TheBanyanTree: Gender specific stamp purchase with USPS

[tobie at shpilchas.net]

It’s Friday, January 3st, 2020


Hello and Happy New Year to all us wildly fabulous people,

	Yesterday, I was filling out a form online at the USPS (United States Postal Service).  I’m running low on stamps. Where one supplies identifying information, the boxes to fill are standard fare. First box: the prefix of your name. I was given a choice:

Mr.
Mrs.
Ms.
Miss

	There may have been Dr., Rev., etc. But I forget because I was moved to feel sorry for Poor Little Mister.  He only gets one choice, which is to say, no choice at all, while we females get, Mrs., Ms. Miss as well as Dr., Rev, etc.  To be fair, this is not from privilege. Originally, the choice was either Miss or Mrs., the point being to indicate marital status. In other words: Lady, who is the somebody that owns you -- Your parent or guardian, or your husband? Somebody has to be responsible for you, dear. It’s not like a female is a free agent. The male of the species need not reveal his dependence on parent or guardian, nor his legal attachment to a spouse or unattachment thereof.   He is simply, "Mr.," with all the rights and privileges awarded at birth. Very convenient in the service of the wandering eye should his legal status perturb him one evening.  Women were also the only ones required to wear a wedding ring, the mark of the husband’s ownership — a bit of visible subservience. However, the wedding ring certainly is a sociological and anthropological advancement over the nose ring and chain, the shackles or the logo from the family branding iron.

	In the last forty - fifty years or so, it’s become standard for both parties to wear a wedding ring. I remember my second husband complaining that he didn’t want to have to wear a wedding ring; rings bothered him, felt uncomfortable on his fingers.  "Okay," I agreed. "We won’t wear rings." That bothered him. No. I should wear a wedding ring. He finally gave his assent for both of us to wear a locket around our necks.

	All right here, let me not lose track of my fun time online at the USPS stamp store.  So the form required a prefix or title to the name. I selected, "Ms. Tobie H.," (one is allowed only the initial for middle name) Shapiro. But then there was an optional box to fill in for a suffix to the name. The choices were:

Senior (Sr.)
Junior (Jr.), then
II
III
IV. 

	I don’t think there was an option for V.  I thought this was a shabby treatment for possible suffixes. Only Senior, Junior followed by a few generations? 

	O! Ooo! This affords me a fine opportunity to entertain you with one of the finer discoveries resulting from a foray into the Oakland phone book.  This was back when phone books could be used as booster seats for your young tykes (Jr.? II? III? IV?) or step stool to reach the top shelf — especially should you live in New York City where the phone books got a marker on the doorpost with the rest of the kids to chart their yearly growth.  Another, more glorifying use of the grand old phone books, before the tragic arrival and dominance of the cell phone, was as a prop employed to demonstrate the awesome and intimidating strength of a muscle man:

	Thod Guggers, the strongest man on earth, will now tear the New York City phone book in half with his bare hands! Drum roll, please!!

	Now, in the post "smart"- phone world, phone books are getting thinner and thinner. They are, in fact, nothing short of puny — pamphlets.  Not impressive at all.

	Thod Guggers, Jr., son of the former strongest man on earth, will now tear the New York City phone brochure in half with one bare hand!!

	Circling back to the star studded names I discovered in the Oakland phone book, long ago, when phone books were phone books and men were gods  —  a romp through metropolitan phone books was one of my favorite sources of delight.  I’ve collected the names that thrill. In this case, demonstrating these particular names provides more than mere entertainment. There is more meaty stuff here. We can contemplate the possible motives for slapping this name on a child. But should we also consider ethnic influence? Sub-cultural familial imperatives? Perhaps benign bad taste?  Yes.  Well.  Back in the early 1980s, I culled this fabulous name. I can even see it on the page — middle column, left side of the two page spread, about a third of the way down the page:

Dr. Harold D. Puckeylowe

	Poor Harold!  On the other hand, he did have that celebrated and respected, "Dr.," prefix before the personal problem.  But then my eyes caught sight of an unexpected treat. Right below Dr. Harold D. Puckeylowe was:

Dr. Harold D. Puckeylowe, II

	Yes. They did it again. 

	Here is my thought, the thought that sprang to mind while registering on the USPS site — a new suffix that really needs to be elevated to standard use. I will use my own name to illustrate:

Ms. Tobie H. Shapiro, PTSD



	Like I said  —  Happy New Year



Love,

Tobie
in Berkeley, California



























At my first meeting of the faculty wives club of the University of California at Berkeley way back pre post feminism:

Other wife looking at my name tag: Hello.  What does your husband do?

I: I’m a musician.

Other wife:  No.  I asked, "what does your husband do?"

I:  He married a musician.





Tobie Helene Shapiro
tobie at shpilchas.net <mailto:tobie at shpilchas.net>