Confluence of little girls

I have been away from the blog, contemplating the blog and what my intentions are re: the blog. It's a new form of writing for me and alas, since I have not been writing for a long time, I really don't know what the parameters are. Actually, I realized some time ago that there are no parameters. This is blogging. I recall having a similar inner debate about what and why one writes. Milan Kundera suggested that it may have to do with immortality, but I am not certain if that holds true for the relatively new domain (no pun intended) of blogging. This is a medium where anyone and everyone, with a computer or access to one, can state their point of view, make their voice heard and so on. Where my struggle lies is with the distinction between what is here and what manifests in my journaling.

I had no intention of writing in here tonight and here it is. I had just bookmarked my current read Sweetness in the Belly by Camilla Gibb, after finishing a couple of heart-wrenching chapters on female circumcision and infibulation of two five-year-old girls. Unrelatedly, I remembered that I had to renew my three-year-old daughter's library books, so I turned on the computer. I received a message from my cousin who had just delivered a baby girl. In the span of a few minutes, four girls entered my consciousness: my own; my new niece; and, two fictional girls whose stories, I suspected, represented those of untold girls and women.

I am so blessed by my daughter and happy for my new niece. I am grateful for all the girls and women I know, but I cannot help but worry about the difficult lives for these young girls and those experienced by so many I know. I grieve for the past, present and future pain for I know that the life of a girl/woman is not an easy one.

My mind wanders to Manjit Panghali, a local woman who was four-months pregnant at the time her husband killed her and disposed of her remains by burning her body. She left behind a three-year-old daughter. What will this child's life be knowing the tragedy of her mother and the viciousness of her father? Statistically, women have a higher risk of being murdered when they are pregnant than when they are not. Now, there's an interesting argument for abstinance. "No sex tonight, honey. I might get preggers and you might off me!" Yikes! O, The Oprah Magazine, did a piece on it called "The Laci Effect," an allusion to the highly publicized Laci Peterson murder. What happened to good old-fashioned divorce? My husband cannot get over the fact that these men believe that they can get away with it. It's comforting to know that his common sense will bar him from pursuing such an action against me. It's too bad that others are not and were not so fortunate.