Lots of phone
calls coming in today from all my family.
I wasn’t sure
that I’d be able to make this posting by Mother’s Day or even receive phone
calls, as earlier in the week, my internet and phone suddenly both went out, leaving
me incommunicado for days. Even a repurposed cell phone given me by a friend after
she’d upgraded to a new model failed to function inside my house, flashing a “no
signal” notice. If you are seeing this posting now, then you know the problem
has finally been resolved.
When I was in
the Peace Corps in Honduras, being without phone or internet, or even without electricity
and running water, was not a calamity because that’s how everybody lived and we’d
all adapted to it. But today in Washington, DC, being incommunicado even for a
few days is unexpected. Family and friends were leaving phone messages, as that
system still functioned, but I did not call back, or they were emailing me without
a response, so had started to worry. Now, I’m back and getting caught up.
Again, in a preview, some strange changes of font appear, though I've used the same font throughout when keying in this posting. It's very hard to go back to the blog and remember "blind" what may need correction and correction attempts are often unsuccessful, as the corrections just revert. By now, I hope my readers understand. I assure you that any such oddities do not appear on my original posting and I hope now to have minimized them.
Not all my
readers are mothers, but all have--or have had--mothers, so can join me in celebrating
this day. Without mothers, none of us would now exist, so we can thank our
mothers for bringing us into being. And I insist on still calling it Mother’s
Day, not “Birthing Person’s Day.”
Now on this Mother’s Day in 2022, it’s somewhat ironic that non-motherhood is currently in the spotlight. A frenzied hue and cry about threats to Roe vs. Wade has gripped many parts of the nation after the leak of a Supreme Court draft decision, reportedly authored by Justice Samuel Alito, triggering speculation about the identity and motives of the leaker. This pending decision, scheduled for release in June, apparently would allow states to craft their own abortion statutes, making Roe no longer the overriding law of the land. Roe’s advocates are now trying to muster majority support in Congress for codifying its provisions into law before the Supreme Court preempts that possibility. Was that the leaker’s intent? Texas Republican Senator Ted Cruz guesses the leaker was a law clerk for Justice Sotomayor. Or, conversely, was the intent to release the current draft to assure that it would not be modified? Chief Justice John Roberts has said it is not a final decision, while calling the leaker “foolish” and “a bad apple.” The draft decision now has supporters of abortion access declaring abortion to be “a fundamental constitutional right” and a matter of “reproductive justice.” Access to abortion does help level the sexual playing field between men and women.
Supreme Court Draft Decision Would Strike Down Roe v. Wade https://www.thedailybeast.com/supreme-court-draft-decision-would-strike-down-roe-v-wade
Canada says
door open for Americans to get abortions with Roe in peril | The Hill
https://thehill.com/policy/healthcare/3477844-canada-says-door-open-for-americans-to-get-abortions-with-roe-in-peril/
Those seeking abortions in Canada would, of course, have to pay for the procedure, either out-of-pocket or through insurance. Apparently, some Canadian women already seek abortions in the US if a location is more convenient. With fairly reliable contraception available in both the US and Canada, it is surprising that abortion is still in such demand on both sides of the border, though very much less so now than in the Roe era. But sometimes the condom breaks or a woman has intercourse when unprepared.
Whatever the leaker’s actual intent, protests are already taking place outside the Supreme Court, a few blocks from my home. Regular readers are well aware that I consider that after 50 years, some modifications of Roe are overdue. Fifty years may have endowed the decision with the weight of precedence, but also with the weight of obsolescence. No Supreme Court decision is sacrosanct and there have been updates of other laws due to changing mores and circumstances, most prominently regarding slavery and its aftermath, as well as with women’s suffrage. Precedence is valued, but so is change.
If the Supreme Court’s final decision should be rendered as currently drafted, it would create a patchwork of different abortion laws across the nation, aligning with majority opinion in each state. While the “right of privacy” has never been absolute, as a practical matter, as indicated before, the advent of medication abortions taking place at home means they will continue no matter what the law says. If women seeking abortions cannot get the pills locally or from another state, they will get them from Mexico, just as millions already do with illegal drugs of all kinds. It’s quite likely that the right to an abortion per se may not be challenged by the high Court, rather that its timing will be left up to individual states. Even that would spark a huge outcry as being a retrogression in the law, but would also find much support in more conservative states where the Roe decision has never been accepted, even after all these years.
Abortions have been attempted throughout history, sometimes carried out, other times resulting in a woman’s death, often failing and resulting in a live birth. During most of human history, partnered women have simply accepted pregnancy and childbirth as their lot in life, as did my own paternal great-grandmother, a mother of 12. Before the advent of modern medicine, the premature death of one or more children in families was not uncommon.
Only in our lifetime have abortions become safe, easier, legal, and
more commonplace. Much of that has been due to the advent of newer abortion techniques.
The actual number of abortions in the US has been declining steadily since
1981. This has been attributed to the use of more-- and more effective--contraception,
as well as to a substantial reduction in teenage sexual activity.
USA Today, How many abortions are actually performed in the US? Rates have declined for decades.
Most
Americans support legal abortion, upholding Roe v. Wade: poll – The Hill
https://thehill.com/changing-america/respect/equality/3475854-most-americans-support-legal-abortion-upholding-roe-v-wade-poll/
While a modest majority of all Americans in recent polls do support legal abortion, a substantial portion still oppose it, with responses varying according to region and to the actual questions asked. And after the first trimester, there is no longer majority abortion support. A self-described abortion supporter, if asked about a fetus aborted at 21 weeks, would probably advocate trying save that nascent life rather than summarily snuffing it out, even though Roe protects abortion up to 24 weeks as a woman’s “right.” Even those who consider themselves “abortion rights” support do not fully support Roe in actual practice, as majority support of abortion disappears after the first 3 months of pregnancy. And moderates on either side seem reluctant to express a nuanced opinion.
We all know that mores and laws do change and evolve, and that circumstances may also change, so that what is considered right and moral today can become modified over time. Current neonatal and preemie care have now lowered the point of fetal viability, something the Roe decision did not anticipate, but probably should have.
Still, a good argument can be made that a teen, who aborts her first pregnancy when she is ignorant about contraception and not ready to become a mother, can go on later to have children when she is better prepared. Or what about a woman with kids already who has unprotected sex with a man she dares not refuse?
The question of fathers’ rights, even within a marriage, seems to have been decided in the negative, namely, that a father has no rights until the actual birth. Then his rights become equal, or nearly equal, to those of the mother. In some cases, a mother has relinquished a child to an adoptive family only to have the absent father suddenly reappear to claim the child.
Erie Times News, With Roe v. Wade in question, bill could make fathers liable for unwanted pregnancies in Pa.
Under this
proposal, a man who impregnates a woman would be liable for civil penalties for
“wrongful conception.”
Roe v. Wade called into question by many Democrats, liberal scholars over the years Several Democrats have said the ruling represents judicial overreach https://www.foxnews.com/politics/democrats-liberal-scholars-questioned-roe-v-wade
Today, our country could use some more births and more babies. Better support of motherhood, or of parenthood in general, both moral and practical, is needed, especially now that having children has become more a choice than an inevitability in most relationships. President Biden has proposed providing more assistance to families with children, while also supporting “abortion rights.” Some pundits have made the point that having children lowers a woman’s earning power. So, if that’s the tradeoff, then should women stop having babies? In this country, many women have already chosen to be childless, but if too many others follow suit, no one will be around to support them or any of us in our old age. Few actual mothers would exchange their children for a better paying job. While bearing and raising children can be challenging-- I’m the first to admit that--it can also be exiting and fulfilling.
Some might prefer to see a dampening down of the partisanship and rhetoric around abortion, but in an election year and with the Supreme Court decision pending, that’s unlikely now. The fight is only going to get more heated, drowning out more conciliatory voices.
Daily Advertiser, Louisiana
Right to Life opposes bill that could charge women who have abortion with
murder
Some anti-abortion proposals go too far even in red states.
Amarillo
Globe-News, Shelburne: Abortions based on race or gender?
Supreme Court decisions are not sacrosanct, nor did
the Founding Fathers settle everything in perpetuity; abortion was not a
subject they’d even considered. To the extent the laws of their time even addressed
abortion, the procedure was illegal.
Politico, Pro-abortion rights groups to spend $150M on midterms
A trio of pro-abortion rights groups is rolling out a $150 million spending plan ahead of the 2022 midterms. The groups — Planned Parenthood Action Fund, NARAL Pro-Choice America and EMILY's List — will spend the nine-figure investment on paid ads, field programs, messaging research and polling in nine states, all of which feature top congressional and gubernatorial races this fall. The spending will be spread across offices up and down the ballot, from state legislative races to Senate races, in Georgia, Nevada, Arizona, Michigan, Pennsylvania, New Hampshire, California, Kansas and Wisconsin. Of the nine states, six are home to competitive Senate races, and all are electing governors in November.
AP, Motherhood deferred: US median
age for giving birth hits 30
This is a marked change, though as long as mothers, and also fathers, are able to
maintain their health and commitment for the long-haul as children grow up, it
may have advantages, provided that life-expectancy also increases.
US average life
expectancy has actually decreased during the pandemic, but an upward
trend is again expected as the pandemic wanes. Media stars seem a big part of this
trend, with women in their 50s becoming first-time mothers, sometimes by surrogacy
or adoption. (Many surrogates have been revealed recently to be Ukrainian women
now caught up in the war.)
People, TV Icon Donna Mills on Becoming a Mom at 54, Taking an
18-Year Acting Hiatus: 'I Went After It' [She adopted a daughter.]
A few notable
mothers have made news with multiple births.
BBC News, Mali
nonuplets in perfect health on first birthday – father
Here’s a young
couple in another part of the world, already with a 3-year-old daughter, who
then produced 9 surviving babies. If it takes a village to raise a child, that certainly
applies to nonuplets who require considerable extra care and resources, as
these now 9 one-year-old babies certainly do.
Before the Mali
mother gave birth, the mother of the most surviving babies in a single birth
was Californian Nadya Suleman who in 2009 produced octuplets by IVF, using the
same donor as for her 8 previous children. After the arrival of the now 13-year-old
octuplets, Suleman apparently decided that her family was complete.
While not in
competition with the aforementioned mothers, a 37-year-old New York mother is
holding her own.
GMA, Mom of
8 welcomes 3rd back-to-back pair of twins
Since this recent
mother of 8 happens to be African American, rightwing TV pundit Tucker
Carlson would certainly not care to encourage her any further. Carlson and
his true believers, predominantly older white males, may be vociferously “pro-life,”
but probably are not supportive of all nascent human life, rather, more concerned
with preventing Caucasians from becoming outnumbered.
Mr. Carlson promotes a relentless narrative of “us versus them,” with them being members of minority ethnic, religious, and racial groups. Most of Carlson’s faithful viewers do feel threatened, so eagerly embrace his message. Here’s a big tv star boldly giving public voice and legitimacy to their own darker sentiments! Though President Biden has been trying to bring Americans together, media personalities like Carlson, as well as Donald Trump and his imitators, including Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, keep stoking ethnic and regional tensions.
The Week, Texas
Gov. Abbott's border inspections prompt Mexico to move lucrative trade link to
New Mexico
Gov. Greg Abbott’s ill-considered border stunt has backfired spectacularly.
Yet Donald Trump’s hold on the Republican Party still remains firm, even though he’s out of office, because his followers continue to revere him, as Republicans who have opposed him have learned to their peril. Kevin McCarthy did an obsequious about-face to get back into Trump’s good graces after damaging audio was leaked.
While America’s culture wars have now shifted into high gear as the midterms approach, it’s been a great relief for those of us living in the nation’s capital to no longer have Mr. Trump still here. He seemed uncomfortable living in our city, rarely leaving the White House except to travel elsewhere, in contrast to other presidents and their families who’ve gone out in public to eat, shop, attend religious services, and visit local schools. Jill Biden now even has a teaching job at an area college.
With Trump gone now, we no longer see the lobby of the downtown Trump Hotel selling his tacky memorabilia or teaming with Republican lawmakers and foreign visitors jockeying to win his favor. Meanwhile, out in the hinterlands, such as in West Virginia where my son lives, residents there still revere Trump, clinging to the belief that he actually did win the 2020 presidential election, only to have it “stolen,” as he has insisted. (Never mind how an election could possibly have been stolen from a sitting president.) Most Trump supporters and everyone else they know actually did vote for him. Mr. Trump got a record number of votes in 2020; it’s just that Joe Biden won a lot more.
Here in DC, our focus now is on the Democratic mayoral primary, scheduled for June 21, with whoever wins going on to win the Nov. election, as over 90% of city residents are registered Democrats. Incumbent Mayor Muriel Bowser is running for an unprecedented 3rd term. The other 2 candidates, both DC Council Members, may end up splitting the vote. If Bowser wins again, this really needs to be her last term.
In other news:
NY Times, As Britain
Turned Away from E.U., Northern Ireland Turned Toward Sinn Fein
After all the bloodshed and tears, after so many years of the “troubles,” Brexit has Northern Irelanders now considering joining the Republic of Ireland after all.
The Hill, Feds extend work permits for hundreds of thousands of
immigrants |
https://thehill.com/news/administration/3475522-feds-extend-work-permits-for-hundreds-of-thousands-of-immigrants/
Welcoming more immigrants and putting them to work is one way our population can grow, even as the US birthrate remains below replacement.
Biden administration cuts Title 42 deal to remove Cubans, Nicaraguans, while aiming to end Trump asylum rule https://www.foxnews.com/politics/biden-cuts-title-42-deal-remove-cubans-nicaraguans-end-trump-asylum-rule
While
legal immigration may become modestly expanded on May 22, in the meantime deportations
are rapping up. The Biden
administration has reached a deal with Mexico to expel up to 100 Cubans and 20
Nicaraguans per day from three border facilities, the AP has reported.
The policy went into effect April 27 and will end May 22, the day before the
administration expects to end Title 42.
WHO: Nearly 15 million died as a result of Covid-19 in first two years of pandemic
Switching gears, ageism is a topic of special interest to me at this juncture in my life. Is ageism still a pervasive problem in our country? I would certainly say so, just based on my own experience. But it’s sometimes hard to decide what aspects of aging should be accommodated and which are a bridge too far.
NYTimes, As
Feinstein Declines, Democrats Struggle to Manage an Open Secret
At the last posting, I mentioned questions being raised about 88-year-old Senator Diane Feinstein’s ability to adequately fulfill her Senate responsibilities. Her husband died last year, which probably affected her subsequent functioning. As a person of a certain age myself, though somewhat younger than Feinstein, I now find myself torn between wanting to support her and realizing that maybe her abilities have actually faded far too much. With only 2 years left in her term, she may still want to hang on, but surely should not run again, and should also consider resigning now to give someone else a chance to take over and to have a running start at being reelected.
Changing the subject again, at the recent Met Gala, I noticed women wearing strange concoctions impeding their walking and designed for maximum exhibition of their bodies. Some outfits were oddly engineered to fully expose breasts while barely covering the nipples, seemingly the only naked display now forbidden. Skirt slits cut high up the side brazenly revealed no underpants beneath, leaving little to the imagination. I guess I’m showing my age by being amazed and not having moved forward with the times.
Виталий Островский is a new Facebook friend suggested for me, as we reportedly have a friend in common. I rarely use Facebook anyway, so choose now to simply pass as I can hardly even pronounce his name.
A friend and neighbor has shared images from an amazing immersive exhibit recently opened at the Hirshhorn, something looking very special and memorable, so go see it if you can.
CVS’s online questionnaire blithely promises a “free gift” for completing it, so what’s the catch? Well, maybe the gift itself was free—I chose a small flashlight—but delivery was $7.95, perhaps even more than the flashlight’s actual cost at the local store, pretty tacky.
While
Boris Johnson may have reached an agreement with Rwanda to
offload asylum seekers there (for adequate compensation, of course), the
current Rwandan government is hardly a welcoming bastion of human rights. During
the genocide of years ago, I was a board member of an organization we called the Rwanda
Children’s Fund. I still have some of the RCF t-shirts we sold then. We
supported teenagers, whether Tutsi or Hutu, orphaned in the genocide by paying
for their continued care at boarding schools until graduation. However, since
then, the Rwandan government has become increasingly autocratic and punitive, not
someplace where most asylum seekers, many of them actually fleeing from Africa,
would feel welcome. Is Johnson’s announced plan for asylum seekers perhaps a
warning for them to stay away?
On a recent weekday evening, the NPR program “Hidden Brain” revealed how almost instinctual unplanned responses can save the day when a surprise physical attack occurs. An American tourist and his daughter managed to make a timely escape from a group of pickpockets surrounding them in Barcelona. In Barcelona, I’ve observed such well-organized pickpockets myself, just waiting to rob unsuspecting tourists, along with similar groups in Argentina and Romania. Though it may sound racist to say so, members of these groups in the various countries have all been gypsy or Roma people. Though not identified as such on the NPR program, I immediately had a flash of recognition about who they were. As a young woman, I’d spent some time in Barcelona, a fascinating city, where my own protection involved making friends with several Roma young people who even invited me to stay in their home. In addition to their Roma language, they also spoke Spanish, allowing us to readily communicate. Is it unfair stereotyping to regard most Barcelona pickpockets as Roma? Likewise, here in DC’s Capitol Hill neighborhood where I live now, diligent “porch pirates” follow delivery trucks around, methodically scooping up packages from front porches. Some have even opened up my packages to take only what they wanted, leaving discards behind. Do these habitual petty thieves, often caught on camera, ever turn out to be older Caucasian ladies like myself? Certainly, it’s quite possible for an innocent-looking elderly woman to be a thief. But no, cameras have revealed these porch pirates to all be quite agile younger African Americans, never a white person. Is that observation an example of racial profiling or what? Where’s the line? Readers already know that some members of my own family identify as black.
Moving on now
to Asia, to an autocratic nation like China, where the few instances of random
killings are mostly done with knives since firearms are simply not available
there. Likewise, Britain and most other European nations see rare gun deaths,
as relatively few guns are in circulation. Our own country is an outlier in
terms of gun fatalities and injuries because of the so-called “right to bear
arms,” pushed forward by the NRA and identified long after the Founders’
deaths. Of course, if your neighbors and everyone else is armed, you may feel the
need to pack heat yourself for your own protection. That’s also the situation in
Honduras, which has a gun death rate even higher than our own. It’s a vicious
circle: having a personal firearm promotes more even more gun possession. And,
as is the case with abortion, supporters of gun ownership tout it as being a “constitutional
right.”
Most school
shootings in our country are carried out by troubled youths with easy access to
parental firearms, used likewise in suicides and family massacres. Hey folks, guns
are dangerous! If parents should feel the need for a gun, it should be locked away
securely where a child or young person has no access. Too many parents leave a
loaded gun loose in a bedside drawer—that’s how my son Jon got shot at age 11
by a dropped gun, though thankfully was hit only in the foot. Young children
have killed themselves or a sibling after finding a loaded gun hidden under a
couch cushion or under the seat of a car. A mother was pushing her toddler in a
grocery cart when he found a gun in her purse and shot her dead. Enough said.
Insider, Trans
kids rarely change their minds about their gender, according to a years-long
study tracking hundreds of children
I’ve known some folks, especially women, who have gone back and forth on matters of sexual identity and same-sex attraction between adolescence and adulthood. But such fluctuations may not occur when feelings begin much earlier. According to the study mentioned above, if a child considers him or herself a member of the other gender as early as 3 and persists until age 12, then that child is likely to continue identifying with the opposite sex, rarely switching back to their original birth gender.
Readout of
Vice President Harris’s Meeting with Caribbean Leaders | The White House
https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/statements-releases/2022/04/29/readout-of-vice-president-harriss-meeting-with-caribbean-leaders/The
Vice President discussed economic recovery following the COVID-19 pandemic and
reaffirmed that equitable economic growth in the Caribbean is a priority. As
the United States is the region’s largest economic partner, the Vice President
and the leaders discussed ways to further facilitate trade and attract U.S.
investment. On security, the Vice President
informed the leaders that the United States will expand our assistance to the
Caribbean through the Caribbean Basin Security Initiative (CBSI). The Vice
President discussed new funding to combat firearms trafficking, enhance
maritime security, and support training for police and others.
AP, Powerful
blast at Havana hotel kills 8 people, injures 40
The hotel was undergoing renovation and reportedly the
blast was accidental. Now the death toll has risen 22.
The Hill, Top US
diplomat: Cuba, Venezuela, Nicaragua won’t be invited to Summit of the Americas
Miami
Herald, Nicaragua is giving Putin a foothold on our doorstep. The US
must push back | Opinion
MarketWatch,
British Virgin Islands premier claims immunity over U.S. drug-smuggling charges
This man argued that he cannot be charged as the elected head of a British overseas territory. Since when does having been elected provide legal immunity? That would be a handy get-out-of-jail-free card for many leaders. This man found out otherwise, but he has been allowed to await trial at home wearing an ankle bracelet.
62
organizations and 78 artists demand that the Cuban government release the
artists Maykel «El Osorbo» Castillo Pérez, Luis Manuel Otero Alcántara, Abel
Lescay, María Cristina Garrido and Randy Arteaga, who were unjustly detained
for exercising freedom of expression and argue that these cases are part of a
campaign by the Cuban government, itself marked by repression and human rights
violations, in order to intimidate, silence and imprison artists and creatives
who dare to criticize them. (I’ve actually
met Otero.)
Son Jonathan is now the closest one at hand, living about 2 ½ hours away, though he hates coming into DC and now has an older gas-guzzling van. Also, he is being kept pretty busy in his small W Va. town with his new hotel job, also with regularly helping neighbors out with yardwork and trash pickup, walking their dogs, and also feeding stray cats, as he’s always been an animal lover. He took up painting for time and also sometimes plays his own compositions on guitar and piano, but hasn’t had much time for any of that lately.
Jon was originally adopted from Colombia, only coming into our family at almost one year of age, overcoming early problems in health and mobility, as well as a bout of cat-scratch fever at 22 months that landed him in the hospital. He became a US citizen at age 4, proudly displaying a little American flag given to all the children at his citizenship ceremony. So kudos to my son Jonathan, a survivor of traumas and watershed events both large and small.
I also have 2 wonderful daughters, Mel, and Steph, as well as a granddaughter Natasha and her son De'Andre. Readers already know that I lost my first son Andrew in 1994 after a work accident, a tragedy impossible to recover from completely. His loss has become less acutely painful over time, but still leaves an empty space in our family and in my heart. I also lost my Cuban foster son Alex to AIDS the following year.
Though readers already know much about my life, as recounted on this blog and on its predecessor, gaps still remain, so time now for a brief overview of my entire life, since a couple of readers have asked.
I was born in Boston, the oldest of three siblings. My father was born in Alberta, Canada, my mother in Duluth, Minn. While we kids were growing up, our family lived all over the US and Latin America, providing us with an interesting and instructive childhood, though making it hard for us to maintain friendships. I also had some close health calls while living abroad, but am still here. I finished high school in Bogotá, Colombia, where my parents then remained, and left for college in the US at age 16. Graduating cum laude from UC/Berkeley after just turning 20, I then embarked on a 5-month hitchhiking tour of Europe, returning to Berkeley to marry Tom Joe, a young man of Korean heritage, hence my unusual last name. Tom, who was totally blind, had never held a job, and was only a grad student at the time. So, needless-to-say, my family was not thrilled about my marriage and did not attend my wedding, but eventually came to accept and even admire my husband. I worked first at the Alameda County Welfare Dept. and later went on to earn an MA, again at Berkeley.
In 1969, with 2 small children, we moved to Washington, DC, to the very house where I still reside. My husband soon established a successful social policy consulting firm. I helped him with his work while also working part-time for a local psychiatrist, ghost-writing journal articles for him and once even attending a DMS revision panel in his stead. In 1992, I accompanied my husband on a work trip all over Europe while pregnant, also with our 2 small children in tow. Later, both Tom and I worked on Jimmy Carter’s successful presidential campaign.
About 22 years or so into our marriage, my husband hired a young woman assistant at his office, thus taking much of the burden off me. We now had 4 children, one born in DC and the other adopted from Colombia, as mentioned, so it was getting harder for me to keep up. Tom and his assistant soon began spending more time together, including after hours. I was unhappy about that, but willing to tolerate it provided he stayed in the marriage, hoping that over time, his apparent attraction for her would wear off. At first, he denied an impropriety, but soon told me she was insisting that he get divorced and marry her. So he divorced me after 24 years of marriage and married her in Las Vegas. They went on to have daughter, he won a MacArthur Genius Award (to which I felt I had contributed), then he died of lung cancer at age 64. He’d been chain-smoking unfiltered Camels his whole life, up to 3 ½ packs a day. At our house, he’d kept a standing ashtray right next to his favorite living-room chair. He even smoked in bed, burning holes in the sheets. Our whole family had been exposed to cigarette smoke for years, not realizing it was harmful. In fact, ads of the time promoted smoking as being healthful.
After moving out, my ex never once set foot again in our home, fought me on child support, and did not offer any child visitation. He never spoke to me again except for once on 1984, when he called me after some of my articles about recently released Cuban political prisoners appeared in the Washington Post and Washington Times. As I may have mentioned before, my name was even omitted from his obituary when he died in 1999, while our children were listed, nor was I invited to his funeral, but attended anyway, sitting way in back with a friend. After my ex-husband’s death, his family members whom I already knew well, but who had avoided me after the break, suddenly reappeared, embracing me like a prodigal daughter.
After Peace
Corps I began working part-time as an on-call Spanish interpreter and
translator, traveling all around the city on public transportation, sometimes even
via train to Baltimore to the U of Md. Hospital. Now, I have no desire
to do that anymore. And after 41 years as a volunteer activist with Amnesty
Int’l USA, including the last 18 years as Caribbean Coordinator with the help
of 2 assistants, I’m ready to pass that torch along as well.
More about
my work and experiences in Cuba and Honduras can be found in my books, Confessions
and Triumph & Hope, available both in print and as e-books on Kindle
and Nook, also via the covers displayed on the upper right corner of this blog.
Every life is unique and eventful, though mine has been especially so. Now I
lead a rather quiet life, but it’s not over yet, so stay tuned.
When I
started this blog quite a few years ago, blogs were the very latest thing. Now
the latest thing is a podcast, but I lack the equipment and technical knowhow
for that. So, I’m very grateful to you all, my faithful readers for sticking
with me so far. Special wishes now for the mothers among you.
---------------------------------------------------------
Grieving Parents Healing Hearts, Child Loss
Festejemos a Mamá
Discurso del diplomático holandés
Coalición para elecciones presidenciales
Después de la asignación, obtendrás tarifas con descuento
