Seems Like the Day to Do This

My Beautiful Daughter. Photo credit: Leah Mills

The Supreme Court has legalized gay marriage in all of the United States. There has been rejoicing and mourning, and all manner of commotion, so it seems that since the hornets' nest has been well and truly kicked, I might as well make an announcement: my oldest daughter is bisexual. I found out not too long ago, though I had suspected for about a year. (She was very careful about her pronouns when discussing her dates.)

As anyone who knows me or has been reading my blog for a while knows, I have long held the belief that it's none of my business what people's sexual orientations are. My business is to work on my own sins and to love people. It's a hard job and I'm glad I have a Savior to help me with it.

My daughter's bisexuality is simply one part of her. She is smart, kind, quiet, funny, insightful and good to the core. She is one of the most delightful people in the universe. I thank God every day that she is a part of my family. And I want to be very clear. I will not choose between my God and my daughter. I choose both. I choose to love God and to love my daughter. When it comes to people, I will choose my children over anyone. Period. And the fact that my children are such awesome people makes that choice an easy one.

And though it isn't perfectly in tune with either the marriage equality movement or the marriage-equals-one-man-and-one-woman movement, I am happy that she will be able to marry the person she falls in love with, but I'm worried too. Life is going to be harder for her. People who have never met her will hate her, wish her harm. It's frightening.

There's a whole portion of me that hopes she will fall in love with a man, because her life will be so much easier if she does. She won't have to worry about extended family disowning her or friends deciding to cut her off. She could move anywhere in the world without fear instead of only Western Europe or the West Coast or NYC. I have always been appalled at the violence and prejudice that LGBT people have had to endure, but now I have a face, my beautiful daughter's face, to picture those hate crimes being performed against. And I am more than a little afraid for her.

If I had a magic wand, I would make all the hatred, violence, and fear in the world disappear. Alas, I have no magic wand. All I've got is my love. And I give it fully and freely. I hope you will give yours as well.

Dang It!

It's not over. People are still waving signs and flipping out about Prop 8 AND my Internet is still down. :( :( :(

BUT I do have a limerick winner. :) My mail carrier, Wendy the Wonderful, has chosen. Melanie J--YOU are the winner of a fine triangular chocolate bar for the delightful limerick:

There once was a cute mommy blogger

With a stroller, Snugli, and jogger

Who let them all rust

Or at least collect dust

She got blog addicted, so let's flog her!

Please email me and I will get you your Toblerone in this calander year!

Also here is a link to Thora's delightful blog. She is the winner of the name that country contest.

Love to you all. I miss you so, but Mr. MEANIE Internet won't let me visit.

A Daily Dose of Irony

I think you may be beginning to understand why I did not want to talk about this. It's like abortion: once I get in the debate, I cannot stop. Here's the latest installment in the disgusting saga of Prop 8.

My sister (who is a rather outspoken person--you might have noticed) just spent a half an hour chewing me out about my stance on Prop 8. Turns out that on her late night walks she's been putting "H"s on people's Yes on 8 lawn signs. "Yes on 8" is hate. H-8. Get it? Everyone who supports 8 is filled with hate. The five Mormons who go the High School where she teaches are silent about it because they would get their @$$ kicked for being so hateful if they made their views known. All attempts to point out that NONE of the people I know who support Prop 8 are hateful fell on deaf ears. To me, most Pro 8 people mostly just seem worried and fearful, not hateful. Most of the Anti 8 folks I know are pretty mellow. Yet there are a few vocal hate-mongers on both sides. "If you don't think as I do, you are hate-filled." rhetoric is almost as appealing as the "If you don't believe as I do, you are going to burn in hell." rhetoric.

Tuesday cannot come soon enough.

Then again...

I'm not generally an alarmist. You'd have a hard time convincing me that genetically-modified crops are going to kill us, that the second coming is next week, that we'll all be starving soon. So even though I've been endlessly frustrated by this election, I've been sure that everyone on both sides has been fighting for what they believe is right.

But just when I conclude that no one is going to die over this election, I get an email. Not a total stranger email. I know this mom; she's a homeschool co-op acquaintance of mine. Literally this happened last night. She's in charge of organizing the Pro-Prop 8 work in her stake (which is mainly composed of tiny, little towns). She had asked her sons (18 yrs and 14 yrs) to help put up "Yes on 8" signs yesterday. Some crazy person took offense at their actions and tried scare the bejeebers out of them. It's disturbing, just plain disturbing.

On [the boys'] way home last night they still had a couple of dozen [yes on 8 signs] in the back of the truck. They decided to post them along the frontage road on the way to our house. After a couple of signs a car pulled up behind them right on their bumper with their brights on. My son pulled back on the road and the car continued to follow them. He didn’t want to lead them home so he drove through M V….3 times! Each time the car followed on their bumper. He went into Winchester and the car turned and left them. They waited a few minutes and then started for home via the frontage road between M.V. and A.. Near the A. gas station they pulled over and Joseph took two signs to post. He walked about 20-30 feet back behind the truck. Further down the road headlights came on the car gunned its engine and started fast toward them. The car swerved onto the shoulder and headed straight for my son who ran as fast as he could and jumped into the truck. The car slammed on its brakes inches from our truck. D called us and we called 911. The boys couldn’t get the license plate because it always had its brights on them and was right on their bumper but did see it was a teal colored Ford Explorer. Whoever was in the Ford Explorer could see that my son was on the phone and “peeled out”. The Highway Patrol responded quickly and took the report. We are to talk with them this morning. I am hoping they are taking this a seriously as we are. I know the Lord was protecting the boys. If J would have tripped the Explorer would have run over him. The boys are no where near as affected by this as I am. They have been totally involved in the cause of protecting marriage. They have endured months of their mother’s daily involvement in ProtectMarriage, nightly dinner conversations, attended many rallys and town hall meetings, waved signs, made deliveries for me, stuffed envelopes, written letters, posted signs, debated the issue in classes and Daniel has done all the walking with his dad, and wears a ProtectMarriage t-shirt everyday to Sierra! This has just hardened their resolve to fight for the cause of freedom, family and faith! Their mother just continues to pray!

D expressed this thought from Abraham Lincoln: (one I have used before) (our boys have read the original writings of the founders and great statesmen in our history, memorized the Declaration of Independence and know what the Constitution says and what it doesn’t and what our government it truly “supposed” to do. D does not use this quote lightly but literally.)

“Neither let us be slandered from our duty by false accusations against us, nor frightened from it by menaces of destruction to the Government, nor of dungeons to ourselves. Let us have faith that right makes might; and in that faith, let us, to the end, dare to do our duty, as we understand it.”

5 more days…..

I HATE THIS ELECTION! I'd say "just shoot me and put me out of my misery," but now I'm a little worried that someone might take me at my word. Freaks.

OK, I've worked out my objections...

...to the new Moroni hoisting the "yes on 8" banner, found some words to express my shock at the comparison. Rest assured that I love you all, yes-folks and no-folks, even though I am, of myself, a gutless flip-flopper.

I think there are significant differences between the ancient Book of Mormon situation and our modern one. Moroni was dealing with power-hungry conspirators who wished to install Amalickiah as king. When it looked like they were going to lose, the cowardly traitors took off to join the vicious enemy, intending to come back and destroy the Nephites. Moroni made the standard of liberty, then he stopped as many of the dissenters as he could, encouraging them to renounce their conspiring ways, and killed those who refused.

Those who did renounce their intentions to overthrow the government were spared to...[fast-forward a couple chapters]...come back as the nasty king-men who were willing to allow the Lamanites to kill their fellow Nephites so long as they got a piece of power. Moroni again compels the no-good dissenters to support the cause of freedom or die, again uses the title of liberty as a statement of his society's values. Freedom being the central point of those values.

Even though Moroni and the freemen did not delight in bloodshed, "they could not suffer to lay down their lives, that their wives and their children should be massacred by the barbarous cruelty of those who were once their brethren, yea and had dissented from their church, and had gone to destroy them by joining the Lamanites" Alma 48:23

Life and death. Not definitions. I believe these events happened. Not as symbolic fiction but as absolute fact. But I just don't think the comparison to proposition eight is wise or accurate.

Are we really going to kill the "no on prop 8" folks? No.

Will my children and I be massacred if the "no on 8" people defeat the proposition? Extremely unlikely.

Marriage as an institution is in danger. Fornication, adultery, serial divorce, same sex families are all symptoms of a problem that will not, should not, be solved by legislating chastity. Turning people's hearts toward God would do the trick. I just feel strongly that the other societal attacks on marriage are much more destructive than the very small percentage of people who are breaking the law of chastity in a same-sex relationship.

That said, I will vote yes on eight because to me marriage is one man and one woman in a lifelong committed relationship. That has been the definition for centuries with very few exceptions. I'm willing to vote yes to keep it that way.

So anyway don't hate me because I was flabbergasted yesterday by the comparison to the title of liberty and the support it or die implications therein. I love you all. (Except you meanies. I just tolerate you. I'm working on it though. One of these days I'm going to love you all, even the meanies.)

A Picture is Worth a Thousand Words

Um. Uh. Wow. Really? Huh. Gee. Golly. Oh my. That makes this post one thousand seventeen words.

Two Toblerone Chocolate Bars Need Homes

First, a reminder about the Toblerone Giveaway. Enter to win chocolate by correctly guessing the name of this politically neutral country which I attempted to use as a joking symbol of my staying out of Californian politics this year. Of course, I've recently declared my definitive stance as a flip-flopper, but I'm still giving away the amazingly yummy Swiss chocolate bar. I know it's hard, but go ahead, take a guess. You know you want to win this exquisite chocolate crafted in Switzerland.

I shall be holding a drawing from all the correct answers on November 4th as the polls close here in California.

Second, Alison (whose blog is well worth a read) voiced a fondness for limericks, SO in her honor I announce the

Win a Toblerone Limerick Contest!

Yes, that's right! A second Toblerone will be awarded to the writer of the best limerick!

(Just to give you courage, I'll go first.)

There once was a blogger named Jami
whose contest was silly and lame-y!
November 4th it ended
because it felt splendid
to be done with smeary, dumb blame-y.

P.S. Keep it clean.
PPS. Enough with the eye-rolling. Lame-y, Blame-y and Jami DO TOO ryhme.

Resolution Redux

Due to some freakish self-defeating mental condition, I am much less likely to accomplish something if I make an official goal. The only New Year's resolution I have ever kept is 2006's: I will not kill anyone. (That was back when I was on the school board and TRUST me only the fear of God and my New Year's Resolution kept a couple of people alive.) By golly, I did not kill (or maim or even threaten) a single person all year long.

So here are the 2008 New Year's attempts (and results).

1. Get the playroom clean. (Define "clean.")
2. Oft speak kind words to the munchkins and the wizard. (Define "oft." Define "kind.")
3. Blog less. (January 1st I was reading By Common Consent, Mormon Mommy Wars, and Feminist Mormon Housewives daily, commenting and following the links found therein. September 22nd. I am following approximately twenty blogs and comment regularly on all of them. AND I started my own little mish-mash blog, my own little bloggy playground. [I am not addicted! I can stop any time I want. I just don't want.] I spend about two hours a day playing. More if I'm looking for a picture of a pirate kitty.)

So that's how the New Year's resolutions are going.

So how about my fake gastric bypass? DOA. Oink, oink. Got some seriously unattractive gluttony going on here.

To add the final flourish to my goal-making humiliation, I have the following to report:

******CAUTION, RELIGION ALERT. PROCEED AT YOUR OWN RISK******

How's about that not talking about it plan? Not going so well. I've been reading everything I can find on the subject, chatting with sympathetic friends, and pretending not to be listening to all of the exhortations being dished up at church. I've been wandering around, irritated at this blatant politicizing in my place of worship, looking forward to November 4th (oh SO looking forward to November 4th) when the whole stupid issue will be laid to rest!

AND THEN?!? Why, the Living God decided to have a little chat, of course. Not a face to face chat. More like a heart to heart. I will spare you the details, but the gist of it is that I have been asked by God to obey. To humble myself, to trust him and to volunteer to make phone calls. Oh and since my objections were made in such a public forum, He thought it would be a good idea to use that same forum to mention my acquiesce to His will.

What is interesting about all this is that I have not been asked to change my mind. I still don't think that the world will end if gay marriage is legal. I still don't think that homosexuality is any more of a sin than any other kind of unchasity. I still think church is a rotten place to talk about Proposition Anything or Candidate XY and his running mate XX. However, I am going to be making phone calls on behalf of the Yes on 8 campaign. Because God asked me to. Because He created me. Because He knows best. Even when I disagree.

(p.s. Yeah, I'm still having the Toblerone give-away.)
(p.p.s. I just achieved my unspoken, unofficial goal of writing a post with the word redux in the title.)

OK...

which one of you narked me out to the bishop? I got called into the principal's bishop's office on Sunday. About this. He was a bit worried about me and thought a testimony check was in order.

Testimony? Check!

I am seriously so blessed that my bishop is one of the nicest men I've ever known. And even more blessed because he's fairly shock-proof due to his marvelously outspoken wife. So, my dearest narking friend, now that you know the bishop is reading you don't have to forward him my posts. He'll catch them on his own.

If you become concerned, you can just talk to me personally. If it's just too scary to talk to me, rest assured that I love my husband and my children. I believe that the gospel has been restored in its fullness. I know that Joseph was a prophet, that President Monson is a prophet as well. The Bible and Book of Mormon are the word of God. I know that God is my Father and loves me. You too, as a matter of fact. Jesus is the Christ, my Savior. Yours too, as a matter of fact. Even though I blog, I am still praying, reading my scriptures, and seeking to increase the influence of the Spirit in my life.

In short, I'm OK, but please don't do that again. Love ya!

I'm Not Talking About It...

...and you can't make me. But they are. And so are they. And it's looking like they are going to get into it too. And for those of you who can't get enough, here's one more. You can talk about it with them. Unless you'd rather sing "Kumbaya" with me. Or maybe "As I Have Loved You."

And now for a new feature I'm calling...

Name That Country!

All readers who correctly name the country pictured above will be entered into a random drawing to receive a delicious Toblerone candy bar. Entries will be accepted until 8 pm, November 4th, Pacific Time.

Oh CRUD! or Just slice me in half, would you?

Not again! Another marriage = a man + a woman political campaign supported by the church. Here's a copy of the letter to be read in Sacrament Meeting (our main worship service) on the last Sunday of June 2008.

There cannot be an issue on which I am more conflicted. I know and love many gay people. If my friends ask me if I believe that homosexual sex is against God's will, I have to say that I do, but I also believe that God loves all of his children regardless of their sexual behavior. I like the recent comments by the church on same-gender attraction.

On the one hand, I feel very unhappy actively opposing the choices of my friends. On the other hand, I feel very unhappy actively opposing the commandments of my God and the request of his prophet. Arg!

Then I have the "stop the decay of the English language" response. I believe that people should all have the same legal rights, but why mess with "marriage" as a word? So many perfectly wonderful words have already been corrupted. "Lovers" can't be used to refer to a chaste couple who are wooing. Do we talk about a woman being the "mistress" of her home? "Gay" has already been hijacked to the point where it can't be used to mean happy and bright. What next? Will people's names be commandeered by popular culture to refer to private things? Oh wait, never mind: a gal named Fanny? a guy named Dick?

Live and let live? Follow the prophet? Save the English language? Dagnabit! I hate this sort of nonsense!

OK, I've made my decision. I'm playing dumb. (Issue? What issue? Huh?) After this post, I am not talking about it and you can't make me.