When we arrived and parked outside the abortion clinic, I noticed a flurry of people walking around its entrance. I looked at my watch. It would open in a few minutes. I fingered two money orders in my shorts’ pockets. Sweat dampened the paper. My girlfriend, Marie got out of the car. Her brown eyes watered. She tied her long black hair back in a bun. I sat silently staring at her. She said, “We need to go.”
“I know . . . I know,” I said. I got out of the car. I walked over to Marie, putting my right arm around her 5’4,’’ 135 pound body. I pulled her close. At 6’1,” I towered over her. She looked like a little girl, even at 19. Lately, I felt a lot older than 23.
We walked towards the clinic entrance.
A woman approached and screamed in my face, “Murderer!” She stepped aside. In the breeze, her oversized T-shirt blew at me like a ghost.
Another woman leaned forward, shoving an anti-abortion pamphlet at me. She said, “Don’t do it. Don’t do it. There are other options.”
I turned away. I let go of Marie. I took a deep breath. I pivoted back towards the entrance and took two steps forward. Immediately, several protesters blocked the doorway. Good, we were not getting in. A moment later, my heart sank when six policemen parted the protesters like the Red Sea.
We entered the clinic; I could not focus on anything. I saw colors, but objects ran out of their boundaries. I stopped walking. Marie went to the admittance desk and checked in.
We left the waiting room and walked down a long hall lined with office doors and windows. All I could do of value was stand behind her, holding her hand. Inside the offices, blank faces seemed to accuse me of a wrongdoing. In reality, they probably didn’t notice that we were there.
Finally, we reached the procedure room.
I felt dizzy. I wanted to run away, just get the hell out of there. She went in for the abortion. I couldn’t. I was to wait outside. I pretended to go to the bathroom; instead, I bolted down the corridor. Fifty feet felt like a hundred miles in this place. I crushed down the exit door lever; the sun blazed down like a spotlight.
I prayed to God for forgiveness. . . .
I was raised in a Norman Rockwell painting with a clean-cut, workaholic father, a parochial school mom blessed with six boys, a spacious yard, two cars, and a big, white house. The house rules were simple: remember the good Lord’s ways; no publicspectacles; remember that God has a plan; never speak ill of family members to others; remember you are attending Mass on Sunday; no free time (idle hands are Lucifer’s workshop); remember the Ten Commandments; don’t be a baby, be a man, never cry. My parents were kind but distant. My five brothers and I were rough and tumble (or so we thought). Displays of emotion or the “touchy feelie” were outlawed. The sentence: ridicule. Growing up, I don’t remember my mother and father ever kissing on the lips. Sex education consisted of a book on reproduction - filled with cartoon animals and people - abandoned on my bureau with a note in my mother’s handwriting, “Let me know if you have any questions.” Being Irish and Roman Catholic, a stoic but guilt-ridden existence was the norm. Keep it on the inside; volcanoes only erupt once or twice in a lifetime. . . . After leaving the abortion clinic, I walked a few miles towards Fenway Park. I was pretending that geographical distance would absolve me. Two days ago, I even told three friends that I was coming to Boston and would meet them at the Red Sox game. I spoke to them as if I had an intention of showing up. I was lying. I needed a mental placebo to avoid the real reason for coming here . . . the abortion. A half-mile from the ballpark, I grew tired.
Scowling, I sat on a sidewalk bench. My stomach ached. What was I doing? I had to go back. I turned around and started back to the clinic with a whirlpool of nausea in my stomach. I should have done something before today: asked advice; looked at other options; spoken to our families; faced the reality: that the abortion was going to happen; not been a bystander, maybe stopped it. I was a coward for not acting, for leaving her alone. Regrets would multiply.
. . . Two months before, I had begun to notice that Marie, then my girlfriend of six months had put on fifteen pounds; I thought it was just an extended spell of overeating, I had seen it before. One night, after devouring a large cheese pizza by herself, I smiled and said, “Are you going to eat anything else.” Marie was silent.
“Well, you have put on a little weight,” I said.
“I know I’m getting fat! I’m pregnant!” she said. “I haven’t had my period in two months.” “Christ. You’re kidding,” I said, standing up from the table.
Marie stared at me with tears running down her cheek. “I know I’m pregnant. I know I am.”
“Shit.”
The next day, Marie tested positive for pregnancy. I was in disbelief. “No way!” I said, “The over-the-counter pregnancy tests are wrong. Let’s go to a doctor.”
“No,” she said. “I want this quiet, my parents will find out if a doctor is involved, the insurance. No one but us needs to know. I’ll contact my cousin, she’s a nurse. I trust her.” Sounded logical. Why cry wolf? . . . Two days later, at Marie’s cousin’s house, the pregnancy test was positive and the retest was positive as well. She cried and cried, sobbing, “Having a baby is supposed to be happy.”
I am lousy when women cry. When my mother cried when I was younger, it was like the apocalypse at the house. Urgency, no time left. Scramble, stop the tears, admit guilt if necessary, appease her. Women’s tears were scary. Underneath my exterior, I was sensitive; I hated to see people upset, crying, especially women. I always tried to patch people up. With men, I talked to them, related to them, and told them, “toughen up, men don’t cry, they suck it up and deal with the situation.” When it came to comforting women, I was lost at sea; I just rowed in any direction hoping for land.
Now, I needed to be a man and deal with things. I coached myself, “Be honorable. You did this, own up.” I mechanically asked her, “Do you want to get married?”
“No! I don’t want this,” she said. “I’m 19. Not now. It’s too much.”
The half-hearted hero takes one in the chops. I was shocked but relieved. Who could blame her? I was not surprised at her response; besides my irresponsible behavior before the pregnancy, our relationship was off and on. We had started as friends and it evolved. We were not too serious about it. We were not afraid to spend time apart, sometimes weeks at a time. Occasionally, we kidded about marriage. We loved each other, cared about each other, but not in the manacled-for-life sense. For two weeks following the positive pregnancy tests, we played round after round of “what do you want to do.” Soon, Father Time was about to limit our choices.
The final solution continued to come up: abortion. I was always noncommittal; one day, Marie called the clinic. The procedure was scheduled in three days. I offered to pay - money orders, no personal checks, no trace. I wanted this quiet. I didn’t feel right; the infection incubating, festering.
. . .
I was raised a Catholic. My religious resume: Baptism; ten solid years of CCD; special training in the Sacraments of communion, confession, and confirmation; a repertoire of numerous prayers, scriptures, and the Ten Commandments, twenty years of overall experience.
Over the years, I had had the guilt aspect of Catholicism pounded into me. I did plenty of things wrong and had plenty of guilt to go with it. When I was nine years-old, the cool kids in elementary school were into stealing packs of gum at the local convenience store, The Li’l Peach. I aspired to be a cool risk taker. I was too chicken to try this there, but my father owned a package store with a candy section. I planned my heist. I would walk to the store after school and strike. The day of the robbery, I was nervous as I entered the store. Everyone said, “Hi” to me. My father offered me a soda. I declined. I walked into the candy section unnoticed and took a ten-cent pack of Juicy Fruit. Then I walked out of the store. About one minute later, after stuffing the entire pack of gum into my mouth, I felt sick. I walked back in and put about eight dimes on the counter by the register. I went home and cried. I prayed to God every night for a month asking for forgiveness.
The older that I got; the less I practiced Catholicism. In my early twenties, I was turning too much into a sinner: swearing, premarital sex, gambling, drinking. About my behavior, I felt pangs of regret or felt lousy about it. At this point, I figured shoot for Heaven, but don’t be surprised to see Purgatory. . . . Somehow, I figured the abortion was not going to happen. I thought that Marie would have a last minute revelation that this abortion would end a life or that its emotional ramifications would be devastating. Since her decision to have an abortion, I had been at odds with myself. I was for an individual’s free choice in life but personally against abortion. I hadn’t planned on having these conflicting beliefs put to a test. Because of my religious upbringing, an avalanche of guilt loomed over me waiting to thunder down if the abortion occurred. I became inactive. I let my conscience rest, the moral issues lay dormant.
. . .
Two hours later, I returned to the clinic. I paced around its environs, feeling totally self-consumed, powerless, and insignificant at the same time. I was physically numb, mentally taped together, and emotionally erased. I had left earlier fully knowing the chain of guilt between linked us forever. Distance or time would never break the connection. I glanced around the waiting room; I could not find her; I headed for my car. When we met on the way back to the car, I did not say anything; I barely held her hand. I tried to rationalize the guilt away: I agreed to this by default . . . I didn’t do anything but pay for it . . . It was her decision . . . I am not taking the fall for this. This approach was useless. Responsibility had been shirked. I was irresponsible to myself. How could I have done next to nothing? What a time to have no backbone. Marie cried and cried; I told her to stop. I was wrecked but determined. I was not going to cry. I would store the pain, regret, and guilt. Too much at once, I could crack, let it slowly seep out. I had to block this out for now.
A week after the abortion, we disastrously parted for good. It was supposedly over a fight about what we would do in the future; the real culprit was the dead hand of the past and our inability to deal with it. For the next months, my feelings were partially paralyzed. My external emotions were like a printer running out of ink; the text was light and hard to read. I never laughed too loud. How could anything be that funny anymore? I never exploded over some personal injustice, no matter how unfair. I deserved it. Sinners pay. I had trouble holding babies. I had to switch abortion commercials: photos of fetuses aused my reservoir of guilt to overflow. I emotionally tortured myself with an internal Inquisition consisting of a daily dose of, “you procrastinating coward.” At these times, I would stare blankly - feel old, feel nothing.
I still feel remorse about the abortion; it comes out of nowhere. It feels like icy fingertips on my soul. When I let my mind go, a gray cinder block lay on my chest. Death is concrete. I learned you cannot replace some things.