Wednesday, April 19, 2006

Rock On, Sisters

A few weeks ago I was on the couch watching the Twins play the Red Sox in one of their first televised spring training games when there was a knock on my front door. I assumed, since baseball was on, that My Ho had dropped by unannounced to watch the game with me, because that is the sort of thing he sometimes does, usually bearing ice cream or buffalo wings (as I have mentioned previously, he is the best boyfriend ever). But that night when I opened the door, to my bitter disappointment, it was not My Ho at all. Two women with clipboards were on my doorstep.

Crap, I thought, they're selling something. And now I’ve gone and answered the door and rendered useless my usual passive/aggressive ignore-the-knocking-until-they-go-away approach. I had left myself with no choice but to resort to Plan B: Thinly Disguised Rudeness.

I mustered up my “are you REALLY going to try and sell me something when baseball is on?” face, and opened my mouth to implement Plan B. But before I could make a sound, the clipboard woman with crayon red-dyed hair said, “Hi, we’re here from Pro Choice Minnesota.”

(Cue the scratching record needle sound clip.)

“Oh my God,” I said. “Where do I sign?”

They tried to give me the pitch anyway, about South Dakota and Mississippi and Missouri, about how women's health and rights are being jeapordized all over the country, and I said, “I know! It’s terrifying! GIVE ME THE CLIPBOARD!”

As I added my name and address to the list of signatures they’d already collected, they told me they were going door to door trying to raise support and funds. On behalf of my daughters, my sisters, my niece and myself, I thanked them sincerely.
And then I went and got my checkbook.

There aren’t many good reasons to interrupt me when baseball is on (my children will testify to that). But that was a good one.

5 comments:

Lin said...

Good girl!

Katie Burke said...

Indeed. Way to welcome the very welcome interruption!

Anonymous said...

Thanks Julie! It warms my heart to hear you're willing to interupt baseball for my favorite cause. If Roe fails, you folks in Minnesota are probably going to have the same situation as we'll have on the west coast--all the desperate women who can't get reproductive care in their own states will cross the border to yours. But over here we've got a whole coastline of abortion friendly states. You Minnesotans are hanging out in the upper midwest all on your own! Keep hanging!

Tom said...

It's just downright scary and amazing what they want to do in SoDak and other states.

"hey, lets prevent people from having options!" pffff

Anonymous said...

OMG, you must go out, find them and send them to my neighborhood. Especially to my neighbor whose high school senior gave birth over Christmas break.