I had just come into the store, taken a cleaned cart and
was turning to enter the produce area (according to the arrows) when I had to
immediately stop. There was a man
standing in the narrow space between the tomatoes and the carts. So I stopped and waited. Nothing happened. He didn’t appear to be shopping. There was a woman shopping on the other side of the carts so I assumed he was waiting for her. He suddenly noticed me and stepped back one
step into the carts. That is when
another man started walking past him towards me. He stopped and looked at me as if I was in
his way even though he was going against the arrows. I thought maybe he wanted to go past the
tomatoes to the deli counter but no he wanted to go past me to the cash
register. There was nowhere for me to go
except back out of the store. He finally
backed up a little bit beside the other man and I had to squeeze past
them. They refused to take another route
or clear the area. I mentioned the arrows as I passed them.
Finishing in the produce aisle, then bread and meat I
turned to go up the next aisle following the arrows. There was another man standing in the middle
of the aisle doing something on his phone which was in his hand. I stopped and waited. Eventually he noticed me and backed up to the
food. I said I would wait until he was
finished. He became agitated and told me
to pass him. If I didn’t, I would have
to turn around, miss the next aisle, circle back and so I begrudgingly went past
him. I did mention that this was not the
place to play on his phone as I passed him.
The rest of the shop was fine. By the time I got to the check out and the
clerk asked, “How are you?” I told the
truth. “I’m feeling a bit frazzled from
dealing with the cottagers,” I answered.
Of course, she didn’t actually want the truth so she remained
silent. I realized that I was very
frazzled and told her about the man with the phone. She gave me the answer that I’m sure her
employers have told her to say. “You
have to be patient. There’s no point
getting angry.” Well, I am an older
woman and that sort of statement didn’t help.
I got home, cleaned all the food coming in as usual and
then went for a swim in the lake to cool off in more ways than one. I stood in the deep water letting the waves
move through me and thought about why I was so upset. Gradually, it came to me. I was raised to let men do whatever they
wanted. It was easier that way. It was safer that way. This is what my mother and other women of her
generation taught me. I was taught to
work around men because they were difficult and sometimes dangerous. Who knows what would happen if they got angry?
But now, I am an older woman and I am tired of keeping quiet
and changing aisles and backing out of stores.
I have a voice and I am trying to use it. I had used it in the store but I hadn’t
actually got one of the three men to play by the rules. They all stood their ground and I had to put
myself at risk to get past them.
Standing in the waves, I wanted to cry. I felt as though I had broken the code, the
code of placating men in order to stay safe.
The female clerk had given me the same code. “Be patient.
It’s no use getting angry.” But
this wasn’t a case of being patient. I
wasn’t waiting until they picked their fruit or cans. They were exerting their privilege of being
able to stand and walk and do whatever they wanted without any thought for the
rest of us.
Well that seems to me to be the same privilege that is
destroying the earth and making this virus difficult to control. Being patient and not getting angry has
allowed this privilege to create un-safety or threat for the majority of people who don’t
have this privilege. My training advised
me to risk my own health rather than upset these men past a certain point.
Perhaps it is time for women to start speaking up for the
whole community, for the whole world. I
have been using the strategy of avoidance to keep safe. I am staying out of stores except once a
week, off of busy trails, off of public transit and away from groups. But now, this strategy isn’t working as
people are out and about and seemingly unaware of what they are doing. The grocery store is staffed by teenagers on
a Sunday morning and I have noticed that they are not going to take on people
and point out the rules. I know that
some larger stores hire security guards to enforce the procedures. But here, I am on my own.
It occurs to me that I need to speak out to protect myself.
I need new strategies to
communicate. Perhaps using sentences
that include things like cooperation is a new skill I need to develop. Perhaps, getting used to the discomfort of communicating
the idea of cooperation to people who seem to find this an alien idea is
another. Perhaps this is where the difficult
conversations will occur. This virus
will stay with us while we fail to cooperate.
Climate change will continue while we fail to cooperate. Following the old code will not keep me safe
and it will not keep any of us safe.
After I swam, we went for a walk in the forest. Due to the mosquitoes, we haven’t met anyone
in the bush for weeks. There was one car
parked at the entrance but it is a big forest.
I started to calm down as I walked under the trees but my nervous system
was still on high alert. I could feel it
buzzing. We followed the trail down the
hill to the river which we always do and stopped to look at the Partridgeberry
patch to see if any berries were forming yet.
We were just about at the river when I heard a sharp dog’s bark very
close by. I startle easily at the best
of times and I was still on high alert, so I made a startled cry. Then I saw a young woman through the trees by
the river just before a barking black Lab ran at us. I am not usually afraid of dogs and I wasn’t
afraid of him. But he was sure afraid of
us. He was growling and barking at our
legs as the young woman called out, “Don’t worry, he’s a friendly dog.” Trusting the evidence before my eyes, I did
not try to pet him. I talked calmly to
him and stood still as did my partner.
The young woman called the dog to no avail. Then she started to walk towards the dog and
us. She was about six feet away from us
and still moving when I ordered, “Don’t come near us. Social distance!” She caught herself and took an arc towards
the dog instead and put him on a leash. She
then led him and the other off leash dog away down the path.
The message was becoming clearer. I can’t expect other people to keep me safe
and apparently avoidance is not working very well. I can use my voice and my body language to do
so however. I usually make myself
smaller so as not to inconvenience other people. But, this needs to change. It seems that I need to become larger and
remind people to think of the whole group.
I have had to do this occasionally on the walking and
biking trail that runs through our village along Georgian Bay. Hundreds of people have been driving to the
village, parking their cars and getting on bicycles to cycle on the trail. We only attempt to take a walk at supper
time. But even then, people riding two abreast
come straight towards us or even worse from behind with no warning. We can step off of the paved path for about a
foot before we encounter thick poison ivy.
The trail is about 7 feet wide.
Even without a pandemic, it would be polite for the cyclists to ride in
single file when passing pedestrians since we are sharing the trail. But not these days. I have found myself standing in the middle of
the trail and directing them to ride single file using my hands like those men that direct jets to park. Some cyclists comply but some refuse and then I remind
them about sharing space. I do not say
anything about them as people, just about the actions that would make it safe
for all of us.
What would happen if all of we older women started to take
on a leadership role in the community from within its midst? Most of us don’t care what other people think
of us. This is not about being liked. If we were valued by society, these people would not be putting us at risk. So, what if we took our nurturing
energy that was once used to raise children and used it to help our society
grow up and think of the whole? What if
we embodied our power and found ways to speak, not out of anger or fear, but
out of wisdom? What if the world needs
our voices? Perhaps it is time for us to
speak for the whole.
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