“Get a job!”
“I love you!” the tambourine girl sang back, blowing a kiss to the crowd.
Curious about their destination, Marion tagged onto the end of the procession, but when they reached the huge stretch of grass in front of the Ontario Legislative Building, she forgot all about them. The park was teeming with people like the group she’d followed, sitting, standing, and dancing, using placards for shade. There had to be thousands of them. She had suspected something was going on due to the skunky odour hovering over the grounds, but she’d never imagined anything this big.
Feedback squawked from a microphone, briefly overwhelming the throng, and she noted a large stage set up at the end of the park. A man introduced someone, but his mouth was so close to the microphone Marion couldn’t understand what he said. Then he stepped back, and a woman took his place, her long black hair spilling over the guitar in her arms. The crowd rose as one, applauding and cheering, then growing quiet with anticipation.
“Thank you,” the performer purred, gentle as a breeze. “Thank you, everyone. My name is Buffy Sainte-Marie, and I’d like to sing you something I wrote called ‘Universal Soldier.’?”
A cheer exploded from the crowd, and Marion set down her bag to listen to the words. She didn’t know the song, but Miss Sainte-Marie’s voice was clear, and Marion liked hearing the probing questions and the message of personal responsibility. She’d heard a lot of angry lyrics lately, and there were plenty in this song. Every generation wanted to be heard, and this one was especially demanding. She wished Miss Sainte-Marie would play something more cheerful or contemplative, like “Blowin’ in the Wind.” That’s the kind of melody Marion preferred. One could always find a reason to be angry, but it was important to be grateful and hopeful as well.
Marion scanned the crowd, thinking her sister would fit in well. Marion didn’t think Pat smoked pot, but she did enjoy the music, the fashion, and the rebellious momentum behind the protests. It made sense that this was her world, since Pat had always been the hip sister, the younger and more beautiful of the two, and the life of every party. A cheerleader who, straight out of high school ten years ago, had married the quarterback of the football team and become the envy of every girl in her graduating class. When he inherited a small fortune, Pat had become—in her own words—“the expensive candy” on her wealthy husband’s arm. The kind of woman who sunbathed on the front lawn of her large brick house without a care in the world. She’d recently cut her golden hair into the latest style: a bob with heavy bangs that tickled her false eyelashes. She tucked it behind her ears so everyone could see her diamond earrings glitter in the sunlight.
All of that was fine, Marion thought. Good for her. But she didn’t like how Pat continued to preach to her, and to anyone who would listen, about the importance of women’s independence. Marion wasn’t sure if her sister saw the irony.
“Everything a man can do, a woman can do better,” Pat liked to say. “Think about it. We don’t even need men anymore, now that artificial insemination is available.”
“Well, artificialsemenis not,” Marion replied flatly. “Women cannot live without men. We might want to sometimes, but men take care of a lot of things we can’t do.”
“That’s silly, Marion. We can do anything a man can do. Name one job I can’t do.”
“You’ve never had a job in your life.”
Pat rolled her eyes. “We’re not talking about that. Name one job I couldn’t do that a man can.”
“Just one?” Marion started counting on her fingers: “Build a bridge, dig tunnels for the subway, install plumbing, fix a car, carry a piano… Want me to go on?”
“Those don’t count.”
“Why not? Are those jobs not vital? Maybe not the piano carrying, but the rest are.”
Pat thought it through. “Well, if we weretrained, we could do those things, but they wouldn’t pay as us much. And women should be paid equally for doing them.”
“I agree,” Marion said, “as long as the women are accomplishing the same.”
Pat scowled. “How would we know if that’s possible? Women aren’t even given the opportunity to accomplish things. Male chauvinism exists, Marion. Men don’t want to work with us, so they put up barricades. They think the workplace is their territory alone, and we belong barefoot in the kitchen.”
“I’ll give you that,” Marion said reluctantly. “But chauvinism and bigotry are manageable. It all depends on if you let it get to you or not.”
“Manageable? We shouldn’t have to deal with it at all!”
“Of course not. But look at all the progress women have made over the past fifty years.”
“We don’t beat our laundry against rocks in the river anymore, if that’s what you mean. And sure, we can vote, but this is still a man’s world. I mean, look at you. How many women were even admitted to that medical school? If we can’t get the degrees, we can’t get hired, and we can’t do the work.”
Marion knew that all too well, but she wasn’t ready to concede the argument to Pat, since she had never had a job or gone to college. Her sister was right, of course. All her life, Marion had encountered chauvinism at every turn. Throughout medical school, most of her professors had dismissed ordiscouraged her, and male students either kept their distance or suggested doing a different kind of “homework” with her. The prejudice against Marion and every other woman in those classrooms, then in the Ontario Hospital itself, was exhausting. It didn’t seem to matter how well she did something; it wasn’t enough. So many mornings she’d gone to work, done everything she was supposed to do and more, then had her pride squashed by a random catcall in the hallway or a discouraging, narrow-minded remark from her prehistoric boss, Dr. Bernstein. Their message was the same: she did not belong in their hallowed halls. What was a woman doing, they scoffed, working elbow-deep in blood and bone, when she should be cleaning her house or preparing dinner for her husband?
The truth was, Marion could probably bake a soufflé better than any of their mothers or wives, and her apartment was spotless. She assumed a husband and family would come eventually, but that had never been her priority.
“Like you said,” she replied, “look at me. I am where I am because I wanted it too much to give up. The only way to achieve acceptance in the workplace, and therefore equal pay, is to work harder than the men.”
Pat turned her face to the sky and made a sound of frustration. “News flash, Marion. Working harder than men for equal pay is not equality. And not everyone has the kind of determination you had. You’ve always wanted to be a doctor. Most women aren’t like you. A lot of them just want to work without being treated harshly. Why should we have to fight every step of the way?”
“Because that’s what it takes. Things are changing, though.”
“Way too slowly.”
“One step at a time. It will get better. In the meantime, women have to toughen up. We need to be better than the men, like I said. Every day, I remind myself of that.”
