George and Norah
The bulk of the use of imagery in the narrative is devoted to describing the married couples who make up the focus group of the research into the issue. These couples come from across the country and each with their own specific backgrounds but are united by the fact that one spouse came from a blue-collar background and the other from a white-collar background. It is in the specifics of their stories that imagery is utilized to the fullest effect:
“George married Norah, a gregarious and proudly nerdy woman with big glasses and a penchant for reading. She was raised by a father who presided over laboratories at a large hospital and a mother who spent her time trying to keep up with the upper-class fashions in their neighborhood. Unlike George, Norah grew up with access to balls and galas, music lessons and museums, as well faraway vacations.”
The Most Common Complaint
The most common complaint unifying the wives of these couples—regardless of whether they are the blue-collar or white-collar spouse is the lack of help offered their lazy husbands when it comes to helping with cleaning the house. The research shows that the patriarchal attitude toward domestic chores within a marriage is still firmly in place. Or, perhaps, it just shows that a whole lot of husbands worthless lazy bums who need to get off those bums a bit more and start acting like real men:
“`When we first bought the house, I was doing all of the cleaning, and Kevin was watching a lot of football. And I was like, this is a bunch of B.S.' Kevin would not do more household work and instead recommended that they hire a woman to clean their home. This worked until their finances changed, and they could no longer afford to pay others to clean their house. Ten years later, Mia, now a stay-at-home mother, again tried to prompt Kevin to do what she considered a fairer share of cleaning but found herself failing: `Just last week we had a discussion and I said, since we’re both home…I don’t think I should be doing all of the cleaning. You could clean the master bathroom. I am still waiting for him to clean the master bathroom.”
Class and Emotions
The author’s research (which is, admittedly, quite open to questioning) suggests that class plays a bigger role in the emotional psychology of people than gender. Those who come from blue-collar backgrounds tend to be more open and expression as well as impulsive when it comes to making decisions. On the other hand, those from white-collar backgrounds are fundamental more reserved, less open to naked demonstrations of emotions, and far more likely to make a more carefully considered decision based on their emotional impulsive. All of these research elements are expressed in a white-collar husband’s analysis of the divergence between his father and his father-in-law:
“Her [blue-collar] dad is wide open emotionally. A wonderful person who just wants you to like him. Very considerate of other people . . . He’s just a really nice guy. Very emotional, cries at various things. Cried at my mom’s funeral. Cries if he talks about his daughters and his grandson. He’ll start to get teary. My father believes showing emotion is a sin. He’s just a very closed person.”
White Collar Planning
White-collar environments produce managerial spouses who like to plan, organize and generally suck the life out of what those raised in blue-collar environments call the zest of living. While surely there must be something to say for carefully planning impulsive behavior, the blue-collar crowd as a general rule simply can’t understand this rigid desire to remove all surprises from daily existence. As white-collar husband Ian explains about the difference between his mom and wife Isabelle’s mom:
“My mom, she’s very planned out. So she’ll start talking to us three weeks before we’re going to go visit and telling us about the menus that she’s picked out and exactly who’s going to sleep where and ‘Well, I’ve got this air mattress. I think it’s going to be okay. If that doesn’t work out, I’ve got this back up plan…Whenever we visit Isabelle’s mom, it’s like we never know when we’re supposed to go where, and there are many times when it’s not clear if we need to go get dinner ourselves or if she’s going to make it.”
