Essays on Reclamation, Identity, Enjoyment, Belonging, Art, Nature, Beauty, Food, or whatever I’m really interested in.

**Content and Language warning. **

Episode Title: “Slur.” Trish.

 

Written By:

 

This office is divided.
The guys work international.
The girls work domestic.
4 even five times as much money in international
“Domestic.”
*Cause I’m not in the mood for a motherf*cking fight
every day for the next 8 months or however long I need to be
here.*
And the girls’ side has sandwiches and organization
and at least pretending to like the customers,
and nail painting.
And, look, feminism didn’t say I had to lie, okay.
Painting my nails,
and eating sandwiches, and talking nice to
the customers, sounds better than having to fight.
Have you ever seen a man lose all his gentlemanliness
when you outsell him
And these guys, these are the exact guys
who will lose their…they will …like a crawly thing
takes over their minds
they don’t see me anymore
it’s just everything
their father
said about not “even” being able to keep up with a girl
or some wounded kid driving a lunch tray over their head
while calling them a girl
because girls girls are worthless
right
and now he’s less than that
less than a girl
less than worthless.
the crawling thing has taken over his mind
and he’s got to be not that
not worthless
not less than a g*ddamn girl
now what is she even doing here
“girl” is now lodged into this guy’s
head as a slur
and now this person who was
just laughing and chatting with him
me maybe selling one too many, or fourteen too many, customers
more than him
on the leaderboard they put up to drive perfectly decent
men insane,
now my existence
to the crawling thing in his mind
is the same as his father
or Eugene who fell back 3 grades
calling him a slur.
the slur called girl
the slur called not even a girl
the slur called less than a girl
and he can’t see straight
and he can’t think straight
or doesn’t or whatever
and the crawly thing now sees me as the enemy
and there is nothing I can do to
have it be alright except
help less people
help less customers
make less sales
make sure that he is always ahead
have them take me down
off the leaderboard
so that if the person who did happen
to be selling the most that week or the last 4 months
happened to be me, nobody would have to know…
Does he need to take his name down, off,
the leader board, if it’s him.
no.
Because guys beating guys
spurs competition
but girls beating guys apparently
means that guy should just crawl into
a hole and die
or destroy the thing
crush the thing
own the thing?
kill the thing
drive the thing away
that it seems like made a perfectly
expected competition amongst men
uncomfortable.
and sometimes in a dress, or a skirt,
or in heels, in heels, too,
on your way to an event
not every second of the day
in a hoodie so he can least forget you’re of these
girls
do you know how much I would have been absolutely helped by 4 to 5 times the money
a girl came
for one day
worked international,
–stuck it out for 3, 4 more days–.
then she was gone.
that would have been me.
the only solution in certain
environments
is not to be there.
then again in some environments
you can’t disappear enough
to make the guy whose mind is screaming at him, about
what it means that you exist in this place, feel safe.
there are places where the guys would take me, or someone else under their wing,
and be happy for me
this is not that place
so I’m going to go ahead and try this fuchsia fusion plum polish with little sparklies on top
choose less pay per sale, and try to make up for it by just helping more of the people,
get myself another sandwich
and accept that the guys can be happy for me
and cheer me on
and ask
when are they going to get to marry me
and can I cook
and I know. I know.
But this is them being friendly.
To me. To us.
because i’m over here and not over there
because we’re over here and not over there
and I can’t be the first
to notice,
the first girl to notice that it was this way
to have noticed that it was this way
and felt exactly where in this office
she would be safe.
After all, there’s some reason, in the first place, this office got to be the way that it is.
Me over here
Them over there
Us over here
Them over there

Divided.

Written By:

© July 2025. Originally Posted in Word Snapshots. All Rights Reserved.