You all know I care for a nonagenarian who has survived the Great Depression and has made it known to all of us repeatedly. You see; she's the mother of one of my oldest friends. So, Gran maw-maw was ten-ish the first year after Black Monday of 1929. She's lived in her house all her life and was born in a house four doors down from her current residence. She has seen things that will make you wig out! The transformation of our little neighborhood from a field to a full-blown "village/small town" of sorts where there was a business of some sort and a tavern on every corner (well, after prohibition actually), thus the knickname of the area from north Pilsen down toward Back of the Yards "Whiskey Alley," All them hard working stock yard workers, factory drones and others had to decompress some way, thus....the bottle!
Well, I'm sitting with her and watching on a regular basis (per her request) "Mona Lisa Smile," as she was completely the age of those Wellesley girls in that there movie. The wedding scene in the movie resonates with me most as it was that year more or less my patient married her husband.
She tells me the two stories on a regular basis re: when she married her husband which was January 1953. They were supposed to go to Florida for their honeymoon but had to stay in Chicago as it was incredibly snowy! Well, that's what she says....I can't find any documentation regarding the weather history of that month on the net.
The other story she mentions is how she would work one shift whilst her husband worked another. They both worked at the GM plant that was on 39th/Pershing and Paulina in the McKinley Park neighborhood, which is now the location of brand new gorgeous million dollar homes. She mentioned she'd come home, hubby would go out to work. She'd clean up, change, get the house prepped and dinner ready (or lunch as he worked another shift than she) and she knew exactly when he'd come home, so she'd sit...dressed up in her pseudo Dior of the time and her heels, pearl necklace and with dinner on the table, hair perfect, no apron on she'd sit; and wait until he walked in the door; making like she made absolutely no effort to make dinner or seemed exhausted after her long shift at the GM plant, then off to cook, clean, press his clothes, etc.... She told me "It was my place to look like his pretty wife waiting for her husband. What kind of wife would I be if I wasn't dressed lovely for my husband, with dinner ready for him on the table after he just slaved at the plant?" I asked, "but what about you? You just spent an entire day at the plant, and then you'd rush home, cook dinner, clean the house, in your heels and pearls and then when you were finished, you'd do your hair and prep yourself to resemble Lucy Ricardo so your husband had something pretty to look at whilst he ate."
She'd take his bag, coat, etc....pull out his chair and serve him. How "Leave it to Beaver" like, would't you say? I asked, "weren't you tired from work yourself?" She said, "that's what we did. We sacrificed ourselves for the happiness of our husbands and family. It was a sin and selfish for a married woman to think of herself in any way. She had to give everything to her husband....and family."
Wow. "Mona Lisa Smile" wasn't too far off according to her, no? The Marcia Gay Harden character epitomizes what my patient was....but my patient was married. Marcia's character stated in class (she was one of the "professors" at Wellesley) "a few years from now your sole responsibility will be taking care of your husband and children." She went on about how the girls are there for an easy "A" but she states with irritation, "but the grade that matters most is the one 'HE' gives you; not me." So basically, she reiterates how it was so important to be that perfect wife, mother, maid, cook, etc...as it's possible for your husband to give you a thumbs down or even reject you (as we see in the movie via Kirsten Dunst's character). Furthermore, re: Kirsten Dunst's character, she expresses that idealism; stating how it's their duty; nay, obligation to do such, IE, to "reclaim our place in the home; bearing the children that will carry our traditions into the future." She had photos taken of herself studying and vaccuuming up as her husband sat with his paper, pipe and sitting in his easy chair.
Why am I going on about this? Well, it just proves the accuracy so to speak of the movie "Mona Lisa Smile." That whole....Donna Reed/June Cleaver thing wasn't a joke, nor an urban legend. It was real. Women may have been able to attend college and earn amazing degrees, but what did those women do with said degrees? Went off for the most part and got married, and had children. And they took care of those husbands' and children; and raised the non-traditionalist future bra/draft card burning anti-war Woodstock attending dancing naked high on acid and weed Grateful Dead fans who happen to be our parents. Furthermore, I think it's terribly fascinating! And I now know even more so how the term "mother's little helper" came into play. They needed it...desperately.... It reminds me of an old "Family Circus" book cover with the mom all frazzled with the four kids hanging off her, the little girl handing her a brush and her ponytail all jacked up, the baby crying, dogs barking, the two boys pulling on her, phone ringing, ironing behind her and she's holding a saucepan that seems to have burnt product in it with the headline, "For This I Went To College?"
I love that! I actually had that book too back in the day.....
To think those amazing women went to college to do just that....
No wonder the ERA/women's right movement went full throttle in the 60s.
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