Bad Signs for a Future

For a city, one of whose best attributes at times is that at least we are not Detroit, the news of Detroit's bankruptcy should leave the city of Cleveland wondering if we are next. I say should, because there may still be a chance to pull this city back. I'm not sure that's likely to happen, given how many people refused to acknowledge that Detroit was in such grave trouble, but at the very least we may gain some sort of timetable as to how soon Cleveland will also slide off of the cliff. It's discouraging to see Detroit's abysmal literacy rate ranked with areas of Cleveland, for sure. It's sad to see that children with Down's Syndrome have a higher literacy percentage, at least according to this site. Surely almost half of Detroit's population is not severely learning disabled, is it?

I'm not really an expert on Cleveland city schools, but I do know that the superintendent of said schools pulls in around six figures, which seems rather criminal, given the job results. I also know from personal experience that teaching a child to read does not need a teaching degree or fancy materials. In my case, I was willing to take a lot of time, had the ability to take as much time as was needed without the stigma of my daughter falling behind peers, had the advantage of one-on-one time, and had a child who was generally obedient about doing her work, and knew she was expected to learn. I'm sure all of these things are lacking to a certain extent in the Cleveland public school system, especially the one-on-one time. What would be useful would be being able to address a problem individually in the case of a child from a negative environment, or in a classroom in the case of a poor teacher. The parents blame the teachers, and the teachers blame the parents, but ultimately I think the responsibility should lie with the parents. The mayor is in direct control of the schools, and the mayor, in my mind, ought to be under the direct control of his constituents. But maybe I'm biased, because in our own case, faced with a parochial school which wasn't challenging our daughter, and a public school district in academic emergency, we decided to do it ourselves. It often seems to be the way to go if you want something done right.

h/t to Bookworm Room.

Taking Care of Business

On a international crafting forum, someone who does not reside in the US was complaining because her PayPal account had fallen victim to fraud. She was angry because PayPal was making her pay for the fraudulent charges, when there was no way she could have made them, because she was in the hospital giving birth! I sympathize with victims of fraud, and it can happen to anyone. It's a headache getting things sorted out, although usually you can work to get fraudulent charges removed without having to pay them. This person claims no one at PayPal is willing to work with her. Someone else said her husband had fraudulent PayPal charges show up, and although it took a lot of work, things did get taken care of in the end. Perhaps the fact that the original poster does not live in the US means she is getting poorer customer service, which of course is not right, but may help explain her difficulties. On the other hand, it almost sounded like she was simply expecting PayPal to take her giving birth story at face value, and that's just not what a business does. Does the general public not know anything about running a business anymore?

In the comments section, people were looking for all kinds of alternatives to PayPal. The problem right now is: there isn't any. Not that handles so many countries and so many different currencies, at a reasonable price. And why would a handful of people running a international forum site want to get into the difficulties and risks of handling international transactions anyway? Bottom line is that right now PayPal is the only game in town.

Unfortunately, the take away from this by the original commenter? Maybe some nice, crafting-friendly person will someday start an alternative to PayPal. I definitely wouldn't mind seeing a PayPal competitor. As I just said above, right now the business has a monopoly. However, if such a competitor actually enters the market, it won't matter if the founder is "nice" or enjoys sewing or woodworking. What a business founder really needs? Money. In the LEGO community, there was at least at one time a system where if two people wanted to buy/sell LEGO, but they didn't know each other, a trusted third person would agree to receive the funds and let the seller know it was safe to ship. But that's one transaction, in a community where the most trusted people were often known in real life to many in the group. Heck, Mr. BTEG and I even had dinner with one of the big names in LEGO collecting, when the Musician was just a wee little thing. But expecting to run an international business? You'd better have some start-up capital, and expect to gain trust slowly. And sharing a hobby with someone else in private life, does not change how fraud needs to be handled in public life. I do hope this woman can work through the fraud issues, but it won't be because the business is "nice."

What's in a Name

More Hollyweird stuff! This time it's a Rebecca Romijn, who says eventually she's going to change her last name to her husband's, because she predicts that eventually, her daughters will wonder why they don't all have the same last name (they're four.) Which led to several people in the comments insisting that you don't have to have the same name to be a family, darn it! Yes, it definitely feels good to be all inclusive and open and accepting of everything. But considering that many of these same people are probably also fine with the break-up of the family via divorce, or the aborting of a family member, should we believe them? Or are too many people just parroting the standard phrases of the day because they've been told that's how the "right" people think? After all, is the family stronger overall right now, or weaker? How often have you heard "straights" have already messed up marriage so much, that gay marriage won't damage the institution any more?

I happen to think that the name *does* make a difference. We are the Evil Genius family, and in being so, we are part of something greater than ourselves. By birth, I am linked by blood to all of my female forebears. But I am also tied to all the women who produced the men in my husband's lineage, by name. I am one of a long line of Evil Genius women, and sometimes I am sorry there will be no more Evil Genius women directly after me. But my daughters will take their identities of what the Evil Genius family shares, the things that make us the Evil Genius *family*, and carry that to their new families. They will still be part of their father and I by blood, but part of their new family, the family they create, by name.

Being "Equal" Can Mean Messing Up Equally Too

I have a confession. When I get too frustrated reading political news (which happens more and more often these days,) I take some time away and read celebrity gossip instead. Which lead me to a tidbit about how Natalie Portman's new movie project is in trouble even in the midst of production. What's hilarious is how the writer tries to keep any of the blame from actually falling on the star and producer of this film, Portman herself. First of all, Portman and her crew may just be too smart for us: "Because it seems like something that would happen with Natalie and her friends, like they are too intellectual to function in normal society, not to mention a film set where you actually have to make firm decisions." Um, yeah. Is this writer serious? I'm not actually sure. I mean, Hollyweird is not normal society anyway, and a great number of the elite in that society would be asking you if you wanted fries with that if they had to live a regular life. And being intellectual keeps you from making firm decisions? Uh huh. I'm sure all the emergency room doctors, for example, stand around saying "I'm sooo smart; I just can't deciiiiiiide! Do I intubate or operate or what?"

But of course, people may also be talking trash about her because she's... a woman! In other words, we poor little women are still suffering from evil stereotyping by men. In reference to her supposedly terrible temper, "maybe she's (Portman) just bossy and men can’t handle it." Or, you know, maybe she actually does have a terrible temper. Although why a man or a woman would want a supervisor that's bossy doesn't make sense either, so?

Bottom line, if women want be treated equally, they'll have to take the same chances men do of failing, as well as succeeding. Maybe Star Magazine just wanted a nice gossipy story. Maybe Natalie Portman really does suck as a producer. In any case, if the movie totally tanks, the producer should get a big share of the blame, man or woman.

Starting Anew

God must know that we humans need lots of chances for new beginnings, because we get them so often. Lately, I've been needing a fresh start every morning, but that's a great time to start! Happy new week!

For Better or Worse

It's interesting that the whole idea of marriage is coming up for me now, as Mr. BTEG and I will be celebrating our twentieth wedding anniversary this Wednesday. By the world's standards, we apparently married shockingly young: I was a month short of 25, and Mr. BTEG had recently turned 23. I would have liked to marry sooner; Mr. BTEG and I had been officially engaged for about a year and a half by then, and unofficially engaged for longer than that. But we waited until Mr. BTEG was through with college (and getting married while in college could be a whole other topic.)

Well, one advantage to marrying younger is having children younger. I think the difficulties of conceiving the older you get are getting swept under the rug in view of things like IVF or even surrogates. But those aren't easy or guaranteed, so I wouldn't advise depending on them. Of course, some people unfortunately cannot conceive at all, and I know that brings deep pain. But if you can, why not have children younger, when you have more energy and can bounce back quicker? In my case, neither of my pregnancies were easy, nor were my deliveries. My youngest ended up being an emergency C-section, and I'm sure recovering from that was much easier at 30 than it would have been at 35.

Being married didn't hinder Mr. BTEG's career, either. We knew we didn't want to live in a big metropolitan area like New York, Chicago or LA, but Cleveland and Columbus were just the right sizes to offer him many choices in IT anyway. I'll admit that me being a stay-at-home wife/mother for most of our marriage made it easier to move to different locations, but I would have had job opportunities as well. And IT guys typically move around quite a bit, so even at thirty Mr. BTEG was not completely settled down at the company he was going to work at for the rest of his life. How many people even do that anymore?

Of course, if one of us had wanted a career that involved more schooling, that would have made things harder. But unless you have wealthy parents or a sugar daddy (don't get me started on that) you have to feed, clothe and house yourself while you are getting more schooling anyway. If you've met the right person, why spend more money living apart?

And there is the crux of the matter for me: if you have met the right person. Mr. BTEG and I knew that we were right for each other, and that we wanted to be married. Our choices were: live together, live separately but keep seeing each other until we hit the "magic" age of 30, keep shopping the dating market and hope we found someone else we wanted to marry when we were older, look each other up again when we were both older and hope that we were still single, or... make a commitment to marry and deal with problems and changes and difficulties together. I will admit, Mr. BTEG has taught me a lot about commitment no matter what. Perhaps some of that is because I am a child of divorced parents, perhaps some of that is my mental instability. But I knew going into marriage that it should be for a lifetime, and I still think that after twenty years. It's incredibly freeing to have the stability and comfort of such a long relationship, and I recommend it. :)

The Marriage Mart

At one of my daughter's dance classes, I was appalled to hear one mother say that she was counseling her daughter to not get married until she was thirty. Instead the daughter should be focusing on her own life and on establishing her career. I was even more shocked and unhappy when one of my daughter's dance teachers agreed. As a matter of fact, I became furious, and had a hard time keeping my temper. I wasn't even sure why at the time I was so angry, except that the institution of the family is very important to me, and I hate to see it treated so casually. I think it especially ridiculous for a Christian (like my daughter's dance teacher) to be advocating such ideas. I've spent a while turning it over in my mind, and I've come up with some specific thoughts.

When I typed the second sentence, one of the reasons I've felt uncomfortable about this really stood out: it is all about the self. Focus on YOU and YOUR career. Get yourself comfortably set up, and then you can be ready to let someone else into your life. The problem is, and this is assuming you were brought up in a close family, for about nine years of your life, your focus will have been on you. This is not about people who are single because they haven't found the right one to marry, by the way. This is about those who are doing it for essentially selfish reasons, to get the most out of life for themselves before they even think about sharing that life with another human in the most intimate way possible. But after having lived for yourself for years on end, tasting the best life has to offer for someone with no commitment other than a career, and no one to spend your money other than your own whims, why settle down then?

In today's society, indeed, why settle down at all? There is no stigma attached to living together, not even in having children out of wedlock. And even if you don't find someone you want to shack up with, you can still be having plenty of sex. It seems to be a very tempting prospect; you can have a romantic relationship and sexual release on your own terms, and if it doesn't suit one or both of you, you can walk. But again, once you've lived that life for long enough, why change, and how well will you be able to commit to one person for the rest of your life after treating your relationships as temporary?

Of course, you can live with someone and call it committed without getting married. But that detracts from the whole point of what the mothers who want their daughters to put off getting married seem to want to avoid, and that is the pain of breaking up a relationship, and the annoyance of being stuck with an unpleasant ex if you have to deal with one because of shared children. Somehow if you wait until you are thirty, and have a successful career, you and your prospective spouse will be able to take on a committed relationship with extra assurance that it will work out. I will probably take on that idea soon. In the meantime, what do you feel think about putting off marriage?

Can't Wait to Be Done

I'm glad that the suggestion for students in the United States to go to school year-round has never gotten much momentum, because I really need a break. A long break. And it's not even like we're going to be sitting around all summer. The girls have another Higher Things conference, the Dancer will be taking several classes for the six week summer dance season, the Musician has gotten a job working with the high school theatrical tech crew and of course she will be involved in marching band. Mr. BTEG and I will be taking a short trip to celebrate our twentieth wedding anniversary. But the pace will be so much more laid back and relaxed, and I need that. I'm so sick of just about everything, and I'm hoping to refreshed and ready to start "normal" life again in the fall.

Do You Want It All?

What does it mean for a society when children are seen not as gifts, but as a burden, something to avoid? We hear from a DINK, that "Not Having Children Is Letting Us Have It All." If by "all" they mean the material goods of this world, then yes, they have a lot of stuff. Of course, I don't think they'll always be happy with the amount of stuff that they have. There is always a bigger house, a fancier car, new furniture, a pool, a boat, a bigger boat, and then of course there is the curse of more, more places to visit, more clothes to buy, more purses and jewelry and shoes. This woman is very foolish if she thinks that she has it "all." First, because as I just stated, no one can have it all. Secondly, because she really doesn't have it all.

Maybe she and her husband will never appreciate it, but there is nothing like holding your newborn baby, a gift that God enabled you and your spouse to create with love. There is nothing like the special love that a toddler has for her mommy. There is nothing like that brief span of life where Daddy can fix anything. There is nothing like watching your child take her first steps, hug a sibling, learn to read, learn to play an instrument, go en pointe. There is nothing like the joy in the eyes of Mr. BTEG's late grandmother, as she held her newest great-grandchild, the last one she would live to see. That joy is even reflected in the Dancer's eyes.

If you look at the map towards the bottom right of my page, you can see that I have traveled. There are even places I've been that aren't on there, because I haven't figured out how to update the map. I've rafted the New River in West Virginia, been to the French Quarter in New Orleans, hung out on the beach in Costa del Sol, touched the Berlin Wall. I've had *experiences*. But experiences don't last. Since most of the traveling I listed above was done before I was 21, they are becoming dim memories of experiences, at that. I have plenty of photos, but even looking at the same photo can get boring over decades. Sure, I could do more traveling, and I probably will, but again, those are brief moments in the big picture of life. And even traveling can get old after weeks of living out of a suitcase.

For some reason, memories of the people I love never get old in the same way. Not just with my children, but also people like my grandfather or my dear friends. If you are blessed enough to be happily married, do you still like to think fondly of your wedding day? Do you remember sharing an activity with a grandparent, or the road trip you took with your friends in college? We are meant to want to be with people, to have people in our lives that we care about, and who care about us. Not all of us will be blessed with children, and the author above says she is happy she doesn't have any. That may never change; she might be eighty and be glad that she didn't have children. But I think that when I am eighty, I'll have a lot more to show for my life than old W-2s, purchase receipts and travel albums.

So Very Tired

So Plan B, the "morning after" pill, is approved for over the counter purchase to girls as young as fifteen. And I'm sure you've heard lots of arguments why it's a bad idea. It is ridiculous that I as a forty-four year old woman have to show my ID to buy cold medicine, but my teenage daughters, with their still maturing bodies and minds, can buy, with no oversight, a medication with a much greater chance of complications, even when it is taken as directed. I had to show my ID to my own sister-in-law when my daughters got their ears pierced, because we got them pierced through the jewelry store that she works at, and she had to have proof that I, as a parent, had given permission. Because ear piercing is so much more dangerous than making your body abort a pregnancy, and messing with the hormones of a girl which are not completely settled to begin with.

But honestly, I expect no less from this government. What discourages me, and makes me tired, is I would expect the majority of people in this country to either, 1. still heartily approve, or 2. not have any idea this happened. And the second group bothers me more than the first, because the second group is more likely to disapprove, and thus, there might be a chance of changing the way we treat the unborn in this society, and the inconsistent way we grant "freedoms" to citizens. Plus, some people might wake up to how little they are aware of things. Maybe? I'm considering running a little experiment and asking moms of some of the teens I know, if they have heard about this ruling. Just to see how little some people pay attention.

In the meantime, I've had to tell my daughters to be aware if they hear someone they know has taken, or is going to take Plan B. Just in case something does happen.

History 101

Since my two favorite eras of history are the Victorian and the Edwardian, I really enjoy the following two Tumblrs: This Is NOT Victorian, and We Are Not Amused. They are great sites taking on the "This crap is old and stuff; it must be Victorian" mentality. I'm admittedly only an amateur fashion historian, but I have spent hours on end for years reading, looking at pictures and photos and extant costumes. I try to stick mainly to the Victorian and Edwardian eras, although I have branched out both backwards to Regency and forwards to the 1930's. I could study even more eras, but therein lies madness, I'm afraid. I've already recently taken up learning how to roughly date daguerreotypes by the mat and preserver, if there is one. There's so much minutiae! Although, like the above Tumblr authors, I find myself yelling at the computer or TV screen if somebody has his fashion facts way off. My family has learned to tolerate it.

I Think You're Confused

As a stay-at-home mom, this article caught my eye. I'm glad that the author acknowledges that women do have the right to do as they like with their lives, including staying at home and bringing up their children. Someone who argues that women should be able to do whatever they want, should let women do... whatever they want. Even if that means spending a season of their lives as a stay-at-home wife and mother.

I'm confused, though, at the assertion of the author that a women who does enter the workforce must do so for the purpose of "women's advancement." At least, a woman who enters an elite field like Harvard-trained lawyer, or Senator, must do this. Presumably, waitresses and administrative assistants can work merely for the grubby purpose of actually earning a living. But when she mentions that a woman can attend Harvard or Yale, become a lawyer, Senator or even POTUS, and then turns around and says that women need help advancing, she loses me. What else do women in this country need? Most charitably, I would say that leftists get caught up in some imaginary dream of perfection. Some woman somewhere suffered something that we can fix, so we must work harder to make things right for All Women Everywhere.

Less charitably, it seems like the professional left always needs a victim to stand before the cameras and cry, so that the left can push more of its issues forward. Whatever women have, it's not enough, it would seem. Honestly, if women have the freedom to choose their vocation, I think they should be able to choose not to devote their lives to "women's advancement."

Something Smells

Our local trash day is Monday. However, this week the trash has been sitting out since then, and has not been picked up. The girls have been hearing at school that the garbage men are on strike, so I steeled myself to go to one of the online local news sources, and found out that the garbage men are indeed on strike, but only in solidarity with garbage men in Youngstown, OH that are also on strike. Well. Youngstown isn't a place where the wealthy tend to congregate. My in-laws live there, my husband grew up there, and we go there often. It's not Detroit, but Youngstown has its share of abandoned buildings and run-down neighborhoods. Maybe the garbage men in Youngstown have a legitimate issue. Maybe you just can't get blood out of a stone. Mr. BTEG's previous job didn't offer enough money, or a good enough health care plan for our needs. His previous employer didn't particularly care. Apparently they felt they could afford to lose Mr. BTEG as an employee, when he was able to find a better job. The company made its decision; we made ours. An employee can't always get more money just by asking for it, no matter how unfair that may be in the mind of the employee.

In this economy, with unemployment high, and with lots of people who have gone through their 99 weeks of unemployment pay and basically given up looking for a job, I do wonder about the wisdom of striking. There might be a lot of people out there who would like work, even collecting garbage. I also wonder about the wisdom of striking when you are not even the group that has the grievance. It's over 80 degrees today, and we have garbage on the curb that has been there since Sunday night. We have raccoons locally, and I'm sure some people have had their garbage broken into. These things are not really making me think favorably about the garbage men. And what am I supposed to do, anyway? Call the Youngstown city offices and demand they pay their own garbage men more? All this strike is making me do is hope that the strikers here get fired.

Who Says?

I had alarm bells go off yesterday when reading a comment from someone in a crafting forum. She pronounced an action that someone else had taken with one of her patterns, not as right or wrong, but as not "fair." Well. I guess all you need to do is scream "Unfair!" and Mommy or Teacher should come right over and make it fair. Right? Life *should* be fair. And all we have to do is pass more laws, and play nice with others, and it all will be fair.

Remind you of any group that you know?

Gratitude

I made what I hope is my last visit to the orthopedic doctor today. I am cleared to start walking actively, and don't have to go back to the doctor unless there is pain again. Every visit I've had, the doctor has made a point of saying how normally injuries like this require surgery. Today was not an exception. He said people with this injury generally have to have screws put in, and that I am a very good healer. I am very grateful that God has healed me, and for people that were praying for me. I'm going to appreciate my reacquired mobility.

The Road Ahead

I've been sick all week, which means survival mode. It's also meant I've been unusually depressed. It also means I've been at the computer a lot, which has made me even more depressed. It may not be the best idea for me to be reading so many current event blogs, but I have an insatiable need to know what it is going on. The worst part is feeling like I can't do anything but what I am already doing, which is my vocation of bringing up my daughters, with the help of their father. And maybe that's all that I'm supposed to be doing. I certainly haven't been called to do anything else as of right now, and my motherly duties are expanding. The Dancer is spending more and more of her time at... the dance studio, now that she has started pointe on top of her other classes. The Musician hangs out with friends a great deal and is starting her important senior year in high school this fall. Yikes! I may also have to try my hand at organizing fundraising efforts for my daughters' school activities if a levy does not go through this spring. It's actually very freeing to think about just following my vocation....

Oh No, You Didn't

Some Communist idiot on MSNBC has the temerity to say this:

“We’ve always had this private notion of children… We haven’t had a very collective notion that these are our children. So part of it is we have to break through our kind of private idea that kids belong to their parents or kids belong to their families, and recognize that kids belong to their communities.”

You can have your child brought up however you want. Keep your grubby mitts off of mine. Our daughters will continue to be brought up with their parents, in their family. Mr. BTEG and I will take them to church, send them to Higher Things, educate them how we wish, have veto power over what they wear and where they go, make sure they are eating properly, give them chores and expect them to be done, give them guidance and support as they move towards adulthood. Leftists aren't big on religious freedom, but Mr. BTEG and I have been blessed by God with children, and it is our vocation to train them up. It worries me a little that someone can say something so obviously totalitarian on national television with so little backlash, albeit on a channel that is very leftist to begin with. Although my daughters are older, I would prefer not to have to fight for the right for them to rear my grandchildren. May God protect us and have mercy on us.

Butterflies

Since we've been talking about learning, I've been wanting for a while to talk about our real-life lesson in butterflies, and this post gave me the impetus to do it. Once again, this author is one of those completely down on public schooling; this line, particularly, "fill the void left in the child's heart after the state forcibly curtails the intellectual adventurousness of the wandering bug-studier, stargazer, or bookworm," made me think of our family's short adventure with Mona the Monarch.

It was early October of 2005. We were at one of the local outdoor malls on one of those days when winter is drawing closer to its appearance; it was cold and rainy. While we were walking, we saw a monarch butterfly on the sidewalk looking completely bedraggled. We found a cup in our car, and once the butterfly got into the dryness and warmth of our car, she immediately came back to life, fluttering around wildly. We decided we didn't want to turn her back out into the cold and damp, so we took her home and temporarily let her free in our bathroom, where she had room to fly. We had stopped on the way for a better temporary carrier for her, and some hummingbird food, the best thing we thought we could provide to nourish her. We did some research to discover that Mona was indeed a girl monarch, and that butterflies drink with their long tongues, and taste with their feet. Here you see Mona checking out the hummingbird food.

I contacted via email a group involved in tracking the yearly migration of the monarch butterfly, and was told that Mona could still make it to Mexico if she was released. So we simply waited a few days until the weather was sunny, and warm enough, and set her free, after a few pictures to remember her by.

She flew right up into the sky until she was over our house, and then headed almost due south. We like to think that she did indeed make it to Mexico, and that her descendants are still flying around somewhere.

What really brought her to mind was a comment that the Dancer made about a month ago. She is excelling in her math and science classes, and is taking Honors Geometry and Honors Biology in high school, next year, so we're not ruling out a STEM career of some sort in her future. She mentioned that she might want to have a job studying butterflies, because of her experience with Mona. That surprised me, because of how long ago our butterfly adventure took place, but it made me happy that it had left such an impression on her.

Tying it in to the article above, however, the author asserts that public school will kill the enthusiasm of the "wandering bug-studier." Granted, we were homeschooling when this all took place, but it was completely extra-curricular and spur of the moment. We could have done all of the above even if the girls were attending a public school, especially since we discovered Mona over a weekend. And the kids that my girls were friends with before we started homeschooling would at the very least not have shot down their interest. They might have thought it was interesting themselves, even if they would not have enjoyed the experience so much. The Dancer had even done a very simple "lesson" on butterflies in her preschool class.

I hate to see myself becoming an advocate for public schools, but the continuous stream of articles describing public school as nothing ever but a soul-sucking waste, make my contrarian nature want to respond that while public school is not perfect, it is in no way one hundred percent the same for everyone, everywhere. I'll probably respond more to this article in future posts, but this one was mostly to use as a jumping off point for another adventure in learning that I wanted to share.

Footsteps

There has been much excitement and activity here since a few weeks ago when the Dancer's dance teacher first suggested that she was ready to start work in ballet en pointe. The first step was simply trying to go en pointe in a pair of borrowed shoes. She found that to be no problem. Next was a trip to a podiatrist to get an x-ray to make sure that her feet had stopped growing so that she won't do permanent damage to them. The doctor was happy with how everything looked, so then came finding a time to get to the dance wear store and get the Dancer her own shoes. Next was me sewing the ribbons onto her new shoes, and her showing off the shoes to her dance class last night. I have to figure out exactly where to sew the strips of elastic and take care of getting those on. She'll start working en pointe probably next week. She started this process all the way back in 2006, by her own choice. It's fantastic to me that she has kept at it this long, and that she is now starting on a whole new part of her dance years. These are the things that make watching your children grow up, worthwhile.

Innocent Blood

So now scientists are saying that as early as 28 eight weeks gestation, babies may be able to tell different syllables apart. We learn more and more about the unborn, and about infants, and what they are able to perceive and learn. And yet there are people still defending Kermit Gosnell, an abortion practitioner going on trial, who among other atrocities killed viable infants who survived abortion. Don't go over to that link unless you want your stomach to turn.

I've grown to understand the mentality of a society that on the one hand continues to learn more and more about how complex even the unborn are in their ability to learn and process information, and on the other hand looks the other way when those same miraculous creatures are killed in horrific manners and body parts preserved in jars. The truth is, not only does evil exist, but too many people have been so swayed by emotional appeals that they overlook evil. Certainly, gruesome abortion details do create an emotional reaction on the other side. But go beyond that and think about why an unborn child deserves to be killed at all, and all of the ways to kill the unborn are pretty gruesome, when even science is telling us how, dare I say it, human, these little ones are?