Posts

Creative Trauma: Patriarchy Within the Workplace

Image
Photo credit: Better Homes and Gardens I am learning to thrive through the trauma.  I graduated from college in May of 2009. Our country was still in the process of stabilizing itself after the devastating market crash in 2008. I had student loans to pay off, so finding a job was my first priority. And there were not a lot of them to choose from. I took the first job that I was offered. Even though it was a student position, had zero benefits, and paid me $10/hr. I didn’t care, it was a job and it helped pay my bills.  And it was a great job, apart from the lack of benefits and terrible pay. I spent my days cataloging original artwork for the Review and Herald Publishing Association (may it rest in peace). I was getting to photograph all the artwork that many of us remember from The Bible Stories, Uncle Arthur’s Bedtime Stories, My Bible Friends , and all the other books and magazines that we had grown up reading. When I started working there, the art vault was in serious disa...
Post a Comment
Read more

Trauma

Image
photo credit: istockphoto.com The thing about trauma is that stuff you thought you had dealt with, has a way of finding its way back to the surface. The election results yesterday shattered something that had long been buried. I was back in that board room, getting screamed at by one of the marketing guys. The book cover I had designed had missed the mark. I was told later that he was having a bad day and I should cut him some slack. Because obviously, that is what mattered. Not the verbal abuse that I had just endured.  I left that meeting. Went back to my office, closed the door, and burst into tears. No one stopped him from unleashing his verbal assault. No one told him to leave the room and not come back until he cooled down. No one told him to apologize.  That day I learned, yet again, that women within our society (and especially the Adventist Church) were not valued. It was fine if we wanted to be secretaries or some other low level job. But we were supposed to stay sma...
Post a Comment
Read more

This is my grief

Image
Copyright 2024 by Emily Bowen, all rights reserved The grief is strong like the death of a friend Today I mourn for what we have lost We failed our daughters and ourselves     We let hate win            But we are not going back  That is why I am allowing myself to grieve      Because I have already walked through this darkness          I have seen personally what happens when people put a man above God               I have felt the despair and the anguish I did not leave my former church because I wanted to      I was pushed out            By the pastor and those that supported him    The act of leaving cost me everything      It took away my church family           It took away friendships               ...
Post a Comment
Read more