Gravity’s wide palm fights to support my growing burden.
Taurus is an earth sign.
A stalwart.
A constant.
Uncompromising.
As Earth, I bear witness and carry with me the burden of memory.
But my memory is more than a recollection of sweet sixteens, first loves, and pregnancies lost. My memory is not my own. Like scars that scatter the earth, scraped mountain tops and dammed rivers and felled forests; my memory has been implanted with the memories of others. I tell the story they were not permitted to tell.
My hands clenched the steering wheel, and I felt my foot heavy on the accelerator as I listened to Brett Kavanaugh’s opening remarks. NPR played a dark tune about sexual assault, male privilege, and American justice. In sharp contrast to Christine Ford’s composed statement, Kavanaugh’s defiant indignance rattled through the speakers. My right hip seized in response. A gripping muscle spasm that shot through my leg and sent my heel to the floor. I watched the speedometer climb—75, 80, 85, 90.
91 South is a lonely road in mid-state Vermont, and I was grateful for cuts to the state police budget. My slim chances of a speeding ticket made slimmer by my Veterans license plate. Military wives served, too.
I don’t know Brett Kavanaugh, and his opinions will have little effect on me. My days at Planned Parenthood are long over. I’ve grabbed the fist full of condoms from the fishbowl and used my fair share of free exams. Unlike some of my girlfriends, my abortion would come later—after marriage, my first son, and three lost pregnancies.
But this is not that story. In this story, I’m past all that. My Roe v. Wade days washed away in a tide of nightly sweat. Why should I care if this weasely whiney man ascends to supreme power? Something about women’s rights?
My disdain for white male traditional power began in the late 1800’s when my great grandmothers farmed leased-land on a mossy crag off the southwest coast of Ireland. The smell of wet turf fires permeated Valentia Island, and for centuries before English royalty claimed. . .
Bottom line: REPRESSION. Must we always give backstory when the outcome remains the same?
Repression. Repression. Repression. 
Women as chattel.
Women as homemakers.
H-O-M-E-M-A-K-E-R.
There is a “me” trapped in a fixed mindset.
Fixed by society.
Tethered by the memory of the Englishmen who invaded and turned my womenfolk into domestics and fishmongers. When the English bowed out of southern Ireland, the Catholic Church filled the governance void. By 1923, women were subservient breeders.
Across the globe, women have been raped, abused, emotionally neglected, and denied economic advancement for all of history.
Women are too vocal.
“Simmer Down.”
While I drove down that lonely route in the midst of the decaying foliage, I listened to this over-privileged white male berate his accuser and his inquisitors—
How dare we question his good name?
Do we know who he is? His education and contributions and family.
How dare we?
The voices of the goddesses scream eternal, and I hold the burden of their memories.
How dare I remain silent?
How dare we?