proteanme

I am so fucking sick of being a second class citizen. If I thought about it every day I think I would burst with rage. Lift the ban Mr. Nobel Peace Prize winner. Toss some dignity and respect my way.

Whether it’s “strategic” or not, whether it’s what our “leaders” think we should do or not, it’s pretty clear that real actual LGBT people are done with the closet. We’re seeing things in a new way. We’re no longer willing to settle for simply not getting beaten to death, for being able to live in our constricted safe zones without fear of baseball bats to the head and getting fired.

I believe in reaching across the aisle. I believe in dialogue and common ground. I really do. I was close to a guy at work who prayed for my queer ass. But I’m not psyched about Rev. Warren giving the invocation. Why him? I just wanna say to Obama, hey didn’t gays give up enough supporting you even though you don’t support our right to full citizenship. C’mon give something back, dude. Reach out to the all the queers who worked their ass off to help get you where you are. Seriously. I’m tired. You know as well as I do, we’re not gonna wait forever.

If you can’t swing a dead cat in Portland without hitting a Thai restaurant, then you can’t swing said feline in Western Mass without hitting a Dunkin Donut. I had no idea North Easterners were so into fried dough. Seriously. And I miss good coffee. I was at a restaurant last night and saw they served coffee and asked the young women working the counter if the coffee was good and she got all insulted because she makes it. Of course I got some and it wasn’t badly made, but the brew itself was kinda flat. After trying an actual coffee shop this morning I’d say that they just don’t have the good beans out here in Western Mass. Damn, if Portland’s not ruined me for seriously good beans.

I’ve only been here in Northampton for about a day. So this is a pretty cursory report. As expected, there’s a serious college town vibe for sure, mixed with the old hippie thing and of course the lesbian factor, which is amazingly high. Really, I haven’t seen this many down-to-earth lesbians since I went to a womyn’s music festival. And that was way back in the day. Also, I haven’t seen so many stores selling so many things I would never in my life buy. Except maybe all the geegaw shops on the Oregon coast. I can’t say for certain if I’ve seen a butch or a femme, although I spied a pretty masculine dyke at the food coop last night.

I was a little sad that downtown doesn’t have a square. Just a main drag with streets shooting off it. I thought I’d get a nice small town square ala so many small towns in Indiana. No such luck. Walking around I passed three street musicians. All guys with beards and guitars, separated by a number of blocks. At one point each one was playing a different Neil Young song. A street jam conspiracy or coincidence? You tell me.

My girl lives out in the wilds surrounding Northampton. For you Bloomington folks it feels kinda like if you lived out in Brown Country or out past Lake Monroe. For the Portlanders, just imagine getting out past the urban growth boundry on some small road and you get the picture. But it’s a different world out here on the other side of the continent, although there are echoes of Willamette Valley and Southern Indiana, that is if I had to find something familiar in the landscape, which I do. It helps me orient myself.

I had forgotten what so many deciduous trees look like getting ready for winter. The way they bare themselves against each other and the sky. Not that there aren’t still a fair amount of fall leaves around. There are. It’s just that it looks like I’m on the other side of what must be quite stunning. And I guess that was several weeks ago. But it’s still beautiful. Thick and wild and beautiful. It must feel pretty lush round here come spring and summer.

Right now, the sun is out and I’ll call that good.

So a black man is president and I’m still a second class citizen in my own fucking country. It’s a bitter sweet pill to swallow and mostly I’m focusing on the sweet part. I didn’t want this election to turn on gay marriage, but damn it sucks to be confronted with spite and hate.

I watched the election with friends and was not at all impressed with any talking head who tried to sum up the historical nature, the watershed moment, we all participated in last night. But give some people microphones and time slots and they will fill it up anyway. For me it was kinda like our Berlin Wall coming down. And Jessie Jackson tearing up said what no pundit could express anyway.  I left to come home feeling subdued, not that it’s unusual for me to hold back, and I sat down to watch Obama speak by myself and I just started crying. I was moved and proud to be a second class America citizen. I feel forever grateful to all the good people who worked the Obama campaign.

It’s interesting that I’m not getting much in the way of comments or feedback on my butch posts, especially after the lively discussions about the darker side of life.  But I’m not drawing any conclusions.

I’ve had a couple conversations with some women who say they date butches (one of whom identifies as femme), but then  refer to their dates as “girls”.  And man, for me that’s just not right.  I don’t think I ever wanna hear somebody I’m dating refer to me as a “girl”.  I’d just feel like she really didn’t “see” me or “know” me.  I had a brief encounter this year with a woman who wanted to call me, “Lizzie”, and I immediately told her, no, you can’t do that.

I don’t have lots of concrete non-negotiables for dates, but she’s gotta wanna date a butch.  And if she’s new to all that,  that’s cool, but she’s then gotta get that she’s attracted to this masculinity.  We can talk about the markers and all,  like how to refer to me,  but she can’t just disregard them.  Cause it’d be like she didn’t understand who she was dating.

Taking a break from writing about darkness and neurosis cause this weekend I got my freak on. It was first weekend for Pedapalooza and it was also Pride here. The two events crossed paths on Saturday when I packed (translation for folks who don’t know what packing means, it means I harnessed up my nice big bendable cock under my pants) and rode my bike down to the Dyke march and then pedaled over to participate in my first Naked Ride. I heard that Portland had about 2600 riders, which means we might have topped out with the biggest ride. Topless dykes in the sunset and bare asses in the moonlight. If Portland’s got one thing going for it, it’s that it’s not uptight about nudity. And while I’m not a naked enthusiast, I think it’s nice to lighten up a bit on our bare bodies. Anyway, a little freedom and a little freakiness - I’m gonna call it a good day.

This is great practice trying to articulate all this complex stuff. Thanks for all the thoughtful comments people.

Lemme back up and say that I’ve been thinking about language, and specifically labeling, in the context of thinking about my own ethics - how I walk my talk in this world, as well as how my ethics exist in this much bigger picture - the world I’m walking in.

When I talked about willingness and the aggressive language around illness (and let’s say we expand the term “illness” to encompass a wide range of troubles like anxiety, fear and depression) I was trying to get at how I experience my troubles in a world that often seems hell bent on conquering them, and how that has not worked for me at all. And for what it’s worth, having spent thirteen years in social services, it’s not worked real well for lots of other folks who’s relationships with their troubles are often chunked out in those two steps forward and one step back dances. The idea of conquering doesn’t leave much room for the steps back.

After reading through the comments on the last couple posts, I’d like to narrow down my focus on how labels inform how we think of the darkness that exists in the world and the darkness that exists in ourselves.

I’m going to put aside how labels, like mother or boyfriend or geek, can help us understand something about someone, even if the understanding is very abbreviated and full of assumptions that may be off. For instance if I tell you I like to fuck women, in your head you’re likely thinking ok, she’s a lesbian. And even though I don’t use that label for myself and there’s all sorts of things about lesbian life I’m just not in to, at least you get that because I like to fuck women I’m different from the majority of other women and in the U.S. that difference matters. But as I said, I’m putting that conversation aside, at least for now.

I’m also putting aside how labels can motivate us to overcome unwanted behaviors and/or undermine our efforts at cultivating the positive ones. I think I understand what David was getting at in his comments, but I want to dig deeper and that thread seemed more symptomatic of the bigger issue I want to try and talk about it. Quickly, though I will say that it saddens me that there is not broader interest and support in this culture for cultivating curiosity and neutrality (in the Buddhist sense) towards one’s strengths and shortcomings.

Well now I’ve gone and posted so much that I’ve run out of steam for talking about darkness. At least now I know what I’m talking about later.

The first time I saw Raquel Welch was on a televised USO show in December, 1967. By that point she’d been made a star by Fantastic Voyage, and after some roles in British films, she was a legitimate sex symbol. A soldier was picked out of the crowd and invited up on stage to meet her. From all buzz and cat calls and guys jostling for position, a lone GI emerged and made his up on to the stage, looking a bit sheepish, but still eager cause he was gonna get a kiss from her. Granted, it was only a kiss on the cheek. But it was fucking Raquel Welch.

And I wanted to be him. Badly - with all my 5 year old being I wanted to be him. I sat in the bath that night, closed my eyes, scrunched up my face, and pressed my hands together and wished as hard as I could - let me be that guy for that one second when Raquel Welch leaned in close and put her lips on his skin.