:: The S.I.C.L.E. Cell ::

:: Sunday, January 29, 2006 ::

Tomorrow's the day of course. I was just telling a dear friend that the build up is usually worse than the actual anniversary. It seems to evolve, so I never really know what to expect.

Right now I can't get the thought out of my head: "Don't do it, don't do it!" I see the 24-year-old ghost girl under the sheets thinking "Tomorrow it will all be over. Oh, I don't want you to die, little one! How can I keep you? PUT THAT OUT OF YOUR MIND! I can't, I can't! I can't DO this anymore! It's me or you, kid... and it's NOT going to be me."

I'm not that girl anymore. I'm not that mother anymore. But I see her in the final minutes before the death of pretty much everything. I see her and I scream through the vortex of time. She doesn't hear me. She won't.

I would still be waiting for my husband to come home. What would he be thinking and doing at work the day before he took his wife and child to die in a grungy abortion clinic in Orlando where the oranges hung fat on the trees? I thought they were mocking. I see they were imploring. "Turn back, turn back." No, mother trees, I can't eat your children if I don't devour mine. For an orange, you see. I did it for an orange. You will remember I had fruit salad afterward. Fruit salad and hotel treats.

My child is fresh-slain by my hand
my hand that short moments afterwards lifts
strawberries and chocolates up to lips
lips that will never kiss a child
a child broken
by a mother's dysfunctional heart.

Above the noise of the TV I hear him coming through the door. Tomorrow Big Trouble in Little China will feature Kurt Russell, and I dream that I will finally be able to care. But I won't. I never will again. Big Trouble in Little Orlando.

Since every moment is a precious jewel of pain I sleep at 6 or 7, unheard of, until the dark 3 AM hours of the next morning, but tonight, "the night before", my husband is in a fog. He doesn't hear me or seem to care about my comfort or my sick hours. I must sleep; get me to the gurney, get me to my life again so I can bathe and eat and walk and work and put this all behind me. He is in a world of his own, drawing out the moments. Saying goodbye or holding on.

I have spent long hours in the day saying goodbye and dying away from what I know I should live for. Whispering goodbye and clutching my belly wailing like a mother who is clutching her belly and saying goodbye to a child she will kill as the rooster crows. I have opened every Easter egg of hope, releasing the breath of life into thin, indifferent air. Ruptured every moment with perverted lying love. Sliced permanently through all good things to unfetter me from transient shackles. Traded an ephemeral sentence for death and life in the Cell.

"Turn off the TV. I want to go to sleep."
No reply.
"Turn off the TV. I need to go to sleep. Don't you care? I need to sleep!"
He doesn't hear me. I am shocked enough by his odd behavior to leave him alone. On into the night he watches TV while I fade in and out of the dream called "It will all be over tomorrow."

I am thinking of who I was then, of how glad I am that in that sense I am dead, and of a child who will never benefit from the moral of this story. I am counting down the minutes, watching the ghost shadow under sick sheets going so horribly wrong, making, by far, the worst decision of her pathetic, stood-for life. I am screaming to her through the vortex of time. She doesn't hear me. She never will.

January 30...
tomorrow is yesterday again.

:: ashli 4:26 PM # ::
...

One more added here, and I think that's the end of this particular bandying.

:: ashli 4:16 PM # ::
...

More added here.

If you are one o' them thar "right-wing religious fanatics", please pray for this dude and his family. Chances are the majority of the Cell's readers were like he was and are grateful that we are no longer. I'd be a hypocrite if I said I thought he meant harm. I know my own intentions were good when I was a "choicer". But then, like many of you, I lost a child in abortion and theory became experience, experience became genuine exploration, genuine exploration became knowledge, knowledge became truth.

I saw the light.
I saw the light.
No more darkness
no more night...

I have traded the wrong for the right.

:: ashli 11:27 AM # ::
...

Just read. I promised the writer, who so graciously granted permission to post these anonymously, that I would not provide any commentary. In addition, I'm not even going to attempt to ameliorate any of my sloppy spellings or verb conjugations. It is what it is, submitted to you.

I got the first letter out of the blue:

Him:
"I am sorry but you and your fellow bloggers listed in your blog space are self rightous right wing religious fanatics. You interfere with the difficult decisions people are forced to make under duress and inject YOUR BELIEFS in their process of decision making. Are you GOD? Are you doing GODS WORK? I don't think so. It just makes me sick to see your self rightous proclamations of doing what you do because you "care"about the people involved. What you care about are your own personal "religious beliefs" and your belief that you are right and in a sense...GOD. Enjoy being GOD ...and as you confuse and complicate the decisions of all the scared pregnant young women that come to your blog site for help, remember that your sense of self importance comes at a price that you will never have to pay but they will. Hi...Just a brief comment on your site. We all have our opinions. I am sure you are well intended. I just think you are misguided thats all-"

Me:
"your opinion of people like us is one i misguidedly held myself for 25 years, but i was probably much more avidly pro-choice than you... ***. (i'm assuming you're a man.) i am a woman who lost a child in a second trimester abortion. i'm entitled to reacting to my experience, and i'm entitled to offer women the help i wish I'D gotten. i'm also blessed to have as part of my life the women and children who accepted that help in the 11th hour, love and sacrifice instead of the knife.

and i'm not sorry.

what makes you sick is a woman's site on abortion.
what makes me sick is how abortion hurts some women and hurts ALL aborted children. so i'm shining the light on what abortion does to some women and all children. it's bound to infuriate those who want to remain in the darkness perpetuating the lie that abortion is a necessary sorrow.

i accept your fury. the only affect it has on my pain is to add to it, and so steadies yet my resolve.

love,
ash"

Him:
"I am the proud father of **** girls ages ****. What they do with their lives is a personal matter between their parents, their doctor and their own sense of right or wrong. I would never want my daughters to be forced to have a back alley abortion IN SECRET the like of which was so common prior to the passage of Rowe vs Wade. I am *** and remember vividly the results of those dangerous and illegal procedures. It is my right to protect my family from unwanted intrusion into the very personal decisions that having an abortion entails. While I don't necessarily think abortion should be taken lightly, what YOUR personal experience was and how it affected you, is no reason for you to impose your remorse for your second trimester abortion on anyone else. At least be transparent about what your site is about...and don't lead on some poor vulnerable young women into your snare and force her to have a baby she can ill afford to have. And if you do and she has that baby, take personal responsibility for that child and give it the financial and emotional support that child will need to become a responsible and loving adult. It is your responsibly after all, if you take that path. Otherwise, do the girl a favor, ask to talk to her parents or doctor or school councilor...tell her to get input from those around her that really care and love her. It is her choice, no mtter what your feelings are for her fetus. That is the easy part. Raising the real life beby to adulthood is the hard part. You are doing nothing but the light lifting without any responsibility toward the fetus you hold so dear. Put your money where your mouth is! ADOPT ALL THE FETUSES YOU SAVE!"

Me (responding to his red comments more specifically):
"it is no one's right to endanger their children or their grandchildren.

my remorse is not the issue. the cause of the remorse is: killing a child. no one, not me, not you, not your daughters has the right to do that. you can't hide behind personal choice and personal convictions. killing a child is killing a child no matter if it makes you happy or sad, no matter if you take it lightly or flippantly.

my "snare" is love and it's a tender "trap". but seriously, have you READ my site? it's as transparent as anyone could get.

there are a lot of women who are ill prepared to parent children who've been born into poverty or young parenting. social services' solution is not to kill those children. they create programs that attempt to help our fellows, programs that PBS liberals like you are so very proud of. i'm proud of them too. they're the right thing to do. knocking on the doors of these children and putting a bullet through their skull to put them and their tired, frustrated parents out of misery is NOT the answer. your sense should make sense in-womb and out, because people are people in and out. if your rationale isn't consistent, it isn't rational.

"And if you do and she has that baby, take personal responsibility for that child and give it the financial and emotional support that child will need to become a responsible and loving adult. "

the relationship i have with my dearest friends is nothing i have to answer to you about. but further, were i steer someone away from the dismembering death you call kindness, i would not have the moral responsibility to care for them for the rest of their lives anymore than you would have the moral responsibility to "adopt" financiall and emotionally the 2-year-old child whose mother you talked out of killing him/her. if you want to know more about my relationship with women i have loved then you might invest a little time in exploring the sight you are so bent on lambasting.

"Otherwise, do the girl a favor, ask to talk to her parents or doctor or school councilor...tell her to get input from those around her that really care and love her."

a girl's parents are her guides in life, not her doctor or her school counselor. and being a doctor or a school counselor are not what certify love. it is a parent's responsibility to guide his/her children wisely. where parents are unwise, the state steps in. it is not a perfect system. it never will be. you're asking for an impossible perfection, and whatever is, abortion is not the answer. some things we do know: killing children is not an acceptable solution to any problem.

"You are doing nothing but the light lifting without any responsibility toward the fetus you hold so dear. Put your money where your mouth is! ADOPT ALL THE FETUSES YOU SAVE!"

ok, i'll do that when you agree to adopt all the children you help save through welfare/healthcare, etc. programs. or could it be that there is some type of flaw in your argument that i must adopt everyone i help? i love your gumption. you could do a lot of good if you understood what love really is.
.
you're talking to someone whose life was literally saved by the illegality of abortion in '71 (much to your chagrin, i suppose). i would have been ripped to shreds by your brand of "compassion" if it had been legal; how can you argue with me that my death was someone else's right and would have been better? (how offensive is that?) i endured years of poverty and sexual abuse as a child, but i'm so glad to be alive today! suffering is not a crime to hold against a child... that s/he should get the death sentence for his/her own "good" and the "good" of his/her duped parents is an amazing injustice. finally, consider my own second trimester child and what i saw on the white-tiled floor. oh, dear sir, there is nothing upon nothing you can ever say to me that will have me unknowing what i can never unknow. no amount of your chocolate dipping will ever conceal the bitter fruit underneath.

i implore you to arise, o sleeper. there is hope yet. cling to it. don't give up on people. there are positive ways to meet life's most difficult challenges. killing our vulnerable fellows is not the answer to our problems. we can all do better than abortion. of every sorrow it is an unnecessary one. would that you could see that.

ashli
p.s.
i intend perhaps to post these emails anonymously. i will of course take out any of your identifying information such as your mention of your age and specifics about your children. if you are opposed to this, please let me know and i will reconsider."

Him:
"Ashli- Your choice of language speaks for itself. Vivid images of violence really makes your argument look rather perverted. I will always take the high road in that sense. You and I are different, I believe in privacy and the right of a women to choose, you insist that no one has the right to, as you put it "kill a child". I guess then every month a women kills a potential child during ovulation and a man does with each ejaculation that has no purpose other than pure pleasure. It is in the definition of the words you use that you pervert the act of abortion and make it into something utterly hideous and violent. It is always amazing tome how people who hold such heart felt passion for the fetus, yet have no regard for the lives of say, an Iraqi family who is bombed into dust by US warplanes. Their lives are meaningless and not worthly of your concern. Maybe if one of the women was pregnant youmight feel some compassion. The death penalty? I bet you favor it! This is all sanctioned by your Christian religious beliefs...right? Partial Birth Abortion... a violent image of a living breathing full term baby having its life ended for the simple convince of the selfish mother? A hole punched in its head as it exits the birthcanal...murdered...and you believe this is an accepted practice in pregnancies involving unwanted pregnancies? From my reading on the matter this not a normal practice and is used only in saving the life of the mother. You and your supporters are delusional...you see an evil society of evil people murdering babies. The truth is far less dramatic. The truth...not your perverted vision of the truth, is what I am concerned with. I don't really care what you think about me andmy liberal beliefs. I am proud to share that heritage that goes back to the foundation of this great country...liberal, thinking, passionate men of words who shaped our Constitution and provided liberty and justice as the hallmarks of our governmental system. You and I are are different yet we share a common father...we must learn to live together and accept the differences that divide us. We must learn to tolerate the things we can't change and accept them for what they are. What you want and what I want don't differ too much. Security, shelter, love and family, community and brotherhood. I wish you would develop a sense of tolerance and understanding...change the definition of the argument...but be on notice, me and millions of other Americans will resist to the bitter end any attempt by anyone to restrict the right of any women, regardless of age or location, to have the personal freedom to choose."

Me:
"Ashli-"Your choice of language speaks for itself. Vivid images of violence really makes your argument look rather perverted. I will always take the high road in that sense. You and I are different, I believe in privacy and the right of a women to choose, you insist that no one has the right to, as you put it "kill a child". I guess then every month a women kills a potential child during ovulation and a man does with each ejaculation that has no purpose other than pure pleasure."

killing a child with potential, is violent, is never morally high, and is different than a potential child. "potential children", as you call sperm and egg, don't yet exist, so that argument is a bit silly.

"It is in the definition of the words you use that you pervert the act of abortion and make it into something utterly hideous and violent."

abortion kills a child. it is what it is.

"It is always amazing to me how people who hold such heart felt passion for the fetus, yet have no regard for the lives of say, an Iraqi family who is bombed into dust by US warplanes. Their lives are meaningless and not worthly of your concern. Maybe if one of the women was pregnant you might feel some compassion. The death penalty? I bet you favor it! This is all sanctioned by your Christian religious beliefs...right?"

you're speaking in absolute terms charging me with the crime of thinking and feeling how YOU THINK i think and feel. you who are spouting for women's rights don't even give me the pleasure of thinking and feeling for myself! i think that says a lot about you.

"Partial Birth Abortion... a violent image of a living breathing full term baby having its life ended for the simple convince of the selfish mother? A hole punched in its head as it exits the birthcanal...murdered...and you believe this is an accepted practice in pregnancies involving unwanted pregnancies?"

no.

"From my reading on the matter this not a normal practice and is used only in saving the life of the mother. You and your supporters are delusional...you see an evil society of evil people murdering babies."

the abortion-supporting ama says it is NEVER necessary to save the life of the mother, because the baby can always be delivered by c-section. you are perpetuating a lie.

"The truth is far less dramatic. The truth...not your perverted vision of the truth, is what I am concerned with. I don't really care what you think about me and my liberal beliefs. I am proud to share that heritage that goes back to the foundation of this great country...liberal, thinking, passionate men of words who shaped our Constitution and provided liberty and justice as the hallmarks of our governmental system."

our country was founded on God and the right to each individual's life. our foremothers opposed abortion avidly. this "america" you speak of is different than america at our inception. your "america" it's a nation of your making, not of our forefathers'. and if you think roe v. wade was decided honestly and democratically, then you have not done your research.

"You and I are are different yet we share a common father...we must learn to live together and accept the differences that divide us."

you use a lower case letter to describe our Father which speaks again for itself.

"We must learn to tolerate the things we can't change and accept them for what they are."

we can change abortion. furthermore, our Father tells us very clearly not to kill and to rescue those innocents being lead away to death. you speak of our Father, but you follow mushy 70's free-to-be-you-and-me psychobabble. there's a difference in the burger king and the KING of kings. with God, you can't have it your way.

"What you want and what I want don't differ too much. Security, shelter, love and family, community and brotherhood. I wish you would develop a sense of tolerance and understanding..."

i have zero tolerence for child killing. your flowing pixel, spruced up as you make it, will never convince me otherwise. again, you are talking to someone who has experienced second trimester abortion (you haven't). and you are talking to someone who would have been aborted but who wasn't because abortion was illegal in florida '71. you skirted around that, didn't speak to that at all. but what could you possibly say? "your mother should have had the right to kill you." ?? "your decapitation and evisceration was her right."?? oh, you don't like those words. you don't like the pictures. you don't like the truth. you hide behind vernacular and concept and personal definition. how can you resolve that? how can you live on that? just because someone walks out of an abortion clinic with "phew!" on their smiling lips? people are dying in those buildings not to mention that every mother exiting has significantly raised her risk of terminal breast cancer, so sayeth abortion advocating research physicians. don't you even care?

"change the definition of the argument..."

the truth is what it is, no matter how you decoupage it with flowery lies.

"but be on notice, me and millions of other Americans will resist to the bitter end any attempt by anyone to restrict the right of any women, regardless of age or location, to have the personal freedom to choose."

oh, don't trouble yourself with the drama of a warning. i know evil when i see it. i know that you and your ilk will not rest, but i also know that love will ultimately prevail in spite of your malevolent advocacy. it's not about me v. you. it's about women, children, families and liberty and justice for ALL.

ashli
p.s.
i noticed you did not give me permission to post these exchanges on my blog. you couldn't possibly be afraid of your words being scrutinized, could you? at any rate, i will not post them out of respect for your wishes."

Him:
"Ashli-Shall I post your words on my liberal blog site? NO, YOU DON'T HAVE MY PERMISSION TO USE MY WORDS TO YOUR ADVANTAGE. If you do then we will see eachother in court. I wish you well."

Me:
"yes, you have my permission to post our correspondence on your liberal blog site.

and while i don't legally need your permission to post excerpts and general ideas, i shall refrain because i do see how upsetting it is to you, and i have no desire to cause you any discomfort.

i will say that i think that your refusal to consent to going public with even your ANONYMOUS correspondence (which you initiated, btw) says just about everything of your advocacy... and i think that's worth your individual exploration. but that's entirely up to you.

at any rate, your life is precious, and i am glad that you are in this world.

take care.
ashli"

Him:
"OK...if you really want to post my views go ahead...*** was watching over my shoulder as I was typing you a note and *** thinks I waste too much time answering emails like this. *** is a Republican, I am a liberal Democrat...*** whole family is Republican...*** is an internationally famous Christian Minister and PHD. in religion...who moves with the top Christian leaders of today...you know them by name I'm sure...he is an author of books against porn...has met with the POPE three times during his career,,,was a member of Reagan's Commission on porn in the 1980's...and I argue with him over this issue as well...we go around the block, but we are civilized about it. Maybe its because we are family and as family he CONNECTS to me as a human being...regardless of our beliefs, we have a genuine respect for eachother. That is what I hope our society can achieve, because there will NEVER be complete agreement over the defination of child and fetus and exactly how to define what is murdering a child and what is exercising a womens right to choose her own personal destiny. Go ahead, tear this paragraph up line by line...I've seen that tactic used before and it only serves to make you look right and me wrong. If that is what is important for you go for it! You see, it isn't that easy...you want it to be, but it isn't. There are 300,000,000 people in America from every country, race creed and religion and non-religion here, all demanding freedom and respect for their values. If you IMPOSE your will on someone you are robbing them of their rights as a free citizen of this country, their Consitutional Rights. Go ahead... use violent words like murder and viseral descriptions of abortions to prove your point. I don't care. Be that as it may, it is YOUR RIGHT TO DO SO! I am glad you exercise your right to free speech! I encourage you to do so! It is when you cross over the line and insist that you have to right to deny someone else their rights of life, liberty and the persuit of happiness as expressed in our Constitution that I bristle and take action and get involved with people like you who live in a world of unchallanged ideas, surrounded by people who agree with you and nurture your passion. Tolerance is the key to a health society, allowing gays and lesbians to live freely without discrimination, government free of religious interference so it can truely repent all Americans of all races, religions and cultures. Christianity and Christians have a very selfish viewpoint, a viewpoint that says "we are the CHOSEN ONES" and as such deserve SPECIAL TREATMENT by the government. Well, unfortunately there are millions of NON-CHRISTIANS in America that deserve equal and fair treatment by the government as well. The idea of Seperation of Church and State has a reason behind it, and our founding fathers knew that it was not healthy for a Democracy to allow one religion to dominate government. That's what they left behind in Europe, government sponcered religion, and they KNEW FROM EXPERIENCE it would not be healthy for the United States of America! Find tolerance in your heart, forgive those that don't live the way you want them to, be a citizen of good faith and allow diversity without bigotry...we can all live together here...and we are after all...from the same source..."

Me:
"in all that you say about me, you're not connecting with ME as a fellow orb crawler, and you're so dead wrong about so many assumptions you have about me personally. i'm not trying to be cheeky, but i kind of have to laugh sometimes at your satires of me, because you just have no idea who i am and what i'm about... but you're so sure that you do that it's just mindblowing. it only serves as further evidence to me that you just don't take the time to actually make sure that you know what you're talking about before you form such strong, tireless opinions.

you're preaching to the choir with a lot of what you say but you just can't accept me and MY differences. i just have to fall right in line with what you think a "lifer" or a Christian is or, as you've charged before, i'm being "deceptive".

again, re: terms. you just don't like that i verbalize the truth without packing it in rose-scented excelsior. abortion is what it is: a grisly practice against humanity. you want me to use sanitizing terms like "products of conception" and what. (hitler did the same thing when he called gas chambers "relocation centers"; it had a nice beat that you could dance to but really didn't make him a swell guy, now did it.) i mean, take a look in the mirror: YOU'RE a product of conception. terms don't magically transfom the true nature of a thing. i couldn't even begin to get away with these terms if EVERYONE didn't REALLY know that what i'm saying is true. good grief, do you know that on my abortion records the abortionist even refers to his patients as MOTHERS??? even HE can admit what he is doing (and btw, he's so sure about it that he doesn't even hide behind the folly that the abc link is an "invalid" ploy used by "lifers"; he mentions that it's a risk right there in the papers - warns us poor aborting mothers! and that's another issue i have re: some of your past comments. not all aborting mothers are poor - some are wealthy - so there is even less of a case for financial/emotional adoption of "saved babies" in those situations, but i digress.).

i know what was in my belly. i know what i saw. i know what i am. i know what my child was. my physician referred to that "mass of tissue" as a "baby". MY PHYSICIAN (who performs abortions)! gestating human beings are nascent children. i don't need you or anyone to define that for me, and you can't "define" it for yourself. the truth is what it is: a person is a person. didn't we learn this lesson post-civil war? didn't we learn what a poverty discrimination is? egads! to think that it's still alive and well and being practiced by the very people who are so fond of decrying discrimination!

furthermore, all this "tolerance" stuff is just a 90's buzzword throwback. it means squat. tolerance isn't an absolute. i'm sure that you don't "tolerate" a man's personal choice to get his freak on every thursday at midnight with his 7 year old daughter. i almost KNOW you don't. but hey, what if he goes clintonesque and defines "sexual relations" as something other than say, what you and i personally define "sexual relations" as? no worries, the law steps in despite his personal beliefs. he gets no tolerance, and you and i applaud. what about the lovlies who come from other countries where it is acceptable to kill a teenaged daughter who brings shame upon the family? do we just tolerate that religious difference because dear ol' dad has a right to privacy, and the different belief is personally his? oh, isn't it nice to have our own personal definitions and all our happy sunshine carebear tolerance. c'mon man, we're talking about cutting up and sucking out growing human children, not pruning our own personal hedges on our own personal, private property while Christians push square boxwoods on everyone while screaming that topiaries will not be tolerated. give me a flipping break! i'm with your wife. debates like these are just as stupid as the debates between the north and south over slavery and what "personally" constitutes a human being and not a piece of biological property.

thanks for the permission to blog our email discourse. the posting will be just that: a posting of our emails without commentary. they don't need edit or commentary. people should look at what you say and at what i say and use their brains. the truth stands on its own.

ash"

Him:
Ashli-This last message seemed like it came from a different person. How many Ashli's are there? Do you team write these replies? It sure seems so to me...different words, different references but always similar use of the vindictive...Clinton is history now... 90's words? The words and ideas I express are common mainstream respectful words, timeless ideas about our Constitutional freedoms. Don't mean to be rude by this observation... You and your supporters that contribute to your blog are so sure of yourselves...so smug in your self righteousness...I bet it warms your heart to tear apart those women and men in search of answers...in need of understanding and help with your passionate beliefs. Just because your passion and religion says it is wrong doesn't mean it is wrong for those who don't share your values. I don't share your values or even come close to understanding them...they are foreign to me...we are genetically different I think...wired differently. I accept that, and it's OK. I can live with you and your beliefs. I respect your fundamental right to believe any crazy thing you want, out of experience, the Bible or any other document...I don't thinks it is healthy for your mental health, but I accept it on its face. In Nazi Germany people like you would have supported Hitler...what he did he did in secret...like President Bush who does his killing and torture in secret, you would have supported Hitler if he made you feel safe and stopped abortion or read your Bible and spoke of your God. Do you still support the President now you know he has sanctioned torture and killing of prisoners in our custody? I bet you do! I bet it all makes perfect sense to you. Corruption by big money of your political elite...Tom DeLay and the rest of the Republican power brokers are covered in dirty money...and the blood of tens of thousands of innocent civilians in Iraq and Afghanistan. Has God given TomDeLay the authority to be corrupt in order to raise money by any means to fight the good fight against abortion? Get the country firmly in the hands of unstable right wing religious zealots so they can do God's work? Ironic isn't it that you support war and the killing of innocent people by the thousands, yet rile at the thought of abortion. Don't you ever ask yourself why that paradox might cause a moral dilemma in an observer like me who watches your behavior from a distance and see through the hypocrisy of it all? Good night and Good luck Ashli...who ever you are...

PS) I just reread your last reply and I think I deserve answers to my "assumptions" about "YOUR POLITICS" and "YOUR RELIGION"...You know where I stand but you only offer up your disgust with the act of abortion and the more extreme abuses women endure under certain religious and cultural conditions both here and abroad. Transparency is the key to any communication and what I am getting from you is anything but that. Religion is dangerous and so is unchecked passion. Are you a supporter of the death penalty? The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan? The use of lethal military force by this government to further its goals? Do you support torture of prisoners at the hands of Americans, and even murder in the name of "national security"? There is a list of prisoners that died during their stay under our care. Do those lives mean anything to you? No anger, just some straight answers is what I want...Abortion is about more than abortion. It strikes at the heart of differences between us, but is only one of a list of issues that needs clarity and vision and judgment to balance what an individuals true moral fiber is made of. What are you made of?

Me:
"when i try to centralize the issue, which is what my blog does, which is why you wrote me in the first place, you meander out into all available nether regions of the world's problems... and then assume that you know how i feel about them. plus your duplicity arguments are somewhat ad hominem. you know what they say about assuming... and you have done it a lot in our discourse. (point in case: no one helps me write my blog, etc.)

i care about you as a fellow, your feelings, your person and what. however, if it seems i am a bit blunt at times it is for wont of being understood. sometimes we exert more effort in being "sensitive" than we do in actually communicating a point. to be honest, swaddling the truth in pleasing vernacular has never really been my strong point. not even when i was a "choicer" like you. (especially not then! lol!)

so i say it again, i supported abortion for 25 years, so avidly that i fain attended rallies at my church (whose pastor was a lesbian), so avidly that i made all the flawed arguments that you are now making and voted for clinton on the single issue of abortion alone just to seal the deal, so avidly in fact, that my own child died in one. whoops; that was the day i stopped living in theory.

i was just like you once; i had no idea that what i was supporting (and doing) was discrimination, disenfranchisement, an horrific abuse of human rights, and just plain wrong. i thought i was the intellectual, compassionate one and all the lifers were a bunch of oversimplifying, religious fanatics trying to force their personal views on everyone else. i thought they were well intentioned but misguided for certain. you can't imagine my chagrin at finding that as a "choicer" i was the one who had been duped, that by supporting abortion i stood for everything i hated for TWENTY-FIVE YEARS.

apparently, however, there was hope for me. and there's hope for you too. and i so value your potential and your humanity, and verily i AM glad you're here! but i think perhaps at this particular juncture you and i are at an intellectual/emotional impasse. i mean, we can't just go round and round like this endlessly; it serves no purpose other than vexation and as i've said before i've no interest in being a thorn in your side. we've said enough for the other to accept or reject or at least explore. i'm satisfied with that. and i really do wish you well.

ashli"

Him:
"First of all, I am not confused about where I stand or what I believe in or who I am. I am very secure in that. I just question the intensity of your emotion concerning this issue. Maybe it is exactly because you were such a strong supporter for 25 years that you had this horrific revelation that what you did and stood for for so long was morally repugnant and so you now hate yourself. I think I prefer the "old you" and not this new morphed version, but that is my opinion, surely and not yours. It has been interesting having this debate with you. I only wish I could walk away from our encounter with more a feeling that what transpired lead us both to a deeper understanding of the differences. Unfortunately that is not the case, and my sense is that no warmth or humanity was forthcoming from your side. Seems like only intense critism and vile sarcasim towards my liberal beliefs came out of your mouth...I am glad I don't carry that around inside me...I tried to connect to you but couldn't. Be that as it may, I too wish you well. This will be my last email to you. Peace and Love to you, my liberal and hippie mantra..."
-------------------------------------------------

I have so many comments, great arguments that I skipped right over for lack of knowing really where to begin with the myriad charges... alas, I did say that I wouldn't run commentary on this one but would let you deduce what you would. So I leave it to you to examine the dialogue and come to your own conclusions. Also, I generally find it especially civil to give the other party the last word as a courtesy, particularly when nothing will come of a response anyway.

I think that in the next series of debates with any future initiating abortion advocate, I am going to do less debating and more questioning. Perhaps a little "guided" exploration would be refreshing. I'm going to begin mulling this concept over presently, so if you have any ideas/question contributions, let me know. I think there should be a specific survey or set of questions for abortion advocates who identify themselves as Christians, a list for secular liberals, etc. This is more along the lines of what I'm visualizing, so put on your thinking cap and shoot me an email.

:: ashli 9:02 PM # ::
...

"Earlier this month, the Massachusetts Supreme Court ruled in favor of killing Haleigh, saying it was "unthinkable" to give the power to make a life-and-death decision to the man accused of putting Haleigh in a coma. Instead, the court did something just as unthinkable: It handed that power over life and death to the same child welfare agency that had failed time and time and time again to protect Haleigh from her abusers in the first place. According to the Boston Herald, a report by her court-appointed guardian showed that the Department of Social Services had received 17 reports of abuse or neglect involving Haleigh in the three years before her adoptive mother and stepfather were charged with pummeling her into a coma."

This is the most informative article yet. You must read all of it.

:: ashli 3:42 PM # ::
...

Not much of an update on Haleigh. I wonder... can this gal be adopted so that she can finally be loved by someone and so that the state can't kill her?

P.S.
Seeing her in the prisoner costume is, to me, overwhelmingly symbollic in that she is a prisoner of all that happened... and continues to pay the price for the heinous crimes of those who were entrusted with her care.

:: ashli 1:19 PM # ::
...

Yesterday was the sad anniversary of Roe v. Wade. Roe doesn't even want Roe anymore, but whatever. Here we are. Some of us anyway.

Knowing that I would have been aborted had abortion been legal in Florida in 1971, I can't help but appreciate that abortion was one time illegal. Those "dark ages" liberals keep screaming about saved my friggin life. So thank you, thank you to the "neanderthals" who valued my gestational existence.

I digress.

Yesterday was Roe v. Wade. Why I had to "pick" the week after such an anniversary to abort my child in the second trimester I'll never know. January just sucks. It's getting to me.

My pastor didn't say one friggin thing about abortion yesterday in church, and he's usually very good about it. Perhaps he's trying to give me a break. Perhaps he just didn't feel like talking about gestational life preservation again. He does it once a year, but is skipping '06 I guess. There are people in our church, hold onto your hats, who don't care. I've heard them talking, some supporting abortion in the "tough" cases... like their child becoming pregnant with an oopsie baby. Forget the whole Bible thing about children being knit together in their mother's womb and God having a plan for us all.

I didn't say one friggin thing to my pastor about his not saying anything about abortion on the Roe v. Wade shamiversary. Lately, I just don't want to think about it. I just want it to go away like everyone else. I've taken a break. Skipping '06 in an effort to survive? I've taken up crocheting, reading, working on stained glass windows again. Trying to recover a few things that color life. There's a sadness in the art of my old self. A visited graveyard where roses bloom. It's sweet and somber.

Last night I was shutting down as the newscaster flickered a Roe v. Wade abortion advocate march tape across the screen. The anchorwoman commented that Alito has confirmed that he is "anti-choice". I sank into the mattress and clicked the television off. Babies dying in toilets and Alito is "anti-choice". Words, words, words while every Thursday of every week late trimester babies are dying in the room where my second trimester child was deconstructed. Blah, blah, blah go the designer suits making paper mache pig banks out of newspapers, glue and blood.

We lifers are all piteous, misguided twits, they assume. We mean well, but wouldn't we all just fork our way through a hot slice of reality? I know there's nothing I can tell them. I will still get their emails. They will still think I'm an uneducated idiot, a God-player forcing the world to adopt "my own personal" convictions. Yaddah, yadda, yadda and the low, quiet voice of my husband's words washing over me: "You can't make them see." He is right. It's Roe v. Wade day and I'm toppled by the crimson wave of 30 plus years of bloodletting.

My pause over, I slinked out of bed, the quiet of the house ground for feet to traverse. Snapping off the lights I come across the unknowing work of my 19-month-old unaborted daughter: there on the computer screen she has somehow miraculously called forth, from her random keyboard tappings, a large flickering candle that I lit a few weeks ago in memory of the 40 plus million aborted persons that Roe has packaged and sold America topped with a ribbon of "rights". A dark room, a rotten pinata filled with half-chewed thoughts and a candle flickering large across the screen, placed there by a baby I thought for green moments to abort. And one I did more than think away. Picture it.

I wake up today to hate mail, to a lecturing male telling me tsk, tsk, I don't know what I'm talking about. I wish I didn't. I want to be fool that he is.

:: ashli 3:09 PM # ::
...

"This is the after-hell: I see the light."
~Sylvia Plath

:: ashli 11:21 PM # ::
...

Insanity and despair
and
weeping and weeping.

:: ashli 6:29 PM # ::
...

Apparently, an abortion at 8 months of pregnancy costs $19,000.

Full Trisomy 22.

Adorable Annie.

Perinatal Hospice.

Abortion. (Graphic.)

:: ashli 10:58 AM # ::
...

"Tiller sent Gilbert to a local hotel after the abortion 'even though her condition was worsening' following the botched abortion."

Surely they aren't suggesting that an abortionist would send a woman with comprimised health to a hotel!

:: ashli 11:33 AM # ::
...

"'We should triple the number of abortion clinics here. Hotels should offer weekend packages -- get an abortion, see a Broadway show,' he adds.

'Planned Parenthood should offer free taxi service from the airport to anyone with a positive pregnancy test,' Dobkin explains -- adding that the cost of abortions would more than make up for it.

'[T]he New York tourism industry will laugh all the way to the bank -- after all, if there's anything our city loves more than giving legal abortions, it's the sweet smell of cash,' Dobkin concludes."

In 2004, 40% of New York's gestating children were aborted. That's a big bite out of the Apple.

:: ashli 12:10 PM # ::
...

When the NAACP took an official position in favor of abortion in the early part of 2004, which it has since quietly rescinded, a poll conducted by Black Enterprise Magazine found that 60% of African Americans disapproved of the decision.

:: ashli 12:05 PM # ::
...

Mention of our friend Rebecca Porter (the chick whose sign got ripped up by a Kerry crony during the last presidential campaigns).

:: ashli 10:14 AM # ::
...

Priceless.

:: ashli 10:12 AM # ::
...

I anticipate varied reactions, but one interesting thing I'd like to point out, here on this blog, in January of all months, is that my child,











their sibling,
died in the building you see in this video.

(Long download time.)

:: ashli 2:33 PM # ::
...

"I'm pro-choice but I've produced results which, if anything, favor a pro-life viewpoint," he explained. "It's obvious I'm not acting out of any agenda except to do reasonable science about a difficult problem."

Fergusson defends his study saying it suggests more should be done to determine how abortion causes women emotional anguish.

"Our study is strongly suggestive of a link between abortion and developing mental illness," he concluded. "What people should be saying is, 'This is interesting ... we need to invest more to answer this important question'."

:: ashli 9:42 AM # ::
...