if i lived in the 1800s and making dinner meant spending every waking hour baking bread and plucking a chicken or whatever and then my husband sat down and said "let's thank god for this meal" i think i'd poison him
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Husband grew up on farm (73 yo). Those women did nothing but work in the kitchen the ENTIRE fucking day. Baked bread, got eggs milk, picked garden’s produce, took meals out to workhands in field. OMFG I would have murdered someone.
That’s why they wouldn’t let women have rights, if they were allowed to have their own jobs and their own bank accounts and mortgages none of them would have gotten married
I can picture the argument with my 1800s asshole (of course he is) husband:
Him: I provided that bolt of cloth for you.
Me: I turned it into something useful.
Him: Ha! It was useful as it was.
Me: Then you'll wear it as it is.
My grandmother who lived to 102 told me stories of having to feed the fire for everyone’s bathwater. She said it was miserable and hated her father in law who was particular about his bathwater temperature.
his farming, all alone in the homestead, wouldn't necessarily thrive. a chicken would be doubtful. maybe a whole potato with some weeds. meanwhile, Indigenous ppl would show up to offer food, knowing that your fam were starving, and your husband would hiss at them for being 'satanic'
At a personal level, thank you; however, it is a UN-reported static, 70% divorces initiated by women, femicide, etc. You say you're a philosopher. Go for it.
Let me introduce everyone to the FABULOUS book "More Work For Mother," a deep dive into how household "advances" (like refining flour) actually made things MORE difficult for women, while these same advances made work EASIER for men. Released in 1984:
When my mother would take us to the cemetery to visit relatives we would walk around and she would point out the graves of men with two, three, and four wives buried around them - telling us that he had worked them to death. Several stones mentioned that they had died in childbirth.
Added to the wish list. A blog post that stuck with me contrasted the washing machine (a genuine labor savor) with the way the vacuum cleaner made the monthly task of four hours beating out all the carpets into an hour's work - and so women were now expected to do it on a weekly basis.
I think maybe some of them did.
My great grandparents didn’t even speak to each other in their later years. Even when they were in the same room, my great grandmother would say to one of the kids “Tell papa that . . . “
He did treat her like shit, if family lore can be believed
Aqua Tofana was a strong, arsenic-based poison created in Sicily around 1630 that was reputedly widely used in Palermo, Naples, Perugia, and Rome, Italy during the Renaissance.
Mostly by women to husband's
Girl got a murder mystery on it
Lillies were a traditional gift to a bride because they are a strong poison and can grow in your yard. I believe you can even just prepare the bulbs (not 100% on that). In North America we also have jimsonweed and poison hemlock; the latter is almost *indistinguishable* from the edible wild carrot.
Reminds me of being a physician in the hospital, working intensely with nurses, respiratory therapists, pharmacists, etc to save a person's life - and their family member thanks god. 🤢
Let’s all keep in mind that for some major proportion of the world’s women, this is their current reality. We who were born post WW2 in the west are extraordinarily lucky. Despite sexism.
😅😅 honestly what gets me is when a tragedy happens, and many die and a few live and that person is like “i just want to thank god, i know they saved me.” like… what you saying about all those other people?! god was like, F them ppl??
In shul we pray for refua shelayme (healing, basically) but we precede this portion with announcements, which includes asks for who can help with mobility, food delivery, home visits, and the like, because healing isn't magical.
I always include thanks for my wife.
I'm getting kind'a old. Don't always have an appetite, but then I look upon the meal she has set before me and I see the attention.
I like to get her talking about the processes she goes through getting everything to turn out at once.
When my maternal grandparents got engaged, my future grandmother had one iron clad condition… they would not be farmers and live that kind of life, even though they probably could have gotten the land through family. She knew she didn’t want to live that way.
Except the man didn’t have to carry, birth and care for a dozen farm children on top of that. If she died in childbirth, she would quickly be replaced by another young woman.
I tell my wife often that it is not her responsibility to feed me. I am fully capable. However, I do enjoy being fed and am so grateful for her caring.
I would have been that weird lady that lived in the woods that all the kids told scary stories about. After my husbands all died in the fields from dysentery. It some other weird shit
Well, you kind of forget the back breaking life everyone had in those days. That husband would most likely come from 12+ hours at some steel mill or dawn to dusk work in the fields.
You probably had to go out and kill that bird, too. You did all this while taking care of a brood of a dozen kids. I have a whole lot of respect for all my grandmothers before me.
Yep, but not before cranking water out of that well, and building a fire to heat it first. My grandma did this up until the early 70s, when grandpa's life insurance built her an indoor toilet and plumbing. It was a luxury. I remember having to use the outhouse.
That’s if you were lucky enough to live somewhere that allowed you to keep birds and you didn’t have to rely on a butcher of questionable repute-and even more questionable cleanliness.
And how did you get the flour for the bread? The chickens to pluck? At least he's acknowledging the sacrifice of others and not just saying "let's thank ME for this meal" while disregarding the contributed efforts... Like you.
I’m fortunate to me married to an atheist. I do 99% of the cooking; every time we finish dinner and no matter whether it was delicious or (occasionally) more on the iffy side, he thanks me. As in “Thanks for supper, dear-it was really good” or similar. Nice to have one’s efforts appreciated.
I’m fortunate enough to be married to a kindly man who loves cooking, and enjoying a beer while waiting for the veggies to cook! I mostly remember to thank him, I hate cooking. I iron his shirts.
You gave me a hearty laugh with your post. I’m following you. There’s bound to be women back then that thought that way! When I ask my hubby if he wants a salad with dinner, he saids it doesn’t matter. So we have no salad and he wants to know where it is. If it makes no difference, I’m not doing it.
When i was growing up we followed a Hungarian custom, i had to thank my mother for the lovely meal and we were not allowed to touch the food until she replied with enjoy your meal.
Me too I just put two loaves of bread and a shepherds pie in the oven and it’s only 10.53 Started the bread and 7.30 IfcI had to do that every day I’d be back in bed after lunch and a nice ‘sauce would be waiting for dinner
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Him: I provided that bolt of cloth for you.
Me: I turned it into something useful.
Him: Ha! It was useful as it was.
Me: Then you'll wear it as it is.
Dysentery is a bitch.
https://www.hachettebookgroup.com/titles/ruth-schwartz-cowan/more-work-for-mother/9780465047321/?lens=basic-books
My great grandparents didn’t even speak to each other in their later years. Even when they were in the same room, my great grandmother would say to one of the kids “Tell papa that . . . “
He did treat her like shit, if family lore can be believed
Mostly by women to husband's
Girl got a murder mystery on it
Reminds me of being a physician in the hospital, working intensely with nurses, respiratory therapists, pharmacists, etc to save a person's life - and their family member thanks god. 🤢
Next time Ill bring a scientist into the patient's room so they can take a bow.
Idiot.
And now I know. 😀
I'm getting kind'a old. Don't always have an appetite, but then I look upon the meal she has set before me and I see the attention.
I like to get her talking about the processes she goes through getting everything to turn out at once.
It was miserable for everyone, where moments of joy were cherished.
Now, we are approaching the same misery as serfs to oligarchs. Maybe focus there?
https://archive.org/details/customshabitsofs0000salo/page/n5/mode/2up