February 27, 2013 Aunt Patrice to Job
Dear Job,
I’m so excited about this blog business. I’m getting readers from all over—the US, Canada, Germany, France, Spain, New Zealand, Sweden, Ukraine. New Zealand I get since I have a friend from the oil business there, but the Ukraine! Huh? Everyone’s encouraging me to keep it going. I just posted a new one I’m sending you about growing up and becoming a Mormon atheist.
My friend Anna wants me to write about something I was telling her Sunday when she was visiting with me and Chrissy and Joe came by to say hello. I was telling her that Diana and I grew up in a family with two distinctly separate cultures—the female culture and the male culture—and that it was remarkable how rarely they crossed over. Diana and I had a friend, Franklin, who taught architecture at Tulane. He was gobsmacked when we told him we grew up thinking girls were smarter than boys and that it was a big adjustment for us that the rest of the world doesn’t feel that way. I said the boys’ experience was completely different from the girls’.
I asked Joey if he grew up thinking boys were smarter than girls. He didn’t answer. You’re almost a pure distillation of that male culture I’m trying to understand. I said the fascinating thing I learned about Molly was that she grew up in a male culture, understood it far better than Diana or I ever will. Daddy and the boys were really remote to us. The Aunts Beryl, Daisy and Sadie were all smarter than their husbands in our view. It bothered us that Mama and the Aunts held the church together while the men got all the status and credit. Being a skeptical Yankee, Daddy couldn’t get no respect, but that’s another story for another letter.
I’ve started another blog called The Book of Job. I’m going to start posting stuff there, but I won’t make it public until you say so. It’ll be a good place to store stuff so we can work on it together when you get out. Miller Williams’ poem Compassion is a perfect theme for it.
Love,
Aunt Patrice
I’m so excited about this blog business. I’m getting readers from all over—the US, Canada, Germany, France, Spain, New Zealand, Sweden, Ukraine. New Zealand I get since I have a friend from the oil business there, but the Ukraine! Huh? Everyone’s encouraging me to keep it going. I just posted a new one I’m sending you about growing up and becoming a Mormon atheist.
My friend Anna wants me to write about something I was telling her Sunday when she was visiting with me and Chrissy and Joe came by to say hello. I was telling her that Diana and I grew up in a family with two distinctly separate cultures—the female culture and the male culture—and that it was remarkable how rarely they crossed over. Diana and I had a friend, Franklin, who taught architecture at Tulane. He was gobsmacked when we told him we grew up thinking girls were smarter than boys and that it was a big adjustment for us that the rest of the world doesn’t feel that way. I said the boys’ experience was completely different from the girls’.
I asked Joey if he grew up thinking boys were smarter than girls. He didn’t answer. You’re almost a pure distillation of that male culture I’m trying to understand. I said the fascinating thing I learned about Molly was that she grew up in a male culture, understood it far better than Diana or I ever will. Daddy and the boys were really remote to us. The Aunts Beryl, Daisy and Sadie were all smarter than their husbands in our view. It bothered us that Mama and the Aunts held the church together while the men got all the status and credit. Being a skeptical Yankee, Daddy couldn’t get no respect, but that’s another story for another letter.
I’ve started another blog called The Book of Job. I’m going to start posting stuff there, but I won’t make it public until you say so. It’ll be a good place to store stuff so we can work on it together when you get out. Miller Williams’ poem Compassion is a perfect theme for it.
Compassion
Have compassion for everyone you meet,
Even if they don’t want it.
What appears bad manners,
An ill temper or cynicism
Is always a sign of things
No ears have heard,
No eyes have seen.
You do not know what wars are going on down there
Where the spirit meets the bone.
Have compassion for everyone you meet,
Even if they don’t want it.
What appears bad manners,
An ill temper or cynicism
Is always a sign of things
No ears have heard,
No eyes have seen.
You do not know what wars are going on down there
Where the spirit meets the bone.
Love,
Aunt Patrice
