My dad was playing golf and my mother was preparing for labor. It was something he took pride in saying to me. My dad was an entrepreneur, self-made and self motivated. My mother was an efficient home-economist as well as a clandestine entrepreneur. They can still be seen dancing to Que Sera Sera in our suburban track home, across the linoleum. They danced their way through Camelot and moon landings. The heel turning of the gender gap was evident from my balcony view. I also witnessed the cultural revolution in its ‘hug, sway’.
“What do you want to be when you grow up Patricia?”This was the $64,000 question that I asked in my childhood. While I was tempted to say, “How the heck do I know?” I just couldn’t resist the temptation and smiled like little girls should. It was a strange idea that I could be anything I chose. Is that even possible? It was impossible to control my eating habits, what I wore and when I got up in the morning. We were constantly at odds over sheer sleeves, floral overalls and patent leather shoes. My future could not be dictated by me.
Now I see that the question was asked in late 1960s to me put me at the forefront of social reform. There were 28,7 million female workers in 1968. The majority of them were secretaries and typists. Many clerical employees, waitresses or household staff were women. However, young women were entering corporate employment in great numbers. Their expectations of the future were shifting as they enrolled in graduate school and received college degrees at an unprecedented rate. It was no longer difficult for women to get into management or business jobs.
As a young girl, I witnessed a moment of great transformation. This was captured perfectly in small talk between mothers at Macy’s and online at the bakery. My father did not treat me differently to my brothers. As a small business owner, my father saw no gender boundaries. His office was dominated by women, and his books were run by my mother. He kept telling me that I could do anything if I put my mind to it. He also famously said, “Find a spot in life.” His father believed that this is a crucial point. My father believed that it was important to stake your claim on the world and be committed to getting what you want.
My Irish grandfather reiterated the notion of self-determination. I can recall him sitting with me on The Warren Hotel’s beach in Spring Lake. “highball”You declared that the country was the most beautiful in the world. My dad didn’t know or care about the fact that the beverages brought to him by hotel staff cost money. My father, for his part perpetuated the notion that America is the land of abundance and never shared it. “Pop”The drinks were not free.
My mother was a housekeeper. Every mother of my friends was a homemaker. Although they were amazing women, I couldn’t imagine myself living in a house and caring for children like them. As a child, I longed to be a diamond trader like Red Haberman (my father’s best friend) or to sell Boar’s heads meats like Neal Darragh (his other pal), who had the largest black and red truck I’ve ever seen — complete with a gigantic boar’s skull painted on the side.
A brief moment in which I thought “I want to become a stewardess” was what happened. My American grandmother made it a promise that she would never let me express this again. “You tell me you want to be the pilot!”She spoke with wide-eyed eyes and hands tightly gripping my shoulders, her mouth open in a way that was almost comical. I was also struck by the possibility of being a business magnate, an international spy or even an astronaut. There was no reason why I shouldn’t be able to go places that no other girl has gone before.
Then, there was that year when I decided to become a nun. I was able to do it, despite the poverty vow, the dress and veil, as well as the tunic, without any difficulties. It was very appealing to imagine sitting at tidy wooden tables and eating Entenmann’s Coffee Cake. My grammar school’s nuns painted a serene and hopeful picture of humankind. This was so far from my excruciating experience at St. Margaret’s School, where I was regularly ostracized because of not liking the Bay City Rollers. “See I told you she was a freak,”Diane Kavanagh exclaimed as she bounced off, her school parochial pleats waving across her knees. A foreign band dressed in strange pants and knee socks was not something I could afford. It was up to me to decide what I wanted to do.
My cognitive and intellectual development was forged on rainy summer afternoons during marathon sessions of Candyland™ and Kerplunk™ sitting Indian style on the garage floor. As I rode my bike down Sandra Lane on my banana seat bicycle, which is tucked away in a small cul-de-sac of suburban New York, it was a peaceful street. I discovered that I was at the socialpolitical crossroads. I was the sugar-free soda and ‘The Mod Squad. Five Easy Pieces and 60 Minutes were my favorite songs. Fleetwood Mac, Fleetwood Mac, Fleetwood Mac, Fleetwood Mac, Fleetwood Mac, Aretha Franklin, and 60 Minutes were some of my favorites. I was a rebellious, nonconformist, and willful child of my time.
While I didn’t know everything going on around the globe at that moment, I did realize that there was a great war. My grandmother lived on Long Island, and I vividly remember the morning when three men carrying a folded flag marched up their front steps. Their oldest son was about to leave for Vietnam. John was John’s name. It was small arms war. It was his 20th birthday, and you can still see the picture of him on the living room wall just to the left. It was the house that changed my view of life. As I looked across the hedge, years later I thought of John. When he grew older, what did he desire to become?
Life is a journey that we choose. Robert Burns wrote famously to a mouse
Men and mice have the best plans
Ask often,
We are left with only grief and pain.
For promised joy!
You are still blessed when compared to me.
You are the present.
This poem represents a famous apology for a mouse whose nest Burns disturbs when he ploughs a field. Burns believes that the mouse is the better off. While it lives in the now, humans live on the continuum of everything past. Our collective consciousness is a product of us, whether we intend it or not. Before the advent of the smartphone and pocket calculator, the mouse didn’t have to endure. It didn’t have to deal with discos and shoulder pads. The Cold War and Jonestown were all well-known to it. The mouse never knew what its purpose was in all the chaos and turbulence of the field.
At this point, it is possible that I sound like my six year old self asking questions about my grandmother’s life prior to automobiles. Her arrival from Ireland was no way to check Car Fax or wait for an Uber-ride to Boarding House. Her intention was to blend seamlessly into the life of a Greenhorn. It was a relief to not be seen and she felt grateful. When I was nineteen, my major was not yet decided. My mother was already all set for a transatlantic steamship.
It is when I see human existence from her eyes that I can recognize the importance of the transformational decisions made, even when we have our backs to the wall, that I know they matter the most. In my youth, my mother, grandmother and aunts, as well as all other women, didn’t have unlimited options or gender-neutral goals. They believed they were both pragmatic humanists, and accidental feminists. “whatever will be, will be”As they systematically removed the limitations and conventions of the past. The Days of Our Lives included everything from The Feminine Mystique, to The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. It’s been a long journey, baby.