Groundskeeping as a girl

Talk of the Quad: TBT abroad

I had been excited to study abroad. Like going to overnight camp in Maine and attending Bowdoin, studying abroad in France was something that my mom had done. She’d told me what an important experience it was, and, like any privileged middle-class American small liberal arts college student, how “formative” it had been for her.
I was looking forward to gaining perspective away from Bowdoin, improving my French, learning about a new culture—you know, living, loving, laughing abroad. “The food!” everyone would rave. “You’re going to just adore French food!” “Thanks!” I’d say, not knowing how to respond.
I got to Paris and my host dad hugged me, asked if I was scared of motorcycles (no), and the two of us promptly zipped off to late-afternoon Vietnamese food in the thirteenth. He and his ex-wife lived together in a loft in the ninth. She cleaned, he cooked. They took me to art exhibits and I posted Facebook photos and I considered staying a year, because it was exciting.
The honeymoon period with Paris wore off, and the excitement stopped shrouding the intense OCD I’ve been dealing with since I can remember. I would post photos on Facebook in front of the Eiffel Tower and at bars and with the kids in my program, who thought I was silly and crazy and fun, but not a real person or something. They would always tell me, “You’re not even real, Phoebe! You’re like, not a real person!” And I’d laugh but be like, well, actually, I am. I looked like I was having fun, but slowly I was becoming kind of miserable.
So one time, I decided to eat lunch alone. It was relaxing. I felt less lonely alone, actually. I started to eat lunch by myself most days—I’d go to a restaurant and treat myself to steak at noon and watch old French people take their lunch breaks to polish off a burger and a beer. But then this sneaky diet I had kind of been on for the past year or so started to keep me company, and soon this exciting preoccupation became consuming and scary and my only friend.
Soon I was eating alone every day, not because I was enjoying my own company anymore but because I didn’t want anyone to call me out on the food choices I was making. There was this store by school that listed the calories in every single item and I would stand there by the cold case for 10 minutes examining every single thing and deciding which I could rationalize eating, and then I would use up my international phone data googling the calories in each food item, too, because one could never be too sure when it came to these things.
When my mom called me to tell me that she had booked a ticket home and it was for tomorrow, I had gotten down to mostly just five major food groups: coffee, sparkling water, cucumbers, radishes, gum. I was always hungry. I was exhausted and headachy and faint and one time I fell in the metro and I almost choked on the celery stick I was eating to will away my hunger pains. I bruised, because I was pretty bony, and I cried and people walked past me. I hated Paris and I hated myself.
Needless to say, none of the things that were supposed to happen in France happened (well, except for Oktoberfest. That was epic.). One day I was starving myself by the Seine and the next I was in a hospital where a dietician named Nicole held a peanut butter and jelly in front of my face and I started to cry. Not in a cute way, but like, really awful tears.
We did a lot of drama therapy with this guy named Doug who’d bring his guitar every Tuesday and then never actually use it. And I spent a lot of time with Nicole, going over my meals and arguing with her about what I had to eat and always losing. And I made friends and got better.The point is this: I worry that we at Bowdoin have a tendency—in all our high-achieving, outwardly squeaky-clean perfectionism—to shroud the rough stuff. And I’m taking the risk of sharing this with you because I still struggle sometimes, and because I can’t preach mental health destigmatization without attempting to destigmatize my own stuff. I care about my Bowdoin community too much to let my own fear of being judged impede my potential to let someone who’s struggling know that they’re not alone.
No matter what you’re going through, or where you’re coming from, know that your struggle is valid, and that there are more people on this campus than you think who know exactly what you’re going through. Let’s talk to each other. You’re not alone.

Talk of the Quad: (Dis)ability

I was called a cripple for the first time during Field Day in fourth grade. I fell during a game of kickball and overheard a group of boys in my class laughing about “when Daisy the cripple lost our class the big game.” Not fully understanding the word that these budding kickball professionals had just used, I returned home and Googled the definition. It didn’t take long to find: “One who is disabled. A social cripple—or, socially deficient.”
I was born 11 weeks premature, and due to brain trauma I have a developmental disorder called Cerebral Palsy. I’m a spastic triplegic—use of my legs and left arm is limited because of stiffness and atrophy, and I have poor balance. If you’ve seen me walking around campus, you’ve probably noticed my affected walking pattern, which makes carrying a cup full of hot coffee a grueling experience. Shoutout to travel mugs and other lidded drink receptacles.
On that day in fourth grade I had just turned 10, and I had never thought of myself as “deficient” in any way; by that age I had already endured multiple muscle-lengthening, bone-rotating orthopedic surgeries, and I actually had quite a rockin’ self esteem. Being faced with my apparent social deficiency was a blow to my fragile prepubescent sense of self. I became increasingly introverted and anxious in unfamiliar social situations. When new people asked why I limp, I’d avert their gaze and mumble about a sprained ankle. I faked sick a lot and laughed along when my friends called things retarded. I spent a lot of time playing the Sims by myself and mentally playing out absurd scenarios where someone found a cure for Cerebral Palsy and I could be “normal.” Being labeled a cripple that day triggered a pretty significant period of my life marked by feelings of incompetence and confusion.
One word created a huge shift in my understanding of myself and the world around me. Maybe I’m conflating typical preteen angst with this one moment—but even today it is a word that stings to hear. Now at age 20, I’m a very different person than I was at 10 or 11. I’m comfortable with my body and understand my strengths and limitations. I look people in the eye when explaining why I walk the way I do. I happily advocate for myself and my needs and don’t mind asking for help. At any given time I’m stressing about 700 other things before I’m stressing about my disability; like any other Bowdoin student, I’m preoccupied with papers, meetings and regretful nights in Baxter basement. One of my favorite comedians/activists Maysoon Zayid said it best in her TedTalk: “I’ve got 99 problems…palsy is just one.”
That being said, there are inherent frustrations to being disabled on this campus. I never use the quad-facing stairway to leave Searles because there is no railing and I stress about getting knocked over when herds of people are trying to get in and out. I get nervous walking alone in the winter in case I fall on ice when no one is around. The idea of navigating Bowdoin with less mobility than I have now is daunting—we’re minimally wheelchair accessible.
Here at Bowdoin, we don’t talk about disability. As a community, we’re engaging in lots of thoughtful dialogue around issues of diversity and inclusion; however, disability issues are continually left out of the conversation. There are fantastic spaces here for students of color, queer students or students of different religious and socioeconomic backgrounds to discuss and share their experiences. Bowdoin lacks this space for students with disabilities, and as a result, moments of ableism go largely unaddressed.
I’ve heard friends call one another cripples after an injury. I’ve heard cripple used in 24 College, which I consider my space of comfort, safety and support on this campus. I’ve heard variations of the word retarded get thrown around without hesitation. When people don’t speak up, the damage of words goes unacknowledged, and ableism ultimately prevails.
As a community, we have progress to make when it comes to acknowledging and supporting the experiences of students with disabilities—whether cognitive, physical, emotional or learning-related. I’ve noticed a fear or hesitancy in people when it comes to talking about disability. With so many questions and uncertainties related to what’s right, wrong or offensive, just starting the conversation can feel like a challenge. If we open ourselves up to asking the tricky clarifying questions (Is it okay to ask someone about their disability? Is retarded the right word to use to describe someone with a mental disability? What qualifies as a disability?), we can learn about the issues together in a way that validates and prioritizes the experience of students with disabilities, while still educating others as to why, say, calling someone a cripple isn’t cool.
We need to talk about the power of words, we need to think about language, and we need to be open to asking the tricky questions that make useful conversations happen. Sometimes the best way to communicate something is just by saying it. So as I finish this piece, feeling a vulnerable power in having shared this part of my life, I hope we start talking about it.
If you are interested and want to get involved with tackling diability issues on campus, contact Daisy Wislar (mwislar@bowdoin.edu), Jacob Russell (jrussell@bowdoin.edu), or Sarah Bonnano (sbonnano@bowdoin.edu).

Talk of the Quad

This piece represents the opinion of the author:

Anastasia Hediger

Contributor

October 2, 2015

“Strong is the New Beautiful.” That is what Nike, and subsequently more and more companies like it have been telling us recently. By us, I mean women and girls across America, where fitness and body image have merged to become a multi-billion dollar industry. I was a pretty big proponent of this campaign until I found myself on the Bowdoin groundskeeping crew this summer.

During the summer 2015 job search, I was paralyzed with indecision, a lack of direction and by the overwhelming ambition of my peers. All I knew was that I did not want to be chained to a desk. By the time April rolled around, “Groundskeeping Crew” was one of the last jobs left on Bowdoin’s employment website. My first thought was Hagrid. And then golf carts. As a person who is happiest when active, the job sounded appealing. I didn’t think too far beyond that before I accepted the job.

During my first morning in the break room, I notice one woman (who I immediately am intimidated by), and the rest are men who are neither amused nor impressed that I am standing there. “Anastasia—trash cans with Jake and Hope.” That was my first assignment.
“What have I done?” repeated in my head throughout the morning. As I got acquainted with the very trash bags around the Quad that I have often, mindlessly dumped crap into, I realized that this would be hard. As friends and classmates passed by with their backpacks on the way to lab, I felt hyper-aware of what this job would mean for me as a girl. I wondered what other people thought as they passed.

Laughs and friendly jabs were the common reaction when I first committed to groundskeeping. I didn’t mind this so much, but it became harder and harder to take myself seriously.

Throughout my initial weeks on the job, I would regularly incorporate words such as “butch” and “manly” into conversations with friends and fellow students about my duties as groundskeeper. I felt the need to discredit why I was doing what I was doing fearing that if I did not, my femininity would be compromised. Because breaking a sweat every day before 7:30 a.m. in my already sweat-stained t-shirt sounds miserable, right?

Well, the truth is that I kind of love breaking a sweat, and getting dirty, and wearing my tattered, mismatched outfit. The trouble was allowing myself to embrace these qualities rather than apologize for them. The more people appeared confused at my attempts to degrade my own job, which I truly was enjoying, the sooner I realized I was the only one fabricating these thoughts. “Why are you embarrassed? I wish I was doing that,” or “Damn, you must be getting so strong.”

I remember rolling out of the Brunswick Apartments at 6:50 a.m. one morning with another female classmate, both rushing to make our early swipe-ins. I immediately noticed her summery, business casual outfit while I wore the same shirt as the day before, knowing it would be wet again soon enough. She said, “I’m so jealous you get to be outside all day!”

That moment I knew I was wrong. Wrong to have used the word “butch” in this context, especially with myself as the target. I was wrong to assume that people needed to hear a justification for my job. This “aha” moment revealed that for years I have been apologizing for not adhering to a certain stereotype—the classic girly stereotype that I felt alien to growing up with broad swimmer shoulders and a hearty appetite. Somehow, the media and my own experiences led me to believe this discrepancy was a negative thing.

Those days of self-consciously feeling like Rambo as I whacked the weeds in front of Admissions as tours passed by grew into days of gratitude for the beautiful weather and for my more-than-capable body. I felt less alone in the predominately male crew of burly groundskeepers, and more so as an integrated member who could proudly keep up with them (trash talk included).

In hindsight, as out of place as I felt in the beginning, not one of the crewmembers batted an eye or saw reason for gender accommodations. My perception was too clouded with what a girl “should” be doing to notice that I was as in place as I could’ve been.

The fact that society has to grant women permission to feel both muscular and beautiful at the same time, by way of ad campaigns and merchandise, is counter-productive and maybe a little hypocritical. I am sure that I am not the only girl whose self-esteem has been founded upon a misalignment with some public archetype, especially an archetype that is constantly shifting.
Accepting yourself for what you like to do—without even thinking to apologize—is the first step to finding what makes you beautiful.

Strong is beautiful, but so are a lot of things; so how about we just start saying “Do what you want, ladies.” Now that’s hot.

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