If I were to win the lottery this weekend, I just might buy another house, a sweet waterfront cottage in Pocasset, the same village in which I work.
I’ve been restless about the neighborhood where I live now ever since I moved here over five years ago.
It’s a “family” neighborhood, which means couples, which hereabouts means if you don’t drink and/or make passes at other people’s husbands, you don’t fit in.
There’s another single lady in this neighborhood who feels the same way as I do, and keeps to herself. I’ve never seen her at any get-togethers, or talked with her more than once.
The years of slights and snide remarks about the fact that I’m single have worn me down, but the straw that broke the camel’s back was yesterday’s news that a “couple” is planning to move back here, with their nasty Rottweiler in tow.
That mutt is a nuisance, and it terrorized me when they lived here before.
I’ve often wondered why it simply isn’t enough to avoid judgment by your neighbors simply by being quiet, considerate, contributing booze and side dishes to parties, maintaining your yard and keeping your hands, eyeballs and mouth to yourself.
But, oh, no, more is required, and it beats me exactly what that is.
After five plus years of busting it to turn the house where P&B live into one of the prettiest in the development, even my son’s neighbor gave me the cold shoulder when we met in public a couple days ago.
After long – very long – consideration of what I could possibly have done wrong – a natural inclination for an adoptee – it occurred to me this morning that I haven’t done anything to offend anyone.
Rather, and I hate to think this, it’s a matter of social class.
I’ve been working in professional environments for almost 34 years, sometimes very successfully, and sometimes not, but I’ve certainly been exposed to the rules of engagement and civility among well-paid, college-educated people whose professional lives are defined by intellectual pursuits.
Those rules don’t seem to apply in Mashpee, at least not in the circles defined by where we live.
In those circles, homely, bright single women who wear glasses provoke discomfort. I am lucky that I don’t live with a man from one of those circles because no doubt I’d either be dead or under indictment for murder, like that mid-Cape medical doctor who finally shot her subhuman pig of a husband after decades of extreme verbal and physical abuse.
This isn’t to say that college grads in white collar jobs are angels, not by any means. Their particular prejudice is that it’s okay for women to be bright, so long as they are whippet-thin, small-boned and pretty without makeup.
The whole thing would be laughable if it weren’t so cruel and destructive.
Think for a minute about the connotations thrown by the phrase “man up”: stiff upper lip, step up to the plate, be brave.
Now, consider what a joke it would be to tell someone to “woman up”. I daresay most of us would take it as an insult, an invitation to prostitution or maybe domestic abuse and self-denial.
The media is obsessed with shilling for women as victims or vixens, and while there are probably many excellent role models out there, we rarely read about them or see them.
For example, Hillary Clinton.
Considering that she’s had the best education money can buy, she’s an abominable speaker, a muddled thinker and lacks the talent to turn even one memorable phrase.
Example: having been First Lady of the state of Arkansas for, what, fourteen years, when she was asked about Walmart, that gigantic corporation based in of all places, Arkansas, what were the first words out of her mouth? “(nervous tee hee)They’re a mixed blessing.”
So, the media presents us with the following female role models:
Women under indictment (Martha Stewart, Nancy Heinen)
Women over their heads (Carly Fiorina, Nobuyuki Idei)
Women as selfless volunteers (every community newspaper in the country)
Women as you-know-what (every “chick magazine” cover and rap video in the world)
Considering all this, I understand where the attitudes of my blue-collar neighbors come from.
And unlike racial prejudice, which seems to dissipate with familiarity, there are so many negative messages about women who are not swinging a bag on a street corner that it’s a losing battle to try to buck the system.