Plague Journal, Another Day
I couldn’t concentrate on the email summary of the stories in the New York Times. Maybe the brain fog will dissipate as the morning flows into midday. The Times featured story was about a recently taken Gallup opinion poll on the matter of abortion in Texas. The poll shows that Texans think remarkably the same as the rest of the country about allowing women to have an abortion. That is what the legality of abortion amounts to. I wonder if it is possible for anyone at this point in time to think about this subject? Is clear analysis possible after so many years of existential discomfort in the wake of Roe v Wade? After years of flogging by the Christian Mullah’s, how many insecure, misogynistic Ministers have marshaled “the faithful” to join behind the “pro-life” banner? Is it possible to think anymore? Have we fallen into the pit of inchoate feelings? Especially in Texas?
It is offensive that abortion is even discussed as a legal matter. Abortion is an intimate personal decision, made in circumstances of dire extremity by the female whose physical well being, whose mental health hang in the balance. It is not my business, a male, to have any opinion whatsoever about “abortion” as a actual medical procedure. Politicians and preachers in a sane world ought not involve themselves…
We have one more day of walking about the mountain town of Asheville, North Carolina. The leaves have started to fall. The roadside culvert is filled with colorful maple leaves the size of a child’s hand. There are numerous galleries, specialty shops displaying crafts and artworks here. Asheville as a reputation of being a progressive, artsy, music community. That is the description given by our waiter last night. He moved here from Savannah,
There are many homeless, street people here as well. I spoke with two young males yesterday. They were seated on a blanket by a storefront playing their guitars. I stopped and dropped a small bill into their guitar case. I asked them, “so what is your day-job?” He smiled 
and said “This is it, man. On the weekends you can make good money doing this, – as much as $120.00 a day…” Suddenly I wished that I had more cash 
on me to contribute. One hundred and twenty dollars a day maybe is sufficient for food, that would be about it. Hardly good money… I wondered what circumstances had brought the two male, twenty-something buskers to the Asheville streets? Do they have a home somewhere to return to? Winter is coming and the streets very cold.
Asheville, a small town that reflects in miniature the human condition: fine restaurants such as Isa’s French Bistro, local art displayed in the repurposed space of the Woolworth store (we enjoyed a coffee and tea at the restored soda fountain counter) and people living in vehicles, living on the street scratching for their survival.
“And so it goes.”
4 thoughts on “Plague Journal, Another Day”
Jerry, I wish that your second paragraph, especially its precise first sentence, repeatedly appeared in a major publication. “It is offensive that abortion is even discussed as a legal matter,” is extraordinarily well-phrased.
It has been argued in the past that the military draft is immoral for forcing anyone to risk / sacrifice his life for the benefit of someone else. Involuntary pregnancy is exactly that, yet I never see the situation framed that way. Good show!
The abortion “debate” is a straw man concealing the monster of misogyny. I do not think that the pro-life side cares about life at all. That is but a faux theological wrapper for something quite sinister.
Jerry, I too agree that abortion is deeply intimate, deeply personal and very much between the female and God; it is offensive to see it any other way! Well said my close friend.
I am confident that a majority of the diehard pro-lifers have never known a female in dire circumstances that evokes abortion as a live option. It is a terrible decision that never comes easily. Many choices in life have to do with deciding which is the lesser evil.