Amanda's couldn't-have-said-it-better link (Frederica Mathewes-Green at frederica.com) is a much needed voice, often ignored. Arguments on issue provide no synthesis no fullness no place. This cannot be argued from the strictly personal but it cannot be argued from the quote objective endquote and why is it Argued battleground style, two armies in straight lines marching across field?
Stop.
x
No Solicitors.
No Trespassing.
No Parking.
Officers on duty.
Lavender building hidden behind white steel spike fence, unnoticed behind gas station dumpster pawn shop fast food, parking lot empty but for a few nondescript older models and broken glass. Two tired women smoking, scuffed white nurses' shoes on second shifts. No signs on the lot today.
No purses or handbags.
No backpacks.
Please show proper ID.
Only one partner or support person.
Support person must also present ID.
No children beyond the waiting room.
Bulletproof glass warps the receptionist's smile and makes her eyes disappear behind her reading glasses. Eight forms, two-sided. Mirrors on the sides of the desk. Racks of magazines but we sit with our hands in our laps listening to the news, whispering to the woman across the row of chairs to the right. Shushing children. Touching up lipstick. The woman is here with her friend and her friend's seven year old son; she is tired of being sick but really doesn't know what this will be like, just knows it's the closest to what she wants. We tell her all we know good bad and ugly and she is reassured. I hope for her that reassurance lasts. This room holds more hopefuls than any Miss America anteroom. Friday. A warm summer evening. The lobby is a nunnery, a girl's camp, full of cameraderie and wishes of good luck godbless be well. Full of you have no idea bitch, fuck you and your sympathy, go lean on your (boyfriend?) sitting here like it's his ordeal somehow. It is his ordeal, for some of Them. Quiet resolve sits two seats down from barely contained hopeless misery. By Wednesday we will be weaker, sick to our stomachs, but by next Friday we'll know for certain the direction of our lives from here and now.
It is not a thing to be taken lightly.
x
For reference: Norma McCorvey's affidavit for reconsideration of R. v. W.
Stop.
x
No Solicitors.
No Trespassing.
No Parking.
Officers on duty.
Lavender building hidden behind white steel spike fence, unnoticed behind gas station dumpster pawn shop fast food, parking lot empty but for a few nondescript older models and broken glass. Two tired women smoking, scuffed white nurses' shoes on second shifts. No signs on the lot today.
No purses or handbags.
No backpacks.
Please show proper ID.
Only one partner or support person.
Support person must also present ID.
No children beyond the waiting room.
Bulletproof glass warps the receptionist's smile and makes her eyes disappear behind her reading glasses. Eight forms, two-sided. Mirrors on the sides of the desk. Racks of magazines but we sit with our hands in our laps listening to the news, whispering to the woman across the row of chairs to the right. Shushing children. Touching up lipstick. The woman is here with her friend and her friend's seven year old son; she is tired of being sick but really doesn't know what this will be like, just knows it's the closest to what she wants. We tell her all we know good bad and ugly and she is reassured. I hope for her that reassurance lasts. This room holds more hopefuls than any Miss America anteroom. Friday. A warm summer evening. The lobby is a nunnery, a girl's camp, full of cameraderie and wishes of good luck godbless be well. Full of you have no idea bitch, fuck you and your sympathy, go lean on your (boyfriend?) sitting here like it's his ordeal somehow. It is his ordeal, for some of Them. Quiet resolve sits two seats down from barely contained hopeless misery. By Wednesday we will be weaker, sick to our stomachs, but by next Friday we'll know for certain the direction of our lives from here and now.
It is not a thing to be taken lightly.
x
For reference: Norma McCorvey's affidavit for reconsideration of R. v. W.
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