Happy 30th Post!

Well, it's fall. The weather is getting a bit chilly and all the kiddies are going back to school. One of the delights of escorting on the late shift around back is listening to the announcements from the junior high school behind the clinic. We listen to them talk about intramural sports, birthdays and new rules and reminisce about our own inevitably hellish days in junior high. Fun.

Fall also means a bit of a shift in escorts; some leaving us (going away to school or not being able to fit their class schedule around volunteering, or simply being too busy) and some coming back (from summer job placements or vacations), and some entirely new faces. Very exciting time of year.

It also seems to make a difference to the protesters, too, as it means a higher concentration of older ones. Their two token young guys, the Anger Twins, were not protesting today - could it be they are off edifying themselves at one of our fine institutions of higher learning? One hopes so, while at the same time experiencing some doubt as to whether it would make a difference, when the students in question don't think the Supreme Court's rulings affect them, and habitually discuss the possibility that Revelations is supposed to be taken literally. I weep for the youth.

So yesterday was fun, despite those absences. The gentleman who sometimes passes by, and who once dropped his coffee out of frustration and anger with the presence of the protesters, passed by and tried to smile at us, but it turned into more of a grimace at the protesters, whose presence seems to make him physically nauseaous. We shall henceforth name him Cool Guy.

A young man came by and started snapping pictures of the protesters at one point. Judging from his style and expensive camera, I would guess a photography student. The protesters were all in a huff about that, and Peter Ryan had to emerge from his cave and sort the fellow out. Really he just asked him what he was doing. I wasn't close enough to hear the guy's reply but Peter Ryan didn't seem very pleased about him being there, and the photographer soon left. After that the protesters felt it necessary to huddle together and discuss in urgent whispers these new developments.

Another thrilling week at the abortion clinic, such as it is.