journeys of a restless mind

Notes to Self, Rainy Weekend Edition

~When writing party invitations always be sure the put the date and the day on them so that other parents who are perhaps similarly calendrically challenged as yourself will not drive twenty miles in the pouring rain only to find the party venue emtpy and all of their carefully planned weekend activities (which might include much-needed non-kidlet time) thrown asunder.

~In your Sisyphean attempts to impose some sort of order on your household, do keep in mind that moving all the clutter from one room into the next doesn't really count as cleaning, no matter how sparkly the first room is after you empty it out and scrub it.

~No matter what time you say that you will pick the kidlet up from his dad's nor how many times you say it, your cell phone will always ring while you are driving and it will be the kidlet's dad wondering why you aren't there picking up the kidlet at some random hour that he was expecting you.

~Suede makes for a shitty raincoat.

rose hips

I'm late

Those words can be an ordinary expression of apology or exasperation as in, "Oh, crap, I'm late blogging for the anniversary of Roe v Wade.", or they can sit heavy in your heart like a stone when you whisper it to your partner or best girlfriend when your period's overdue.  I know that feeling.  I know what it is to be pregnant and overjoyed about it, and I know what it is to be pregnant and broke and living in a developing country where abortion is illegal.  I have been pregnant four times.  I have one son.  I am the most reviled kind of aborters:  the repeat offender.  I used to feel very ashamed of this fact.  I don't anymore.

Fetuses are not people. Zygotes and embryos are not people.  They might become people, but it is a long arduous process, as anyone who has been pregnant can verify.  Women, on the other hand  are people.  As the brilliant Bitch PhD says, abortion is about trusting women as moral agents who know the importance of children :

"It is precisely because having children is so important that abortion is something that can't be legislated away.  When it's illegal, desperate women who know the importance of children will still abort pregnancies they know they can't bring to term.  Because women will do anything, including risk their own lives, for their kids.  Women have had abortions from time immemorial .  To call abortion "selfish" as some do, is to completely deny that women are moral agents, to completely deny the importance of motherhood."

In other words, nobody knows better than I do when it's best for me to have a child.  And I don't subscribe to the notion that abortions should be "safe, legal, and rare."  They should be safe, legal, and readily available to someone that decides she needs to have one, just like any other medical procedure.

This new blog is about coming out.  About not hiding behind the pseudonym of nina, about blending all the things I love about my "nina" persona into Janeen.  It's about my own identity, as well as about my desire to make something beautiful and lasting in this world. I want to tell the truth about my life, even the stuff that might not endear me to everyone.  I'm tired of molding myself into the way I think I should be to make people love me.  I'm too old for that bullshit.  I'm growing ever closer to who I really am, and who I really want to be.  That's my most important destination.  Wanna come along for the ride?

We Write To Taste Life Twice~Anaïs Nin

Editor's note: Welcome to <destinations>, the new blog of Janeen Armstrong, author of nina turns 40. Thank you for your patience while I'm still getting things set up.  Kindly notify me of any broken links, typos, bad grammar, or otherwise unacceptable behavior.  I welcome your comments about readability of the new template, etc.  ~jla

Anaïs captures it perfectly for me, that "why" of writing.  Life is such a big, messy, complicated thing, how can we ever be expected to make sense of it?  I have to write it all down.  Organize it, analyze it, savor it, purge it.  The moments are fleeting, they move by so quickly, how else can I remember? I can't let anyone else tell my story.  My story is all I have.