH never cleans anything but the kitchen EVER).

  3. Earlene

    I hear what both my daughters are saying and I understand what they are saying. Don’t keep it in. Let it out. Let em have it. Kelly, you will get your time back and Lori, in just a few years they will all be gone, except for Ted, and you won’t care if he stays up all night, etc. Just be strong and remember to take care of yourselves, even if noone else does.

  4. Aw hugs to you. I am glad you are liking your new job though. With luck as it is, if there is such a thing as luck, we’d all come back as men only to find that women were the power brokers and men did the laundry.

  5. I’m completely convinced I’m getting in line to be a man in my next life?—?but only if I can guarantee that I can have a wife like me …
    Kellypea,I know just how conceited this must appear, but I could not, in my entire married life,53 years of married life, have come up with an almost perfect description of myself during the first

  6. my comment was cut off before I finished.

    TWENTY YEARS of some fifty-three years of married life. After that? Well, let’s just say I proved myself to be all too human, after all.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.