'Tis the season to be depressed.
I started watching "It's a Wonderful Life" the other day. I gave up when I started to realize that very few people's prosperity or happiness in my Bedford Falls depended even remotely on me.
As the gay only son of an only son I don't have family. Nada. Zip. Earlier this year Kyle and I got married. I deluded myself into thinking that would give me a family. In-laws. You know. Visions of a family Christmas were dancing in my head.
I suppose the fact that last year Kyle went to Georgia without me should have been a hint. You see, Kyle does have family. The issue of having family is completely different for him.
So when I make any attempt to make his family mine it falls on deaf ears. When people ask me, "Does being married make a differene?" I thought, yes. Now I think, not so much. I was talking to Kyle's sister-in-law and mentioned the wedding. She asked if Kyle's parents knew, because they hadn't told her. They knew.
Not one of Kyle's friends asked about the wedding.
This isn't so much about a personal disappointment, although that is a reality, it's about the cultural discomfort in even the most accepting people. It's about our own discomfort about it.
So I continue to pray for the generation when this will not be an issue.
Feeling like an orphan even when I have a family by marriage is n0t unique, but it is definitely enhanced by the fact that I am gay.
So, ho-ho-ho ya'll... and don't bitch about your family.
Tuesday, December 30, 2008
Saturday, December 27, 2008
Manger Meal
Deciding at the last minute to head to Georgia for Christmas, we left Rochester Christmas morning. At least Kyle got to see his first White Christmas as we drove through lake effect on our way toward Cleveland.
It soon became apparent that food would be an issue. The last open fast food we saw was in Erie, PA. One lonely Whopper® stand. For the rest of our annua pilgrimage it was Slim Jim's and jerky for protein. Or usual stop for Chili 4 ways and the coney 8 pack in Cincinnati left us without a Gold Star on the skyline to guide us.
After 10 hours of driving, hope appeared. Floating above carbon arc lit oases appear the 11 letters that brought back memories of late night munchies. Could they be open 24 hours on Christmas Day? We hoped not to find the answer to the unanswered question, "Why are there locks on the door of the Waffle House?"
They were indeed open, and at the expense of the poor souls that worked their we we rejoiced.
We packed ourselves and our animals into the $34.95 Motel 6. It was not a barn or manger. It was the closest we had been to sleeping in one though. Kyle emerged from the shower asking when he had gotten a tetanus shot as I drove to the local home of scatter, chopped, smothered, and covered. I was to get a triple order with a big slice of Country Ham (or hammed salt). Kyle wanted cheeseburger and fries. Once settled in at the counter chili and sweet-tea were added to the order.
No cattle were lowing, but the crowd brought a new meaning to diversity all in a straight white context. It was packed, behind and in front of the counter as busy servers and cooks in black and gray slipped past one another.
Not an unpleasant sound was heard, even as many waited 30 minutes for a 40 cup coffee maker of sweet tea to be brewed. It took an hour to pull it all together but, I only saw one waitress who was close to cranky. The miracle of Christmas. A meal of locked and loaded reflux in our tummies and snuggled in a bed in Richmond, KY with Koda and Pookie. As we drifted off we knew that the scattered drops of red on the floor of the bathroom had to nail polish. It had to be.
Merry Christmas.
It soon became apparent that food would be an issue. The last open fast food we saw was in Erie, PA. One lonely Whopper® stand. For the rest of our annua pilgrimage it was Slim Jim's and jerky for protein. Or usual stop for Chili 4 ways and the coney 8 pack in Cincinnati left us without a Gold Star on the skyline to guide us.
After 10 hours of driving, hope appeared. Floating above carbon arc lit oases appear the 11 letters that brought back memories of late night munchies. Could they be open 24 hours on Christmas Day? We hoped not to find the answer to the unanswered question, "Why are there locks on the door of the Waffle House?"
They were indeed open, and at the expense of the poor souls that worked their we we rejoiced.
We packed ourselves and our animals into the $34.95 Motel 6. It was not a barn or manger. It was the closest we had been to sleeping in one though. Kyle emerged from the shower asking when he had gotten a tetanus shot as I drove to the local home of scatter, chopped, smothered, and covered. I was to get a triple order with a big slice of Country Ham (or hammed salt). Kyle wanted cheeseburger and fries. Once settled in at the counter chili and sweet-tea were added to the order.
No cattle were lowing, but the crowd brought a new meaning to diversity all in a straight white context. It was packed, behind and in front of the counter as busy servers and cooks in black and gray slipped past one another.
Not an unpleasant sound was heard, even as many waited 30 minutes for a 40 cup coffee maker of sweet tea to be brewed. It took an hour to pull it all together but, I only saw one waitress who was close to cranky. The miracle of Christmas. A meal of locked and loaded reflux in our tummies and snuggled in a bed in Richmond, KY with Koda and Pookie. As we drifted off we knew that the scattered drops of red on the floor of the bathroom had to nail polish. It had to be.
Merry Christmas.
Monday, December 22, 2008
Rick Warren is an insulting choice - LA Times, opinion
Opinion
Rick Warren is an insulting choice
Preacher Rick Warren's views are simply too extreme for Obama's supporters.
By Katha Pollitt
December 22, 2008
To understand how angry and disappointed many Democrats are that Barack Obama has invited evangelical preacher Rick Warren to give the invocation at his inaugural, imagine if a President-elect John McCain had offered this unique honor to the Rev. Al Sharpton -- or the Rev. Jeremiah A. Wright Jr. I know, it's hard to picture: John McCain would never do that in a million years. Republicans respect their base even when, as in McCain's case, it doesn't really return the favor.
Only Democrats, it seems, reward their most loyal supporters -- feminists, gays, liberals, opponents of the war, members of the reality-based community -- by elbowing them aside to embrace their opponents instead.
Most Americans who've heard of Warren know him as the teddy-bearish, Hawaiian-shirted head of the Saddleback megachurch in Orange County and the author of "The Purpose Driven Life." Perhaps they also know he's the rare right-wing Christian pastor who sometimes talks about poverty and global warming and HIV. His concern for those issues has given him a reputation as a moderate and has made him the darling of Democratic Party think tanks, ever hoping to break the Republican lock on the white evangelical vote.
But on the signal issues of the religious right he is, as he himself has said, as orthodox as James Dobson.
read the rest
Rick Warren is an insulting choice
Preacher Rick Warren's views are simply too extreme for Obama's supporters.
By Katha Pollitt
December 22, 2008
To understand how angry and disappointed many Democrats are that Barack Obama has invited evangelical preacher Rick Warren to give the invocation at his inaugural, imagine if a President-elect John McCain had offered this unique honor to the Rev. Al Sharpton -- or the Rev. Jeremiah A. Wright Jr. I know, it's hard to picture: John McCain would never do that in a million years. Republicans respect their base even when, as in McCain's case, it doesn't really return the favor.
Only Democrats, it seems, reward their most loyal supporters -- feminists, gays, liberals, opponents of the war, members of the reality-based community -- by elbowing them aside to embrace their opponents instead.
Most Americans who've heard of Warren know him as the teddy-bearish, Hawaiian-shirted head of the Saddleback megachurch in Orange County and the author of "The Purpose Driven Life." Perhaps they also know he's the rare right-wing Christian pastor who sometimes talks about poverty and global warming and HIV. His concern for those issues has given him a reputation as a moderate and has made him the darling of Democratic Party think tanks, ever hoping to break the Republican lock on the white evangelical vote.
But on the signal issues of the religious right he is, as he himself has said, as orthodox as James Dobson.
read the rest
My God can beat up Your God
We continue to try to define God on a list serve to which I subscribe. The latest discussion is about the us "My God." Gene Robinson talked about "His" God and Rick Warren's god not being in agreement on some key points. Of course he was referring to his understanding of God, not in the possessive. But people jump parse every word.
Here is my contribution:
Fellow Christians,
My... oops strike that... God is so inclusive that God includes those people that are exclusive. OK, I'm down with that. I believe that God loves, ergo includes, everyone, including those that exclude others.
Does anyone else see the treadmill this puts us on? Circular reasoning? Catch 22?
Personally I don't believe that God wants people to exclude anyone. There are people who clearly think that he does. So the question is: To what kind of Church do we want to belong?
Some of us are working very hard to make this an inclusive church, others to make it exclusive. On the whole, the God that I understand (of course not "My" God in the possessive sense) is happier with the "includers" than with the "excluders."
And again I say as I try to wade my way through these esoteric arguments about who is in and who is out, "Good thing there are no starving people or wars...."
"'My' God. 'My' God! Why have you forsaken me?'
Was He being literal or making a rhetorical point?
Here is my contribution:
Fellow Christians,
My... oops strike that... God is so inclusive that God includes those people that are exclusive. OK, I'm down with that. I believe that God loves, ergo includes, everyone, including those that exclude others.
Does anyone else see the treadmill this puts us on? Circular reasoning? Catch 22?
Personally I don't believe that God wants people to exclude anyone. There are people who clearly think that he does. So the question is: To what kind of Church do we want to belong?
Some of us are working very hard to make this an inclusive church, others to make it exclusive. On the whole, the God that I understand (of course not "My" God in the possessive sense) is happier with the "includers" than with the "excluders."
And again I say as I try to wade my way through these esoteric arguments about who is in and who is out, "Good thing there are no starving people or wars...."
"'My' God. 'My' God! Why have you forsaken me?'
Was He being literal or making a rhetorical point?
Sunday, December 21, 2008
Taking Stock of the Rick Warren debaucle...
After the dust has settled and I said my piece on this awkward moment. After reading what many silver tongued pundits have said. After listening to the anger and feeling it. After inviting Rick Wrren over for Christmas Dinner in what he apparently considers the house evil. After reading what Rick Warren has had to say about the controversy in my denomination, throwing his support behind an Anglican Archbishop who supports laws that not only would jail "homosexuals" but those that support their inclusion. After it all... I went to my husband's blog.
This is a man who said, this experience has "made me realize that I have given up on religion." This man goes to church with me because it is important to me.
In his blog I see more spirituality than I have been able to feel this week.
I hope you will ready his post. "Fine.."
Here is the conclusion and the video:
This is a man who said, this experience has "made me realize that I have given up on religion." This man goes to church with me because it is important to me.
In his blog I see more spirituality than I have been able to feel this week.
I hope you will ready his post. "Fine.."
Here is the conclusion and the video:
Reverend Joseph Lowery will be giving the benediction of the Inauguration. He will wipe the floor with Mr Mega Church. He is on the side of the angels. Watch this clip of him at Mrs. King's funeral. Listen to what he has the righteous anger, and faith, and stature to say, in front of President Bush. This is a man of light, this is a man of God, this is a man who " gets it" .
Bring on your paunchy yuppie preacher , We have this:Saturday, December 20, 2008
Hot Stove League Luncheon
For the 4th year I have joined Jack McKelvey at the Hot Stove League luncheon to benefit Challenger Baseball World Series. What a great cause and so cool to see Red Wings fans gathered for comeraderie, and raffles, silent and live auctions to benefit this great cause.
Here is the press release about the founder, who received a Press-Radio Club award in 2007:
Tony Wells is the founder of Challenger Baseball in Rochester, New York. The Challenger Division of Little League is a program for special needs children, which enables them to enjoy the full benefits of Little League baseball. Since founding Rochester's Challenger Baseball 15 years ago, Tony has expanded enrollment to include over 300 children. On hand to present the award to Tony Wells will be Bill Costello, CLF and General Agent of MassMutual Life Insurance Company's (MassMutual) Financial Architects.
Here is the press release about the founder, who received a Press-Radio Club award in 2007:
Tony Wells is the founder of Challenger Baseball in Rochester, New York. The Challenger Division of Little League is a program for special needs children, which enables them to enjoy the full benefits of Little League baseball. Since founding Rochester's Challenger Baseball 15 years ago, Tony has expanded enrollment to include over 300 children. On hand to present the award to Tony Wells will be Bill Costello, CLF and General Agent of MassMutual Life Insurance Company's (MassMutual) Financial Architects.
Starting a new one...
I have been publishing a blog using iWeb, a Mac app. I love it. It will be referenced here and linked here often. This is an experiment to compare which I like best. To check out the other, older blog, A Gay Episcopalian KISS
I am retired. I should be doing this from a treadmill. Hmmm there's a business opportunity.
So many of my friends us e-blogger. My husband uses it. Kyle+Blog
The curse of my world is that I say what I am thinking.
So here I go again.
I am retired. I should be doing this from a treadmill. Hmmm there's a business opportunity.
So many of my friends us e-blogger. My husband uses it. Kyle+Blog
The curse of my world is that I say what I am thinking.
So here I go again.
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