gender bending

I've been thinking a lot about gender roles this week. In all the years I taught early childhood, the argument of nature vs. nurture came up...a lot. I never had a clear cut answer for anyone. I'm certain, no matter whether it is politically correct or not, that little boys are hardwired for different kinds of play than little girls. Give a four year old girl and a four year old boy the same Barbie doll, and they'll both play with it. But the girl's Barbie will be groomed, go to a wedding, and play with friends. The boy's barbie will be tied up with string at some point, be dragged through mud, and possibly interrogated. In particularly sophisticated play, the Barbie might actually become a gun - little perfect plastic legs pointed and "pow, pow" sounds resonating through the air. But.....little boys love pink just as much as little girls, and I'm certain that it's only society that makes blue preferable. After all, purple was once the color of kings - women would never have been allowed to wear such a rich color. We teach them a lot - girls dance ballet, boys play football. We teach them that boys are good at math, and girls talk too much, so they're better in English class.

Some of us grew up with the idea that there are men's jobs and women's jobs. So, it all came back to me in a rush tonight, while I was doing the dishes. How fitting. I worked today - all day- came home, cooked dinner, did laundry and then cleaned up the dishes. John is on vacation this week....he took the kids to Academy, and then he watched television while I cooked, cleaned and fussed at the kids. When he's not around - sometimes for weeks at a time - I take care of whatever needs to be done. But it never occurs to him to do all the things I do...the man could walk past a pile of dirty clothes for months, and it would never occur to him to wash the smelly socks. He'd just go buy new ones. I know...he's done it before. I've spent years conducting experiments to see how long I can leave things to fester before he'll turn a gimlet eye in their direction. Now...he does vacuum. Vacuums make noise, they have moving parts...they are manly.

Is it a learned gender role, or are grown up boys still playing different roles than grown up girls? I wonder....

When Katie slammed her bedroom door one time too many (which would be only once, for those who know me), I threatened to take her door off the hinges. Her answer to me, "you can't, my Daddy won't let you use his tools." Wait, wait, wait...I have my own tools. They're not even pink.

For those who know me, my only brother is gay. He is a gay, brilliant musician...he does not use tools, work on cars, or care about my dad's war career. I was the only person left for my dad to teach. I can paint a house, shoot a gun, replace a car battery, and am quite good at maintaining the lawn. But even my dad maintains that just because I CAN do those things, doesn't mean that I should. Women should be kept safe. Well...I'm all for safe, but I'll gladly trade some grass mowing for someone else putting away the freaking laundry.

I've never told my girls that there are any kinds of limitations on what they can do as females (except peeing standing up...there ARE some lines you just don't cross). Yet, as puberty rounds the corner for Katie, I see she's embracing what it means to be a girl in our world.

So, the water was growing cold on my dishpan hands while I was thinking about all of this tonight, and I refuse to believe that I am destined to smell like clorox forever, just because I have a Y chromosome. I'm pretty sure the lack of that same chromosome didn't deprive the males around me of the ability to put laundry in a machine. It's a machine, guys, it makes noise and it even walks across the floor with a really manly swagger, if you put in enough heavy stuff. Maybe if I paint it camouflage colors and call it Rambo...in the meantime, I think I'm sad that I never had a little boy so I could observe some of these things from beginning to adulthood, and draw some conclusions. Then again, one person leaving the toilet seat up at my house is probably enough.