Tag Archives: Memoirs

I Will Vote for a Conservative-Minded POTUS (and that’s NOT Trump)

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For decades the party that stood for conservatism – that was guided by The Constitution was the Republican Party. I don’t think I am the only one that agrees with Senator Mitt Romney that:

I voted for the Reagan/Bush ticket in the 1984 election. It was my first eligible election and I didn’t really know what I believed. Besides that, I had no understanding that a vote could have lasting impact that could last for decades. Knowing what I know today, forty years later, I would probably take that vote back and… I have a variety of rather pale excuses for that vote.

  • I grew up in California and attended a private university in Southern California that offered sorority housing points for joining The Young Republicans campus organization. (Just being honest).
  • As a Business Administration – Marketing major, I was a “Neoliberal in Training”.
  • I was not “adulting” yet so I had no life experiences to shine a light on living as a financially responsible citizen in the real world.
  • I was not an informed voter.

After working in the business world, I went back to school and earned a teaching credential. I married and we began to work toward the American Dream of owning a home and starting a family. The American message was to be a “rugged individual”and then show off your hard work as a consumer with name brand products. We had the privilege and support to start a small business that is flourishing thirty years later. I wrote about “Gaining Awareness of My Opportunities”.

In 1992, I began to educate myself about policy and I researched candidates as best I could (without the internet). At that time, I was a registered Independent. I didn’t vote party line. I voted on issues and the platform positions of those who were running for office. I followed my paternal grandfather’s advise about voting:

Read. Inform yourself.
But in the end, sometimes you just have to go with your gut.

John Hillman

The 2016 election awakened me.

I was a Never Trumper even before he ran for President. His presence in the media through his various bankruptcies, divorces, and business practices made him unlikeable in my mind and not a serious person for any federal leadership position.

With his lack of any civil service experience and his misogyny and name calling during the primaries, I was surprised and shocked that the Republican Party made him the nominee. It did not matter who the Democrats put forth, I would be voting against Trump. As the campaign continued, it was becoming obvious that there was a support system that was moving away from the conservative values of the Grand Old Party (GOP). He was beginning to say things out loud that allowed others to change and morph away from civility. I saw a movement away from common sense and a slide toward accepting “alternative facts”.

I figured out early on that something was manipulating social media feeds and sending people down rabbit holes of disinformation. I deactivated my Facebook account because there were things I didn’t want to see on the feeds of my friends and families as they became more and more entrenched and angry.

When he won the electoral college count, I was disappointed, but not shocked. As I had done before when my candidate did not win, I accepted the outcome and hoped the winner would be successful because then it would benefit everyone. That didn’t last long. As I suspected about him, he showed his true colors at the inauguration. I suddenly feared for women’s issues – especially the right to make healthcare choices with their doctors.

I was called a hysterical alarmist. “Roe will never fall”. I wish I had been wrong.

All Americans have lived that presidency, COVID, and the January 6th Insurrection. I saw it all with my own eyes, live on TV. I cannot unsee. I have read extensively. I am informed.

I choose to “go with my gut”. I remain a Never Trumper.

In 2020, I moved to Arizona. I registered as a Democrat. With all of the women that had run during the Democratic Party primary race, I started the research for my first term paper after returning to grad school. Early in the campaign season, I was initially drawn to Senator Amy Klobuchar and met her at the first political event I ever attended. Once Harris was the VP nominee I began reading Kamala’s books, listening to her past campaign speeches, watching her Senate moments, and reviewing her hundreds of Senate Bill proposals and combed through her Congressional Record. When someone told me I was going to find myself on the wrong side of history I replied: “I will proudly wear the t-shirt”.

We are 100 days from Election Day, and I believe that:

Vice President Kamala Harris has more conservative policy positions than candidate Trump.

I respect Adam Kinzinger and Liz Cheney even if I do not agree with every one of their policy positions. I value what they say and share, because they put country over party and spoke truth to power.

In Adam’s Substack essay, “Trumpism Isn’t True Conservatism: Even He Says So”, I am reminded that I agree with many conservative positions and historical ideologies. Here are some of the points presented by Kinzinger:

  • Conservatives favor free markets.
  • Trump calls for sweeping tarriffs on imports. Trump is transactional for himself and has made promises to cut taxes for corporations and billionaires that support him.
  • Conservatives are for freedom.
  • Trump has promised troops to halt protests. Trump will not protect Reproductive Rights.
  • Conservatives support free speech and the freedom of the press.
  • He harasses reporters and in his past presidency wanted journalists prosecuted for leaking stories from his staff. He has attacked and diminished truth by calling it fake news.
  • Conservatives believe in the three branches of government and the balance of power.
  • Trump attacks the courts who do not support him and seeks to control Congress.
  • Conservatives believe in limited government.
  • Trump wants to expand his authority in a multitude of ways with the support of the authors and think tanks of Project2025.
  • Conservatives believe in “conservation”…of traditions and institutions.
  • “Trump has no respect for the wisdom of his forebears or the traditions that hold society together”. He seeks to make the DOJ his own “police force and law firm”. He has no respect for the rule of law and believes he should never be held accountable for any of his actions.
  • Conservatives believe in democracy and are anti-authoritarian.
  • Trump longs to be a dictator and he has said it out loud in a television interview.

MAGA followers call themselves conservatives but they do not know the history of the party or the policy programs of former GOP Presidents. Kinzinger reminds us that:

Abraham Lincoln fought to end slavery as well as protect and preserve democracy from Confederate oligarchs. He put into place a temporary income tax. He instituted the land grant program to give every state land for higher education and he opened federal lands to those who wanted to settle the West.

Theodore Roosevelt created the national parks to conserve our natural lands. He broke up monopolies to protect and conserve the free markets. He created the agencies to inspect food and drugs to keep citizens safe and healthy and he promoted irrigation and hydroelectricity to stimulate the economy.

Dwight Eisenhower expanded Social Security and when the Soviets launched Sputnik he proposed financial programs to support all scientific research efforts to match that program. He promoted high quality education and funded the interstate highway system.

Richard Nixon created the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to conserve land, air, and water. He went to China to open up free trade relations and worked with other international leaders to negotiate and reduce nuclear war, as opposed to Trump who wants to isolate us from the rest of the world and abolish our NATO relationships.

Ronald Reagan saved Social Security from bankruptcy. He worked with Democrats across the aisle. Although he reduced regulations, he didn’t try to diminish the federal work force or take away experts in the fields to run the government.

The Presidents Bush in honor of Eisenhower and Reagan, promoted education and philanthropy. They were supporters of our allies in NATO. “Unlike Trump, they believed America should engage with the world through diplomacy, trade, and treaties”.

Reagan wouldn’t recognize Trump-style‘conservatism’ – a look at how the GOP has changed (October 3, 2023)

The MAGA movement has replaced the GOP. The Republican Party of just a decade ago is no longer. This was especially obvious with the multitude of missing participants at last month’s MAGA convention to nominate the 2024 POTUS ticket. Not a Bush, Cheney, or Romney in the crowd. Only a handful of former Cabinet Members. No former Speakers of the House. No Mike Pence, the former Vice President that he basically gave away to the rioters who wanted to hang him on January 6th. His choice for running mate this election is the most unqualified elected official – besides Trump himself the first time he ran for office.

“[Trump] has grievances , not governing philosophies or ideas”.

stuart stevens

In the conclusion of his Substack essay, Kinzinger notes an interview with CNBC that asked Trump about the upcoming four years if he was to win the presidency and Trump replied, “I’m not a conservative…”

Who is Trump running against?

Kamala supports breaking up monopolies that are elevating prices for record high corporate profits and not allowing free market competition and innovation. She believes in the freedom to make choices for your own body, to love who you want, and practice your religious faith in whatever way you choose. She supports freedom of the press and free speech and rejects book bans. As former prosecutor, she believes that no one is above the law and that this nation is based in the rule of law. She supports the balance of the three branches of government and has been outspoken about the need for ethics reform of SCOTUS. She is strongly outspoken against the Project2025 blueprint to expand the government into a form of authoritarianism that strips a great majority of Americans of their freedoms. This all sounds very rooted in conservative minded values.

Project2025 is in writing. They are not even trying to hide it. JD Vance wrote the forward for the book by the Heritage Foundation’s President – Kevin Roberts that outlines his involvement with the 900+ page blueprint outlining the plan for the next “conservative President”. It is not conservative. It is a playbook for a dictator – “on day one”.

I Choose Kamala.

In her first advertisement after becoming the presumptive nominee she stated:

We choose something else.
We choose FREEDOM.
The freedom not to just get by, but to get ahead.
The freedom to be safe from gun violence.
The freedom to make decisions about your own body.
We choose a future where no child lives in poverty, where we can all afford healthcare, where no one is above the law.

We believe in the promise of America…

#We CHOOSE KAMALA

Kamala Harris will fight FOR THE PEOPLE to CONSERVE DEMOCRACY

REGISTER TO VOTE and CHECK YOUR REGISTRATION

Vote for Reproductive Freedom

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https://www.womensmarch.art

I will vote for a future that gives every citizen Reproductive Freedom.

I have written about my experiences to exercise my Reproductive Freedom here and the long road to build our family of three kids through infertility treatments, failed IVF, adoption, and a live birth in my posts “Angelfish ONE, TWO and THREE“

Reproductive Healthcare supported me through multiple non-viable pregnancies in the 1990s. My eight miscarriages and ectopic pregnancy REQUIRED medical assistance – which is being denied to childbearing individuals and families today in multiple states across the USA. Without my “abortions”, I would have most likely lost my future fertility or my life – and would have unable to give birth in 2002 and/or parent my three children today.

The experiences lead me to declare this truth:

Forced pregnancy in not risk-free nor does it guarantee a healthy child after gestation.

I’ve met multiple women who have had long term chronic health issues as a consequence of becoming a mother. One eventually needed a kidney transplant and now the medication is shutting down her muscular system and she is trying to find support to parent that now 11 year old son. I know multiple women who now have the auto-immune issue of Hashimoto’s since giving birth. The maternal mortality rates continue to rise at an alarming rate in this country and especially in the state of Texas since the 2021 Abortion Ban enacted prior to the fall of Roe.

Guttmacher June 2024 Fact Sheet on Abortion in the United States reveals that:

  • As of March 2024, there were no clinics providing abortion care in the 14 states with total abortion bans in effect at that time. These states had 63 clinics in 2020. Those missing clinics are no longer there to provide ANY healthcare. There is a rise in maternity care deserts across the country.
  • Abortion bans and other restrictions imposed or enforced after Roe was overturned have led to a surge in people traveling from states where abortion is banned or heavily restricted to seek care in states where abortion is available.The share of all abortion patients who traveled out of state for care increased from 9% in 2020 to 17% in 2023. No one should have to pay to travel away from their home or family to receive reproductive healthcare.
  • Some 55% of people who obtained an abortion had previously had at least one birth and Some 41% of people obtaining abortions had an income below the federal poverty level (FPL) and 30% had incomes between 100% and 199% of the FPL. This is an economic issue as well as a healthcare issue but it in my opinion it is a human rights issue. Every human body should have the right to make decisions about their own body and financial freedom.

There have been ripple affects as a result the Dobbs decision. The repercussions of non-abortion related reproductive healthcare as well as the lack of financial support from states that are basically mandating forced pregnancy are disturbing.

Women who never intended to end their pregnancies have nearly died because they could not get emergency treatment. Miscarriage care has been delayed. Routine reproductive medical care is drying up in states with strict bans. Fertility treatments were temporarily paused in Alabama. 

Fortunately a few states have rallied to put reproductive rights on the November 2024 ballots. Every eligible voter of every state should have the opportunity to have their voice heard about Reproductive Healthcare and freedom to make choices about their bodies.

Status of Abortion-Related State Constitutional Amendment Measures for the 2024 Election BALLOT TRACKER Updated as of July 2024

kff.org

Bans Off All Bodies. Bans Off Our Lives. Bans Off Our Health. Bans Off Our Rights. Bans Off Our Future.

Blood Data

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Your blood makes up about eight percent of your body weight.

When you want to be pregnant, you do not want to see blood. 

When you do not want to be pregnant, you wish for menstrual blood. 

I have been pregnant ten times. 

The first time, I was 20 years old. I longed for my period to begin. I had an abortion. 

I got pregnant soon after we threw away the contraception. It was a blighted ovum. I had a D&C and I shed blood from the surgery. 

A few months later I was pregnant again. I was using the restroom at the university where I was working on an advanced degree. The spotting started a multiple week waiting game until cardiac activity ceased.

I trickled blood from another D&C.

The total amount of blood lost during one period is usually about 60 milliliters.

That’s about 2.7 ounces, 2 shot glasses, 16 teaspoons every month. 

I couldn’t get pregnant. I spill blood through many moon cycles.

Multiple pints of chocolate milk. A few bottles of vodka. 

In Pregnancy #3, I dread every wipe, but I will shed post-op blood. I eventually get pregnant again. There is bleeding, and then there isn’t. My body knows, but it will take a few more weeks to diagnose an ectopic pregnancy.

They apply band aids over the spots where they cut through my abdomen to remove the mass from my fallopian tube.

A newborn baby will have around 1 cup of blood in its body.

My body has experienced multiple procedures and surgeries. It has been cut and stitched and explored. One out of ten people who enter a hospital will need blood, I am not that person.

Victims of severe car accidents may need up to fifty pints of blood before their condition normalizes.

I feel like a casualty that is bruised and bloodied and thrown to the side of the road. The knife of life circumstances cuts deep into my heart.

I am leaking inside.

There is no clotting agent for the sadness and loneliness that travels through my veins. 

I yearn to hold a child pumping 2,000 gallons of blood daily.

Beach Day

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In June 2021, I took a class with Nancy from The Writer’s Center on Personal Narratives Fiction and Non-Fiction by Aaron Hamburger. The assignment was to write a short, yet sensory rich, memory from childhood. I know I started going to this place before my sixth birthday (since I celebrated it there), but since we did not have a second car until after Nancy was born it could have been the summer when I turned five.

As we waited in the parking lot for them to pull up our 1968 Impala station wagon, with the three tail lights flanking each side of the tailgate, I was giddy that I had settled on the Cherry Charms Sweet Pop as my drive home treat.  I had agonized over the decision, but as much I loved the cold feel in my mouth, from the luscious vanilla soft serve ice cream, swirled into and on top of a flat bottom cake cone, it would have melted before we got all our beach gear loaded up for the drive from Santa Monica to Burbank, California.  With the window down, and the air drying my freshly washed hair, the sucker barely fit in my mouth and would last well beyond the drive home, if I didn’t bite on it.  It didn’t always last until we got home.

At least twice a week, we had the childhood luxury to drive through Los Angeles to the Beach Club, sponsored by my father’s company, to escape the summer heat.  We would pull up and the boys in white shorts and tennis shoes, with matching navy shirts, would help my mom unload her three active beach enthusiasts.  We learned to get out quickly and get behind the white line so the next cars could come in off the busy Pacific Coast Highway.  We walked down the stairs to the sounds of paddle balls hitting rackets and tennis shoes squeaking on the courts.  I was too young to play.  I think you had to be ten.  

We skipped along the walkway to the intersection of choices.  Turn right to go to the indoor pool with the high dive and low boards.  I won swim races in that pool to the sound of echos from different water activities.  No one entered without shuffling your feet in the six inch deep mini pools, tiled with little blue squares, to wash off the sand before the smell of chlorine met salty sunshine.  

Turn left to the stretch of beachy playground and the vibrant blue ocean.  More helpful boys carried umbrellas and beach chairs as we passed the swing sets and monkey bars along the way. The concrete walk ended at the flagpole, the meeting place of many kid activities, and then it was a mad dash to the awaiting waves.

If we had walked straight from the car, a red and white awning entrance welcomed diners to the outdoor grill. I was allowed to get in line and order my own french fries. They were crispy on the outside and soft to the bite with just a perfect amount of salt.  I always wondered if it was sea salt from the watery waves.  

Above all of it was the big deck with the white chain with a little sign that read Adults Only.  We could ask people to send word to our parents that we needed them, on weekend afternoons when we stayed for the evening cookouts. I would not see that mysterious area until I was in my senior year of college. It did not meet my imagined expectations.  

We would start the day at the edge of the ocean with the waves chasing us in and out of shore.  We would collect sandcrabs in our bright colored buckets and keep them watered for the journey home.  We stopped doing that after only a couple times.  At lunch time, we would go closer to the clubhouse so the little ones could go into the nursery for naps.  The bell would ring and I would be sent up to check the board for our last name to tell us when my siblings were awake. I could wander to the area that held the big green craft box that was the source of many lanyard keychains and beading projects. Some days there was more time at the shore, and others we swam until it was time to go to the locker room to shower off any remaining Coppertone sunscreen mixed with salt and sand. 

From hopping towel to towel with bare feet when the sand was too hot, to duck duck goose games, to the smell of Ivory soap and Breck shampoo as I watched sand go down the drain, to the sound of the metal machine that spun the water out of our wet swimsuits, I can quickly serve myself vivid memories to fill my cup with a base of seaside mixed with a splash of childhood sweetness.  

Remembering My Journey

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In early 2020, I signed up for a Memoir Writing Workshop with Irene Graham. I came to the class with plans to write the story of growing up in Southern California in the decades following the quest for women’s equality. After an outside the box brainstorming assignment, the story of my daughter’s homecoming came bubbling onto the paper. The pandemic interrupted my scheduled pace to finish my two son’s stories.

The project came back to life as I explored “Sex, Politics, and Reproduction” in a course offered by the Women and Gender Studies department at Northern Arizona University. Again, I planned to write on a different topic, but I was pulled back to my experiences with infertility and miscarriage and the stigma and shame I felt on my journey to motherhood. The culminating project shares the power of storytelling to heal and give hope for those who have experienced miscarriage, recurrent pregnancy loss, infertility, and other reproductive injustices.

Reproductive Potpourri: Stories of Reproduction is the blend of my personal journey, academic literature review, and insertions of all three of my children’s birth and homecoming stories.

Click here to read Three Angelfish in long form. Or enjoy the upcoming posts of individual chapters.