The Resentment Grew
I was sick today. I went to bed feeling good last night, but slept fitfully, coughing every few minutes. I finally woke up feeling as if I was hung over or coming down from a weekend of drugs. My head and body felt as if I had a really, really bad cold or the flu, but I had none of the symptoms like congestion or a scratchy throat or aching. I knew it was simply my faulty, sick system that had gone haywire. I've had this strange feeling before...ever since I learned I have cancer, and my fever has also gone up mysteriously. Later in the day my fever did go up, causing chills, which only added to my misery. My nurse happened to call and I learned that there is a thing they call "tumor fever" that simply appears for no reason other than the fact that there is cancer. Ah ha...so this can be the way cancer acts. One day you feel relatively good and even healthy, the next morning this tumor fever moves in to remind you that you really are sick...sick with some insidious thing that never lets you forget for long that it is in charge and it's taking over. That reminder alone is enough to make me sick.
I always thought of myself as healthy. The only thing that ever got me down was a faulty gall bladder that was removed in 1978 and, once recovered from that, I went on as usual about the business of being a wife and mother and, of course, working, as most of us who are members of the working class do. There was never really a choice of working or staying home to raise my children. There was never enough money, no matter how hard Jim worked or how frugal we were.
I had my first official job as a car hop when I was 13 years old. Prior to that I babysat for a little money in my change purse so I could go to the movies on Saturday. My Social Security registers me as having worked from the age of 14 until the time I retired 49 years later. I never worked because I wanted to, never worked because I was bored or ambitious...I worked out of necessity, just as all working class people are forced to work. Just imagine...49 years. Imagine spending 49 years of your short life working at a dead-end, demeaning job every day all those years, dragging yourself and your children out in every kind of weather day after dreary day, where you are dehumanized and merely a number to those who employ you, and especially if you are a woman, being sexually harassed in the days when there were no laws against it or protection for women. All this while working for incompetent, ego-driven bosses who had a little ounce of authority, some of whom were less intelligent than you, but who gave you orders because they were fortunate enough to have some initials behind their name. Forty-nine years, commuting the same highways day after day until you thought you would go insane and start screaming each time you got behind the wheel. Doing the same, repetitive, usually meaningless job day after day after day for 49 long years.
As an adult member of the work force, I hated the jobs I could get and after a few years working for poor wages under miserable conditions, I began to blame others for my lot in life and was resentful because one salary was never enough, no matter how hard Jim worked or how frugal we were. Once we had children, I wanted to stay at home and raise them, but the poor working class cannot afford that luxury, so I did what all poor mothers do...I dragged my babies and young children from one baby sitter to another, trying to find someone I could trust, until they were old enough to stay at home alone, when they became latch key kids. Finding a decent babysitter was always hellish. One sitter that came to my house told my 5 and 3 year olds that there was no Santa Claus. I was appalled! I blew my top and fired her instantly, sick at heart that she had ruined an important part of the magic of Christmas for my little ones. About this time I was just beginning to feel the real stress of a working mother and there began the onset of stress related migraines which plagued me all of my adult life. I missed very little time from work because of migraine headaches, however. I had to save any sick leave I had for the days my children were too sick to leave home, so I tried my best to work even with blinding headaches when they appeared.
When Reese was about 13 months old I took him to a day care center doing business in a Church of the Nazarene close to home. I naively thought that a day care operated out of an ultra religious church would take special care of children. One day when I brought him home after work, he had multiple bite marks all over his back and stomach. I wanted to throw up to think that my helpless baby had been subjected to that kind of pain and abuse while no one at a supposedly reputable day care center was watching over and caring for him.
I got rid of another caretaker who had a child of her own and agreed to keep my two. I stopped taking my children there when Reese told me, because my little girl was too young to talk, that his baby sister had been stuck with needles by the demonic little boy who lived there. That was another time I almost threw up. All these incidents with sitters and caretakers made me resent having to work even more and the stress escalated.
I never had a boss that was understanding or sympathetic about me taking off work when my kids were sick. I had to meekly apologize for taking off and was always docked for the time away from work.
My resentment went deeper with each injustice. I resented the fact that I had to leave my precious children for someone else to raise, I resented the menial jobs I had to take for low wages, when I was smarter and brighter than many of the people who gave me orders. I resented the patriarchal attitudes wherever I worked, and the unrealistic demands made on me by someone called the boss, who was usually only an ego driven little man with a little authority over me and others. I also sometimes resented my husband for not making enough money so that I wouldn't have to be away from home 8 hours a day, yet I couldn't stand the thought of him having to work two jobs, so I persevered. I would work my 8 hours, plus commuting time, then be cooking dinner by 5:30 or 6:00 and the night had just begun.
At some point I began to realize that it was neither Jim's fault nor the fault of any individual, but was the fault of the system under which we live. I slowly began to resent the government as the culprit. Eventually, after the assassination of President Kennedy, the corruption in the Nixon administration, and events like the Iran-Contra affair, which exposed the CIA and how crooked our government could be, I no longer trusted it or the judicial system, which included abusive cops, and I finally began to understand that we, the working class, were merely being played as pawns in a system designed to keep us poor and subservient. I began to blame the right people...those few at the top of the pile who run our country and our world...the current administration, whoever they might be or whichever side they might represent, and big corporations, who were their co-conspirators and who had deep pockets.
I always thought of myself as healthy. The only thing that ever got me down was a faulty gall bladder that was removed in 1978 and, once recovered from that, I went on as usual about the business of being a wife and mother and, of course, working, as most of us who are members of the working class do. There was never really a choice of working or staying home to raise my children. There was never enough money, no matter how hard Jim worked or how frugal we were.
I had my first official job as a car hop when I was 13 years old. Prior to that I babysat for a little money in my change purse so I could go to the movies on Saturday. My Social Security registers me as having worked from the age of 14 until the time I retired 49 years later. I never worked because I wanted to, never worked because I was bored or ambitious...I worked out of necessity, just as all working class people are forced to work. Just imagine...49 years. Imagine spending 49 years of your short life working at a dead-end, demeaning job every day all those years, dragging yourself and your children out in every kind of weather day after dreary day, where you are dehumanized and merely a number to those who employ you, and especially if you are a woman, being sexually harassed in the days when there were no laws against it or protection for women. All this while working for incompetent, ego-driven bosses who had a little ounce of authority, some of whom were less intelligent than you, but who gave you orders because they were fortunate enough to have some initials behind their name. Forty-nine years, commuting the same highways day after day until you thought you would go insane and start screaming each time you got behind the wheel. Doing the same, repetitive, usually meaningless job day after day after day for 49 long years.
As an adult member of the work force, I hated the jobs I could get and after a few years working for poor wages under miserable conditions, I began to blame others for my lot in life and was resentful because one salary was never enough, no matter how hard Jim worked or how frugal we were. Once we had children, I wanted to stay at home and raise them, but the poor working class cannot afford that luxury, so I did what all poor mothers do...I dragged my babies and young children from one baby sitter to another, trying to find someone I could trust, until they were old enough to stay at home alone, when they became latch key kids. Finding a decent babysitter was always hellish. One sitter that came to my house told my 5 and 3 year olds that there was no Santa Claus. I was appalled! I blew my top and fired her instantly, sick at heart that she had ruined an important part of the magic of Christmas for my little ones. About this time I was just beginning to feel the real stress of a working mother and there began the onset of stress related migraines which plagued me all of my adult life. I missed very little time from work because of migraine headaches, however. I had to save any sick leave I had for the days my children were too sick to leave home, so I tried my best to work even with blinding headaches when they appeared.
When Reese was about 13 months old I took him to a day care center doing business in a Church of the Nazarene close to home. I naively thought that a day care operated out of an ultra religious church would take special care of children. One day when I brought him home after work, he had multiple bite marks all over his back and stomach. I wanted to throw up to think that my helpless baby had been subjected to that kind of pain and abuse while no one at a supposedly reputable day care center was watching over and caring for him.
I got rid of another caretaker who had a child of her own and agreed to keep my two. I stopped taking my children there when Reese told me, because my little girl was too young to talk, that his baby sister had been stuck with needles by the demonic little boy who lived there. That was another time I almost threw up. All these incidents with sitters and caretakers made me resent having to work even more and the stress escalated.
I never had a boss that was understanding or sympathetic about me taking off work when my kids were sick. I had to meekly apologize for taking off and was always docked for the time away from work.
My resentment went deeper with each injustice. I resented the fact that I had to leave my precious children for someone else to raise, I resented the menial jobs I had to take for low wages, when I was smarter and brighter than many of the people who gave me orders. I resented the patriarchal attitudes wherever I worked, and the unrealistic demands made on me by someone called the boss, who was usually only an ego driven little man with a little authority over me and others. I also sometimes resented my husband for not making enough money so that I wouldn't have to be away from home 8 hours a day, yet I couldn't stand the thought of him having to work two jobs, so I persevered. I would work my 8 hours, plus commuting time, then be cooking dinner by 5:30 or 6:00 and the night had just begun.
At some point I began to realize that it was neither Jim's fault nor the fault of any individual, but was the fault of the system under which we live. I slowly began to resent the government as the culprit. Eventually, after the assassination of President Kennedy, the corruption in the Nixon administration, and events like the Iran-Contra affair, which exposed the CIA and how crooked our government could be, I no longer trusted it or the judicial system, which included abusive cops, and I finally began to understand that we, the working class, were merely being played as pawns in a system designed to keep us poor and subservient. I began to blame the right people...those few at the top of the pile who run our country and our world...the current administration, whoever they might be or whichever side they might represent, and big corporations, who were their co-conspirators and who had deep pockets.
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