rivers_bend

Since long before Prop 8 passed, I've had a problem with heterosexual weddings. Not in theory--straights can get married if they want--but in practice; attending is painful for me. And yet, I continue to attend. In large part because that's what you do, but also because I forget how much it hurts until I do it again.

My cousin's wedding is a whole weekend extravaganza. Thursday night was the rehearsal dinner, last night was a pre-wedding BBQ for family and wedding party, and today is the ceremony and the reception. I'm trying to focus on the fact that it's nice to see my parents again after ten weeks.

I can't even count the number of times I've heard something along the lines of "I don't have a problem with gay people, I just wish they wouldn't shove their lifestyle in our faces..." like straight people just have lives but we have a lifestyle. Fuck that. Thursday we were presented with a slide show of the bride and groom. It was cute and adorable, and nice to see the woman my cousin is marrying, as I don't really know her. But all the heteronormative lifestyle it displayed was really upsetting to me.

The prom pictures with strings of girls in dresses and boys in tuxes, the college theme parties with couples in matching outfits, the series of proposal pictures, the happy families portraits with mom, dad, two kids and a dog... That is a lifestyle, and it's one that school administrations, opinionated bigots, the voting public, state governments, the federal government, and thoughtless, ignorant people deny me and hundreds of thousands of queers every single day. And it's really fucking painful.

And I'm one of the lucky ones. Believe me, I know that. I have parents who not only love me, but who go way out of their way to support me, fight for my rights and the rights of others like me, who advocate tirelessly, who make sure that people who aren't as lucky as I am have someone to talk to. I have always lived where it was pretty much safe to walk down the street holding hands with a girl. I've never lost my job, or been denied housing, or had to find a different real estate agent, or been punched or kicked or stabbed or shot.

But I have been verbally assaulted, shoved, surrounded by a gang and taunted, threatened with violence, spent a year in my job defending my right to care for women in labour and live with my girlfriend, put up with insults, been told to pretend my girlfriend was a boyfriend, asked if I wouldn't rather be straight, been told I was abnormal, a freak, and sick, been asked not to flaunt my sexuality when I was talking about the fact my girlfriend was a vegetarian, lived with the fact that if I wanted to stay with my British partner I could not reside in the USA, had to spend a year gathering "proof" that my relationship was real, including letters, pictures, bills, and other documents in order to live with her in the UK, when straight couples just have to provide a marriage license, faced thousands upon thousands of media slights and insults every year, and spent twenty years coming out over and over and over and over because it's worse to live a lie than to put up with all that shit, and because I am one of the lucky ones, I feel a responsibility to everyone less blessed than I am to try to make their lives easier by keeping queerness from being a shameful secret.

I don't begrudge my cousin and his fiancee the happiness they've found with each other. But I have to admit I do begrudge them how easy it is for them to get married. How they don't have to have in the back of their minds that what they are doing today is a political act, how hundreds of convenient legal changes will happen to their relationship when they sign that license, how all the people here to see them today assume this is the 100% natural next step in their relationship. And, I'll admit, I resent that they don't know any of this.

I think someday soon I'm going to have to stop going to straight weddings. It's never an appropriate time to soap box, and yet grinning and pretending everything is fine and dandy feels like swallowing glass. But I'm here now, and I'll make the best of it. Thank god my parents get it, at least mostly.

Angry Birds. iPod game. SHOULD NOT BE SO HARD. Just for the record, I have now been attempting to do level 3-12 for MORE THAN FOUR HOURS. As far as I can tell, all the online walkthroughs start at level 4 or 5 because apparently before then it's too easy? (or too random, who knows) and I'm going to stab something if I don't get past this level. Stupid white birds are not helpful. I need a bomb bird!

I would like to point out that those three hours were over four days; I have not been playing straight through, though I did play for an hour on the way to my aunt and uncle's house and for an hour on the way back the other night.

*breathes*

Okay. Calm now. Last night I went back to one of the early levels of Plants V Zombies for the soothing easiness of it. I've gotten through every other level so far, and I'm sure I can get through this one. If not, my life will not end if I fail to complete the game. It scares me how many more levels there are, though.

I almost couldn't be bothered to watch House, but in the end I did. ( House )

wendy I was totally thinking of you while watching Fringe. Clearly they imagined that lots of people weren't going to spend time watching the two hour premiere, because every other line was a re-cap of what happened in the first episode. It definitely stays on my fall lineup though. ( Fringe 1.02 (only very minor spoilers) )

and now I really must get cracking on the homework due tonight.