Seize Your Joy
Last Saturday, Jeremy and Andrew got engaged…
October 11, 2008: The catering is all in line, and the outfits perfectly pressed. The months of planning have trickled down to hours. Andrew and I are holding our Manhattan engagement party, step one in our bicoastal wedding celebration.
October 11, 1995: I watch every word that comes out of my mouth for fear that my less-than-masculine speech patterns will lay bear the truth that is and has always been within my head. It’s unfair to date members of the opposite-sex, both for me and my partners in faux courtship. But what choice do I have? There are no gay people in my high school. Heck, are there gay people in my town? In all of Tennessee? The entire Southeastern region?
October 11, 2008: Andrew, the planner of our duo, has the day mapped out. Shave, manicure, and haircut are all booked into specific slots. I, on the other hand, am taking a fairly laxidasical approach to getting my stuff done. But while our approaches are different, our excitement is the same. We are both excited and shocked that this long overdue journey is finally in motion.
October 11, 1995: I’ll probably marry someday. I don’t feel like I have a choice. You get through school then ya get hitched. And hey, at least when I marry, I will finally prove to everyone that I am straight. I’m sure that in time, I too will believe it. Right?
October 11, 2008: The Connecticut ruling makes three states where we gays can legally marry.
October 11, 1995: It’s not like I can legally marry a dude even if I wanted to.
October 11, 2008: It’s not even noon, and there have already been two phone calls from my mom-in-law-to-be. She just might be the most psyched of all of us! And why shouldn’t she be? Her baby is finally getting married!!
October 11, 1995: Did anyone see me looking at that issue of "Entertainment Weekly"? The one with the cover story on "The Gay 90’s"? And if so, did they suspect anything? ::sigh:: I better go watch the game and talk about "hot" girls.
October 11, 2008: 115 guests will be on hand to send well wishes to the two fiancés. Acceptance or "tolerance" is not even up for debate. We are loved. We are accepted. Non-"controversially."
October 11, 1995: Will I ever feel love? Real love? A genuine, rock you to the core love?
October 11, 2008: Today is National Coming Out Day. And while the booking was purely coincidental, the resonance of the date is not lost on me.
October 11, 1995: I just learned that today is apparently something called "National Coming Out Day." I gotta remember to put my guard up extra high, since people will probably be talking about it. Questions are dangerous. And the "right" answers are hard to find since they really don’t jibe with what I know to be true.
October 11, 2008: I’m happy. Really frickin’ happy. I want to wish a joyous National Coming Out Day to everyone:
October 11, 1995: I’m scared. Really frickin’ scared. Please tell me it gets better than this. Please tell me there is peace to be had. Please tell me I will come out of this darkness.
Some photos Here. I’m so happy for both of them. I wish them all the best. This poor angry world needs so much more of this. So very much more.
Do you believe in love? Please help fight the good fight. Please help happy, devoted couples to keep their ring fingers. Donate Here, to No on 8. Or Here, to Arizona Together. Or Here, to Say No On Two.
If you donate between now and election day online (for any amount), and send me your confirmation email, I will draw, if you wish, an editorial cartoon on the topic of your choice. Or…alternately…a Mark and Josh cartoon on the topic of your choice. Or…if my cartoons don’t do it for you…you can have a signed 11 by 19 print of the image of your choice out of any of my photo galleries.
October 15th, 2008 at 2:27 am
Man I WISH!
I’d commission a "Palin As Medusa" with many snake-heads all babbling baloni….untill she looks in a mirror and her heads turn into Anita bryant, Shirly Phelps-Roper, Phylis Shaffly, Nancy Reagan and Karl Rove and Hoover (In pig lip-stick)….or something like that.
October 15th, 2008 at 7:33 am
(grin) No, no…Topic, not content. Although "The Many Faces of Sarah Palin" would be a good one. But deep down inside there is only one, and it resembles Richard Nixon. Seriously. She has Nixon’s bedrock of resentment and his fake populism. And she’s smarter then Bush by a longshot. Bush got where he is by being the son of a rich and powerful family. Without that he’d be just another bar stool loudmouth. Palin did it the Nixon way…by knowing who to stab in the back and when. The question is…is she as smart as Nixon and is she as paranoid.
Nixon wanted to be president of the United States so he could leave his mark in the history of the world. He wanted to be a world leader. His vision for himself was essentially a political and secular one. Palin’s is, I’m pretty sure, a religious vision. She’s a true believer. She wants to make biblical history. That’s going to make her path more complicated. Nixon only had to hide his resentments and paranoias. When they came blurting out, it was disasterous for him ("You won’t have Nixon to kick around anymore…"). But you always knew what his core political beliefs were. Palin’s core beliefs are not political, they’re religious. To succeed, she will have to hide everything Nixon had to hide, plus what she really believes.
October 15th, 2008 at 3:13 pm
A couple of Palin nick-names I’ve heard:
"Mooselim"
"Cruella,” “Gidget,” “Governor Jesus Camp,” “Fertilla the Huntress,” “Iditabroad,", "Coked Up Liar", "Danielle Quayle","Caribou Barbie", "White Dominionist Trash","Spiro Igloo","Wacko from Wasilla"
I still think you SHOULD do such a Palin cartoon anyway!