EARLY YEARS OF MARRIAGE

“On April20 1989 my Life truly began.” That is the day she gave birth to Track Palin so named because he was born during track season? So much for the Christian tradition of naming children after biblical figures like the Apostles , older family members or carrying forth the mothers maiden name. Track was named because he was born during track season and she liked sports. She says jokingly he was lucky it wasn’t the hockey season or he could have been named Zamboni. Some people select names with more care and significance. Later Track told her we would have liked to have been named Colt.

Sarah goes into great detail describing the trials and tribulations of her first labor and delivery and the pain associated with it. Sarah says her drive to become a big time sports reporter was “mellowed’ by the arrival of Track, who was the center of her attention and adoration, so she settled for weekend work at an anchorage network affiliate.

Todd was working for British Petroleum on the North Slope so he didn’t get home that often.

Todd also had fishing rights on Bristol Bay that he acquired from his grandfather and while he was away with BP Sarah, despite being pregnant, and other family members worked the rights during Salmon season. This franchise reportedly brought in $50,000 for a months backbreaking work in the year before she ran for Vice President.

She and Todd moved into their own small apartment and while she was pregnant again with a child they expected to be named Tad for a mixture of Track and Todd. We are not told the significance of Todd’s name.

However her maternity doctor discovered the fetus did not have a heart beat and gave Sarah her choices in getting rid of “it”. The doctors word not Sarah’s.

She says the child miscarried although the medical form used by the doctor to describe the event had the word "abortion" typed in the space describing the procedure. This was changed using Wite-Out and “miscarriage’ was inserted. Sarah is careful to never use the word fetus in this passage and always called the pregnancy a baby and characterizes him as a boy child from the time gender was determined and designated by the name Tad.

She is devastated by the loss which she described as terminated by a D and C procedure. Curiously we are given no dates or doctors names involved in this event, except she describes it occurring one year after the birth of Track, and whether the dilation and curettage procedure was really the method chosen to remove a dead fetus or to remove the remaining products of conception after a miscarriage is any one’s guess. Also no information is given as to why the fetus should die in a presumably healthy mother. However, whatever the circumstances it appears to be a desired child because Bristol came along the following year.

She says we were “more cautious” with our next pregnancy apparently meaning she was less physically active and there is no mention of participating in the fishing season on Bristol Bay.

The next child was a girl whom Todd named Bristol after his beloved bay and fishing grounds. She says she thinks of the name as the substitute for her intended sports career at ESPN which is located in Bristol, Connecticut.

She devotes herself to raising her kids and abandons her goal of being a top sports reporter although she says she worked part time as a proof reader and occasional sports column writer for the Frontiersman, the Wasilla newspaper. Also she remarks she read the newspaper from beginning to end while tossing duct tape hockey pucks at young Track to practice on in hallway of the family home.

She doesn't say what newspaper she read. If it was the Frontiersman it is published three times a week now. So back then it doesn't sound like it would have a lot of thought provoking commentary and reportage on political, economic and cultural events outside of Wassila or Alaska.

So far this book is curiously silent on her academic achievements, interests and civic activities except sports reporting and beauty contests. Also she describes no transformative moments like reading Ayn Rand, or the day John Lennon was announced shot to death by her hero Howard Cosell during the broadcast of a football game or any other book signifying her reading preferences.

This book is very vague and doesn't really suggest the basis of her allegedly strongly held beliefs on i.e. creationism, global warming, right to life or even death panels or how she acquired them except in a most superficial way up to this point.

The book is really a most self centered, solipsistic, (as all political autobiographies seem to be) and soporific account and one wonders why she needed a ghost writer to assist her along with a phalanx of editorial assistants. It sounds like one air head talking to another who writes it down. Probably all the high powered talent at Harper Collins was driven out when Rupert Murdock became owner and the Judith Reagan’s of this world took over the storied publisher.

Thus far there is nothing to suggest this woman is the strong minded, independent who is a “rogue” politician as the title suggests. In 1989 she was twenty five.

Hillary Clinton by this time in her life had established herself as a force to be reckoned with as a student leader, a leader on children’s issues with published articles, and a lawyer.

Labels: Sarah Palin