Mark it on your calendar - tomorrow is International Women’s Day. Time for a celebration of you…and me…and all women everywhere. Today, though, is just a day.

You may have guessed from some of my earlier pieces - last year, for instance, I wrote about playing tetherball alone - that I was not exactly one of the popular girls. I found school somewhat…unpleasant…actually. The incidents in this story I am about to share are ripped straight from my life. Some of them have never been told before…in fact, most of them. While my college and professional experience was slightly different than the one in the story…I took a number of different paths because I could not figure out what I wanted to be when I grew up, and am still exploring…the scenes at the high school are real, as are the scenes from the reunion. Well, not totally. I did actually have one dear friend once I got to high school, and it would be wrong of me to ignore that reality. And the incidents reported actually began in the fifth grade, when I moved to the town where I completed my school career. So, only slightly fictionalized. I give you…All the Girls.

ALL THE GIRLS

Jody kept her head down and stared at her shoes. That’s why she didn’t realize everyone else was staring at her shoes. They were inappropriate for the occasion, but they were the only ones she had. All the other kids were wearing sneakers, but her shoes were cheap imitation gold sandals her mother had picked up at the thrift store. “You can wear these to church”, she said.

She clutched her books to her chest and didn’t look to the left or right as she tried to find her first class. She hoped she wouldn’t have to ask anyone; they all looked…cruel. Unfriendly. She heard catcalls and whistles as she charged through the hallway.

“Hey, sweetheart! Where’d you get that dress? I wanta get one just like it…for my grandmother!”

“Ignore them”, she whispered. “Ignore them.” It wasn’t easy to do when they were pressing against her, whistling in her ear, breathing on her neck. “Ignore.”

“You’re new here, aren’t you?” A hand reached for hers. “Come on, I’ll get you where you need to be.”

Jody wasn’t sure whether to trust, but the girl sounded sincere. She sounded sincere as she told her to turn right…turn left…she opened a door for Jody and told her “In here.”

The boys standing at the urinals looked up as the door opened and she stumbled in. She scooted backwards, bumping the door open and escaping to the sound of laughter. The girl had led her there while everyone followed…it seemed like everyone in the school.

“Okay, break it up.” A teacher appeared and the kids scattered. “Where are you supposed to be?” His voice was not kind, and Jody shrank.

“English”, she whispered.

“That’s down hallway four.”

“Where….where’s…hallway four?” She didn’t look at him.

“Come on. I’ll show you.” The teacher spun on his heel and led her away from the boys room, away from the scene of her embarrassment, toward the class that was probably going to be filled with kids who had witnessed her experience…kids who had laughed. “Down there…which class?”

“Room 414?” Jody scampered in the direction he indicated and took her seat just before the bell rang. At least she wasn’t late on her first day.

“It looks like we have a new girl in class.” The teacher motioned to Jody; she shook her head. “What’s your name?” Jody handed her the schedule. “Jody Farley. Class, welcome Jody.”

Stomps, whistles, and jeers greeted her. The teacher allowed the students to ‘welcome’ Jody for a half a minute, then turned her attention to the lesson. Jody bent over her books, trying to figure out where they were, and focus only on the lesson. She felt the spit ball hit her neck and slide down the back of her dress. She tried not to flinch; it was best not to give them satisfaction, her mother said. Yeah, Mom, you don’t have to deal with this, Jody thought. You’re safe at home where no one is bothering you.

The morning was long and frightening. There was no let up of the mockery. She stumbled to the cafeteria and sat by herself with her lunch. Mom had packed crackers today; there wasn’t much in the house. She nibbled her crackers and kept her back to the cafeteria.

Her first class after lunch was Home Ec. “I don’t want to take Home Ec”, she told the woman who registered her.

“All the girls take Home Ec, dear”, the woman said.

“Can’t I take Chemistry?”

“Chemistry? Why would you want to take that?”

After a few minutes of conversation, it became obvious they were not going to permit her to take Chemistry. She presented for Home Ec as required. The Home Ec teacher looked at her as she came in and laughed. “What?”

“I haven’t seen a dress like that since…” The teacher stopped and looked at the dress. “Wow. That is…it’s the same dress my mother took to the thrift store last week.” The girls sitting at the tables giggled. Jody flushed.

Weeks went by, and nothing improved. The school, especially the students, had rigid standards for what a girl should look like, and Jody couldn’t meet the standard. Her parents didn’t have the money to buy her the sort of clothes the other kids wore. They couldn’t buy her more than one pair of shoes, and her mother insisted they needed to be church shoes. She wore dresses that didn’t fit, because Mom believed she didn’t need to check size. “I can tell just by looking if it’s your size”, she insisted. Jody used safety pins to keep her skirts from falling down around her ankles.

The bus was even worse. Kids knelt on their seats to stare at her and mock her. One boy picked up a piece of bologna that fell out of a sandwich and had been on the floor for…none of them knew how long. He smashed it in her face and rubbed it over her mouth. “Eat it”, he demanded. She turned her face toward the window and kept her lips locked. The bus driver laughed with the kids. He thought Jody was a joke.

“You’re not really a girl, are you?” Erik slid his tray onto the table and sat across from her. “Because girls are pretty. You’re…wow, you’re just a mess.”

Jody didn’t answer. She wasn’t going to speak to him, or anyone else. She put her head down and focused on the sandwich in her bag…until the cockroach crawled out of the bag. She jumped back as three more cockroaches made their debut appearance at the school. Erik laughed and shouted for his friends. The kids clustered around the table watching the roaches crawl down the long table; Erik smashed them just before they reached the edge. Jody left, not able to look at the other students.

Four years was a very long time, but Jody made it through. She kept her silence, not speaking to anyone except when the teachers asked her a direct question. Rumors flew that she was ‘slow’, that she couldn’t talk, that she belonged in special ed. She did her homework and handed it in; she took her tests. Her grades were good, and she applied to take the SAT. She had no friends, and even the teachers made fun of her.

Her SAT scores were good…the best anyone in her family had achieved. She wanted to go away, find a school in a town where no one every heard of her. She was accepted to every school where she applied, but she ended up at the state school close to home. Her mother fussed and fumed even about that. “You know men don’t like smart women”, she insisted. “I suppose…maybe you could get your MRS degree.” She laughed. “I never needed college; I was able to catch a man.”

Jody found college interesting and at times challenging, but she kept up with her program. She was finally allowed to take the classes the high school said weren’t for girls. She thrived in science, and decided to pursue that as her major. With her after school job, she was able to finally buy clothes for herself, and invested for the first time in a pair of sneakers and blue jeans. She made friends in college. She felt like a full person for the first time. No one was laughing now.

College went by fast…too fast…and it was time to join the world. It wasn’t difficult to find a job; she had great grades, and she had the foresight to go by Jo through her college career. Her applications were put to the head of the line, and she had three interviews the first week after college.

“I…I wasn’t expecting….” The human resources manager stammered. He looked at her application. “You’re…” He stopped, and moved his hands in an hourglass simulation. Jody got the idea. She was…female. He expected a male.

“I assure you, I’m fully qualified.” She spoke with a quiet confidence that came as an effort. She still didn’t believe in herself, but she needed to sound as though she did, and she practiced in front of her mirror every night.

“I…I’m sure…you are.” A smile tugged at the man’s lips; it was the sort of smile someone would give a cute child. “It’s just…this lab is all male. We don’t have any women. Bringing a woman into that setting would be…well, it would be trouble.”

“Why? Are you afraid they won’t be able to get their work done if there’s a woman?” Jody held his gaze.

“Frankly, yes. Men and women working together are a recipe for disaster.” He watched her with obvious admiration. “Especially such a pretty young thing.”

“Really? But…it’s 1982. I would think that sort of attitude went out with the 1950s”, Jody said. “I thought…I mean, isn’t it law now?”

“Affirmative action, you mean? Sure, of course. But hiring decisions are still up to us.” The man stood and turned his back. He watched traffic out the window. He turned back. “I’ll tell you what. I’ll give you a try. Two months probation…then we can start your real probationary period if you can make it through without crying or causing trouble.”

Jody took the job. She knew there was no problem with crying. She rarely cried. She hadn’t cried since she was seven. There was no point to crying; things remained bad and you wasted precious time you could be planning your escape. She moved into the lab with a confidence she wore uneasily. The men reacted in various ways; mostly shock, horror, or amusement. Most of them reacted with hands on her ass and leers. She ignored them. She was there to work.

The invitation was tempting. Her 20 year high school reunion. Why not? She didn’t have any friends there, that’s why not. She RSVP’d to say she would attend, and went back to work.

The reunion was a large one; hers was the largest class ever to graduate from that high school. She mingled with the rest of the class, wearing a name tag saying ‘Hello I’m Jody Farley’. No one looked at the name tag; they stared into her face and asked her who she was with. “No one”, she smiled. “I’m an alum.”

“I don’t remember you.” Over and over…until they looked at her name tag. “Oh.”

The reunion over, Jody went back home to her cat. “Shadow”, she told him. “You would never believe it. The women I went to school with? They were all going to be something? Most of them got married…had kids…and got divorced. I didn’t meet one other woman who had an advanced degree. And they were all miserable.” Jody paused, then resumed her report to the cat. “And the men…most of the men seemed to want to take me to bed.” She cuddled with Shadow on the sofa. “Guess I showed them…there are many ways to be a woman.” Shadow purred; it was obvious he agreed.