I'm Coming Out

*This post was inspired by the It Gets Better Project. Check it out, and if you live under a rock and don't know who Dan Savage is, check him out too, because he's awesome.* 

When news of Tyler Clementi's suicide broke, my heart did too, for a couple of reasons.

Now that I'm a parent, the idea of losing a child after 18 short years on this earth is too painful to think about for long. Actually having it happen would be a fucking nightmare.

Long before I was a parent, though, I was a misfit high school kid with lots of misfit high school friends. More than a few of these friends came out during those years - at least, they came out to people they thought they could trust. I was one of them in a few instances. Most of the time, at least to the people to whom the kid was coming out, it was A. not really much of a surprise and B. not really a big deal.

But to those kids, who had been struggling with thier identities and thier sexuality for a long time before summoning up the courage to say it out loud, it was a huge deal. It was terrifying. I clearly remember one friend, who told myself and another friend at the same time. He was shaking, there were tears in his eyes. At the time, we made light of it, saying "no shit" and laughing. We made sure he knew we were in his court, we still loved him, and joked about how he was going to break it to his girlfriend (she already knew). And it seemed fine. And I wondered why he had been so scared.

It didn't take long to find out. My friend lost tons of his friends in one fell swoop. All it took was confirmation of his gayness and people retreated. I was surprised. Until that point, I had thought that our merry band of misfits were all open minded, that we were all in it together for the long haul. After all, we were all "different" in one way or another. I didn't realize that being different - being from a broken home, being artistic/intelligent/geeky/wierd -  didn't neccessarily grant a person freedom from homophobia.

I started hearing the words "fag" and "dyke" used when describing my friends. These, once again, from people that I had at one time thought to be open minded. I started hearing about fears that a person would be construed as gay if they hung out with these kids too much.

 I witnessed friends of the "fags" and "dykes" begin to be harrassed for hanging out with them. I was one of those friends. I was labelled a "fag hag", a "dyke", a "loser", and, interestingly, a "skank", because I hung out with the gay kids. I lost tons of friends too - people who figured I had to chose. I couldn't possibly be friends with them and with gay people at the same time. Which was fine. I'm not really down with people who think you can catch the gay the same way you catch a cold. Fuck.

I'm still friends with a lot of people from those tumultuous years. Many of us, gay and straight, have gone on to live interesting and successful lives. We are designers, musicians, writers, artists. We are teachers, mechanics, entrepreneurs. We are parents and lovers and friends.

We are also survivors. The lucky ones.

A lot of us didn't make it. Isolated from our peers, lacking support from our families, too shy or scared to reach out to people who would care, we found solace in drugs and alcohol. Found ourselves in abusive relationships,  or in the wrong place at the wrong time. We OD'd, were beaten to death, or figured that it was all just too much to take, and ended our own lives. 

There are too many of these stories in my past. There are too many of these stories period. Too many young people who didn't or don't realize that things change, that life is long, and that it does, indeed, get better. That's why I'm coming out as a straight ally for Gay/Lesbian/Bi/Transgendered youth or anyone who feels they don't fit in. I took the pledge to stand by these kids, to let them know that they are valued regardless of how or who they love. I took the pledge to be there for my own children if they ever feel isolated, and to be straight with them about bullying, sexuality, and homophobia. I hope you will too.

Wherein I Write About My T n' A

One of the cooler things I've discovered about blogging is being able to lend my writing "talents" (heh heh) to causes that I think are rad. Yes, rad. It's late and I'm tired. So shoot me.

But first rush over here and read about my boobs!

A Confession

Since Captain Chaos was born, a little over one year ago, my garden has gone to pot. (Not that kind. Put down the phone.) It was beautiful - and bountiful! - last year, but something had to give this year, and the garden drew the short straw.

Unfortunately, I'd spent the year before Chaos was born conditioning the (very neglected) soil in the garden, so when I let it go, the weeds and crabgrass feasted on roughly 500 litres of compost and are now doing very well, thank you.

Now that Chaos is big enough to "help" out in the garden, I'm back, trying to get 'er done. It's a big project, and I'm not making any promises, with Little Brother due in about 8ish weeks, but I'm going to do what I can, and if all we can plant is one bed next spring, I'll consider that a success. If nothing else, I get the satisfaction of getting my hands back into the dirt. Ahhhh...

Here follows a visual confession of my negligence - and an idea of what I've got in store for myself.

Our three apple trees...thankfully unaffected.

The only potatoes this year, growing out of one of the compost piles...heh heh...

Strawberries, lavender, peppers, spring onions, daisies. Sigh..

Cucumbers, pumpkins, melons, zucchini

To the left of the chokecherry bush was my potato patch. In front was lettuce, spinach, and kale. And a bit of Chaos.

The de riguer gratuitious shot of my helpy helper, making sure the apples are ripe.

" Success is the sum of small efforts, repeated day in and day out."

Well, That Clears That Up...

Yesterday was a terrible day. Not in the usual "BD's a douche and I'm hormonal and tired and broke and nothing ever goes my way and hey! where are you going?" kind of way, but in a "Spectacularly screwing up my blog to the point of deleting it, trying it out on another platform, and failing" kind of way. There was a point where I actually got a little sick to my stomach thinking that I had completely lost my  blog.

After finally reinstating Toquegirlworld right here, in all its' obsolete glory (this template is no longer, and is very difficult to find again once you have stupidly gotten rid of it and totally can't find the HTML code from it that is saved somwhere on your computer),  I will never again question whether or not I am wasting my time writing here.  And I have suddenly become obsessive about backing my shit up.

 I had spent so much time in front of this screen during the day that all I could see when I closed my eyes to sleep that night was a burning white rectangle. Which prompted me to announce, via my Facebook status, that today would be a "screen-free day". Which totally didn't happen. The first thing I did this morning was check my Blackberry to see if anyone had commented on the status I had posted. Self defeating much?

Which brings me to the point of this post: to turn the mirror back to y'all.

I just want to know two things;

1. for those of you who blog - what is your motivation? Why do you do that thing that you do? And how would you deal if it were suddenly gone?

2. for all y'all - do you think it's even possible to have a screen-free day anymore? And I'm talkin all screens here. Smartphones included.

Well, maybe it's three things. But it's still in two-question form. Kind of.

This Post is Just a Vehicle for Pictures of My Kid

Autumn, while sometimes spectacular around these parts, can often be a little cold and drab.

It makes it a little difficult to get off the computer and get outside, especially when dressing Captain Chaos for inclement weather is a full-on Battle Royale that can take upwards of half an hour. Hell, just getting pants on him has been my undoing some days.



He prefers surfing nekkid...ish.

 Today, however, Chaos was clearly interested in getting out. I, too, was climbling the walls.

After reading this post  from Lindsey at A Crunchy Life, I was inspired. Let the battle begin! Soon, I had wrestled the little man into three layers of clothing and we were off!

He starts squealing every time we roll up to his playground.

Let the wild rumpus begin!

Up the stairs....

Across the bridge

Back again

And down the slide

Up the slide

And down the stairs

And down the slide

Again!

There are some playground concepts he's still a little unclear on.

I'm sure I rocked this very same look in 1993 - with parade boots instead of Robeez.

Then he saw these stairs, which heretofore had not been climbed.

He's nothing if not determined.

Playground (and staircase) conquered and Chaos corralled, we settled in for a nice nip and a stroll through the hood.

I took pitchers

Late bloomers

Even on the gloomiest of days it's pretty around here.

Home sweet home.

Layers are shed,

And Chaos is off on another adventure.

Bert?

3:30pm - Chaos FINALLY tires of crashing around in his crib, falls asleep.

4:30pm - I finally tire of trying to get blood from a stone (i.e. doing my finances), start getting my sh*t together for supper.

5pm - Dinner is in the pot! And baby is still sleeping! OMG I am so going to pluck my eyebrows! ( As if it's some wicked, delightfully sinful indulgence..)

I rush downstairs to perform said wicked, sinful act. On the way past the washer and dryer, though, I happen to notice that the dryer has stopped.

Better check.

Alright! Grandma's clothes are dry!

Transfer grandma's clothes from dryer to basket. Transfer Chaos' clothes from washer to dryer. Start dryer.

Well hell - that leaves an empty washing machine. Do I want to throw another load of tiny, scuffed pants and fruit - stained t-shirts in? YOU BET YOUR ASS I DO!! Yeehaw!!  Pshew Phsew! ( that's the noise I make when I fire my imaginary six-shooters in the air. In case you wanted to know.)

Hit "fill" on washing machine. Add soap.

I'm one of those people who has to wait till the machine has filled and started agitating before I put my clothes in. It's a hangover from my misspent college days. Many was the time when I would curse as I pulled my clothes from a laundromat washer, only to find them covered in undissolved powdered soap, thereby forcing me to spend much-needed beer money re-washing them all.

Anyway...while waiting for the washer to start agaiting, may as well check my reader.

You guessed it - while I'm wasting time online, washer goes through half a cycle.

Finally! Clothes are in. And baby slumbers yet! I grab my tweezers and the baby monitor and make a beeline for the washroom.

Just as I put metal to brow, the monitor jumps.

WAAAHHHHH!!!!!!

Oh well. Next time.

Wordless Wednesday...