The Low Road

Last night history was made.  Fifty-two percent of the voters in the State of California have voted to legalize discrimination against a whole segment of our population.  A segment of which, I am a part.  I’ll be honest.  I’m truly surprised at how I’m affected by this.  I didn’t think it’d be so hard on me.  In my heart I knew this would happen and yet seeing it has really hurt me.

I hoped and prayed (yes, prayed!) that Proposition 8 would fail and that the people of California would recognize that marriage equality should stand.  That they’d understand that two men being married or two women being married, would have no effect on the “sanctity” of their own marriage, despite their own marriages 50% or greater chance of ending in divorce.  But, I felt it, in my heart, or in my spirit, or in the force, or whatever you want to call it, I felt it and I knew that Prop 8 would pass.  So I should have been prepared for it and not be so hurt by it.

This is my third post regarding this subject since last night and in the first two I took the high road.  It was a short trip!  I’m done with that.  So if you prefer the high road, you may want to stop reading this post now.

THIS IS BULL SHIT!!!  All you hateful, fearful people out there who voted in favor of proposition 8 are shits!  Every one of you.  You should, each and every one of you, be forced to wear a scarlet Y on your chests (if it were up to me it’d be branded on your foreheads, but I’d settle for the scarlet Y) so that everyone else can identify you and then you should all be EQUALLY mistreated.

You should be forced to drink from a separate drinking fountain, to ride in the back of the bus.  You should not be allowed to sit at the lunch counter and you should have to stand silently off to the side with your hat in your hands and your head down.  Your children should be taken away from you and your marriages should be annulled!

Am I over reacting?  Maybe.  But what’s the difference?  I am not a “flaming queen”.  To most people, if you and I stood next to each other, the thought that I might like to pack fudge, or smoke pole, wouldn’t even come to mind.  To me, that’s just one simple way of pointing out that you and I are the same!  So why should you be entitled to a different set of rights than I?

You may believe that what I do is wrong.  You know what?  That’s OK.  I’ve got plenty of people in my life who feel the same way.  One of them even gave birth to me.  You don’t have to approve of my lifestyle, or what you perceive to be my choices, but that doesn’t give you the right to determine what I should and should not be allowed to do.  Do you not know that you are violating the very moral precepts that you are claiming to uphold?  The Bible tells you to hate the sin, but love the sinner.  The Bible tells you to “judge not, lest ye be judged.”  The Bible tells you to “do unto others as you would have them do unto you.”

And if the Bible isn’t enough for you, how about the principles upon which this country was founded.  Our Founding Fathers specifically set up this country with Separation of Church and State in mind.  They came here from a country who’s religion dictated the government and how people were treated and they wanted to escape it.  Separation of Church and State means that your religious views should not have an impact on our laws.  I wouldn’t even mind if churches were allowed to refuse to marry a gay couple because it violates their moral belief system…  Oh wait, THEY ARE.

Anyway you slice it I only hear you telling me that God doesn’t approve of what I do therefor the governments job is to make sure I can’t do it.  THAT’S WRONG!  On many levels, that’s wrong, but I’ll address it just from church and state.  The religious view may be that I’m a sinner, and that I’m going to hell.  I don’t believe that, as I, too, am a Christian, but I respect your right to believe it.  But unlike you, I’m not trying to take away your right to believe it.  My right to marry, however, is not different from yours on a legal front.  And trust me.  Your marriage is on two fronts.  You may be married in the eyes of the church.  You may have had your wedding in a church, or at least a religious ceremony, but you are also married in the eyes of the law, separately from the church.  That’s what your marriage license is all about.

So what’s the harm in my having a legal marriage?  What’s the harm in my planning a lavish wedding ceremony (not to be held in your church)?  What’s the harm in my making a considerable contribution to the states flailing economy by having my wedding in California and spending all my wedding money here in this state?  You have your wedding in your church with your religious piety and I’ll have my wedding in a park or in a back yard or in the little gay bar on the prairie for all I care, but it should still be a LEGAL MARRIAGE.

You know, I will admit that I’m a little surprised by my vitriol on the subject and the way in which it’s been expressed thus far.  The truth is, I’m far less angry than I am hurt.  Cut so deeply, shaken to my very core.  You see, I’m 33 years old.  I’m what I call “newly gay”.  I’m technically still a “gay virgin”.  I don’t have any relationship prospects.  Shit I don’t even have any gay friends.  I’m completely alone and usually feeling pretty sorry for myself because of it.  And I honestly doubt that I will ever have an opportunity to be impacted directly by whether or not Gay Marriage is actually legal.  That would require me to have relationships and to find a man I want to share my life with.  Probably not an easy task.  And while, I’m sure most people will say that I’m taking this too personally, or just plain wrong, I can’t help but feel like this decision is a personal affront.

You see, for most of my life I convinced myself that I believed that gay is wrong.  I convinced myself that I wasn’t gay.  I convinced myself that there were other, perfectly logical, and morally acceptable, reasons why i felt the way I did.  It has taken a lot of prayer, and research, and self exploration and meditation and work to reach a point where I no longer believe that gay is wrong.  I no longer am in denial of the things that I know are true about myself, and I no longer HATE MYSELF for feeling the way I do.  And yet in spite of all that, it doesn’t take much to shake my resolve.  It doesn’t take much for me to question myself.  And I’ll admit that a big part of the Prop 8 battle, for me, was the idea and the hope that just maybe, in a very public, enormous way, society at large would tell me, “Hey.  We believe in you.  We agree with you.  You’re OK, just the way you are.”  Lord knows I need to hear that last part, over and over again.

So there you have it.  I knew, before the first returns came in that Prop 8 was going to pass.  I hated it, and I hate (just a little bit) the people that voted for it, but I knew it.  I guess I’m not really angry that it passed.  I’m not really angry that so many ignorant people out there don’t understand why it was wrong, even if they think it is “moral”.

I’m angry because for the bazillionth time in my life, I’m being reminded, slapped up side the head with the proof that, I must not be OK.  And It hurts.

An Open Letter to 52% of the Voters of the State of California

Dear 52% of the Voters of the State of California-

I want to thank you!

I want to thank you for recognizing that I am every bit as much of a human being as you are!

I want to thank you for finally acknowledging that Separation of Church and State means that even if you don’t agree on a moral level that I should be entitled to marry the man of my dreams, you at least realize that yours is a religious perspective and not a political one and therefor decided to grant me my fundamental human rights to marry the man I love.

I want to thank you for recognizing the direction this country is heading, catching up with the rest of the world, and agreeing to consider me equal, deserving of all the same rights as you.

I want to thank you for voting to defeat this hate mongering proposition to take away my rights to marry the man of my dreams, because you realize that whatever your personal opinion of marriage might be, this issue is much bigger than you or me, and therefore you MUST vote to maintain those rights for all Californian’s regardless of sexual orientation.

I want to thank you for all of these things…

Sadly, I can’t.

What’s My Next Move?

“Hi.  I’m Jesse.  I’ve been assigned to walk around with you during the fire drills” he said.  He’s a rookie firefighter.  Been on the job for three years.  Can’t be much more than 26-27 years old.  He’s 6′2″ ish with piercing blue eyes the color of the sky.

I work for the Facility Management office of a 25 story high-rise building in the Lake Merritt district of Downtown Oakland, California.  Twice a year we conduct Fire Drills and we always invite a crew from the Fire Department to come and observe.  Douche Bag always assigns a fire fighter to the staff members and today I got Jesse.

In the fourth and final segment of today’s drills I was assigned to the fourth floor for observation where I saw an  old acquaintance of mine searching the floor for stragglers.  Her name is Connee and she’s from Niagara Falls, NY.  I LOVE her.  She’s a sweet little older lady who has always been very nice to me.  After searching and then evacuating the floor we met up in the park across the street where we waited for the announcement that it was time to return to the building.  I was chatting with her when Jesse returned to my side and she asked, “What’s your name Mr. Gorgeous Blue Eyes?”

“Kevin.”  Jessey answered.  “Just kidding.  I’m Jesse.”

Connee laughed.  “Oh I thought you were going to tell me you both had the same name.”

“Wait,” I said.  “Does that mean I have Gorgeous blue eyes, too? –  Never mind.”

“Yep.  That’s what I was saying.” He replied.

Now you see, this is where I fall short as a “newly” gay man.  This guy was cute.  I liked him.  I’d have been interested in talking to him more.  But I never thought he was gay.  Still don’t know that he is.  But here’s what his comment suggests to me.  He thought I had nice eyes.  Had been thinking it all along, and Connee gave him an opportunity to bring it up and see what happens.  But because I’m insecure, and an idiot nothing happened.  I don’t know how to react in a situation like that?

So I’m looking for advice.  What should I have done?  And I’m seriously asking, so no smart ass, “You shoulda jumped on top of him” kind of responses.  How could have I have conveyed to him that I was interested without making the scene crunchy if I had misinterpreted his statement?

What, Mr. Reader, would you have done?

A Political Rant from a Political Know Nothing

I generally try to stay away from political rants on this blog, because I don’t fancy myself any kind of expert on anything and I don’t really feel like the average person has any interest in what I have to say on that front.  If you’re easily offended or easily riled by political discussions, perhaps it’s best if you skip over this post, lest your opinion of me be effected.

That being said…

Within my own family there’s quite a dividing line when it comes to political perspectives, beliefs and opinions.  I’m a Democrat.  I’m pretty liberal.  I believe very strongly that my religious beliefs should not come into play in my politics.  On the other hand Vengeful Mother and to a somewhat lesser degree CPA Sis are both conservative Republicans who think that their morals should dictate their politics.  The concept of Separation of Church and State is foreign to them.  But let’s be honest.  Separation of Church and State is foreign to most Republicans.

Right now, in my home state of California, there is considerable debate and controversy over Proposition 8, the Eliminates Right of Same-Sex Couples to Marry Act. As a gay man who has never wanted to live the stereotypical promiscuous gay lifestyle, but rather find one man to settle down with and share my life, I pray that Proposition 8 fails, that same-sex marriage remains legal in California, and more importantly that it spreads to the rest of the country.  Republicans however, are latching onto this issue as if it will make or break the stability of the nation.  Because after all, how people live their personal lives in the privacy of their own homes is going to cause either the proliferation of this nations financial and moral value, or the utter and complete collapse, based on whether they are allowed to be legally married.

From what I can tell, a great portion of the Republican political platform centers around religion and morals.  As I’ve said, I’m not a political expert, but this seems like the polar opposite of “Separation of Church and State.”  This sounds to me like Church run State…

Hmmm…  Church run State…  What is it that the words call to mind…  Ah.  I’ve got it.  THE CHURCH OF ENGLAND!!! It’s been a good many years since I graduated from high school, and even longer since I studied this period in American History, but I do believe the purpose behind the American Revolution, in the first place, was to avoid being persecuted over religious beliefs.  To live in a country that allowed religious freedom and that separated the business of government from the morals of personal existence.

Republicans (and Vengeful Mother) like to argue that this nation was founded on Christian Values, and they’re not wrong.  But this nation was founded on a whole lot more than that.  It was founded on personal liberties, equality, and justice for all.  Justice FOR ALL.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.

I know that it would make me very HAPPY to be able to fall in love and marry the man of my dreams.  To be able to live a happy LIFE free of the persecution and judgment of Conservative Republicans and Christians in general who feel they have the right to treat me differently, just because the person I love happens to have the same genitalia as I.  To be able to experience and enjoy all the personal LIBERTY that our forefathers intended for “We the People.”

In the last eight years, Georgie Boy has been so focused on forcibly installing democracy around the world (You will be free whether you like it or not!), and defining morals for our nation (Marriage shall be defined as being between one man and one woman.) that he’s forgotten to be the President.  He’s allowed the oil industry to rape our nation financially while making zero effort to solve the problem (’cause he’s making just as much money as the next oil magnate) and he’s destroyed the progress that was made toward reducing the national deficit by spending American tax dollars on a war that no one wants, and most recently by “bailing out” an economic downturn that resulted from poor over-site of the banking industry in the first place.  And as we’ve seen in the last 72 hours, that “bail-out” has done not one lick of good.

During his eight years in office, President Clinton, managed to reduce, by nearly a third, the damage done to our national debt by Presidents Regan and Bush Sr.  And in the following eight years, President Bush Jr. completely undid every bit of that progress.  And he still has four months.  How much more damage will he do?

So the question is, given the track record of our presidents over the last 28 years do we really want another Republican President who will continue to run this country’s finances into the ground and will continue with a war that serves no purpose, and will work to deny the basic human rights of an entire segment of our population, or do we want a president who will work to end this war, and repair the economic failures brought upon us by the current administration?  I wish I could argue that he’d also work to provide the freedoms and equality that we deserve, but he’s made no such promises.  At least we can be assured he won’t work so hard to take them away.

I don’t know that either of the options that have been presented to us are particularly ideal.  We need a president and other government leaders who remember what this country was all about and who will work hard for justice and equality for all, and leave it up to us to decide what is morally or ethically right.

Or, if we want to return to the ways of our ancestors…

Well, maybe we could petition the queen to take us back…  Those Princely boys are none to shabby to look at after all.

A Moment of Clarity; My Mom Manifesto

The time is Christmas, 2003.  The place is Vengeful Mother’s living room.  The players are CPA Sis, Mr. Fixit, Precious Niece #1, Myself and Vengeful Mother. 

Allow me to set the stage for you.  Vengeful Mother lived in a two bedroom duplex, in a town in Oklahoma named for damaged Indian weaponry, for 17 years.  The duplex was small and cluttered, full of odds and ends of all sorts that she’d collected over time.  What she had not collected, unfortunately, was much at all in the way of functional furniture.  VM’s living room “suit” was made up of a splintered and wobbly, wood framed day bed; a book shelf made of bricks and planks and an entertainment center she’d inherited when friends of Ex Con Older Brother’s stored some items in her house over a Christmas break from college in 1989, only to be killed in a tragic traffic accident driving back from home in Mexico.  The same 19 inch television that had been the “Family Christmas Gift” in 1987 still sat on that entertainment center.   

Within this scene all the players were expected to sit comfortably to watch that small screen and enjoy each other’s company.  While this is plenty enough furniture for Vengeful Mother on any given night, it’s not a comfortable setting for the entire brood.  More often than not, when I would visit VM I ended up sitting on the left end of the day bed, propped up against a mound of pillows and blankets, while VM would sprawl herself out on the rest of the day bed.  Usually, it wouldn’t take long for her to slide her ice cold feet under my precariously positioned legs and when I’d object, I’d be told to be quiet.

Vengeful Mother had waited only a beat or two, before turning the second bedroom of her duplex into an office, after, I, her third and final child, had made my escape.  Fortunately, this meant she also had a rolling task chair which provided an additional seating area.  CPA Sis tends to experience back problems, and, as we had just discovered earlier on that fateful day, was carrying within her Precious Niece #2, so this office chair made for the most appropriate seating option for CPA Sis. 

Precious Niece #1 was, at this time, about 13 1/2 months old.  She was off of bottles, but unfortuantely, CPA Sis and Mr. Fixit had failed to pack a “sippy-cup” for her before making the trek to Vengeful Mother’s abode.  It became popular opinion that PN1 was thirsty and VM only had bottles in her house.  So, while Mr. Fixit went into the kitchen to prepare a bottle with water, I sat down, temporarily to be sure, on the right end of the day bed, and VM sat in the middle.  CPA Sis was already seated in the office chair and PN1 was standing next to her trying somewhat to get the attention she needed, to get the assistance she needed to alight to her mother’s lap. 

Amidst the various conversation, movement and other chaos that was happening, Mr. Fixit returned to the living room with the bottle of water, walked up behind CPA Sis, placed the bottle against the front of her shoulder, released it, and allowed it to slide down her front to her lap.  The bottle stopped it’s trek when it arrived at her thigh and, naturally, landed on it’s side.  Vengeful Mother, ever the caring nurturer, said, “Oh, honey.  Pick that bottle up before it leaks on you and gets you wet.”  CPA Sis then picked up the bottle and held it out to Precious Niece #1 who showed no interest in it (although everyone was sure she’d been thirsty). 

When Precious Niece #1 rejected the proffered sustenance, CPA Sis reached over and set the bottle down on the daybed, on the left end, where I normally sat.  Now, you’ll recall that I described this day bed as “wobbly”.  It is also a plain, twin sized mattress, that had a 5′4″ 200+ lb woman sitting in the middle of it.  Naturally, the bottle fell over almost immediately…  And, no one seemed to care.  Finally, I said, “Could someone please set that bottle up?”  CPA Sis set it up, but she left it in the same spot, so it immediately fell over again.  I said, “Could someone please move that bottle before it gets the day bed wet?”  This is where this long story, finally gets “interesting”.

Vengeful Mother turned around and looked at me and said, “Just, quit complaining!” 

I said, (Or started to say), “I’m not complaining, but that bottle keeps falling over, and as you already pointed out it’s going to leak, and it’s going to get the day bed wet over there where I always end up sitting.”  I never got it all out though because by the time I got to “…but that bottle…” Vengeful Mother had wheeled around with…  well…  with vengefullness, in her eyes and put her hand up in front of my face.

Now, I’m not saying she was going to hit me.  I really don’t know, ’cause I wasn’t about to giver her the chance.  I pulled my head back and with hatred in my eyes and vicious anger in my voice I said, “DON’T, YOU, DARE!”  Now, you would think this would get her attention and make her think about her behavior in the situation.  You would think… But you’d be wrong.  Vengeful Mother simply squinted her eyes at me in a disdainful look and said, “Well, then, just stop.”  Part of me wishes she had actually hit me, because I do believe that would have been the straw that broke the camels back for me.  And part of me wishes I had said more anyway, but you see…  As I said, “You would think this would get her attention…”  It didn’t get her attention.  What it did do was get Precious Niece #1’s attention and she looked at me with utter shock and confusion in such a way that broke my heart, and I never want to see again.

Now, this is just the beginning of a much bigger story, one which I’ll happily tell in future posts (lucky you), but the reason this event was “A Moment of Clarity” is this…  When it was over, and I had returned home to sunny California and had some time to think about it, I wrote a Manifesto, of sorts…At least as it applies to Vengeful Mother.  Here it is:

1. I will not stay with her ever again.
2. I won’t come to visit again unless I have someplace to stay (i.e. with Mr. Fixit and CPA Sis, another friend’s house, or a hotel) AND a car to drive completely at my disposal while I’m in town, whether it be a retnal or a loaner. (This is somewhat more complicated now, as Mr. Fixit & CPA Sis moved to New York last December.)
3. I will not be ordered around.
4. I will not be reprimanded.
5. I will argue as needed.
6. I will NOT argue in front of the children.
7. I will not have a curfew or feel bad for disturbing those who wait up for me.
8. I will be me and I will not be judged or condemed for my choices or my behavior.
9. I WILL NOT BE JUDGED, COMDEMED OR STEREO TYPED JUST BECAUSE I’M A MAN!!!
10. Pursuant to numbers 1-5, 6 (especially) and 9, I will walk out at whatever stage of any arguement or discussion that I see fit.

I realize now, that number 7 probably would not be an issue based on number 1, however it’s been such an issue over the years that it seems wise to keep it in there.