Queer is too Complicated

I don't see why it all has to be so frigging complicated, this whole queer thing. I mean I just wanna live my life, with a fine woman to share it, and then go about our business. What's the problem? I don't ask other people about how they like to have sex, and for many of them I don't even want to imagine it. I'm a good mother, I pay my taxes, manage my own little business, go to church, hell, I even drive the speed limit and read the bible (though not at the same time). So what's the problem?

Why is being queer even an issue? Well, of course there is dreaded biblical issue of sodomy. Excuse me, I lived as a straight woman for many, many years and, let me tell you, straight men love sodomy (even if women do not). So if straight men love it so much, why do they get their nickers in twist about men doing it? Why do they even care? If they don't want to do it with a man, fine, why worry about the ones who do? And what does this have to do with lesbians at all?

I remember one of the many occasions my mother was coming down on me about the "homosexual lifestyle"...oh let me take a moment for that little jewel "The Homosexual Lifestyle." Being a homosexual is not a lifestyle. My lifestyle is being a single suburban mom and small business owner in a midsized southern city. A life style is something like... oh, how about retired couples that live in an RV and drive around to campgrounds where they set up little strings of lights around their 8'x10' patio and wear fishing hats with hooks in them, sweatshirts with animals on them, and watch TV outside. Now that's a lifestyle. Or say how about those guys (and gals) that work all week in some boring job and on Saturdays or Sundays when the weather not too wet they squeeze into black leather chaps and vests with little chains between the buttons to cross over their beer gut, clamber up onto their precious Harley to ride around the country roads, gathering in a neighborhood pub to drink beer and look at each others women. Now that's a lifestyle (and not bad one, I've tried it). But being a homosexual is not a lifestyle. Homosexuals are people with whatever lifestyle they make for themselves, many of which I totally don't get. Like the women who live with three gigantic smelly dogs and five cats, most of whom sleep in their bed, what is it about the pet thing? Or women who get together at each others houses to watch sports on TV every weekend, drink large quantities of beer, gossip and smoke in car port, and play softball on Tuesday nights. And please, don't get me wrong, all that is fine, I've lived that lifestyle too. It's just not my "homosexual lifestyle." I'm a book reading poetry writing church going nerd mom, and I like it!

But back to my homophobic mom story. So I explain, with my heart racing, that "if you feel that way mom then You shouldn't be a homosexual." Seems pretty straight forward (pun intended) to me. So, she replies, "well that's like saying if I'm a murderer it's okay as long as I'm not murdering you." Reality Shift! Does that make any sense to you? Well bottom line, what I heard was that my loving was being equated with murder. Why does this have to be so complicated?

So this week I heard about the (formerly) right Rev. Ted Haggard (such an unfortunate name, one cannot over estimate the power of a bad name). He still thinks about sex with men but he's still not gay. Then I read a blog about a Christians who seek out help among other Christians who are struggling with "SSA" (same sex attractions). What a great way to meet queer chicks- huh? Forgive me, that may have been mean spirited. Speaking of mean spirited, I laid awake the other night composing a reply to a shockingly crude misogynist comment posted under an article about the Icelandic Prime Minister who is a lesbian. Why do people need to go there? I finally decided it was beneath me to go there but it would have made a clever little joke on my part, I must say.

So well, now that I have that little rant out of my system, at least for the moment, the point is about tolerance. I would like to see acceptance, which goes beyond tolerance, but I would be okay with tolerance. And for all my fussing I am actually very blessed by the level of tolerance I actually do experience in my life. Perhaps because my "lifestyle" is so ordinary, I have had very very few situations in which I personally suffered harassment due to being a homosexual. One time I recall laughing with my daughter (she wasn't laughing by the way, just me) and telling her "Sometimes I forget I'm a lesbian." She dryly replied "No, mom, you never forget you're a lesbian. You just forget the rest of the world isn't." Hahaha, I still love that! And I guess it's true. I just trundle along, and turn a deaf ear to most of it. (Actually, one of my ears is going deaf. I wonder if that is why?).

But I think I had too. I came out in a such a shocking way. I was married for 16 years, had the nice home, the two children in private school, the professional jobs, the Mercedes (I do miss that car), the whole blahblahblah. Then I got involved with, of all people, one of my cousins, we met at family reunion! (You might be a redneck if...) So I was suddenly the adulterous lesbian and the horrible mom in front of my entire evangelical family, four generations, on two continents! Then I went on to live in with my very butch partner the same neighborhood as my former husband, go to the same soccer games, and the same professional associations, in the same small town suburbia-ville. I had to just hold up my head, zip up my black leather jacket, and march on. So that is all I can offer. I'm just living my own homosexual lifestyle as best I can. The church of god neighbors eventually got used to it, and I'm working on my tolerance of denim skirts with sneakers and long hair that needs a trim real bad.