Excuse me, but my uterus is showing

Let me start by saying I have to vote. I don’t have a choice. I am compelled by something, mostly my love of history. After reading tons of accounts about the lives spent and lost for my liberty, I just have to vote. And then top it off with I’m a woman, and with all the women who fought to give me the right to vote. It’s just important to me. I have always wanted my voice to be heard, so it would be hypocritical to not vote.

In the debates, last week, John McCain just killed me. I want to like him, I mean I really really want to, mostly cause he’s the only pro-life candidate. But his use of air quotes when describing “health of the mother” argument on the issue of abortion, was more than simply cringe worthy. It was riot worthy. You know, John McCain, I’m against partial birth abortions too (even in rare health of the mother cases), but you don’t have to belittle thousands of American women by your trite hand gestures. “Health of the mother” situations are real and painful and I don’t want anyone referring my health in air quotes. Especially not a presidential candidate.

So I started looking for some third party candidates and I fell in political love with some of them. There candidates who believe that the privatization of insurance and medical companies are evil. They have candidates that believe in the continuation of affirmative action. They have candidates who actually want to do something about education and the economy and the environment and health care and minority rights and the war.

And everyone of those candidates I loved (on the liberal and socialist end, as if you didn’t know) was also wildly pro-choice. I mean wildly.

And I’m wildly pro-life.

You know what? it’s hard to be a pro life woman, well at least a liberal pro life woman. Especially in my community. Where everyone is told (directly or indirectly) to vote based on a handful of issues (incredibly important ones). It’s hard because all my other deeply seeded beliefs lead me away from the one “approved” candidate.

I’m still undecided about what to do. My wonderfully wise husband suggested that I take the issues and in my own heart prioritize them as I think God would. What would he consider the most important and righteous issues of the day? If I vote for those, with that in mind, I may very well be casting a vote for a man I dislike, but I think I could say to the Lord with clear conscious, “I tried to be responsible with my voice, I tried to do what you would do, I tried to judge like you would judge, in my very human, very limited way.”

Maybe at the end of the day, I know that no matter who takes office, there will be no real justice, no real change, I can only be counted as one who wanted her voice to be heard.

Scent of a Woman

There are certain aspects of womanhood that I could just never grasp onto. Even through repeated effort. No matter how I tried it just never felt natural. Two things come to mind; Lipstick and Perfume. They just seemed so brazen and noticibly feminine I never felt like I could pull it off. Lipstick is so loud and feels so crappy on your lips. Perfume always just smelled desperate to me, desperate and homone -y. Yuck. But then maybe 5 years ago I stumbled onto this.

This is Lemon Sugar. One of my favroite scents. So fresh and clean. Just delightful. I’ve gone through two large bottles and now I have this mini.

So I had finally found a perfume that didn’t smell like sex. I figured maybe I just need to try some more and then I found Stella.

This is not at all fruity. It smells like a wonderful field of flowers. I love Stella, by Stella.

So then of course came…

This is a limited edition Stella Fragrance called Peony. They no longer sell it . I love have loved Peony’s since childhood. This scent always makes me feel like a little girl.

So two flowery scents and one fruit; I need some more fruit so I went back to the Fresh line for this…

Ahhh, Bergamot Citrus. What is Bergamot you ask? I have no idea. But this is yummy and delightful.

And finally, I received this as a birthday gift. This secnt makes me feel like a hot blonde rockstar.

LAMB. This smells like nothing else I have, it smells like sparkle. Love love love the LAMB

This is how I overcame my fear of perfume (and now have a costly addiction). Sephora is my homeland, for fragrance, for make up, for comfort, everything but lipstick. I still cannot do it. Does anyone have any recommends for a natural feeling and looking lip product? I need to breech this last hurdle of womanhood.