Evolution of a Species

Gender stereotypes dog us. Men use hammers, women use potato mashers. Men repair cars, women repair broken fingernails. Women go to the bathroom at restaurants together, men pee with strangers. Women empathise, men show by example. Men BBQ, women bake. Woof.

Hmmm. Well, last Monday, over Thanksgiving dinner with friends, some stereotypes were happily ignored. Sure, a lot of the meal was cooked by the woman of the house, but the man of another house brought over a pie, a cheesecake, a mess of biscuits and some home-made butter. His wife just sat there, sipping her wine and beaming. And the men cleared the table and washed the dishes. That did not happen in my family when I was a girl.

Three cheers for small, incremental, geologically insignificant, but nonetheless encouraging social changes.