The 8th Of March. A Story About Women & Tech.

I think, since the #meetoo movement, women have started to be a little more united. Hurray us! I was kind of starting to get annoyed about our bitchiness and the proverbial men’s union against … well, pretty much anything.

But I am also a bit bugged because I feel that we, women of former communist countries, have been robbed by the 8th of March, women/mothers’ day celebration. When I lived in Germany and I demanded (yes, demanded, cuz post-communist Romania taught me that if I want to get something, I have to ask for it) recognition during this day, people looked the other way, saying this is an Eastern block celebration and I should get my shit together and celebrate this day with the rest of the West. I can’t seem to remember when that correct celebration was, however.

So I did throw up a little bit in my mouth with all the somewhat forced women unification yesterday, but then again, I am sure I was not the only one.

In the title I mentioned technology. This is a post about saying goodbye to a dear friend of mine.

And no, nobody died. Yet. Just passed from being my everyday support to living in a box and maybe donate its parts sometime in the future.

You guessed it. It’s my laptop, Jimmy.

The consumerist that I am, I got terribly excited at the news that I will own a brand spanking new machine to attend to my every whim.

But then it hit me. Jimmy has been with me for the past 9 years.

Granted he has received some cosmetic implants of RAM and transplant of SSD, on the outside he still is … well, Jimmy. With a large scratch on the back, he became very trendy ever since I saw Sergei Polunin’s artificial scratches. The non-retina resolution, that made all websites look bigger than they actually were, created a bond. Since I am a blind bat without my glasses, it seemed pretty unfair to judge.

His hesitation or lag in opening applications or performing processes didn’t put me off one bit. It merely reminded me of how massively unfriendly and therefore slow I am in the morning, without my coffee. Or how once I fell asleep on the toilet in the middle of the night. If I was allowed to do that, why shouldn’t Jimmy be?

And the last of it, throughout my world travels, Jimmy has stood by me, much through drops and kicks and falls. All of them completely accidental, of course. He truly is one hell of a resistant laptop! And this too reminds me a little of myself and the hoops I went through.

So you can understand my mixed feelings about getting a new laptop. Because the old laptop has become me. And then bam!

How much of a woman am I?! Naming a piece of machine, making excuses for it, drawing parallels between it and a person … Totally Lorelai Gilmore, right? Right?

One last bam! I promise.

I did celebrate 8th of March, but in my own way, by being who I am, ridiculously caring about a piece of hardware, and digging out moments we shared. There is beauty in being a woman, but it’s not the instant gratification of nice curves and wavy hair. It’s not even about what comes out of my brain through my mouth or hands. It’s about the subtle mark I leave on the world.

Instead of being united in the name of a day, most people didn’t even acknowledge till recently, we should be united in our grace with which we embrace the world.