The ways we change August 27, 2008

It seems very odd to me that until just a couple of months ago, when we got legally married, Jade and I were fairly closeted about our relationship at work. Those who know us well, of course, already knew. And a few people on the outskirts suspected. But now I just don’t care any more.

Without going into much detail, Jade and I both interviewed at the same place (on different days) for part-time jobs. We know that at least to one person, we were billed as being part of a couple. So I just assumed, when I talked to people during my interview, that they knew that Jade and I were a package deal. An item. A couple.

It didn’t occur to me until after I left my interview that perhaps that had not been conveyed to everyone. And when I realized that, I also was amazed to find that I didn’t care.

They need to know that we’re together. I guess I’m done hiding.

Hit delete July 7, 2008

I just deleted my mom from my cell phone phone book.

Purely a symbolic move. As if I’d forget a phone number that had been my own for 20-some-odd years.

Yet somehow… I felt better. I’m also moving soon. I didn’t give her my last address, except when I wanted her to mail me money from my old account. I’m sure I won’t be giving her this one, either, unless under duress.

I’m sure somehow that’s wrong. I’ll hear from the fundies that say I should rot in hell. I suppose they’d prefer that I kill myself (the route I was heading).

If God is offended by my finding peace of mind and happiness for the first time in my life, then God is a jerk. A fragile jerk who creates people just to toss them in hell. Nice.

I suppose it comes to this: I’m tired of being the punching bag, just saying “yes, yes” while my Mom pours out her frustrations, anger and disgust with me. If I’m so disgusting, then I’m too disgusting to have contact with. Fuck off and leave me alone.

Yet I remain a chicken, venting here in a corner of cyberspace instead of telling her over the phone. In an argument nobody can win, as we go round and round about things nobody can prove, from two people who won’t budge in their ways of thinking.

So instead I just hit delete. It’s best for everyone involved.

She’s not impressed July 6, 2008

So my mom actually asked me if I got married.

I suppose the news of this California thing spread.

I said, “Why, yes I did.”

Silence for a couple of beats. Then the shame. She’s glad my dad isn’t around to see this. Then she had to go.

I don’t understand. If you don’t want to know the answer, don’t ask the question.

In other news, it’s official: I’m going to law school.

Mom: Not impressed by that. She kept asking me about on-campus housing. I told her the same thing twice. I think she’s on the “listening every three words” plan.

Another reason not to argue.

Well, let me go out and recruit children now. I’ll be back in a bit.

News to straights: There is no lifestyle. Shut up. June 29, 2008

I told two of my friends about my relationship with Jade while I was home, and one of them outed me to someone else.

I was furious.

To be fair, I didn’t say to him, don’t tell anybody. Because I’m not ashamed. I also didn’t think I had to.

But what he did was go to the very top of the list of people I didn’t want to tell, and told her. And she tracked me down and called me at my dad’s house. Let me also say she is at the very top of the list of people I never wanted to talk to again, either. I thought my dad was joking when he announced her name from the caller ID. You’re joking, I said. No, he said. I’m glad I didn’t say anything like “What does that bitch want?” because she would’ve heard me.

Maybe straight people don’t know that you’re not supposed to out people if you’re not sure they’re out.

Maybe my friend couldn’t help himself. It was a juicy tidbit, after all. I think he was still reeling. So I left him a message and told him what I thought.

He had a fairly decent reaction to the news, though. Just a few wows and eyes bugged out. And then said that like Seinfeld, his philosophy is “not that there’s anything wrong with that.” Then proceeded to list gay people he knows in his small community. Most of whom said, don’t tell anybody, but you should know …

Maybe that should’ve been his first clue.

I’m not really pissed any more. Amused, I suppose. Telling the one person I never wanted to hear from again (the person I still have nightmares about) isn’t as bad as having the entire office know and offer you congratulations on your wedding.

Also, to be fair to him, this person called him out of the blue, and he’d just heard my news. I suspect he’s probably also still a bit afraid of that person himself. It probably just came out.

As I did.

In other coming outs, I also told a deeply religious friend as we sat near the water, swinging lazily on an adult swinging bench.

She asked me about the ring I was wearing on my left ring finger.

“Is that something special?”

She actually said something about it earlier, but I kind of brushed it off. We were in a restaurant where the last thing you want to do is say the word gay. Because they will lynch you, forks still covered in maple syrup from the excellent pancakes and crepes.

So I told her. I hemmed and hawed a bit. How do you tell your one remaining friend from high school, one who is a teacher missionary to a foreign country? One whose life has always been about loving her god, about serving her god, about helping others?

It didn’t go that badly. I wanted to tell her the truth. Especially since she would like to visit me next summer and I didn’t want to have to sleep separately from Jade. I also knew that it would be just one more thing she’d have to love me in spite of, because I’m also an atheist. She doesn’t push me too hard on the atheism front, which is why we’re still friends.

She said she doesn’t approve of that lifestyle, but that I’m still her friend, and that she wants to include Jade as part of that friendship, because Jade is a part of who I am.

She kept using the lifestyle word, too. Well, I don’t approve of that lifestyle, but I still love you.

I heard that same lifestyle phrase from my aunt and I am currently not happy with my aunt. My aunt, in fact, was supposed to call me back to hear some news I have, and never did. She was also sketchy about whether she could come and visit me while I was staying at my dad’s, and she never got back with me about that either. I suspect she might be having some problems, and if I were a better person, I’d keep trying to get her to call me back. But I’m not her babysitter. Maybe I’m the problem. Maybe she has another problem. But until she can be grown up enough to call me back, I’m done.

I hate that term, lifestyle. There is no one lifestyle. What straight people do is use it as a euphemism for having nasty, disgusting gay sex. It serves as a sanitizing filter in their mind, so they don’t have to think directly about two women making love.
As if sex serves as the only symbol of our relationship. Well, I’m going to say right now: stop using the word lifestyle. There’s no straight lifestyle, and there’s no gay lifestyle. Love does not equal sex. I do not think about you having straight sex. I do not look at you and think, wow, they put the penis in the vagina. How weird and gross! So stop it!

Beware of tiger June 20, 2008

Lizzie teases me about my need for privacy. Which probably sounds pretty funny coming from someone writing here on the Interwebs. But anyhow, says I only share things if asked for. In writing. Filled out in triplicate. And only then, when served with a FOIA form. And a subpoena.

I never thought I was quite *that* bad.

Until my business went out in an email — complete with a pic — Tuesday. To the 100 or so people we work with. And to their spouses. And to friends in other states.

Yeow! I’m supposed to be the one asking questions. This is freaking. Me. Out.

I hadn’t realized all the different layers of veils I wear around everyone. I know I try to control the flow of information. I’ll show an ankle to one person, an elbow to another. But until Tuesday, I’d never realized the extent of the secrecy. I mean, I can’t even break down who knows what. There are almost as many variables as people. And that doesn’t even count the further information that we’ll soon be leaving as I start law school.

We’ve got friends who know about the ceremony but not the official knot-tying, and vice-versa.

I’ve got one friend I’m pretty sure has stopped talking to me because she probably suspects I’m gay, but I don’t know for sure. Try piercing through all *those* layers of secrecy and mind-reading.

There’s my mother, who I’ve recently decided to start talking to again. Sort of. She doesn’t know. She barely knows I’m going back to school. In fact, she hasn’t even called me to confirm whether I still have a job, as some very bad news about my company made news this week. News I think she’s likely aware of. But I’m not sure. Because, well, we’re barely talking.

And then there’s my sister, whom I’m not speaking to at all. And haven’t in more than a year.

But on Tuesday, everything was blasted open, at least at work and all those places adjacent, where our outness was spotty at best. Whereas I usually slowly unpeel like an onion, my outer wrapping was blasted away. And thankfully, blessedly, if I can believe in blessings anymore, it was completely worth it.

People keep asking me, why didn’t you say anything? Most of them don’t realize this is the third time we’ve been married in a year. Some of them perhaps are making a political statement. Others perhaps are so used to those who are very public about their gayness, especially this week, that they don’t understand that, even if there is a good chance the reaction is good, not everyone is out there like that. And still others, I think, honestly don’t understand how second-nature a life of secrecy is — many times, has to be — for someone who isn’t straight.

I have said before, even on this blog, that I would like to live a more open life. That was, in fact, the purpose of coming out to my friends and family about two years ago. Perhaps that was a lie to myself, and what I really sought was just the opportunity to have more options about which parts of me I’ll show to which people.

Out, out, out June 18, 2008

OMG. We are SO out.

Out at work.

It’s a relief, in a way, but yesterday, we felt like bugs under a magnifying glass.

It started when one of our coworkers saw us on the way to the courthouse. And then two more. It was that first one who said something to his supervisor, and then to one of our supervisors.

We got a couple of furtive congratulations when we went to work and then our supervisor asked if it was OK if she shared the news.

I thought about it for a minute, answered without really consulting Jade, and figured that there were two ways to do this.

Let people talk about us behind our backs or just come out to everybody.

We chose the latter.

Immediately, we had several women flock to our desk and congratulate us and say they had NO idea we were getting married; otherwise, they would’ve been there.

I showed them the pictures and then I was asked if we would mind if a message was sent out to the entire larger department, complete with a picture.

Well, news was traveling faster and faster. (It ended up as far as Seattle.) Might as well be in it the whole way.

Jade didn’t like the picture I gave. She was mortified, because we are holding hands, facing each other, looking happy as we are about to kiss.

I think I’ve been forgiven, if only because a) we are so cute, after all and b) because she got over feeling like a bug under a magnifying glass. Or at least stopped minding so much.

Sorry Jade.

Typical responses:

You didn’t tell anybody? You didn’t invite anybody? Is there going to be a party? Are you going on a honeymoon? I didn’t even know you were a couple. I’m so happy for you both. Cute picture. I liked your dress. I liked your suit. How was the crowd? Did you have to wait long?

People were really sweet. If there was anybody that didn’t approve of our situation, we didn’t hear from them.

We didn’t expect this kind of response, to be honest.

I didn’t get any work done most of the time I was at work.

People kept creeping over to congratulate us. We kept explaining that we just wanted to do it quietly, avoid the fuss. We explained we’d already bought a house together, had been domestic partners. Signing mortgage papers is honestly a lot more scary than signing your name to a marriage license, I said. We also wanted to be a part of history. And we were. About 65 couples got marriage licenses in our county yesterday. I’m not sure how many of them got married that day. I heard 30, but there might’ve been more.

Other people paid our dues June 16, 2008

In a way, I feel like we’ve cheated in this whole marriage thing.

Jade and I are about to participate in history, in getting our relationship recognized legally. Not just as domestic partners (which we did last year) but as the real thing. Party A and B. Wife and Wife.

Yet we haven’t participated in the same struggles and suffering other couples have gone through.

Recently, on Pride weekend, we sat with a group of older lesbians at a restaurant, waiting for the crowd to die down after the parade. They took a survey, going around the table, of who had been together how long. Our answer: almost four years. Everyone else had been together more than a decade, and probably had identified as lesbians for decades.

I’ve seen pictures of San Francisco’s poster same-sex couple: Del Martin and Phyllis Lyon. They’re in their 80s; they’ve been together for 55 years.

Jade and I are babies.

And my identity as a lesbian has been growing process.

When Jade and I started having a physical relationship, I didn’t know what to call myself nor who to tell.

We freaked ourselves out. We had a secret from the entire world for months. And people only got let in on the secret gradually.

After it was killing us not to tell. After we thought we could handle the reaction from others.

It took a long while. A very long while.

I’m still not comfortable talking about it. We’re still not entirely out at work. Huge gobs of acquaintances and relatives don’t know, probably will never know.

I did secretly identify as a bisexual for many years, although that was something I kept even more secret. It was something I kept trying to talk myself out of. I’m not attracted to this woman. I do not have a crush on this woman. But I got no further with men than I did with women. After my only adult relationship with a man ended about 11 years ago, I never really dated. Nor seemed to attract anyone, although I had crushes on guys all the time. And tried to quell the crushes I had on women as impractical. Plus my gaydar was horrible …

Can’t help it May 24, 2008

I just had a pleasant conversation with my mom. I told her I was going back to school. And she even seemed *almost* proud, an emotion she hasn’t directed my way in almost two years, ever since I came out to her in Sept. 2006.

Further, she mentioned LIzzie’s name, and asked her role in this entire school bit. (”Yes, she’s moving, no she’s not in school, she’ll be helping to support me.”) That’s all that was said of her, but it was a start.

I hadn’t wanted to tell her about school since that whole conversation a few months back, when she was saying how big a burden it was to be nice to me. But it came up, and she was in a good mood, so I told her.

I shouldn’t be happy. I know this is fleeting. But for the moment, I’ll allow myself to smile.

Do ask, do tell May 3, 2008

I’d love to trade spaces with a straight person for a day. Well, that’s not entirely fair because I told myself I was a straight woman for several years, so I suppose I’ve been there and done that.

But bear with me. I’d like to get a nice, sheltered, hetero married woman to step into my shoes for a day. Preferably one who feels that any sign of gayness is being all up in someone’s face about it.

So hetero woman, I ask you this:

• You’re filling out applications for school. Do you fill out the space that says spouse/partner? What do you put there?
• Someone asks you if you’re married. What do you tell them? Do you lie? Change the subject? Tell the truth?
• An otherwise tolerable stranger blurts out something being “so gay.” What do you say? Or better yet, a coworker blurts out something being “so gay.” Or your boss. How far do you take a response? Or do you chicken out, say nothing?
• Someone mentions your husband’s name, calls him your “little friend.” How do you respond?

We face a million little decisions every day about being out. I find myself being out, then closeted, around the same people in the same day, wondering if they notice my terminology change throughout the day. “My partner… my roommate…”

Right now, my current policy is, “if they ask, I will tell. If they freak out, they shouldn’t have asked.” A coworker asked me the other day if I was married, and I replied, “technically, yes,” which isn’t the best response, but I was kinda surprised he hadn’t figured it out yet, with four matching rings between Lizzie and I, our living arrangements, etc etc. etc.

I’m lucky in that my workplace is a fairly friendly place to be. There are a TON of gay people there. My department alone I’m fairly sure is half gay. But, as Lizzie points out, they’re all closeted. Well, except for the ones who aren’t. But anyhow, we’re part of a club where not all the members are hip to the others. Unless they are. Who the hell knows. Does your head hurt yet?

But anyway… a million little decisions. And in the end, the choices we make about the information we give out may not mean a thing. I wonder sometimes: What if I get into a wreck while alone in my car, or I collapse at the gym during my customary wee-morning visits to the treadmill? If the ambulance is called, will anyone tell Lizzie? I mean, who would think to call a woman to come after another, grown-ass woman? Will they just call my mom, who will then try to ensure that, even two thousand miles away, Lizzie will have no say in what happens? This scenario, actually, was what sparked the entire wedding talk to begin with. We have the requisite legal papers drawn up, but I don’t know if they’d do anybody any good if everyone doesn’t know what’s going on. And this doesn’t even count the horror stories of hospitals and things not honoring those agreements or waiting until the partner dies …

There’s a lot of risk involved with just trying to be honest — risk of losing a job, risk of bodily harm, risk of important decisions being scuttled away from one’s partner. And this is something that people who use homosexuality as a political scare mongering tactic will never, or never want, to understand.

Don’t want to talk March 17, 2008

After an incident with my aunt the other week, I suddenly don’t feel like talking with her.

I said it was OK that she told me what she was thinking, about my relationship with Jade, or our ceremony

But it wasn’t.

I thought I wanted honesty. I want to be honest myself, but when it comes down to it, I don’t like the disapproval.

I could have it a lot worse. My aunt still loves me, serves as a go-between for me and my dad if needed. Jade’s mom exudes disapproval every time they speak. But I think I just expected a little better from my aunt, the sister I never had.

Late at night, on my way home from work, I’ve been getting the urge to call my aunt and shoot the breeze, but then I remember I’m still mad at her. Not mad, disappointed. Disappointed in her the same way she’s disappointed in me.