I am a Feminist.

I took a Gender and Communication class in college that changed my life. I'm sure I use that phrase a lot for crucial moments and mundane discoveries alike... "Diet Coke with lime changed my life;" "that book changed my life;" "Butterscotch Wow Cow frozen yogurt changed my life;" "Rhetoric class changed my life;" etc. Guilty as charged. While I do hope and pray that my life is in fact being changed all of the time, that is another conversation for another day. Today, I am confessing: I am a Feminist. This is a discovery I made about two weeks into Dr. Dunn's class, sitting on her living room floor discussing the different definitions of feminism. The course itself was a fascinating, intellectually stretching and enlightening, emotional journey for me. I vividly remember writing my final paper with more conviction, humility and connection to my words than in any class before. Even moreso, I remember the lengthy, thoughtful, handwritten note I recieved from my professor after the course came to an end. She was proud of me, challenged by me, moved by how she watched me learn and grow and change, and interested to see where I would take my interest in and passion for studying gender, communication, and relationships.

There are many theories and definitions of feminism which I have no intention of getting into right now, although most people have a tendency toward associating the word with a late 60s or early 70s image of a man-hating women's lib activist. I'm not that kind of feminist, although if I was reaching early adulthood sometime before 2009, I may very well have been active in any one of the mainstream feminist movements. Feminism is really no more (or less) than the idea that women should have political, social, sexual, intellectual and economic rights equal to those of men. This is no longer a brand new idea to us as educated upper middle class west coast Americans. Most people that I know believe this. Including the man from my office that I'm about to tell you a story about.

I love where I work. It's not necessarily a career-advancing position, but it's perfect for me right now. It's a pleasant work environment where I am good at what I do back in my corner; people are nice, they treat me well, and I generally have a good time at work. More often than not, I feel as though it is pretty Dunder Mifflin-like over here. We even have a "league" for Trashketball, a game we play daily at 12:45 in the kitchen. It has a legit rulebook (that we made) and an annual tournament (with a trophy). Clerks, receptionists, secretaries, attorneys, even the managing partner all get into it. It's really pretty strange, but totally awesome.

Yesterday right before Trashketball as everyone was gathering, one of the attorney's (who also happens to be one of my favorites) went to get coffee from one of the 4 large pots that are always available to all. Lo and behold, as is often the case in the middle of the day, the coffee pots were all empty. We're all in the same boat over here at m&h, when the coffee runs out, you scoop one premeasured scoop into a filter that is right next to the coffee maker and push a button. It's as simple as that, and everyone has coffee. We're all saved from the disappointment of an empty coffee pot when you're about to fall asleep at your desk. Everyone does it, it's like an unwritten understanding based on mutual consideration and convenience. So, he tried and failed to fill his coffee cup, then just walked away. If he didn't want the coffee that bad we may have let it slide for the next person, but he went on to complain about it. I suggested that he could make another pot, scoop the grounds and push the button, like everyone else. His reponse was "I don't make coffee, and besides, it's not in my job description." Curious, I had to ask whose job he thought it was, since he went ahead and spent a couple of minutes making it very clear that he felt it was beneath him. In so many words, he alluded to the fact that he thought it was mine.

So I stood up and I made the coffee (although it is definitely not in my job description either). I really don't mind making coffee-I do it every morning because I'm the first one in the office. I actually was not personally insulted or offended, but the interaction bothered me greatly on an intellectual level because of what it represented. There's more backstory involving other individuals in the room, men and women. The things they said, buttons they pushed including the unfortunate tossing around of the word "chauvenist," and their role in escalating the whole interaction.

But the exchange between myself and him was as brief as that. After lunch when he walked past my desk he stopped by to apologize for being out of line. I thanked him because I did feel that it was warranted, but I also responded with "I like you, and I know that you didn't mean to be offensive. I want you to know that I truly don't mind making coffee and was happy to do it; but I did have to try very hard to pretend that it didn't feel a bit like it was 1952 and I was making the coffee solely because I am a woman." He understood, and I understood, and I think it was a teachable moment for both of us. I know that I thought about it quite a bit yesterday afternoon. I wondered why it got to me, why it got to him, and why it got to everyone else in the room. Fairness, equality, and courtesy are important to all of us, but at the root of that, more intimately connected to how we feel and respond in those situations is our gender-which is so critically, uniquely, and beautifully central to our way of being in the world.

This is fresh on my mind because I am studying it passionately. I am reading books on gender, sexuality, marriage, and communication. And this week I'm also thinking, talking and reading about the state of the body and gender and sexuality relative to the study of popular culture and theology. It's fascinating, every day, everybody, often tough-to-navigate stuff. It's stuff that gets down to our very core, to how God created us, how He loves us, and how we feel in our own skin, which is worth a little thought. And yes, I love school.