Society Defying Relationships In The Help And My Relationship With My Maid

In “The Help”, we see many instances of close, society defying relationships and many instances of distant, society conforming relationships. This is shown mainly with Aibileen and Mae Mobley and Skeeter and Constantine. Whilst these two examples are two close, society defying relationships and so is mine, many people in this part of the world don’t have my relationship with their maids.

Mae Mobley and Skeeter are both white girls raised by black maids that they grew to love and considered their real mothers. This is something that’s very typical as when a baby spends more time with another person than their own mother, they begin to consider said person as their actual mother. This is a common occurrence during a baby’s development. My mother was very scared that this would happen with me when I was born. Not because she was racist, but because she didn’t want me considering my maid as a mother instead of her. Therefore, she tried her best to be there for me more than the maid.

Even though she tried to not let my maid raise me instead of her, I still grew to have a good relationship with her. As said in the interview, my maid feels like and considered family. It is a mutual feeling of worker and employer. Sadly, many other cannot say the same for themselves. Whether due to racist beliefs and thoughts towards maids, superiority complexes, etc. , it’s just very hard to find a family with a good relationship with their workers such as mine.

My relationship with my maid is much like Mae Mobley’s and Skeeter’s. While I was wasn’t necessarily literally raised by them, I have spent much of my life with them all around me 24/7. I’ve become very good friends with almost all of my maids; to the point where I occasionally just sit and have a chat with them for an hour or two about whatever. Since I was raised by a mother who cared for me, I never needed my maids to tell me things I needed to hear, such: I’m smart, nice, handsome, etc. Unfortunately, Mae Mobley had to have that happen because their mothers weren’t there for them. But all that never stopped me from loving my maids who might not have raised me, but definitely played a major part in my upbringing.

Fortunately, my maids have had better lives than most and so have I due to their major influences on my upbringing. I’m thankful for each and every one that helped raised me and that I got to have a good relationship in a world where most people treat their workers like dirt to this day.