Hard-wired for the Headship of My Own Husband

One of the stories that my parents like best to remember of my childhood is the time when I was about the age Dumpling is now--seven--and took a plane to see one of my two sets of out-of-state grandparents. Apparently, something I said caused quite a stir amongst my two very liberated parents in the mid-70s. I can't say that I have a vivid recollection of the day, but when my parents spelled out the story to me 25 years later, I did sense a memory of a perception.

Does that make sense?

I think I remember how I felt...or I can almost step back into my 7-year-old self and know what I was thinking.

What was this crazy statement that so desperately needed correction, redirection, worry, and concern?

"When I grow up, I want to be a stewardess."

Well, actually, that wasn't the word that rocked Dad's world. See, to that, my dad interjected that, "you could be the pilot if you wanted to be."

But, of course, I couldn't think of one single reason why I should...want to, that is.

I answered his noble attempt at raising the son he never had by saying, "No, Daddy! The boys drive the plane; the girls serve the food."

Yeah. That did not go over well at all.

But I don't regret it. I think I know what I was feeling at the time. Having no ideas about money and status, careers and glass ceilings, I simply recognized the woman's "role" as the one to want. I mean, think about it: while the pilot was stuck sitting still and cramped in a tiny little closet for hours doing all the tedious button-pushing, the stewardess got to dress up pretty, she got to see and be seen, and she got to do fun stuff like offer pillows and serve the sodas.

What's not to like about that when you're a 7-year-old girl?

And despite their best efforts to talk it, walk it, and despise it out of me, my parents were not ultimately successful in raising a feminist.

Oh, don't get me wrong. I spent a fair number of years in the work-a-day world trying to be a feminist--thinking I was a feminist--mostly because that was the default setting in the 80s and 90s--without the finesse gained by maturity, I embarrassed myself with requisite shrill demands for "equal pay for equal work."

But you know what? Surprise! I never got it. I only got what every other foot-stomping, loud-mouthed, demanding, pedantic woman with a chip on her shoulder ever got: asked to leave.

Anyway, the interesting part of this memory for me is not that I used to think that the stewardess was the job to want, but that I still do. Well, no, I don't actually want to go out and get the job of a (I guess the p.c. term these days is) flight attendant. But the point is that the job of the stewardess is the servant job--the nurturing role, the caretaker requiring a measure of compassion. And I'm hard-wired that way; all women are. We were created for the distinct purpose of helping and keeping company with our husband, if we have one.

Even the secular world "gets that" with that landmark quote from the man to his estranged wife, "You complete me."

So, how is it that being deemed the completer--the weaker vessel--has become a shame to women?

In the garden, during the doling out of the curses, of course.

God cursed the serpent to slither on the ground and eat dirt all his days for his place in the fall. And snakes still do, indeed slither, don't they?

He cursed the man to work hard, and with frustration pick through thorns and thistles to get his food by the sweat of his brow. My husband's garden is overrun with all manner of unwelcome growth at this late date in the season, as a testament.

And to the woman was assigned the consequence of a painful childbirth (and some teach pregnancy and rearing as well) and...the clincher...an inherent need to be in charge over their husband, all the while being ruled by them according to God's ordination.

It's all there in Genesis 3. And if God says it, that's good enough for me.

But wait! Isn't it just like our Father to temper what we deserve with grace and mercy? Jesus came here to show us what headship is to look like. It isn't oppressive if you look at it through the filter of His Word.

God's ways are a delight. His yoke is easy. Headship--or "patriarchy" as it is called in some circles--is protective, and orderly and beautiful. But it will forever be misunderstood, scoffed at, and mocked by the world.

Expect it from them. I do.

But Christians?