The Sandcastle

I am old. I rarely start anything new. Should I be doing more?

While wonder about that I started making a list of the roles I have played in my 74 years of living. That list currently has 46 items on it.

Some of the roles were all at the same time like wife, mother, and bookkeeper. The first two have been taking place for more than 50 years and some, like sister, have been all my life.

But all of them have lasted at least a few weeks.

So, I looked at that list and found myself thinking if each of them had been the only one at the time, and if each of them lasted six months, I would still not have to start anything new until I am 90 years old.

So, I am now, once again, content to do nothing much.

TTYL,

Linda

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Last night I was in a debate about these new abortion laws being passed in red states. My son stepped in with this comment which was a show stopper. One of the best explanations I have read:

“Reasonable people can disagree about when a zygote becomes a “human life”–that’s a philosophical question. However, regardless of whether or not one believes a fetus is ethically equivalent to an adult, it doesn’t obligate a mother to sacrifice her body autonomy for another, innocent or not. Body autonomy is a critical component of the right to privacy protected by the Constitution, as decided in Griswold v. Connecticut (1965), McFall v. Shimp (1978), and of course Roe v. Wade (1973).

Consider a scenario where you are a perfect bone marrow match for a child with severe aplastic anemia; no other person on earth is a close enough match to save the child’s life, and the child will certainly die without a bone marrow transplant from you. If you decided that you did not want to donate your marrow to save the child, for whatever reason, the state cannot demand the use of any part of your body for something to which you do not consent. It doesn’t matter if the procedure required to complete the donation is trivial, or if the rationale for refusing is flimsy and arbitrary, or if the procedure is the only hope the child has to survive, or if the child is a genius or a saint or anything else—the decision to donate must be voluntary to be constitutional.

This right is even extended to a person’s body after they die, if they did not voluntarily commit to donate their organs while alive, their organs can not be harvested after death, regardless of how useless those organs are to the deceased or how many lives they would save. That’s the law.

Use of a woman’s uterus to save a life is no different from use of her bone marrow to save a life—it must be offered voluntarily. By all means, profess your belief that providing one’s uterus to save a life is morally just, and refusing is morally wrong. That is a defensible philosophical position, regardless of who agrees and who disagrees. But legally, it must be a woman’s choice to carry out the pregnancy. She may choose to carry the baby to term. She may choose not to. Either decision could be made for all the right reasons, all the wrong reasons, or anything in between. But it must be her choice, and protecting the right of body autonomy means the law is on her side.

Supporting that precedent is what being pro-choice means.”

Most of us know something about the pioneers struggling to make the trek west. Some of us have even played the game Oregon Trail. Either can help us understand the need to determine what we need versus what we want.

Do you have things that should be left alongside the trail?

What thing or thought is keeping you from living a better life?

TTYL,

Linda

Joshua Becker of https://www.becomingminimalist.com wrote the following and it spoke so to me I feel compelled to share it with you

 

I think all of society (ourselves included) would benefit if we started defining success differently:

Rather than defining success by the brand of clothing we can afford, may we find it in the number of people we have helped to clothe.

Rather than defining success by the amount of money in our bank account, may we find it in how much we used to help others.

Rather than defining success by the size of our house, may we find it in the amount of love that was shown there.

Rather than defining success by our level of education, may we find it in the degree of our integrity.

Rather than defining success by the number of ‘likes’ on our Instagram post, may we find it in how edifying and encouraging that post was to others.

Rather than defining success by the type of car that we drive, may we find it in those we have picked up in life and set down on a better road.

Rather than defining success by how loud our voice is, may we find it in how often we spoke up for those without one.

Rather than defining success in the quality and quantity of our personal possessions, may we find it in the level of selflessness we have shown to others.

Rather than defining success in the number of people who love us, may we find it in the number of people we have loved.

My computer died today.

that’s only a minor problem since it is eight years old so it’s time to replace it anyway,

and the Apple store about 15 minutes from here is open and has them in stock.

and they offer curbside pickup if you order online.

so I did.

or tried to.

Dave say I need two cables and one of them is out of stock.

so they want me to wait until Monday to get my computer.

so I called to get clarification about that and got someone in India.

then he and Dave both tried to tell me what to do but neither one was helpful.

so I yelled.

Dave has now gone to the store to buy my new computer in person with whatever cable they do have.

hopefully, I will calm down by the time he gets home.

but he should probably leave me alone to do my own set up.

TTYL,

Linda

ps. Errors in this post are caused by me typing it on my tablet.

pps. The store had both cables in stock.