I was called a bitch. And how was your morning?
I was called a bitch this morning.
By a very nice looking young man in a football jersey riding a homecoming parade float.
This was because I didn’t stop to let the float he was on turn into the parking lot.
I looked behind me. There were no cars after me. I knew they would easily turn after I passed.
So I gave a little wave of my hand.
Then I heard from my open sunroof.
“I wasn’t waving — I was telling you to stop, bitch.”
Something stupid a 16 year old might say.
So why did it make me cray, cray?
It’s not that I have never been bitchy.
But something about seeing that fresh, beautiful young face drip such a demeaning flippant remark — got my usually latent bitchy side all worked up.
In a way, it’s our fault. With the online dump-the-bad-with-the-good culture, women have allowed themselves to become one-dimensional sex objects, faceless body parts. Disposable.
Sure. Why not call a female who holds two undergraduate degrees, a law degree, a license to practice law in two states, a mother three times — two of which required her to travel to emotional hell-and-back through the domestic adoption process . . . yada, yada yada . . . a bitch?
We all could go on and on about our stories.
We are mothers, business owners, doctors, trash collectors. We have survived cancer, foreclosure, husbands who have left, parenting solo.
We have wiped up vomit and cleaned the diapers of our infants and our elderly parents.
We have paid our taxes and voted in elections from school board to the President of the United States.
We are strong, courageous, compassionate and not perfect.
No. I’m not perfect, but I’m not a bitch — at least today.
For young handsome football player I have your number.
If I was truly a bitch, think what I could have written.
