There’s a story that goes along with this.  Details to be appended to this here post later tonight, after I get the kids in bed.

Long ago, back when people picked up newspapers in their hands in the morning and read them, then put them down and went on with other parts of their day (what a time!), The San Francisco Chronicle used to run a piece called The Question Man.  Somebody – presumably The Question Man – went around town asking folks some interesting question. A column’s worth of the short (Twitter-length) replies were printed alongside a thumbnail photo of the respondent and her/his name, age, occupation, and hometown. Through this we got a pulse-reading from our neighbors on matters great and small.

While I read it regularly – along with Art Hoppe and Herb Caen and later Jon Carroll —  none of the questions or answers were memorable. Except one: “When is a person ‘middle aged’?”  The phenomenon (middle age) was a speck in my distant future, but I took a mild interest in the answers just the same.  Some folks named a year — 30, 40, whatever. Others used some other marker, like “When your marriage is older than your dog,” or “When you are the same age or older than movie stars and national-level elected officials” or some such.  But one really stuck with me.  One woman said, “Middle age is when you no longer apologize for yourself.”

This last definition of middle age has stayed with me as the most compelling, until last Sunday night, when I discovered that middle age is really when you are capable of SPRAINING YOUR FINGER PLAYING AIR GUITAR WITH YOUR KIDS.

Yeah, yeah, I know.  Dictionary definition of “pathetic.” I’ll only add, for the record: it was to Lynard Skynard’s “Free Bird,” and it was worth it.  And this post took me 40 minutes to type.

As I quipped on Twitter the other day — and that’s pretty much the main thing you can do on Twitter, quip:

3 kinds of menopause. Angry kind. Weepy kind. And chuck the broccoli over yer shoulder into the kitchen when yer son refuses to eat it kind.

Then I added:

Guess which kind I have.

Really, that was a rhetorical question. Thus the lack of question mark. The kids don’t lose any sleep at night wondering which kind of menopause Baba has, either. What I like to think is that they don’t lose any sleep at night worrying about it either.

Fortunately, as all sane people do in intermittently insane situations, we fold whatever wrinkles we can into humor as quickly as possible. So by the end of the evening, this event had taken on the stature of household legend, a standard against which all future outbursts of frustration will likely be judged.

Meanwhile, the girl child decided to issue an all-purpose reminder.  Her spelling is idiosyncratic (warned you before!), but I think the gist comes across.

It’s the 2009 LD Reader Survey, now with added SWAG RAFFLE OPTION!

Spend five minutes telling me a little about yourself and more about what you think about this here blog, then give me your email address at the end of it (it’s disaggregated from your survey responses; not to worry), and I’ll pick an email address randomly out of a hat on National Coming Out Day (October 11, 2010)!  You — yes, YOU! — may win THE LD SWAG ITEM OF YOUR CHOOSING! Meaning any t-shirt, coffee cup, tote bag, or whatever you want, sent to your home, once you give me your address. Hell, if there’s a caption you WANT on any of the above, I’ll do it up in the inimitable LD font and slap it on a Cafe Press item, special for you.

Last year I conducted a survey around the blog’s anniversary, and learned a TON.  More folks check in here simply for the photography than I had imagined. What with me being a spirited amateur and all.  Many were totally fine with the chef’s surprise variety of content. Those that don’t come for the newsy updates just overlook that stuff and come back again for the essays. Most of you resemble me a great deal: white, lesbian, fairly educated. Parked, for better and for worse, in the U.S.A. But a lot more than I would have expected (yay!) differ from me, too. Every single moment of communication across some element of difference is of great value to me, and I was especially appreciative to learn what got you Other folks to start and continue reading this blog.

I almost titled this post “Lurker’s Deelite,” since that’s another one of the things I got from last year’s survey. Oodles of you read, but are not chatting, for any one of a host of good reasons. Don’t have the time. Don’t have the inclination. So hate the whole WordPress registration rigamarole that it’s enough to keep you just reading in the old-fashioned, non-dialogy kind of way. Would chat, but are shy (! yes! some folks are shy!). Would comment, but want to say things that just don’t feel suited to the fairly public space of a blog comment. And so on. What you had to say was of great value, too, since otherwise I’d have NO IDEA WHAT YOU THOUGHT OF ALL THIS.

I heard from around 200 readers which, evidently in survey terms, was a great turnout. Even if it was an infinitessimal-to-negligible percentage of total readers in any given month. (Current numbers hover at around 7,000- some-odd “unique” visitors a month, who stop in at a rate of around 1-2,000 a day.) I would love it if as many of you filled this survey out this year, and am enticing you to do it with the whopping LD Swag Raffle option you’ll find at the end.

This year’s survey is much like the previous one, with a specific question addressing my existential malaise about the blog’s direction, post-Prop 8.

Existential malaise, in five paragraphs:

1. LGBT families’ rights and recognitions have been  squarely in the center of political crosshairs since before the  California Supreme Court declared Prop 22 unconstitutional, recognized same-sex marriage as constitutional, and set off the nasty, months-long, multi-million-dollar brawl that was the Prop 8 fight. But it got palpably hairier from then on, I’ll say.  What we stand to gain is greater, but as many, many will say, so long as these battles are currently waged on the front burner, as it were, it’s very hard on our families.  Which is to say, homophobia is on the rise in schools, our kids feel the fallout of the hate- and lie-filled anti-gay marriage rhetoric. (Here’s the Marriage Equality USA report, “Prop 8 Hurt My Family: Ask Me How.”)

2. This political urgency both fatigues and motivates me, and as a result it has both rattled and stoked my blog posting.  On the one hand, when I’ve been embittered and burned out, I’ve lost the umph and the motivation to say a thing in public about our lesbian family or anything at all, for that matter.  That’s a problem for any autobiographically-driven, narrative nonfiction writing with a regular publishing schedule.

3. On the other hand, when I have written directly to this, I’ve  wondered whether the essence of what I began this thing to do — to tell the story of our evolving family and my evolving parenthood, and invite other kindred spirits into a dialog about what their experiences are — has gotten drowned out. 

4. On yet another (third!) hand, of course our family’s well-being feels very directly tied to the outcomes of these political battles, even if the waging of them leaves tire tracks on us all. Ours is not the only such family, and many other parents are going through whatever tribulations we do and far, far worse (my own immediate family is insulated by our class and race, after all). 

5. And finally, I think: simplify, simplify, simplify. Pick something and stick to it. Direct folks to other conversations if need be (that’s why the goddess invented the sidebar), but just quiet the noise and tell a story. I’m hoping some other opinions — like yours — will help.

So there you have it.  I would like to know what you think generally, and what you think specifically. And I’ll lure the survey-taker fence-sitters among you with the possibility of your winning up to like $20 in free guff. Thank you in advance for the time you spend.

Click here to complete the 15-question, 5-minute survey.

One thousand bloggers in the same hotel may be a wee strain on the system. Credit to the crack BlogHer events planning tech crew and the Sheraton, who has been feverishly installing/upgrading/what have you. I understand there may be a bellhop or two whose job this weekend is to lean precariously out a window holding a satelite dish in juuuuust the right position.

Now on to the quick note, before I rejoin the happy fray. There will be the jet-setters among you who are out and about all the time, and are utterly dulled to the jaw dropping wonder of the SkyMall magazine. But by my calculations, it has been just over two years that I took a plane somewhere. So I was utterly unprepared for the garden sculptures section of the magazine, which featured, yes,  a GARDEN SASQUATCH.

You might say to yourself, “What is Bigfoot doing in the garden?” But the SkyMall magazine has no real answer to that question. What it does do is provide the following description of the product, which is called “Bigfoot, the Garden Yeti”:

With his characteristicaly big feet, our more than two-foot tall Garden Yeti will have guests doing a double-take as they admire your creative home or garden style! With alleged sightings the world over, from the highest Himalayas to the United States, this elusive, mythical legend has been captured exclusively for [name of poor besotted company withheld for its own good] in quality designer resin and hand painted for startling realism.

Above Sasquatch were a trio of meercats (yup). After I had fixed my jaw back in place, I turned the page to find “The Zombie of Montclaire Moors.”  Yes I did.

 Not for the faint of heart, this [name of company withheld for its own good]-exclusive, life-size (sic), gray-toned zombie will claw his way out of your garden plot, office, or family room corner, pleading for assistance with the eeriest undead eyes you’ve ever sen.  Captured in meticlulous detail in quality designer resin and finished so realistically that you’ll swear you can hear him breathing! (Arrives in 3 pieces)

Looks disturbingly like John Malkovitch.

Now to the happy fray. If you’re here, track me down and I’ll hug you with the zest of 10 Leo Buscaglias! And if we imbibe too much at the evening parties, we can always use this SkyMall hangover remedy.

Never was, ever! Much to the consternation of my parents, and maybe even one or two would-be (guy) sweeties in high school, whose identities were only revealed to me years later by my sister, to whom they confessed their love-lorneness.  Who knew. 

And before we go, I can’t help but leave you with this, sent around to friends this time of year by my chum (and regular LD commenter) Ann Z:

Coast to coast and up and down the internets, the Sisters of Sappho were all: Jumpin’ Jehosephat!  It’s one of us up there!  And of the butchie stripe, heretofore The Gender That Dare Not Speak Its Name! (At least it dare not speak its name on the television set, and according to reports by those who watch the series, if you were to search for this in between part of the gender spectrum on even something like The L Word you would be searching a long, long, long time.)  But back to Dr. Maddow: She’s smart, we all said!  Plus she’s leftie!  Plus she’s not apologetic about any of the above!  I even got a little giddy myself (exhibit A).

There was just one eeensy, teensy problem I hadn’t anticipated, in my initial glee: having one of my kind representing on the TV set meant that I got to witness my beloved watching one of my kind representing on the TV set.  (Cue sound of record player needle being scratched violently off the vinyl.)  Yeah.  So when we all laugh at Dr. M’s rapier wit, the beloved laughs just a leeetle bit harder than I do. You get the idea.

Okay, now before a bunch of you accuse me of being a wimp, I have two things to say. One: you’re right!  Wimp wimp wimp! Monsieur Wimp, c’est moi! But two: Hey! Gals like me, we don’t have any practice!  One of the side-effects of being virtually invisible in the sphere of popular culture is that you don’t have the opportunity to inure yourself to your sweetie swooning over tempting, if improbable, alternatives to yourself.  Which, surprise surprise, Dr. Maddow’s appearance nightly has provided.  You know, alongside probing and insightful analysis of breaking national and international political events.

What’s a gal to do? Carpe carpem, that’s what I say! Don’t suffer alone, quietly! Suffer with others, noisily! And thus was born the Maddow Widowers’ Support Group. Membership is open to all who find themselves bobbing adrift in the sea of their sweetie’s Dr. M-induced mooning.  Most of us MWSG members will be mannish lesbians, but let’s face it, straight women and gay men have found themselves mooning over Dr. M too.  So befuddled straight and gay guys are more than welcome.  I am a very strong advocate of coalition-building across difference.  Basically, come one, come all, long-faced and cranky.

Why am I uniquely qualified to call the MWSG to order?  Glad you asked.  My mind has been boggled, lo these many months of Dr. M’s ascendency, by an eerie number of coincidences between my biography and that of the esteemed left-wing lesbian commentator.  To make matters more excruciating, each one is a “close but no cigar” type deal, again making me the gal for the job.  Allow me to draw your attention to just some of the highlights:

1. We grew up in the same town, only I’m older. By like ten years or something. Unfortunately, we’re in the age range now where older is not better. It’s just, like, with more gray hairs, crow’s feet, and a paunch.
2. We went to the same high school, only when I went, it was still staggering in the wake of Proposition 13’s devastating public education budget cuts, and it had absolutely no academic distinction whatsoever. In fact, my recollection was, it was crappy (sorry, but that’s my recollection.  could be that my entire high school experience would have been crappy anywhere, what can I say).  Later it won some kind of “California Distinguished School” award, but when I was there it was distinguished only by a trend-setting “smoking section.”  Now of course it’s distinguished by being Dr. M’s high school alma mater. (Is there an emoticon for “bitter”?)
3. In high school, I was on the swim team and the basketball team.  Sounds nice and jock-y, yes? No.  Because Dr. M? Swim team, basketball, AND volleyball.  One-upped again. To make matters worse, she’s described as the type of player who was “frequently injured diving for balls.”  We all know there are two kinds of people: people who dive for balls and people who would never consider it.  I’ll just stop there.
4. She attended Stanford University as an undergrad, whereas I went to that low-cost public school across the bay that is constantly complaining about Stanford and defensively citing our greater # of Nobel Laureate professors.  You brats.
5. She attended graduate school at Oxford University as a Rhodes Scholar, and completed a Ph.D. in Political Science. I, on the other hand, was in a Ph.D program  in the great upper midwest at, again, a fine, low-cost public school.  Dropped out before orals, meaning I can officially only place M.A. after my name.  Don’t even get A.B.D. (All But Dissertation). I haven’t devised what M.A. stands for, but sadly, Pretty hot Dyke is already taken.
6. One of the several jobs I had after grad school was one that entailed advising would-be Rhodes Scholars’ at my alma mater. Again, I think I’ll just stop there.
7. I’ll finish with the biographical factoid that I find the most devastating. I like to think I’m tall for a gal — 5 foot 10 and a half inches, and don’t think I don’t count that last half-inch.  And guess what. Go ahead, guess how tall Dr. Maddow is.  No, really, guess.  I’ll wait.  Uh huh.  5′11″.

I think I’ve made the “single white female” case pretty well here.  Now the only question is, what activities should the Maddow Widowers’ Support Group undertake? Uplift is my main concern. Healing. Helping equip ourselves with the skills and capacity to move on, and with self-love.  We could do other stuff.  I’m open to suggestions.

Only a scant few more hours to vote! Best Parenting Blog.

And don’t forget Up Popped a Fox for Best Overall Lesbian Blog.  Voting ends 9pm Eastern, 6pm Pacific Time, TODAY. Many thanks for your good humor through this whole Lezzies voting thing.

Well, faux lite.

I had occasion yesterday to be in a little correspondence with my New Jersey chum, the one whose pessimism makes mine look puny by comparison. �He’s Russia, I’m Lichtenstein. �This is one of many reasons to love him (like a brother!). �As coda following a rant about voter apathy/ naivet�/ complacency on the same-sex marriage topic (that is, before this past Wednesday, when so many were jolted awake), I noted this article–

BEIJING � A noxious cocktail of soot, smog and toxic chemicals is blotting out the sun, fouling the lungs of millions of people and altering weather patterns in large parts of Asia, according to a report released Thursday by the�United Nations.

�–and said: �”Could be worse. �Could be raining.” �(Cue Marty Feldman.)

Here’s what me chum writes back:

Oh, it could always be worse. So so so much worse. All of us who�grouse about unfairness would do well to remember that at times. You�could be in a reeducation camp or in front of a firing squad, and I�could be raising my girls as chattel. In that world, Kathryn would be�just a few years away from having her genitals permanently mutilated.

Much much worse.

See? �Now didn’t that make you feel better? �Though, actually, really: didn’t it? �Helped me a bit. �He knows whereof he speaks, I’ll just put it that way. �If you haven’t read his stuff, just go, and come back in like a few hours. �If at all.

Traipsing around with gobs of other justice-minded people tomorrow’s going to help, too.

Coast-to-coast, in every state: a National Protest Against Prop 8. �10:30 Western, 11:30 Mountain, 12:30 Central, 1:30 Eastern. �At a City Hall near you. �General info here, find your nearest event here. �From their mission statement:

In an effort to make a positive impact in the lives of our community, our allies, and even our opposition, JoinTheImpact.com emerged. Our movement seeks to encourage the LGBTQ community not to look towards the past and place blame, but instead to look forward toward what needs to be done now to achieve one goal: Full equality for ALL. We stand for reaching out across all communities. We do not stand for bigotry, for scapegoating, or using anger as our driving force. Our mission is to encourage our community to engage our opposition in a conversation about full equality and to do this with respect, dignity, and an attitude of outreach and education.�

Big ole demo with respectful, outreachey, spirited, uncompromising justice seekers? �A whole heck of a lot better sounding than a firing squad, let me tell you buster. �I am one lucky clam. �But no, really: I am, and I do know it.

From Aden Nak, courtesy Tagen Goddard. Though it’s also on DailyKos.

The chart is prefaced by a cathartic rant/critique which, while it suffers from an unfortunate dip in rhetorical grace in the opening �, courtesy a ripple of unchecked misogyny, is peppered with some interesting insights and a nice Supreme Court case run-down.

For those of us scratching our heads and wondering what the hell just happened, and/or those of us who spent the vice presidential debate last night yelling at the TV time & again that “That wasn’t an answer! That was yet another meaningless clich�!” this does a tidy job of summing it up.

�

* [Addenda in the comments.]

Talkin’ about the economy, talkin’ about national presidential politics, talkin’ about Baba’s state of mind. Not like you needed to have this spelled out, but menopause + the current economic and political drama = wild toggling between Baba’s paired impulses to either�FREAK OUT!�or�CALM DOWN!

Since I’m still in Work Deadline Lockdown for at least another week, I’ll flesh out the meager content here with a YouTube video whose title matches part of the post title. �(”It was weeks and weeks of Prop 8 harangues and infernal YouTube videos! I couldn’t wait ’til election day and she started to post proper essays on a range of topics�again,�like a normal person!”).

The infernal YouTube video below is the 1984 glam metal song “Round and Round,” by Ratt. It has no more thematic connection to today’s post than Tuesday’s Sarah Silverman – “Great Schlepp” video had to Tuesday’s. Except you could focus on this one line in the song that’s kind of cheery, when construed to be prophetic about Obama’s election: “I knew right from the begining/ that you’d end up wining.” �

Polls do look to be leaning in that direction. �A national economy in the crapper sure seems to help. �But the jury’s still out on Prop 8; all’s we know is that the Mormon Church is pouring ark-loads of money into the battle, over a third of the Yes on 8 funding, if you believe them and the Wall Street Journal. �And Yes on 8 is still out-fundraising No on 8 at a rate of about 3:2.* �Which means, if the proposition wins, we may as well all just cut the middle man and have the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints re-vamp all the state’s laws to their liking. �Save a lot of money that way. No muss, no fuss. �Fundamentalism & church-state merging is all the rage anyhow, world-wide. �What’s the point in fighting it?

Either that, or my fellow citizens will vote their hearts, which have been steadily opening over the years, in spite of all the�scare tactics malarkey. �(See? �You can take this whole post as Exhibit A in the case for Baba’s FREAK OUT/CALM DOWN vacillations. �I think we should all be glad I don’t have time to write for the blog as much this month.)

Now let’s whiplash back to the meaningless video, shall we? �If you really are about to watch this random glam metal early 80’s hit, do look out for Milton Berle’s double cameo as both disgruntled rich guy and disgruntled rich guy’s wife. I always thought he was the uncle of one of Ratt’s performers, but it turns out he was just the uncle of the band’s manager at the time. Thanks again, Wikipedia: the lazy researcher’s friend.

�

*�[That's in spite of the BANK which the LD Love Train is sending into the fray. �Enough to buy one oar for the LDS ark. �We might not have reached the initial $5,000 goal yet, but we're still the BIGGEST CONTRIBUTOR among the grassroots No on 8 fundraising webpage folks. �Proud? You should be!]�

Everything, that is, but the assurance of legal recognition?

How ’bout a nice juicy donation to the No on Proposition 8 campaign? �It’s all the rage at California weddings this season.

And for good reason. �A donation goes with anything you’re wearing. It fits fine in your already crowded kitchen cabinets because it’s actually never going to go there anyway. �And both giver and receiver know it’s the right thing. �Hmm: material possession? �Or advancement in�civil rights for friends, family, and neighbors? �Material posessions? �Or advancement in civil rights for friends, family, and neighbors? �Should be an easy decision. �I’ll go with None Are Free ‘Til All Are Free for $50, Bob.

Above: the donation table at the (3rd, hopefully final) wedding of the nice lesbian gals across the street. Wedding (1) was their own hitchin’, pre-2004; (2) their 2004 San Francisco wedding; and (3) Sunday’s beautiful event, at which their daughter tossed flower petals and clots of kids tucked into a fruit tart decorated to look like a�rainbow-flag. �

Donations to the No on 8 campaign are especially useful now that the Yes on 8 ads have hit the airwaves, with predictable scare tactics and misinformation. �Like, your children will be forced to marry their same-sex chums in kindergarten if this thing passes. �Joy of Gay S*x on the required reading list of first graders. Stuff like that. �

I’m only kind of kidding. �Fear mongering and Your Children Are At Risk crapola will feature prominently. �The interests of children like OUR CHILDREN will be nonexistent. �They DO NOT FIT INTO THE NARRATIVE.

I would like to rebut that stuff with something more deft than a few exasperated ALL CAPS fits, but will have to table it for a future post.�Today’s dittie will need to be short n’ sweet n’ lighter than air, since today is one of two major work deadlines for me lately, and congressional aides�working on the financial markets meltdown got better sleep than me last night. �

But I do want to say HAPPY NEW YEAR for folks who are celebrating today (May you be inscribed in the Book of Life! Along with the words, President-elect Obama)! �Here’s a Tuesday, five weeks to the election YouTube link. Today, for novelty’s sake, not related to the same sex marriage issue.

If you’re looking for Rosh Hashana relevance, it is skimpy-to-nonexistent. �Sarah is asking for no forgiveness, acknowledging no sins, correcting no faults. �Just asking Jewish people with grandparents to get their arses to Florida and get out the (octogenarian) vote. �Consider her a new fruit you have not yet eaten.

�

Sarah Silverman’s The Great Schlep.�

�
The Great Schlep from The Great Schlep on Vimeo.

�