Meerkats

There is this attorney at the last firm I worked out who is also Gay. Her name is Jiblet and she is no way resembles me other than the fact we are both lesbians.

So- a few times a month I will have someone come up to me at court and either call me Jiblet to my face, or begin talking about a case we have together- the problem being the case they are talking about isn't my case- its Jiblet's case.

Jiblet tells me she has had the same experience.

So now I say, " You must be talking about Jiblet, I'm the other lesbian."

I don't do it to make the person feel stupid, its just as though to them I'm a meerkat and I look just like the other meerkats...its the lumping us all in the same place I don't like.

A few times a month someone will tell me I look like Ellen Degeneres and I so don't look like her at all. May be its the lack of dress wearing- I just can't know, but people say it all to me all the time.

I'm guessing people aren't walking up to Ellen and telling her she resembles Jody Downey, so I think this is a unilateral problem, flowing just in my direction, but then again- maybe people are telling Ellen she looks like that Gay woman from the show Glee- whatever her name is....

The other day I worked with a court reporter who told me that her and her husband "just love Rachel Maddow", what she was really telling me is that she was down with the lezbos. It was an awkward moment, as I was unsure how to respond-yet I appreciated the gesture, I prefer this over hostility.

Gioconda says that being Gay increases a persons overall cool factor, I tend to disagree. Overall I have found it to be a pain in the ass, but I think that's mostly because I endured a queer childhood, which at best was isolating.

I grew up feeling as though no one knew me, and if they did chances were pretty good they would not like me- or not just not like me, but try to kick the shit out of me. Growing up in Orange County in the 1980's it was like illegal to be Gay.

I didn't really understand the people I was around, and they certainly didn't understand me. I felt as though I was on the outside looking in, which it something I still struggle with to this day.

Sometimes I wonder what I would be like as a queer teenager in today's world, I don't know...it would have to be easier, but then I think maybe not...maybe it wouldn't be the same - I'm not sure. When you are different from 95% of the women in the world, its not easy...

So with facebook I'm now reconnecting with people I knew in high school, and although there have been a few troubling encounters, overall the majority of the people I have "friended" from those years have been kind and accepting.

Still- when I posted that I was still married after the ruling on Prop 8, a woman I was never friends with in high school, but "friend" in facebook world, commented that - she would not comment because she was "very conservative".

So by not commenting- she was clear in her message- I should not be married. I wanted to punch her in the head. She was an ugly heartless mean girl in high school and 30 years later she was that same person.

I happen to know this woman was on marriage #2...so theres that. I blocked her, but fantasized about exacting a more personal form of revenge. This really, really bothered me.

So here's the deal- straight people never and I mean NEVER have to deal with this type of crap. They never have to rationalize their lives to anyone...no one ever says to straight people- if you haven't had sex with the same sex how do you know you aren't Gay?

Yet I get this all the time.

Being Gay changes who you are in the world- but growing up Gay changes who you are to the core. Its much easier for Gioconda to be "out" as she enjoyed the privileges of heterosexuality for the majority of her life and with that privilege a membership in a club I have never been nor could I ever be a member.

Being a parent has changed much of this for me. In the end I think- or hope- everyone wants the same thing for their children, and so with that there is a commonality I share with most of the world I hadn't before, and this has taken me to another side of life which is inclusive for the most part.

What I do have is I've been true to myself, I've never tried to be anything other than who I am- be that good or bad.

And I remain thankful no one has told me I look like Martina, at least not yet....