Sunday, January 20, 2013

Good, great, perfect

In just a couple of months, I'll turn 46. I've done a hell of a lot in my life. I'm a little bit past the halfway point and, so far, I've:

Fallen in love
Been published
Walked across a swing bridge (after many fearful tries)
Camped out at the foot of a glacier
Spoken before NZ Parliament
Learned to shoot a .22
Soaked in a geothermal hot pool, in the middle of an alpine beech forest, under the stars
Been caught in a hurricane while camping out on the beach
Been up close and personal with a rare, red sea turtle, rumored to be 500 yrs old (he almost certainly wasn't that old...but he was amazing)
Experienced earthquakes in three different cities
Seen Halley's Comet
Sung backup on a rap album
Carved my initials in a tree
Crossed the Cook Strait when there were 5 meter swells
Thrown some killer dinner parties
Seen both the Southern and the Northern Lights
Baptized a baby
Visited the Corn Palace
Delivered my mother's eulogy

And that's just a sampling. Life is so full of things. Or, at least, it is if you're lucky. I'm very lucky. If you're really, truly, damned lucky, you get some wisdom along the way.  I'll be 46 in a couple of months but, in my roughly 46 years on earth, I've never written or said anything quite so wise and true as this bit of wisdom doled out by my 7 yr old nephew. This wasn't homework, or a note he was writing to anyone but himself.  Just something he jotted down. By the spelling and handwriting, it's pretty clear he wrote it a while back. So, it was written by a 5 or 6 yr old. My sister found it while packing up the house, as she gets ready to move for the umpteenth time. I'm so glad she not only kept it, but sent me a snapshot of it. It makes me remember that, no matter how many fun and interesting things I fill my life with, simplicity is all.





Tuesday, January 15, 2013

Our Own Worst Enemies

I'm going to try and keep this short and sweet. We live in a world where homosexuals deify men such as Oscar Wilde who - do your homework, homos - was clever and talented and witty, but who went to prison not to DEFEND his gayness, but during an effort to DENY IT. In fact, his legal matters stemmed from the fact that, upon being called a "sodomite," by the The Marquees of Queensbury, Wilde sued Queensbury for libel. Take that in.  He considered it so libelous to be called a fag, that he not only denied it, but sued the man who made the allegation. And he's a gay hero. An icon.  Harvey Milk (who was NOT the first openly gay elected official in the USA, in case you're wondering) conveniently waited until he was 40, and for all of his relatives to be dead and buried before coming out. That was his prerogative. The mythology that's built up around him, though, is of a man who led a life of bravely being out and proud. Not really the case. And I don't really care. I don't. But many of the same people who deify these two homosexual men, both of whom went to great lengths to hide their homosexuality (Milk talked about how he came close to marrying a lesbian friend, so that they could each serve as beard for the other) have, over the last couple of days, shit all over actress Jodie Foster's Golden Globe speech. A speech which, if you were paying attention, wasn't about being gay, but about being someone who was thrust in front of a camera at 4, and who has enjoyed almost no privacy, since.

For decades, the queer press has hounded Foster to make a public announcement about her sexuality. She finally did, and she did on her terms. It was pretty much an "I came out to everyone who really matters ages ago. I'm gay. Are you happy? Will you leave me the fuck alone, now?" speech. I thought it was awesome and brave. Not brave because she's now "out" (I never thought she was IN)  but brave because it was a sort of polite "fuck you" to the fame machine.

And before you say that she can't have her cake and eat it, too: she's a performer, not a politician. All she ever owes me is the two hours of entertainment when I pay to see one of her movies. That's it.

So what do queers all over America, and especially in the press, have to say in response to Foster's speech? That she rambled. That she should have just shut her mouth. That she has nerve complaining about a lack of privacy. That she DESERVES to have her privacy intruded upon. One gay person I know actually posted "The key to privacy is silence" over a photo of Foster at the Golden Globes. Um, seriously? Is that some sort of retarded twist on "Silence=Death" for truly stupid gay people?

Other people are saying that her speech wasn't enough. What the fuck more do they want, the precious bastards? Do they need footage of her performing oral sex on another woman, with narration by Ellen Degeneres and a soundtrack by Ani DiFranco?

 Being gay in America sucks, in part, because queers are so fucking bitchy with the in-fighting, misogyny, and double standards.

Thursday, January 3, 2013

The Gayest Thing on Television

And by "gayest," I mean the absolute best, most consistently surprising, wonderful, and original thing we've seen on the small screen in years. This 2 minute and 16 second clip is my new favorite thing, for so many reasons.  Sister Judy gets her groove on. Kit and Pepper boogie down. Lana smiles. All is well with the world. I wish I could MARRY this clip.