WHEN SUSPICIOUSNESS BECOMES VALIDATING

This misogynistic society will almost drive you crazy as a young woman constantly challenging her own thought processes. 

I'm seated at the edge of a clean, dry gutter two streets away from my house, still within the estate. I'm there because, by the time I returned from town, house fellowship was already being held in my home and I did not care to be a part of the gathering. So I quietly made a U-turn at the door and headed back for the street. Found a quiet spot with good shade at the gutter.

This man drives past me in an old-model Camry, but not without looking me over first. I ignore him and focus on my phone.

He drives past me again on his return with a woman at the front passenger seat, and they both gaze conspicuously at me as their car passes. Still, I refuse to acknowledge them.

A few minutes later, they're driving towards me again,  this time, actually easing the car into a halt right in front of me, and then, rather condescendingly, the man asks me who I am and why I'm seated where I am.

I tell him I live on the estate, at the next street, and I'm just relaxing at the cool spot.

He says I can't, because he doesn't know me, and they don't allow strangers to loiter around. HE HAS A VALID POINT. But I don't like him very much, so I don't wait for him to finish his statement before I haul my ass. I'm not about to dignify him with a prolonged verbal exchange.

As I leave, I hear the owner of the house at whose front I had been sitting try to intervene by saying he knows my family and me. No point, though. They can eat their street. Besides, I hear the man in the old Camry tell the other man that he was only being security-conscious as I might have been a spy, or someone sent on a sinister mission. 

First, I laugh at the unlikelihood of it. Mr Old Camry is probably just trying to cook up an excuse for his condescending attitude.

But then again, I wonder if I am not enabling the subtle misogyny that ostensibly dismisses the capacity of a woman's mind to devise devious schemes. 

Why do I think MOC is being dramatic about his concerns. Am I so inconsequential a human being that I can't be a potential threat in a quiet neighbourhood? Because if this is true, then the flip side would also be unarguably correct: that I am too inconsequential as a young woman to be seen as a potential advantage to society.

So now, I'm walking back home feeling ambivalent about the entire experience. I'm unsure whether to be angry at MOC's assumption (which was uncalled for; I was the prettiest, most innocent-looking lady you could have seen that day, with my shiny locs and skimpy dress), or to wear my being suspect proudly like a badge of honour, for it means I matter in some way; good or bad.

Have you ever felt this way before?