I will take a moment on this women's day to reflect on all that my foremothers accomplished so that I don't spend so much time thinking about myself compared to men. Other than one sexist calculus teacher I never felt inadequate or ignored in school, even in the traditionally male classes. To this day I still suspect that his sexism had more to do with an unhealthy interest in the strapping jocks in our class than any ill will toward women.
In university I had a physics professor corner me after class and declare that I needed to switch my major to physics because I was doing so well in his class (I also laughed at all of his nerdy jokes). I don't think that I was conscious of being treated any differently than my male peers ever in university. It seemed that the struggle had happened to women of a different generation. When I think back of the badass women like Ellen H. Swallow Richards I can't even imagine what she had to go through to pave the way for me to be sitting inconspicuously at my desk at a formerly all-male university (we only started allowing women to work toward a degree in 1974). By the way, I hope one of you Googles Ms. Swallow Richards because she deserves acknowledgement.
Fast forward to my first career oriented job. This is when things started to change. I worked in a small architecture firm and often accompanied my boss to construction sites. I experienced many occasions when the contractor would ignore me and only talk to my boss even though my boss wasn't as involved with the minute details of the project like I was, and despite the fact that my boss repeatedly referred the contractor to me. One day I went to a site alone to solve an easy dilemma and the contractor insisted on verifying that my boss had meant to send me. I could hear my boss exploding over the phone at the guy (thanks, Alex).
These days I work in a schizophrenic office. My director seems to prefer hiring women because he thinks we work harder and think more creatively but after discussion with my male colleagues I know that the women get paid much less. Like 15% less. One of my supervisors loves to parade me into meetings so that he can point out that I'm an Ivy League graduate but then he hands me his papers to carry behind him like some sort of servant. The first time he did this I was confused as to why he had just handed me a large binder of his crap. "Here," he said, shoving it at me and then he walked out of the room carrying only his ipad like the tool that he is.
After I finish taking this moment to thank the women who paved the way for me to get two master's degrees so that I can carry papers while following behind some useless idiot who thinks he looks cool bringing his little ipad to meetings, who I am certain would not be a supervisor without riding the backs of women like me, I will take another moment to drink myself to oblivion for Fat Tuesday. It cannot possibly be a coincidence that these holidays occur at the same time.
Gawd I need to figure out some way to get out from under his long shadow.
In university I had a physics professor corner me after class and declare that I needed to switch my major to physics because I was doing so well in his class (I also laughed at all of his nerdy jokes). I don't think that I was conscious of being treated any differently than my male peers ever in university. It seemed that the struggle had happened to women of a different generation. When I think back of the badass women like Ellen H. Swallow Richards I can't even imagine what she had to go through to pave the way for me to be sitting inconspicuously at my desk at a formerly all-male university (we only started allowing women to work toward a degree in 1974). By the way, I hope one of you Googles Ms. Swallow Richards because she deserves acknowledgement.
Fast forward to my first career oriented job. This is when things started to change. I worked in a small architecture firm and often accompanied my boss to construction sites. I experienced many occasions when the contractor would ignore me and only talk to my boss even though my boss wasn't as involved with the minute details of the project like I was, and despite the fact that my boss repeatedly referred the contractor to me. One day I went to a site alone to solve an easy dilemma and the contractor insisted on verifying that my boss had meant to send me. I could hear my boss exploding over the phone at the guy (thanks, Alex).
These days I work in a schizophrenic office. My director seems to prefer hiring women because he thinks we work harder and think more creatively but after discussion with my male colleagues I know that the women get paid much less. Like 15% less. One of my supervisors loves to parade me into meetings so that he can point out that I'm an Ivy League graduate but then he hands me his papers to carry behind him like some sort of servant. The first time he did this I was confused as to why he had just handed me a large binder of his crap. "Here," he said, shoving it at me and then he walked out of the room carrying only his ipad like the tool that he is.
After I finish taking this moment to thank the women who paved the way for me to get two master's degrees so that I can carry papers while following behind some useless idiot who thinks he looks cool bringing his little ipad to meetings, who I am certain would not be a supervisor without riding the backs of women like me, I will take another moment to drink myself to oblivion for Fat Tuesday. It cannot possibly be a coincidence that these holidays occur at the same time.
Gawd I need to figure out some way to get out from under his long shadow.
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