Les Dames

she doesn't really care. do you?

I have two stepdaughters. I don’t mention it very often because their birth father tries very hard to make sure their needs are met, and I don’t get along so well with their mother. Their grandfather used to call and keep me updated about everybody. He told me that he was starting to have dementia. I told him that he sure seemed to remember everything important. I told him that if he started to forget me, to try and remember how much I loved him, and maybe it would be the last thing he remembered, even if he began to forget why he called.

I have a niece. She used to be so tiny that she could walk around on the top of a table, and tell us about ourselves in a language only she understood, and complain about her diaper. I know that the boys haven’t always been kind to her. They tried to keep it from me because I’m crazy, and nobody knows what I’d do, but I knew.

A woman tried to sue me once.

“You promised to take care of me.” She said. “You don’t have the right to stop.”

I asked my lawyer if I could use what she said in my defense. He said I could if I could prove it. “I’d rather not.” I said. “Even now, it’s not right that all I can do is give, and all she can do is take. That’s not a fair distribution of life’s fortunes between us.” So, I signed one last check rather than say anything to hurt her reputation—and that was that.

No matter what they tell you, men know that it’s not right how things are between you and me. It’s not right that we’re stronger, the world is kinder to us, and our futures aren’t as limited. It’s not right. Very few of us would give up those advantages, but it’s not right. Actually, giving up those advantages can be hard.

The President-elect will tell you he wasn’t sending a message to women when he nominated Matt Gaetz as Attorney General. Maybe he’s telling the truth. Maybe what women might think about that man in that position was the very last thing on Donald Trump’s mind when he made that decision. Sometimes, not sending a message IS the message. Maybe the message is, “I don’t really care. Do you?”

I don’t know what’s coming. I’m not prescient. I worry that it’s going to hurt. I worry that it’s going to hurt quite a lot, but it will hurt people like me much less than people like her. That’s not fair. That’s not right.

They told me to “protect the right, defend the weak, and guard the honor of woman.”

“I’m nineteen, dude. Why are you telling me this?”

I think I knew it’d come up later. I just never thought about how much it’d come up later.

This would be so much easier if everyone shared the burden, but that’s clearly not ever happening. Some people only really care about what they get out of it. “Defend the weak” is just stupid to them. I can’t promise that they’re wrong.

I’ll stay here. Stand as far behind me as you can. If I say “run,” I want you to run as far and as fast as you can. I wish it didn’t have to be this way.