Heck, people don’t even have to love each other to be married.  The Cyber Amish believe it is better if people do love each other, but that’s largely an optional component.  Neither do they have to live together, nor procreate.  The reasons that people have are their own for marrying, and they are personal.  As long as everyone enters into the agreement of their own free choice, that is what matters.

The Cyber Amish also believes in Temporary Marriage, if that’s what the parties desire.  Marriage for a predetermined period of time, with or without options for extension built into the contract.

We had a few cocktails and sang some Karaoke, and I found a new song to add to my song list when doing Karaoke: kd lang’s “I’m Down To My Last Cigarette,” which went over well and suits my voice pretty well.

Saturday: the day was full of meetings. But first, I woke up, showered, walked to Coffee Bazaar for a big cup of coffee, a bagel with lox, cream cheese, onion and tomato, and some free wi-fi. I met up with Wiley’s partner, Michael, and we talked while I checked email and booked an appointment with some guy from Bear411 who’ll be visiting San Francisco around New Year’s Day.

We walked back to the Triple-R, where he helped Pete and Tommi get breakfast ready for our first meeting of the day. At 09:30, the board and the steering committee dined together and had some fundamental info passed out, including what PrideWorks does, a discussion of the recent history of Team Bear and how it came to pass that PrideWorks took the team on as a project.

Then we had some brainstorming session, talked about the team survey we conducted back in July/August, as well as the all-hands team meeting we had after the ride, to talk about what sorts of things people brought up during those de-briefings. After that, we walked up to the River Grill for lunch, and headed over to the old railroad bridge/pedestrian bridge to talk about some upcoming events PrideWorks wants to do in the next year.

From there, the two groups split up and while the board met about their stuff, the steering committee met separately to discuss broad ideas for fund raising, timeline planning for social and training and other events, how to use technology to get our message out better, and other things. It was a pretty productive meeting.

Saturday night, we had a supper that was kinda horrible - my duck breast was raw in the middle, and quite unpleasant. Similar things could be said about the corned beef and prime rib, too.

But Tommi’s performance as MC of the three women comediennes was the highlight of the day - he’s a real professional and it shows. He handles the crowd well, sings like a dream, and does the glamour cabaret drag like he was born in greasepaint. The comics were funny, too, and I got the contact info of one of them who is interested in helping Team Bear do some fund raising events.

Sunday: low key. another trip to Coffee Bazaar, another breakfast meeting, then we lounged by the pool for a while, took in the hot tub, then finally Wiley and I drove in a caravan with Michael home with a stop at the Petaluma Outlet Stores where I picked up new socks and a couple of pieces of work out clothes. Very inexpensive!

Finally, got back home and into bed. My own comfy bed.

Current Mood:  chipper

I spent the weekend up in Guerneville, enjoying the company of some handsome men!

He’s a good dog.

Wiley drove me up last night to the Triple-R and we arrived around 21:00, time enough to get settled in and to sing a couple of Karaoke songs before bed.

Today, both groups are meeting together before we get divide up and tackle our respective tasks. The Board has to talk about the upcoming Prideworks year, and the Steering Committee has to talk about how we want to do fund raising and team building events this year.

I have some ideas for fund raising and the website and outreach that I will bring up, based upon the feedback we had from the end of last season - we did a poll of the team members in August to talk about what went right, and what went wrong last year, and how we can improve upon that this year. So I am looking forward to that.

OK, I’m sitting at Coffee Bazaar, just finished my coffee, and it’s time to go back to the Triple-R to have breakfast and get to work! I’ll post pics and stuff soon.

I keep reading on all these legal discussion websites that being gay is something that you do, while being black (or white, or whatever) is something that you are. And I think to myself, what planet are they on?

For me, and I suspect the vast majority of homosexuals, being gay is not about what kind of sexual acts we perform, but it’s a way of being. My sexual and emotional response does not move me toward women. Of course, I love specific women, and I love womankind, but I am not, and I hate to use this phrase, capable of being in love with women. I am a homosexual because I love men and I fall in love with men.

This is an important distinction. I was married to a woman, and I had a sexual relationship with her, and I love her as a friend and companion, but I was never in love with her. Nor any of the handful of other women with whom I had sexual relations. In order to perform sexually with them, I had to fantasize about having sex with men.

Similarly, I often muse about the situational “homosexuality” that occurs in all-male or all-female environments. Meeting a sexual need with whatever person is available does not make the person a homosexual. Engaging in same-sex sexual behavior does not make a person gay, or even necessarily bisexual.

If I had never had sex with a man, I would still be a homosexual, because in my mind, I am attracted to men affectionally and physically. It is my frame of reference that makes me gay, not what I choose to do about it.

But that leads men to my next topic. When I was a child, I was a very effeminate boy. I was never interested in typical boyish pursuits, never like rough and tumble play, always wanted to play with the girls at school, played with dolls, played jump rope, played other typically girlish games. This did not endear me to either the boys or the girls. Yet, I didn’t know any other way to be.

As I grew older, my otherness was the subject of ridicule, taunts, violence. There were countless times when my classmates reduced me to tears, terrorized me to the point that I used to get into fights with my parents about going to middle school. I would stand outside the door of my house weeping and crying because they were making me go to school.

The fear of school was a large factor to why I took the GED test when I was 16, and went to work at an alternative high school for a few years as a computer programmer before I joined the Navy at 22.

The otherness was why I was jumped by some football players at a riverside park one night when I was 17, why they broke my nose and ribs kicking me when I was already down on the ground. I hadn’t done anything to them, hadn’t said anything to them, didn’t know who they were. I was just minding my own business with a couple of friends.

I married my ex-wife while I was in the Navy to throw people off the scent. The closet is a invidious place to live. It breeds resentment and destroys one’s self-esteem.

In 1994, a year after getting out of the Navy, I got fired from my first job because I trusted the boss’ wife, and came out to her. I believe that she really didn’t mean me any harm - she really did like gay people. But her husband, on the other hand; she must have told him, because before I came out to her, he had liked me well enough, praised my work and job performance. Not long after that, he accused me of not being a “team player” and fired me. It made no sense.

I feel weird that I feel like I have to write about my discrimination cred after all this blame and counter-blame that’s been going on. I never blamed anyone for the passage of Proposition 8 except those of us were opposed to it. We were too complacent to believe that anyone would seriously oppose us, and we allowed ourselves to be swiftboated. We didn’t do enough outreach to other communities that have experienced discrimination to enlist them as allies, and we didn’t do enough selling of our point of view of why our rights matter, why we matter. Some may argue that we shouldn’t have to do such things, but people need to be convinced that what they are doing is right, and the opponents of Prop 8 didn’t do enough.

I heard someone on the radio today say that she’s a black lesbian and she thought of herself as invisible to the predominantly white, predominantly male gay community in the Bay Area, and that the only time the community ever came to her was when it needed something from her. That issues of poverty and jobs were more pressing issues to her. That stings, and there is probably some truth to it, too.

So what can I do to find more allies for the struggle for civil rights for gay people of all genders, races, ethnicities, national origins, religions? What can everyone do?