While growing up I always viewed my grandparents' strict stances on what was "women's work" and what was "men's work" to just be traditional or old- fashioned. but after reading chapter twelve I recognize those outlooks to be distinctly gender inequality. For as far back as I can remember there have been starkly- defined tasks for the males and females when visiting my grandparents. They live in northern Minnesota so their property requires a fair amount of upkeep and we help with as much as possible while there. My grandpa, dad, and brother would be charged with things like cutting down dead trees, fixing the dock, trimming weeds along the shore, and maintaining the fishing boat. Meanwhile, my grandma, mom, sister, and myself kept busy with garden work, cooking, laundry, general cleaning inside or outside the cabin, and getting whatever refreshments or tools the guys may happen to need.
It was always incredibly frustrating to be made feel inferior by phrases like "You'll get hurt; let the boys do that." After a large fire wiped out a major portion of my grandparents' property during my senior year of high school I finally had the chance to prove to them that I was much more capable than they thought. A ton of clean up needed to take place so they took all the help they could get. Of course, they were extremely surprised to witness a girl so competent in the woods and with tools; I was far more useful than my brother. Since then my grandparents no longer underestimate women to quite the same extent and when we visit them the division of tasks is a little bit more open.
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