Somethings are no-brainers....that is until the brain in question is yours. I had heard severally while I was growing up not to be quick to jump to conclusion. I heard it many years ago but I learned what this meant in more recent years.
I remember when I was in junior secondary school, we had some 'movie' nights. To put things somewhat in perspective, this school had a lot of drama surrounding the spiritual, the metaphysical. Therefore, it is not surprising that the movie nights were strictly about the religious. This particular movie night was about a movie on abortion. As tears streamed down my face, I could not understand the inherent wickedness of a mother who would not only consider abortion but make good the act of killing her baby. For me there was no reason on God's earth to justify or excuse the act. Things were more in black and white.
A few years after that movie, I met a lady on my street who was in the same age group as me, walking by with her baby bump-not married, and obviously without her baby daddy. I took the gist home and surprisingly found myself applauding her courage. In the years between when I watched the pro-life movie and the time I met the lady, I had become a little more tolerant but still unforgiving of abortions. There were a few younger girls in our community, younger sisters to friends, close family friends or just children of my mother's friends who had taken in at an early age and without the a 'formal' baby daddy, had decided to keep the baby. It kinda shocked me that young girls were indeed sleeping around for no apparent reason - money was not an excuse, love was not admissible in court, companionship was a far-fetched excuse. I guess the reason I found myself applauding my neighbour's courage was that I realized that the harder decision was to keep a baby - especially one born out of wedlock and to a father who wanted nothing to do with the mother and child.
More recently, we lost a 28 year old lady who had taken in for a boyfriend who she had been going out with for up to 4 years and who wanted the baby. From the gist I heard, she decided on an abortion to avoid facing the wrath of her parents-and then she died! I was furious, that this woman who had come of age to have children and was blessed with the possibility of having a child, decided to safe face and in the process kill herself and her baby. Argh! At the time I had a few indignant questions for the deceased to answer: Why are you sleeping with someone if you were not prepared to have a baby with him? Why are you trying to save face at the expense of a life? At 28 years you are a woman in every sense of the word and should have started your own family, so pray tell me why you think this age is not as good as any to start your family? Why after 4 years of being with someone you don't want to have their baby then why are you still with them especially after they did not want to take out the baby?
A few years later, it was de-ja-vu again but luckily for the lady in question (luckily in a sad way), she killed only her baby and face was saved. The same questions apply as before but the answers are also a deafening mindless silence.
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