I
t’s 7:45 a.m. We’re walking
down East Liberty Street.
I
have
two
rakes
in
my hand, and Shannon, my
roommate, has a drawstring
bag on her back that holds a
spade, a fork, a hoe and a pair
of shears. We’re excited, if
not a little bit sheepish, about
the adventure that lies ahead
of us. I learned early on in
my time at the University of
Michigan that “wasting time,”
which is broadly defined as
“doing something that you
aren’t going to put on your
resume,” is a criminal offense,
and, up until now, I’ve been
utterly opposed to breaking
the law. But not today. Today I
don’t care if I’m wasting time.
Today I’m going to play in the
yard.
We arrive at a pretty little
house with lots of weeds in the
yard and set our tools down
on the front porch. Shannon
takes one side of the sidewalk
and I take the other. We dig
out weeds with our hands and
talk about the adventures we
want to go on this summer. I
pull my hair into a ponytail so
I can feel the sun on the back
of my neck. I’m having fun.
Is that what it’s called? Fun?
I haven’t had this much dirt
underneath
my
fingernails
since I was 8 years old digging
for treasure in my backyard.
Of course, I’m 20 years old,
and therefore way too old to
play in the yard. I’m in college,
meaning I should be spending
every spare moment making
myself
more
“employable,”
whatever that means. In two
years, I will have graduated
and
officially
entered
the
job market, and no employer
wants to hire a girl who uses
her valuable free time to play
in the dirt.
About
41
percent
of
Americans let some of their
paid
vacation
days
go
to
waste,
likely
because
they
don’t want to be perceived as
lazy for taking advantage of
the benefits outlined in their
contract. In fact, this survey of
U.S. corporate managers finds
that
many
equate
working
longer hours with being more
dedicated, more hardworking
and more responsible. Michael
Bloomberg’s
career
advice?
Don’t even go to the bathroom,
let alone take time off to take
a vacation or play in the dirt.
In 2011, he said, “I am not
smarter than anybody else
but I can outwork you – and
my key to success for you, or
anybody else, is making sure
you are the first one in there
every day and the last one to
leave. Don’t ever take a lunch
break or go to the bathroom,
you keep working.”
I’m a sucker for this kind
of
industriousness.
That’s
why I’m at the University of
Michigan! I take pride in my
ability to work hard. During
the school year, I didn’t take
any
breaks.
I
outworked
everyone else and I didn’t rest
or relax at all-- that is, until I
sat myself down on my couch
to tell Shannon a funny story.
But when I opened my mouth,
instead
of
words
coming
out, I just started crying. “I
think we’ve finally done it,”
Shannon said. “I think we’ve
finally worked ourselves past
our breaking points.”
So we decided to go back to
where we came from the front
yard, playing in the dirt. The
same place we spent every
summer until we hit 12 years
old and realized that playing
in the dirt isn’t productive
and that we should be using
the spare time to set goals
and get jobs. Maybe someday
I’ll really reach adulthood,
and I’ll be able to work, work,
work from sunup to sundown,
and it won’t kill me or run me
dry. But right now, at 20 years
old, I’m still better suited for
playing in the dirt than I am
for sitting at desk 12 hours a
day. Figures.
It’s 10 a.m. now, so it’s time
to put wipe the dirt off our
knees and walk back down
East Liberty Street to get
home. I remember playing in
the backyard with my sister,
and
my
dad
would
come
outside and ruin all the fun
by telling us it was time to go
to bed. Summer was the best
time of year because when our
faces fell and we told him we
weren’t tired yet, he would
remind us that we didn’t have
school the next day and we
could go back outside first
thing in the morning if we
wanted to.
Shannon and I wash the
dirt
out
from
underneath
our fingernails, and we put
slacks
and
button-downs
over our sunburnt, mosquito-
bitten bodies. We will go
about the rest of our days
without
committing
any
unspoken criminal offenses.
In two years, when we start
interviewing
for
our
first
“big-kid jobs,” we’ll tell the
employers about how in the
summer of 2018, we spent
our
afternoons
in
offices
completing
internships.
We won’t tell them about
mornings when we played in
the dirt and let the sun beat
down on the backs of our
necks. We won’t tell them
about how if we hadn’t let
ourselves play in the dirt that
summer, even just a little bit,
we might not have made it
through summer at all.
When
you
spend
your
summer in Ann Arbor, it’s
hard for it to feel like summer,
because, like it or not, it’s still
Ann Arbor. It’s still the lovely
little town that worked you
until you ran dry all winter,
the lovely little town where
you received your first failing
grades and got rejected from
your first jobs. When you walk
down East Liberty Street, it’s
hard to believe that you’re
allowed to end up somewhere
besides the Starbucks where
you studied every evening
during the winter semester.
But if you ever want to join
Shannon and me when we’re
playing in the dirt, I highly
recommend it. We leave at
7:45 a.m. I promise I won’t tell
your future employer.
5
OPINION
Thursday, May 24, 2018
The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
Many of these issues
arise from abuse from the
male coaches; these are
the most common cases.
I myself can speak to
this
issue.
Just
before
I
left
for
college,
it
was discovered that my
32-year-old soccer coach
was
having
a
sexual
relationship
with
a
16-year-old teammate of
mine. Many people went
straight to victim blaming
and asked why she would
even consider doing that.
It is extremely important
to remember this is not her
fault. Most youth coaches
are very charismatic and
develop strong, trusting
relationships with their
players.
This
situation
was
no
different.
He
manipulated
her
into
believing he loved her,
despite
the
outside
factors that he had a wife
and was twice her age. As
I mentioned earlier, this
is sadly all too familiar
for many young female
athletes.
Furthermore,
many
female
athletes
fear
getting cut from a team or
losing playing time if they
displease a coach. These
stories and the countless
others
like
them
are
“testimony to the culture
that exists in sport which
pressures female athletes
to put up with the sexist
environment
and
gives
the impression that those
in positions of authority,
who have sexual motives,
have little or no difficulty
in
selecting
vulnerable
athletes upon whom they
prey.” The objectification
of female athletes starts
at a young age and many
young,
talented
women
face abuse. This kind of
sexualization and abuse
has pervaded the women’s
sports
industry
and,
tragically, a very large
number of female athletes
are
familiar
with
the
very
real
consequences
it causes. Furthermore,
this
male-dominated
industry
has
“not
yet
developed effective ways
of
handling
complaints
and communicating these
processes to the athletes
… not only was the process
a difficult one, but the
athletes were generally
unsatisfied
with
the
outcomes.”
The
men
running
these organizations have
failed to create a safe
environment for female
athletes to report their
abuse.
This
indirectly
perpetuates
the
issue
of
sexual
assault
and
therefore reinforces the
inequality
women
are
facing in sports today.
There need to be programs
put in place that educate
female athletes on sexual
assault.
They
need
to
know what they can do
if they find themselves
in one of these situations
and they need to be sure
if
they
do
choose
to
come forward, they will
be treated with respect
and be believed and the
process
will
be
just.
Without these kinds of
programs, objectification,
sexualization
and
abuse will continue to
be normalized and the
inequality will persist.
Hannah Harshe can be reached at
hharshe@umich.edu.
CONTRIBUTE TO THE CONVERSATION
Readers are encouraged to submit letters
to the editor and op-eds. Letters should
be fewer than 300 words while op-eds
should be 550 to 850 words. Send the
writer’s full name and University affiliation to
emmacha@umich.edu
Sexual abuse in women’s sports by Marlee Burridge continued below:
HANNAH HARSHE | COLUMN
“We will go
about the
rest of our
days without
commiting
any unspoken
criminal
offenses.”
Farid Alsabeh can be reached at
falsabeh@umich.edu.