Did you know?

We've all heard the human interest story about Helen Keller: water pump, fingerspelling, etc. But there's more to her story.

Newspapers liked to pat her on the head for her work with the blind, but things changed when she voiced a political opinion. When she started advocating socialism, the Brooklyn Eagle editorialized that her "mistakes spring out of the manifest limitations of her development."

Keller responded:
The Eagle and I are at war. I hate the system which it represents, apologizes for and upholds. When it fights back, let it fight fair. Let it attack my ideas and oppose the aims and arguments of Socialism. It is not fair fighting or good argument to remind me and others that I cannot see or hear. I can read. I can read all the socialist books I have time for in English, German and French. If the editor of the Brooklyn Eagle should read some of them, he might be a wiser man and make a better newspaper. If I ever contribute to the Socialist movement the book that I sometimes dream of, I know what I shall name it: Industrial Blindness and Social Deafness.

Dear Ms. Keller,
You're my hero.

Waiting it out

One of the first lessons I remember from high school Russian class is about why it's traditional for Russian brides to be sad. It's because they are leaving their family to live with their husband's household. As in many traditional cultures, women had no clout outside the home and had to get all their power within the family. The matriarch ruled over daughters and daughters-in-law. A girl marrying into the family could gain rank by bearing sons. Stick it out enough generations, and eventually you become the matriarch.

Jeff comes from the kind of close-knit family you rarely see in our culture. There are so many of them, it's overpowering. At our wedding, there were eight of my relatives and thirty-four of his. The house is like a shrine, covered in photographs of ancestors. And woe betide the woman who marries in and tries to change things. When Jeff's widowed grandfather fell in love with an abrasive woman, the men in the family took it in stride and the women freaked out. Even aunts who married in years ago never make it to the inner sanctum when it comes to making decisions.

I could probably push more before I met with real resistance, but I'm terrified to try it. I don't want to be that woman they laugh at. This weekend on a family vacation I tried to negotiate for the presence of mustard at a meal. It was a disaster.

Our lease is up in a few weeks, and we've considered moving back into the family house rather than paying too much rent for our tiny apartment. We love them and they love us, but it would be nuts. At this point, I just need to remember that there's a reason I have my own household. I came to this family twenty years too late to be on even footing. In another generation or two, I'll have a chance at being a matriarch.

I must say . . .

I sometimes wonder why some people seem naturally taciturn and others (like me) can't bear to have an interesting thought without sharing it. One thing I love about being married is that there's someone whose job it is to listen to me talk.

Today I got a lesson in where that comes from. I ate lunch with some kindergarteners, each of whom individually asked what my name was what I was eating. Then they began to tell me things, some of which were true. "That's my friend over there." "I'm allergic to bread." "My teacher's name is Ms. Henry." One gap-toothed girl beckoned me close enough to hear her whisper: "I ate chicken soup at my home."

That's it. No concept of what facts will be interesting to other people. Just the urge to share, which some of us apparently don't outgrow. I love it.

Sociological moment

Recently Jeff and I went to my cousin's very posh wedding on Cape Cod. At the rehearsal dinner, the main course was whole lobsters, antennae and all. Most of us didn't have a clue how to get at the food inside the shell. The bride stood up to demonstrate, holding her lobster tail aloft.

"You grab it like this - and you crack it like this - and then you pull the meat out."

So we poor bumpkins were educated in the haute cuisine of Cape Cod. But of course, lobster is only posh food because we think it is. If we went to a wedding in some other culture and saw the bride cracking crustaceans open with her bare hands, we'd think they were barbarians!

Two reactions

Last week I finished up work at Oxfam to start social work school. I met with HR to wrap things up, including the contributions they made to my 401(k). When I was first hired, I explained to an incredulous HR worker that I didn't want to take the money, but she said that was impossible. (I also tried refusing a salary, but that was even more impossible.) So when I met with HR last week, I mentioned how frustrating it was that I was forced to take money that I would rather Oxfam keep. The woman looked at me cooly and said, "Oh. Are you independently wealthy?"

It's the thing I think my coworkers have been wondering all along. They all have access to the database records stating that Jeff and I gave Oxfam about $40,000 last year, more than my annual salary. Two people living on less than one salary? Surely we had some advantage they didn't?

Well, other than having a husband who majored in computer science, no. I sputtered, "We're normal people with normal salaries. We just think it's really important to help people." I'm so frustrated when people believe giving a lot of your income is something only other people - rich people - can do.

So that was the nonprofit. Meanwhile, Jeff had gotten a job offer and was trying to negotiate a higher salary at the technology company where he works. The vice president of his department finally asked, "Why is the pay raise so important to you?" Jeff explained that we want to give as much money as we can. In the end he not only got the raise, but help from the vice president in getting it in forms that made sense (cash now rather than retirement savings which we can't give away for decades). The vice president also said he would consider giving more himself.

So there you have it. The worker at the relief and development nonprofit assumes people give away money only if they have a huge surplus. The worker at the technology company questions the need for more money and totally accepts the idea that you wouldn't want to hoard everything for yourself. Go figure.

The latest news

What's the role of gossip? Fun? Destructive? A way for society to control people, for good or ill?

I recently spent a week at the folk dance camp for grownups where Jeff and I used to work. Jeff couldn't go, so I went alone. Now I'm back, after spending a week with our friends, and I wonder how much news to share.

It's a small community with tons of shifting relationships. Some of the news is quite benign, I think - who sat out late on the dock with whom, etc. But I wonder if I'm doing wrong to relay stories about people. Jewish law gets quite detailed about "evil speech" or lashon hara - it's forbidden to speak ill of other people except in very specific circumstances (e.g. if someone's going into a business deal with a person you know is a fraud.) But I've never seen a small community where everyone minds their own business.

I wonder how gossip interacts with marriage. A major reason I wanted to get married is that I wanted a structure supporting the relationship. I believe my life will be better in the long term if I stay with Jeff, even if there are periods when it's not fun. That's why I want society holding me to my promise. We could have just vowed fidelity to each other privately, but it further solidifies the vow when you say it in front of your family and friends and you wear a ring on your hand that means you're off limits to other people. Knowing that other people expect me to keep my promise makes it easier to keep.

So what happens when you watch someone who was apparently married two months ago, but who comes to camp minus his wedding ring and spends the week cuddling with someone who's not his wife? In a way, it's their own business, and I don't know the whole story. Maybe his wife left him, or they're in an open relationship and his ring just happened to fall down a drain.

But marriage is not just your business. If you want a relationship to dissolve easily and with no fuss, marriage is not your best option. You know people will whisper if you're visibly slipping, and shame is a powerful motivator. When you make your vow public, don't you invite your community to help you keep it?