Okay, this won’t be a screed. I hope. I’m a little tired of advocating my STRONG pro-choice stance especially since so many people are much more eloquently articulating the issues than I ever could. So I will instead provide some memories of pregnant women/girls I knew who had to wend their way through the decision process surrounding unwanted pregnancies and the associated laws.

I don’t have a lot of these stories to tell. Most of my female friends as a teenager and a bit beyond didn’t get in “trouble”. But here is one pre-Roe story.

As a young teenager I joined a Masonic-related organization called Job’s Daughters. I didn’t really have a strong interest in this org except that a majority of the girls in my junior high and high school joined it, including my much admired older cousins. Everybody did it so I did too.

There were a number of “offices” girls could hold including a succession of “royal” (exaggerating a bit) offices leading to junior and senior princess and eventually Honored Queen. Although I envied the royalty, I never expected I would be chosen for this succession and I wasn’t. I am waaaay too nerdy and introverted for that kind of office and as an adult, I have long made my peace with that.

There were also positions that didn’t lead to Honored Queen and one of them was Librarian. Her job was to recite a poem at each meeting. When I was a high school freshman, the girl chosen for Librarian had the same first name as me (without the e) and long blonde hair, like mine. At one of our meetings, I was rushed aside by a couple of adult mentors and asked if I would please become the librarian. I was thrilled on the one hand to be asked to be an OFFICER and agreed to do it. On the other hand the Ann-without-an-e (a junior) had disappeared from school. She was gone for the entire school year.

They were recruiting me because I had the same name and we looked SOMEWHAT alike except she was pregnant. They thought maybe no one would notice?

I am not sure whether these women thought I was stupid or naive or what. They knew my whole extended family (Granddaddy was a mason and Grandma was in Eastern Star) at least by reputation. They knew that I was not stupid (by reputation) but maybe they thought I was young enough to be naive about this kind of subject. I wasn’t (I had Bad Boyfriend hanging around) and I did put two and two together to figure out what was going on. I think she was spirited away to an “aunt’s” house or wherever to have a baby and give it up for adoption, whether she wanted to or not. Don’t get me wrong. I think adoption is wonderful but I’m not sure this young girl had a real choice. I know I wouldn’t have had a choice because my parents (love them as I did) would’ve made it for me. Because having a baby as a teenager would have shamed the family. And abortion was not legal in the Great Lake State at that time. If you were rich, you could go to New York or wherever. If not…

I kept it hushed up ANYWAY but mostly because I didn’t have a clue what to do with my conclusions and it wasn’t something I wanted to discuss with my mom, let alone my dad, WWII pilot and bank president. Yikes! 👀

I can’t really remember how I managed the office of Librarian. Where did I get poems to read? The only poem I remember from when I was a kid was Eletelephony. Not quiiiite appropriate for Job’s Daughter’s meetings🤣.

P.S. My parents voted for Republicans when I was a kid but they were ALWAYS pro-choice. Republicans were different in those days. We weren’t rich, bank prez or not, but if I had gotten knocked up, I think my parents would’ve figured how to get me to New York or wherever and I would have agreed with that.

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