In 2008 and 2010 I volunteered in my district for the Democratic party. This year, I'm in a different district, and felt myself at loose ends. I did one phone bank, recruiting volunteers for the Obama campaign, but that was at the party headquarters, far far away.
So while I was looking for a place to volunteer, I got an email from Planned Parenthood of AZ, who run phone banks for candidates they have endorsed. I mentioned that I am a writer, and amazingly, PPAA (Planned Parenthood Assn. of AZ) has a blog. I met with the editor, and this morning my first article was published. It's my latest version of my piece about fetal alcohol syndrome.
September 9 is Fetal Alcohol Syndrome Awareness Day, and this provided the context. Since the blog deals with women's health, it seemed appropriate. I have tried to post a version of this every year or so since I began blogging here four years ago. It's an important topic, and I like to remind people about it.
The factual part of my article has remained unchanged (read: copied and pasted) over the years, while I have personalized the context. This year, I found myself working closely with an editor, and actually looked at the core again. My language was pretty convoluted in places, and it was interesting to reexamine what I wanted to say, and to say it in the clearest way possible.
I came up against pc language. I used the term "mentally retardation" in one place to say that FAS is the leading cause of mental retardation in the country, though most people with FAS are not retarded. My editor changed this to "mental disability," which is the AP accepted term. I found this imprecise - it didn't say what I meant. FAS is a mental disability, with or without retardation. We were battling this back and forth until last night, when I reframed the sentence by discussing intelligence, and this is the way it appears.
My next two articles are interviews with two candidates in my district, David Joseph and Ann Kirkpatrick.
This is turning out to be fun.