Caterwauling

What a treat — religion AND abortion are my subjects of the day so far! What next, my little chickadees? Do you not KNOW how much rage a menstruating woman is capable of spewing?!?!

Today’s fury is sponsored by the WaPo article, Antiabortion Proposals Advance in Va.: House Committee Backs Parental Consent Bill, Ban on Late-Term Procedure.

Tell me something, did the County of Allegheny, in the City of Pittsburgh, forget to brand it on my birth certificate, next to the “female” part, that my body is property of the U.S. government? You know, when I found myself at the crossroads in June 2001 whether or not to have an abortion, I didn’t hear any men — especially the one whose seed I was carrying — shouting and crying for me to keep the pregnancy intact for the full nine months. Oh, hell no. Yet the men in government and in anti-abortion groups keep on insisting that we serve the role of baby factories for society. And while, yes, I know I was/am blessed to have a healthy and fertile reproductive system, my decision was a difficult one that boiled down to not having the right financial and emotional supports.

I’d just started a brand-new job that was exceptionally demanding of my time and energy. And the daddy lived 350 miles away with his own two children. Tried the Depo-Provera route. That route failed. Tried the, “Hey, come out and live with me. I’ll work and you can start a new life out here,” thing. That failed. Then tried the “OK, so who’s paying for this?” route (He’d volunteered, “I’ll go halfsies.” Which he didn’t. Nor did I ever see him again, although we maintain a distant IMing relationship from time to time.) Disapointment again. I paid for it — financially, physically, emotionally. And for all the pain, I made the right decision … and I am glad that the decision was there for me to even make.

And as far as late-term procedures, while I certainly don’t favor them, it’s unavoidable. I have a friend who has a daughter with a terminal illness, and the illness was predicted to occur in any future female child she would bear. She went on — with great trepidation — to go through with two more pregnancies. Both were boys, which was a relief to that family. Because if it were a girl and it showed up during the late-natal stages that she would have this illness, there would have been a decision to make about bringing another sickly child into the world. And while their daughter is beautiful and spunky and sweet, she’s also dying. And would that family really want to lose two children that way? I don’t know, and thankfully, they won’t have to know, but again — they still would have had a choice on how to handle their situation.

On Pure as the Driven Slush, Heather wrote the most heartbreaking entry about abortion on Jan 22, and she is to be commended for her openness and honesty. She and I both would probably not choose that route again, but we acknowledge that we acted in everyone’s best interests the first time. I mean, sure I could have gone through with the pregnancy at the new job, and then given the child up for adoption, but does anyone have any idea what kind of stigma goes with women when they do that? That “there must be something wrong with her” or “she must’ve known she was knocked up when she interviewed, but didn’t tell anyone.” Or, worse, “How’s your baby? Oh, you don’t have it anymore? Ouch. Sorry!”

Not to mention the changes your body goes through. Even though I terminated early, at the six-week mark, my body felt different, as though I had stepped into someone else’s skin. I was fortunate to have no traces of morning sickness (although I’ve had friends who threw up four times a day, no matter what time of day it was). But I was so damned sleepy all the time, I had a perpetual nipple hard-on, and my mind was racing. And I was so friggin’ horny, I couldn’t stand myself. My body felt as though it were on hyper-alert — my skin was super-sensitive to light, heat, cold, etc. And it also felt like it had been beaten up — everything was so tender. If I were such a wimp for those initial weeks, could you see me in labor? Gaaah!

Add to the fact that I worked for a child welfare agency, where moms in the system were beating and neglecting their kids and where, in that same system, my tax dollars were going to pay for their sundries, when I couldn’t even afford a bag of diapers for my own potential child. Yeah. The system’s not fair, and unfortunately, idiots will continue to reproduce like rabbits, while more upright citizens like me will continue terminating pregnancies until we are financially and emotionally ready for the challenges of rearing a family. I wasn’t ready then. I still am not. But I will be. In the meantime, I will keep hoping that whatever protection I use doesn’t fail again.

Heather has learned how to perform an herbal abortion, for if/when our precious 30-year-old Roe v. Wade is overturned by these marauding assholes who claim to want to protect life (yeah, let’s look up how many of them are behind on their child support payments!). I think I may just have to remember this, because like her, while I would never outright encourage anyone to go through that procedure, if that’s what they feel they need to do, well, then, they deserve to have the choice that I was very grateful to have been able to make for myself. I remember when I did it, I sent a thank-you note to Planned Parenthood, stating, “And I did it when George W. Bush was in office! Wow! Who’d have thought that?!?!”

From the article. …“After the committee vote, a hopeful Black said “this is the first step. . . . This bill, if enacted and signed by the governor, will save more lives than any law that has ever been passed since 1619.”

Two thoughts:

1. This comes from people who look the other way every time an attack on a clinic or doctor occurs, and

2. This comes from the state that is behind only Texas in executions.

Not that I oppose executions — I’m totally in favor of offing the violent criminals who are kept alive by my tax monies. And likewise, although I do call myself a Democrat, I have some very anti-liberal stances, such as using that same tax money as an incentive for people to (ab)use the TANF (public welfare) system. And by bringing more unwanted children into this world, these folks who shouldn’t be parents are at risk for abusing their kids or are simply regaled to staying at home full-time to raise them, with no viable means of support except for federal programs that should be funnelled into our other domestic efforts (such as getting the homeless off the streets or improving care for the elderly or making the Veterans’ Hospitals less of a disgrace) or into torching bin Laden’s and Hussein’s asses once and for all.

This is a subject that should be battled out by women. Sure, you guys contribute the sperm, and you’re genetically programmed to sow your seed and to ensure that you have future generations. And if you’re ready to handle the commitment of being a father — or at least the commitment to the financial upbringing of any child you assist in creating — I would love to bestow the world’s highest honor upon you. Likewise, I have seen too many teen-agers carry a pregnancy to full-term because they were too ashamed to tell their parents about it before they started showing, which meant that they had passed the deadline to receive a safe and legal surgical abortion. So then they went on to squirt out one, two … up to seven munchkins (yes, I have seen this happen to a girl before she was 25), because in their societies, you are taught to take care of your own — that you don’t “give up” your child to another family. Particularly, as Heather pointed out, if the child isn’t “lily-white,” your chances of adopting them out isn’t all that good, anyway.

Furthermore, these scared young girls might be the products of abuse themselves, looking for love in the arms of a scrawny 14-year-old boy with braces and an erection. These are the girls who leave their babies in dumpsters and toilet stalls — they had nowhere they could turn, and couldn’t get the required consent from their parents or permission from a judge (a judge! would you have gone to a judge if you were a scared, knocked-up teen?). I’m not claiming that abortion should be a fundamental right, but it should be an accessible option for anyone who might need it.

At any rate, I am pro-choice and will always be. I am pro-firearms, even if I don’t choose to take advantage of my right to buy one. But I am still glad that the choice is there for me. Likewise, you don’t have to take advantage of a law or a right or a statute to appreciate it. While I will be the first to admit that abortion is the worst form of birth control available (especially for those who use it three or more times), I will also stand firmly beside my belief that everyone’s entitled to a “get out of jail free” card. And for many of us, abortion was that ticket to saving us from doing long-term damage … to ourselves, to taxpayers, to the fertilized egg itself.

And for the record, why don’t we get the assholes who bomb clinics (which, by the way, provide top-notch gynecological services and free contraceptives, in addition to the other surgical services — I had many a pap smear at my friendly neighborhood Planned Parenthood when I didn’t have health insurance) to make bombs to drop on Iraq? We’re spending too much money fighting what doesn’t appeal to us instead of turning the situation in our favor.

Decided to call off sick today — I’m going to actually try to eat today, despite my case of ebola or typhoid or whatever I have, and would like to have a bathroom within barfing distance –but since I’m up, I thought I’d catch up on some blog reading. Just a thought — since my sickness started on Superbowl Sunday, does that mean I have the Super-E-bowl-a Virus? (kill me. …)

Krempasky had an interesting link that I followed, which led me to Hit & Run and eventually to the New York Times’ story Archbishop of Newark Bans Eulogies at Masses. Essentially, the Archdiocese of Newark, Archbishop John J. Myers has banned eulogies by relatives and friends during funeral masses, and it seems that the Hit & Run site supports this decision.

The article goes on to report that a single eulogy by a loved one of the deceased will be accepted, but that’s the limit, as well as that they are encouraged to do the eulogy thing during visitation rather than at services. “The new policy appears to be stricter than that called for by the Order of Christian Funerals, the national church’s Vatican-approved guidelines. The order says that a friend or family member can speak after communion and before the final procession.

“News of the ban, first reported (Jan. 22) in The Record of Hackensack, N.J., was welcomed by priests who favor refocusing on the mysteries of the faith rather than on the deceased’s love of the Jets or penchant for domestic beer.”

Hit & Run noted his belief that, without such restrictions, “This attitude reduces the priest to a functionary whose job is to help cheer up mourning people, and they’d obviously prefer to be thought of as the gatekeepers of purgatory. But it’s the consumer who calls the shots.”

**climbing on soapbox, hoping it doesn’t cave in …**

Yer damn right the consumer calls the shots. Having attended more funerals (otherwise known as family reunions in my clan) than China has rice, I have seen entirely too many of my very non-religious departed family members being bashed into the ground with a Bible. That wasn’t them during their lives, so it was out-of-place at best. Yet, if that’s what made their kids feel better, then that’s what their kids did.

And as far as eulogies, I have given a eulogy at the last three funerals I’ve attended, and I’ve written every last one of them myself. If I loved somebody enough to want to express my love in one final, public way, don’t take that right away from me. Granted, if the family truly had to pick ONE person to deliver the final goodbye, it would undoubtedly be me, as I am descended from a number of Pittsburgh rednecks who (outside of my mom, grandfather and one cousin), pronounce my new homeland as Wa(r)shington, D.C., so you get the picture that I am the literate one of the bunch. heh.

At any rate, though, my beloved great-aunt Lenna passed away a few years ago this week, and you never heard so many people get up to speak about the way she touched their lives. And while oceans of tears were cried during that time, those eulogies (mine included) gave other guests a special glimpse at yet another side of this dynamic woman, with every speaker who approached the podium. As one of the youngest relatives in attendance, I got to hear decades-old stories told with affection and clarity, giving me an added perspective on how very blessed this dysfunctional family was to count her as its blood relative.

I guess my real chagrin would be if my grandmother’s funeral in 1999 would have been dictated by religion. Gram was a fallen-away Catholic, and was against the church as well as my Bible-thumping great-uncle Ronnie, who can’t form an original thought because he’s always quoting Scripture (this same man bashes homosexuals and interracial relationships, yet has a lesbian daughter and a white niece married to an African-American gentleman). At any rate, when my grandmother died, mom felt it would be best to introduce *some* form of religion to the services, so we found a Roman Catholic priest who was liberal and open to me writing the eulogy (I couldn’t deliver it — too devastated). Before he read it, he joked with the crowd that he hadn’t read it, so be prepared for anything. 🙂 The crowd knew me as the one who spent my life pushing everybody’s buttons, so everyone kinda braced themselves for anything. But what I wrote was acceptable … and appropriate … and I also buried her with the eulogy, as well as with several trinkets that were important to her during her final years of life.

And as far as religion, well, we invited religion to the service, but we didn’t ask it to be the guest star. And per Hit & Run, perhaps we did reduce the priest’s role to someone who “cheered up mourning people,” but guess what? That is what we needed him to do. We had a very small graveside service — no visitations except for immediate family — and no church. Guess what, kids — funerals are expensive. Every hour that you clock in the funeral home is charged. Every trip around the city with the casket costs time in the hearse. Every visitation is billed on the half-hour, so the more visitations you have (auspiciously to have your pre-burial eulogies) cost you more and more. Funerals today cost as much as the weddings of yesterday, and I can count on dying much more certainly than I can depend on ever getting married.

At any rate, I admit to being non-religious, so someone with religion may feel differently. I just have this weird conglomeration of Roman Catholic, Irish Catholic, pagan and atheistic influences from my family, which has resulted in agnosticism. I will tolerate religion, but I will not have it dictating the way I want to run my life or run a loved one’s funeral. If there is an afterlife, sure, I want to help my loved one get in, but if they spend half of their lives doubting that the Big Four (father, son, holy ghost and yes, Mary — once the boys add her to the club, I might revisit my Catholicism) exist, then I am not about to force it upon them in death.

One thing I got from the Irish side of me is the Irish wake — it is imperative to celebrate the person we once knew and loved. Death is a time to make us really appreciate the person we’ve lost, and to bond with people from near and far who loved that person just as much. Again, think “family reunions” — it’s sad but true that we don’t make enough time to see people while they’re alive, yet we drop everything to rush to their gravesides. But that also prevents us from mourning alone. And we get to see how the family has grown, and how the smallest member of the family has the deceased’s eyes or dimples or smile. And we see that the merry-go-round of life keeps on spinning, even if one member of the family has decided to ease off and let the younger ones keep the ride going.

But if I have to sit in a church and have some potential-child-molestor-in-a-robe preach to me for two hours about good and bad and the afterlife, well, that isn’t going to help me to celebrate my dearly departed. Sharing stories and memories — and even having a priest like the one we hired, with humor and understanding and without an answer to everything quoted from his big book with a cross on it — is the best way for me to say goodbye to their living bodies and to always feel their living spirits. And anyone who doesn’t have anything to say along those lines, well, won’t be invited to my funeral.