The woman needs to be dusted!

There is, in my museum, a certain mannequin. Pictures of her have been posted by a friend, Beth, on facebook, if anyone cares to look her up. She is a hunched-over old woman, with a small scrunched up face, and hands warped from too much hard labor. She carries with her some sort of farming tool over her shoulder with one hand, and a giant basket that she could probably fit in herself in the other. She is the image of a slave on a rice plantation in the low country (which is in the Carolinas), in an exhibit on the matter. She is shamefully dusty. Across the room from her are two little slave girl mannequins in a fake farmhouse place. They carry on the same recorded dialogue all day long, wherein they discuss their lives as slaves to give our visitors a deeper understanding of it. At the end of their dialogue they sing a song. It is not possible to put into words the feelings this song brings out in me. My headquarters in the museum are inside this exhibit, so every morning on my way in to work I walk past the two girls and the woman. Right outside the door to my headquarters is another door, an emergency door. Now, we all, as sensible people, know what happens when we open emergency doors. An alarm goes off, right? Unfortunately for us in my department, the delivery people don't seem to realize this and nearly every morning they choose to make deliveries through this door, setting off the alarm. So, as a result, every morning on my way in to work, as I draw nearer to my area, I begin to hear the strains of a familiar - and somewhat despicable - medley, wherein the whiney voices of the mannequins singing, "no more auction block for me, no more, no more....many thousands gone" combines with a shrill beeping followed by the automated words, "exit now", and I find that that is all I want to do. Hearing that combination of sounds triggers inside me a strong impulse to exit now and run from the building, or at least set up shop in some other part of it. Why can't the delivery people be taught a different route? Why, I ask? Why? Why? Sometimes we flip a switch and silence the little girls. Their song is just so ingraining and misery-filled. It's just plain depressing to have to hear it so often. Every morning on my way out to straighten the stansions and fill the brochures, I stop by the mannequin of the old woman, whom alone among the things on that morning walk I dearly love, and I vow to her that someday I will make them dust her. "They vacuum the bison," I say, "They swiffer Dumbo. You too have rights and should be dusted!" I feel a connection with that mannequin, and can only hope that one of my other fellow workers, who have often heard my complaints about the dusty woman, will carry on my work now that I have departed.
Yes, indeed, yesterday was my last day of work at the museum. I fly home the day after tomorrow. I have enjoyed working here and I love the people I work with, but I am very excited to go home before heading back off to school for the fall. And to the old dusty woman, who will never read this, I say that she should always remember her rights to be dusted, even if I am not there to daily remind her. One day, I am sure, she will sit at the welcome table. One day, I am sure, she too will be dusted and vacuumed, and given the respect she deserves as an item in the museum equal to the bison, though perhaps still less than Dumbo. One day, I am sure, justice will be achieved, and the old woman shall, at last, be clean.