She was 16. Her father was a religious fanatic. They came to me because her mother was afraid to take her for the procedure since the father kept obsessive track of them, their activities, whereabouts, and bank accounts. I took her. I paid for it. I arranged for the 16 year old’s alibi “weekend away” and I facilitated her seeing a counselor after the fact. They never shared with me how the pregnancy happened or who the father was. I never asked.
I haven’t written here in nine months, and I’d like to be impressively metaphorical (or symbolic or allegorical or idiomatic or something) and limn in hauntingly poetic prose how this entry has been gestating during that time and now, after long nurturing from the moment of its conception, it has only just achieved viability, able to survive on its own, ready for delivery: but that would be a lie.
The truth is — well, there are many truths, or, were many truths in the last nine months, at least, many truths about why I haven’t written, as in:
Truth: Life has been too scary. Reality is a shit-show and it was that which held my attention, and who needed another person’s lugubrious take on our descent into a fascist state?
Truth: Even if anyone did need or want another take on said descent, there are writers far better at putting all that sorrow and hate and confusion and venality into words.
Truth: I dreamed for much of my life of having the freedom to spend my days and nights reading in a room of my own, with no obligations. My life, now, finally, affords me that wide open swath of luxurious time. To write demands a focus which narrows what I am able to read to Joan Didion, Dorothy Parker, and Helene Hanff. 1
Truth: There are a lot of eager and available men in the world — well, on Grindr — and I’m not going to be able to get away with being 49 for much longer. Pursuit (not to say stalking) is time consuming. And, interesting this: I have been able to compensate for my lack of the qualities valued on msm2 hook-up sites by … wait for it … writing. Fiction. Mostly. 3
Truth: My laptop is ten years old and taunts me with its many peccadilloes, such as kicking me offline and dumping what I’ve been working on; shutting down for no reason; taking between five and ten minutes to come to usable life after having gone off; a cursor that jumps from where I am in a sentence to somewhere from a few lines to a few paragraphs prior and before I notice I’ve typed something new in the middle of something old and it requires fixing; and a few other challenging tics and flaws — not judging, I’ve my own tics and flaws — but it does frustrate when one is trying to write, or, really, do anything on it, and I’m an “it’s a sign” person; so when my laptop throws hindrance after hindrance at me, it makes me think, “I’m not meant to write.”4
And, finally, bottom line Truth: I’m a morass of why nots. I’m lazy. I’m impatient. And I’m incredibly unsure of myself. The hours I think “oh, I’m a writer, I can write” are more than erased by the hours I think, “I’m deluding myself, I’m a fraud, I know I’d be pitied and scorned if I showed this to anyone.”
And those are the truths (or seem to me to be so, for today anyway) about why I’ve not been here for nine months. There were ideas thought about and sentences started along the way. But they weren’t meant to achieve fruition. There wasn’t a reason compelling enough to inspire me to offer myself up again.
Then, the supreme court overturned ROE V. WADE, and in so doing made clear that all rulings based in a right to privacy were up for review and revocation, and thus marriage equality, access to birth control, and many, many other decisions to do with personal freedoms were in danger of being undone by the roman-catholic-cabal of 5christo-fascists installed on scotus by the gopzi congressional majority under questionable circumstances using unquestionably unethical procedural manipulations.
I’m not a female. I’m unable to become pregnant or give birth. So, I’ll never be denied the choice to do or not do so. I don’t have sex with women and I have no interest in being a parent, so I won’t be presented with the choice. All of these things have always been the case, and so some might say this is not my fight.
Some would be wrong. Whenever anyone’s freedom is abrogated, everyone’s freedom is diminished. And thanks to scotus’s disgraceful and clearly religion-based/biased craptastic decision and its accompanying in dicta from the should be impeached husband of the should be arrested and jailed insurrectionist, it is clear the fascists mean not only to take away our freedom, but also to criminalize our exercising of human rights. So, future fascist storm-trooper forces, here is my “confession” — I’ve been a part of and party to more than one abortion.
See the beginning of this post for the last abortion of which I was a part. I wish I could share details about the woman who was that 16 year old’s current very successful professional and personal life, but that would identify her and it’s her story and her body and not my place to tell it. She was not the only woman I assisted in having an abortion. And in addition to those women I helped get abortions, I also know other women who have had abortions and shared that information with me. I’m sure there are women I know who’ve had abortions about which I don’t know.
And here’s the thing about that. My atheism is a relatively recent development, a conclusion to which I came about ten years ago. And honestly, I hope I’m wrong. I hope the omnipotent force of Love and Light in which I long believed actually does exist. And if it does, I am one hundred percent certain it is not the vengeful, judging, punishing, dictatorial male figure of which the christo-fascists speak, whose hatred they worship. It is a god much wiser, kinder, and encompassing than that.
And my question for the christo-fascists is this: if your capital G-God is omnipotent, all powerful and knowing, and if They from the instant of joining sperm and ovum into zygote imbue it with a soul, wouldn’t it follow that They would know which of those souls were not going to be birthed? Wouldn’t They specifically and for reasons unknown to us choose that path for that soul? Is your capital G-God so unfeeling and unkind as to send in a soul just for it to be disappeared?
I wouldn’t even want to have coffee with that capital G-God of those folks, let alone spend eternity with them. Sorry, Them.
Nine months is a long time. A lifetime is a long time. In the last nine months I’ve had lots of ideas that weren’t meant to become posts here. There are lots of zygotes that aren’t meant to become humans here. And whether or not I finish a post, and whether or not a woman lets a zygote become a human, is not the business of anyone but the one nurturing the story or the zygote.
And make no mistake, the current illegitimate scotus isn’t about to stop with zygotes; they’re going after birth control, and marriage equality, and women’s rights, and non-discrimination statutes. It’s not too much of a stretch that they will eventually want to control every ovum and sperm BEFORE they are joined. So, boys, your jacking off will be a crime since you’re throwing away millions of little people every time you jizz.
I’d laugh. If it weren’t so close to their truth.
And so, here I am, going. And back. And I think — today anyway — that I am going to write regularly. About this sort of thing, sure, but mostly about books6. Because that’s what I love, books and reading. And writing. And people who read my writing.
muchmuchmuchlovelovelove
Charlie
Explanation of which would require an excursus of some length, unnecessary to this particular entry. Suffice it to say those three are my earliest influences, their work the reason I wanted to be a writer, and their voices so dissimilar to mine I can read them without fear of imitating them as I work. It is akin to a religious devotee daily reading the bible or koran or — you get what I’m saying.
MSM means males who have sex with males.
And, again, to further elaborate on this point would require a divagation not only lengthy but also, in all likelihood, TMI for some of my 7 followers. Otherwise, I’d give you an example of one of my dependably inveigling propositions.
You might be asking why I don’t buy a new laptop? Money. And, too, let’s say my laptop fund ever survived a car repair or rent increase or tanks of gas and carts of groceries or paranoia about my always dwindling savings, there is the matter of choosing the right (or, write) laptop and then contacting my expert who would transfer everything on this laptop to that laptop. Which also costs money. And it all overwhelms. So, here I am, not going. Lol.
I want to be clear about this; while I do not believe in god, nor am I a member of any organized (or disorganized) religion, I have nothing against people who do believe and who do belong. Many of the most beloved people in my life believe in capital-g God. I love them. They love me. What I object to are those who would impose their religion/beliefs on others; those who would use their beliefs to denigrate and deny equality to others. It’s complicated and thorny and sometimes hurtful to love people who belong to and contribute services and financial consideration to churches/sects/cults that believe me — because I am lgbtqia+ — less deserving of equality; it is confusing and upsetting to know people I love adhere to tenets that call me a sinner, consign me to hell. And yes, in very real ways they are contributing to my deprecation (origin of which is early 17th century (in the sense ‘pray against’): from Latin deprecat- ‘prayed against (as being evil)’, from the verb deprecari, from de- (expressing reversal) + precari ‘pray’.), denigration, and making my existence more dangerous by supporting an organization that promulgates propaganda denying my complete humanity and thus makes it seem okay to strike against me, makes me less human than are they.
It is my choice to write mostly about books I enjoy. Even the worst book is loved by someone, and, more importantly, was written by someone with feelings. If I hate a book, I generally don’t say so in public. And I will always tell you where I got the book — whether from a library, or from a bookstore, or from the author or publisher or publicist, or loaned or suggested by a friend. I don’t get paid for this, so, it’s all from my heart and determined by my whims.