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I am Supergirl?

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Supergirl 90% Wonder Woman 90% Superman 80% Spider-Man 80% Green Lantern 80% Robin 70% Hulk 70% The Flash 40% Batman 30% Catwoman 30% Iron Man 30% Lean, muscular and feminine. Honest and a defender of the innocent. Go here

posted by Price of Silence @ 10:04 PM 0 comments

Random activities

It's been a weird month.

Todd had knee surgery on January 9, and for a while there he had to wrap his knee in cling-wrap when he took a shower.

That's kind of a private joke because Todd once found this website that was all about Roy Orbison (the guy who sang "Pretty Woman") in clingwrap. So there my husband is in clingwrap, hopping out of the shower while I really hope his good foot doesn't give way, and he's all wet and "Yes" is written in black letters across his thigh.

Sounds like a recipe for a good time, doesn't it?

By the time he's gone through all that, all he wants to do is go back to sleep. But at least I get to take off the clingwrap.

Also, this month, I got to read a gay romance novel. Copyedit it, that is. It was a good read--the characters were great--but all that happened was that the guy learned to like himself more. Oh, and he went to Brazil to study monkeys. I wanted him to change his life a little more, I guess.

And every Friday, I'm taking an Intro to Fight class. Last time, we actually got to punch each other a little. But since my partner and I couldn't manage to keep our mouth guards in without gagging, we weren't comfortable with doing any real punching.

Damn. Got to give and get a couple of good punches sometime.

posted by Price of Silence @ 9:49 PM 0 comments

Into our own hands

Today is the thirty-third anniversary of the Supreme Court handing down its decision in Roe v. Wade.

How long this anniversary seems from the spring of 2004, when I flew east to join the March for Women’s Lives in Washington, D.C., and felt briefly hopeful about women’s rights in this country. The more I consider the political landscape since then, the more I see how false that hope was and how urgently change is needed.

After Bush won reelection, I gave up on traditional methods of securing women’s reproductive rights. Since the confirmation of John Roberts and the nomination of Harriet Miers and Samuel Alito to the Supreme Court, I have harbored grave doubts about the longevity of Roe v. Wade. And ever since pharmacists have started organizing for the right not to fill prescriptions, I’ve worried about the availability of birth control.

Let’s face it: since the 1980s, the Right has been gaining ground. I don’t see the Left gaining ground. Instead, I see members of the Left crossing over in order to win the enemy’s support. What kind of fight is that?

A better option for women would be for them to return to the basics of providing reproductive care for themselves, using some old methods and some new ones.

At first I thought of flashing pictures of women who’ve died from abortions to counter the pictures of fetuses. I wanted to organize a wave of righteously angry pro-choice women and men to drive so-called Christian protestors far from clinics and other public spaces. We’d herd them home and protest at their houses and businesses, do unto them exactly as they do unto abortion doctors. Operation Save America recently posted fliers in Dr. Warren Hern’s neighborhood in Boulder and got away with it, so I thought, why not turn their methods on them and see if they’re flattered by the imitation?

But that would involve fighting on their terms. I cannot stress strongly enough that women who care about access to reproductive rights must cease to engage with the Right and make choice a reality, instead of waiting for the courts and legislatures to grant it.

We need to take abortion underground where protestors and legislators and prosecutors cannot find it. Wherever we take it, we need to keep it safe (whether it’s legal or not, whether Roe v. Wade stands or not). To do so, we need a network of doctors who will smuggle emergency contraception and RU-486 to women who need them, doctors who can teach medical residents and nurses in their area to perform safe surgical abortions, thus creating an ever-expanding network of abortion providers. Other people would be solicited to provide funding for these underground abortions and, at some point in time, money to purchase the contraceptive method of her choice for every American woman who cannot afford to pay for it herself.

These “clinics” would have to be highly mobile, not only to get services as quickly as possible to the women and girls who need them most, but also to avoid triggering state laws that criminalize transporting a minor across state lines for an abortion. They would need to be easily dismantled into their component parts, thus making them harder to track.

Why make this proposal?

Because I’m sick of the rhetoric and disgusted by the amounts of money spent by both sides since 1973, when Roe v. Wade was handed down. (I wonder how much health care for women all those dollars would have bought.)

And because I think that women should be making these decisions for themselves. We must get over the idea that we need permission from our government to exercise our right to choose.

And because I believe that in a few years, women will desperately need the service I propose. Some need it now.

posted by Price of Silence @ 9:31 PM 1 comments

Thank God for the end of 2005

The New Year has come and gone; my cold/flu has come and gone and returned, and I am SO looking forward to 2006. Getting through 2005 was like slogging through mud sometimes: didn't do much writing, didn't get anything published--even the one story that has been accepted for publication is still languishing in Feminist Studies' backlog.

And no, they wouldn't hear of me sending it out somewhere else. I thought it was a win-win for everyone: if I place it elsewhere, they get to reduce their backlog, and if I don't, they can publish it. But no. God forbid common sense overtake the literary world.

So I've decided to make some changes in 2006 (in addition to my perennial New Year's resolution to lose weight by eating better chocolate; of course, a lot of sampling is required to determine what's best). I'm taking a short story workshop from Lighthouse Writers, and I'm going to hire Writer's Relief to send out at least one story for me. I'm also going to take a page from a fellow writer's book and stop spending so much damn time reading these literary magazines. They all exhort you to, but it doesn't make anything easier for the writer, and that's what I'm all about this year.

My New Year's resolution is to be a happy writer, whether I get published or not.

And that should make people around me happy.

They won't have to listen to me whine so much. Instead, I'll be spreading joy wherever I go.

posted by Price of Silence @ 8:42 PM 1 comments