10:30 p.m.
It dawns on me that I will be alone for nine days. Both the men who I depend on for strength and companionship are away. I have to take care of myself. No protection. So the tradeoffs become more obvious. It is only worthwhile to be what we are trained to be if the tradeoff occurs. It dawns on me that they are now getting everything. We have demanded equality, so they no longer have to protect us/defer to us. Did they ever? Was that a myth? Did anybody really act like my grandparents but my grandparents? How could my grandmother explain to my grandfather that she wanted to work? She was good with numbers. Had run her uncle Victor’s store all those years ago in Montgomery, taking orders, waiting on customers, adding long columns of number in her head. But he didn’t want his wife to work. Didn’t want people to think he couldn’t take care of her. So she kept their house and kept quiet about the headaches that sometimes got so bad she had to take to her bed. We would call them migraines now. She called them “sick headaches.”
But now we are independent. Taking care of ourselves, thank you. So now what? We are still supposed to adore, adapt, admire. All that we are taught to do with men and they are taught to expect. It is difficult to talk about this to a man you’re close to. It comes out sounding so accusatory. Does the man in question oppress me? Can he stop it if he wants to? Do I oppress myself? Can I stop it? And if he does/and if I do, what in the world lies on the other side? How can we even begin to imagine what it would be like without all that bullshit?
Miles Davis stayed in his house for five years. Now I know why. He needed time to think.