HOW OUR GENDER IS IMPOSED ON US What makes us who we are? Is it the clothes we wear or the toys we played with while we were children? Maybe? Or maybe it’s the people and the environment we grew up around? Most people would say that all these characterists would be true, and I’d agree. But if you really think hard about what makes you, YOU, then you’d realize that there is so much more than what meets the eye. Let’s take a look into my life to see what made me the “masculine” person I am today.I can remember back to when I was about five or six years old. Outside playing in the dirt in the front lawn of our house. My pants would have holes in the knees; I’d be surrounded by toys like cars, trucks, and little action figurine models (G.I. Joes). I even had a toy lawn care set that came equipped with a rake and some other tools. When my dad would mow the lawn I would always use my toy rake to rake all the grass clippings into neat little piles and once I was done I would bag them all up. This is my first memory of something that would define the “masculine” gender. I mean honestly, how many girls do you know that played with toy lawn care sets. Now I know there are a few exceptions, but for the most part boys played with cars, trucks, action figures and things like that while girls played with dollhouses, dolls, and make-up kits. Even the holes in the knees of my pants are something of the masculine nature.Where we lived there was this big old red torn down barn. Like, one half of the barn was up, while the other half had collapsed years ago. Anyways, I can remember wanting so badly to go into the barn and explore to see what was in there. But I never did. It was supposedly too dangerous. I was always an adventurous person. Going hiking, swimming in the water hole, or just wondering around in the woods were always something I would do. This, in my belief relates back to the male insti...
