A Life of Choice

Regarding Abortion I would like to point out that the opposition to Pro-life is not Pro-abortion, it is Pro-choice. According to Pro-life, life begins at conception. But, just because an organism lives, it does not immediately mean that it has a heart and a brain, or even a soul.

But, let’s say that it does. Consider the surprisingly all too common spontaneous miscarriage. It is also, by definition, an abortion. Perhaps we should expect the government to do something about unplanned abortions. We could petition for mandated funeral services or force women before a tribunal, or criminal court, to determine if they contributed to a potentially negligent loss of life.

If the government can force a woman to carry an unwanted child to term perhaps they can also do something to force parents to love that child. For physical or mental disabilities, we should not sleep until a government that forces a woman or couple to knowingly enter a life of pain and sacrifice, be mandated to more adequately assist those families. Or, perhaps it does not matter what happens to those lives as long as they are forced to exist.

Demise of Democracy

There is a basic flaw in Democracy where people are permitted to debate each other’s right to exist. The conflict in Israel is rooted in one side’s love of life and their belief that they have a right to exist and the other side’s disagreement on both points. One of the founding ideas of the Democratic process is that all people have a right to life. So, what we must really be debating here is if Jews are people.
All Israeli offensives are attempts to control random acts of terrorism against its people. Supporters of Hamas say they were firing rockets into Israel to protest an impossible situation created by the blockades. How quickly they disregard that the blockades were a last resort against both voluntary and involuntary martyrdom of civilians through suicide bombing attacks against Israeli heavily populated areas.
Traffic in and out of Gaza, including food and aid supplies, was being used to smuggle suicide bombers. Anti-Israeli supporters’ tolerance of the “Kill All Jews” doctrine, their condemnation of Israel’s efforts to guard against it, and world-wide tolerance for Hamas is nothing new. Democracy, by comparison, is fairly new. If we continue to condone and debate any group’s right to declare and attempt to carry out genocide, the struggle in the Middle-East will continue long after North America has ceased to be a place of equal rights for all.

Baby Blues

I have something to tell you. It goes something like this: "What's the point?"

What will we do when there is no more water?
What will we do when it gets too hot?
What will I do if tomorrow something stopped me from kissing her warm little head?

At night time I'm confined to bad air and no circulation. You can't open up a window and you can't really go outside. The days go by and everyday you're closer to living out your days. It would be nice to say you got the most out of each day. But, how often does that really happen?

What will we do if a commet hits the Earth?
What will we do if a bullet rides through the window?
What will we do if a something were to happen?

What will happen if we live our lives as though nothing bad will happen and then we're unprepared for things that do?

What will we do?

What is the point?

How to Close a Door

The other day I asked a question. The idea was that people would put some thought into the answer. Would want to know who was asking and why. Instead the responses were general and more indicative of individuals who want to give but, not take.

That's how we live. Detached. Everybody is afraid of making actual contact despite the popularity of things like blogs and facebook. The fascination is the anonymity. We want to express and not interact. We want others to speak with us without speaking with them. We want to remain circumferential.

What facebook got right is that we do want to connect with other people. We just want to do it from behind bullet proof glass.

Sleep will come

It used to be that a break was unimaginable.
It used to be that life was too short to waste not spending every moment with the ones you love.
It used to be completely inconceivable that soft singing and humming to nobody would be so irritating.
Now that's not the way.
Now mommy time is something all too well appreciated.
Now I get it.
I get what alone time is really all about.
It used to be that seeing something beautiful was something to be captured to be shared with others.
Now I understand the jealous zeal used to guard the happy place.
Now I get the happy place.
We're going on a pretend adventure.
We're looking for cute creatures in the forests that we can find and nurse back to health.
We're having tickle fights and I know that every second is ticking away and one day I'll be old and one day I'll be gone. And now, I don't care.
I'm ready for the one day when I'll be tired, too.
I understand there's life to live and lots that wants being done.
I haven't left my mark yet and nowhere near being begun.
But, one day I'll be tired.
One day I will sleep.
One day it will end for me and I don't care one bit.

At the end of the visit

The people across the road had the grandparents stay with them this summer. I'm not exactly sure how long they stayed. We didn't pay much attention to them because nobody from that side ever said hello.

Then, one day the kids decided to play together. By necessity we had to become acquainted. Still, the old folks were strange. One day the old lady was outside sweeping the gravel driveway. The asphalt had not even been put down yet.

Today, the girls were playing and that's when we found out that tomorrow is their last day. They're going home to China. We just assumed they lived here. The kids don't really get it. You can tell that for them it won't sink in until they don't see the old folks pattering about in a couple of days.

For us, it will have an impact, too. It will mean that the kids won't be outside as much. It will mean that my girl won't see her friends as much. That's what happens when people get older. You notice them less when they are around and when they are gone they leave this void that never gets filled up again no matter how much you try to move on. Somehow, with each day you know they are gone.

My grandparents are gone in a different way, I know what to expect. My kid is spared that for the moment. The best part of oblivion is truly being able to enjoy today and not care about the next moment, day, week, year. You can't really do that once you know and are old enough to care.

Procrastination

I have to go
I cannot stay
I'll come again another day

Work must be done
And still I stay
I'll do the work another day

A list of things that wait their turn
Unattended on the stand
I've stared at them time and again

The list must wait
I'm too absorbed
To do the things it has been told

The days go by
The dust builds up
The floors so sticky for the fly

The chores will wait
For I must stay
I'll do the tasks another day