The Joys Of Being A Woman

I want to start this off by saying that I am in no way a feminist. I do agree that woman are equal to men, and are just as (if not more, in some cases) capable at doing anything they put their minds to. Yet every once in a while, I do get [more than] a little frustrated by some "sexist" stereotypes that people assume, just because I'm female.

At the beginning of summer, I had to get my car inspected. Other than the fact that I was starting a job that required driving upwards of 220-230 miles a week (on top of the miles I put on aside from working), the inspection was expiring at the end of June, and had to be done. As a wedding gift, my mother-in-law told me to take my car to her garage, and have them do whatever had to be done to pass; which included the inspection and emissions test, but also a new serpentine belt and new tires. I had also mentioned to the mechanic that my brakes had been "testy" and should probably be replaced as well. Other than mentioning all of this upon dropping my car off, I had used the exact words, "Do whatever has to be done to pass inspection".

Now, in my opinion, any mechanic would take this as a free ride. "Well Miss, we had to repair the radiator, update the carburetor, top off the blinker fluid, replace the transmission, take the engine out and put it back in, then repaint the whole car. That's $14,000, plus this little tree shaped, cinnamon-scented air freshener, which brings your total to $16,478.56".

However, they did the minimum. New front tires, new serpentine belt, inspection and emissions test. Period. And the brakes were fine...according to the mechanics.

I picked the car up the next day. As I drove home (I had to take a route that took me down a decent hill, roughly two or three miles from the top, down) I noticed the strong smell of brakes, but I remembered that sometimes new brakes will smell like they're burning, and I wasn't sure at this point if they had put new brakes on or not. As I got to the bottom of the hill, and stopped at the red light, I saw smoke coming from around my front passenger side tire. Of course, I panicked, but stayed calm enough to drive the last mile to my house, hoping at every stop my brakes would make my car come to a halt.

Again, the next day, I took my car back to the garage and explained to them what had happened. It turned out that they did not replace my brakes like I had suggested, so I was smelling bad brakes, not new ones. One of the mechanics took my car for a ride to see if he could notice anything...he came back, and said nothing happened. Of course the damn car made a liar out of me.

Now, I don't just assume my car needs brakes. Since the cold weather came last year, my car gets testy when I don't drive for a few days. My car is not made for cold weather, so when I start her up, she'll usually hesitate, and when I drive away, the serpentine belt will make an awful squeaking sound (even after being replaced), not to mention how badly the brakes grind as I come to the first stop of the trip. Well, it's been almost one-year since the first time I've heard them grinding. I've confirmed with others who ride in my car that it is, indeed, the brakes, and I'm now becoming a little uneasy just getting in my car, considering I'm scared to death that one of these times, I won't stop.

But, no, back in June the mechanics couldn't take my word for it, and replace the irrational pregnant girl's brakes just to shut her up.

So what I'm getting at is, do men/mechanics think I don't know my own car? Sure, I may not know a whole lot about cars, but I do know when there's something wrong with one, and I sure as Hell know there's something wrong with mine. And the fact that I'm not listened to perturbs me more than it should. What I'd really like to know is, why? Because I'm a woman? I was under the impression that garages (stereotypically) took advantage of women customers (by doing excessive amounts of work) because they don't know anything about cars. I didn't think that they "don't screw women over" and didn't do work because they didn't want to admit that women may be correct about something needing to be done. Or maybe it's just a "mechanic" thing, perhaps just these particular mechanics, they won't listen to a customer because he or she doesn't have the proper training, and doesn't know what they're talking about. When in fact these particular mechanics are only a few years older than me, and probably fresh out of college. It just really grinds my gears (to quote Peter Griffin in the Family Guy movie).

Seriously, I'm sick of people, mainly men, assuming that women don't know anything about certain "manly" subjects. I recently left a [construction field] job (because of my pregnancy) that consisted of mostly male employees, who all thought of me as "one of the guys". I even knew more about certain things than they did, or at least different techniques.

The job consisted of a lot of cleaning, carpentry, assessing mold, smoke, water and fire damage, the occasional sewer clean up, and I was told stories about "body clean up", but the company didn't get that kind of job while I was there. I often had customers (mostly men, but sometimes women) say something to the guy I was on the job with, such as, "Oh, did you bring your secretary with you?" And I would have to chime in, if my partner didn't say so first, "No, I'm a technician. Not a secretary". I can't even tell you how many people were surprised that I worked for this company, all because I'm a women. It became pretty annoying after a while.

Sigh.. Really, I'm sick of being stereotyped into a certain category. I'm interested in a lot of things, most of which aren't exactly considered "girly". However, as my maternal instincts kick in, I feel myself becoming more "in-tune" with my feminine side. That doesn't mean I can't (or won't) get pissed off when someone assumes I don't know about something because I'm a woman. In fact, I think it entitles me to get even more pissed off. :)

-Cassie