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09-13-2010, 11:05 AM
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#1 |
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PB I'm with you on this one I am perceived as straight too and live in a conservative community so I don't fly a rainbow flag or have stickers on my car either and I should be who I want to be!! Its awful that those people had to suffer an arson just awful!! And I live in Northern NJ close to NYC which is totally gay friendly!
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09-13-2010, 11:10 AM
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#2 | |
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I believe it is my right to honor who i am. I am now considering the notion that it is also my duty to stand by my family....make sense? Not because it is expected by my "family" but because it is a way of supporting my "family".
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~ I've learned that people will forget what you said,
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09-13-2010, 11:21 AM
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#3 |
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I certainly don't hide who I am. My partner and I bought a home in a small, relatively conservative town. Actually, this small conservative town has A LOT of queers in it. We've never had so much as a dirty look from anyone ever. We have two queer city council members also. It's a nice place to live and basically we're all simply tax paying, home owning, sidewalk shoveling, lawn mowing folk. I'm not a huge proponent of stickers, flags and newspaper announcements about my private life. Frankly, I don't want to know what my neighbors do in bed or whom they do it with. Why should I announce what I do? Queer is not all I am, it's only a part of who I am. It shouldn't matter either way, but I'm not naive about my safety which is first and foremost.
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Meallan muilte Dé go mall ach meallan siad go mion. |
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09-13-2010, 11:32 AM
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#4 | |
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I am just at the point that I want to take a stand and try to help so that another house burning may be avoided. It would be different if i could live my life openly and not have fear. There would then be no reason to fly a flag or have a bumper sticker or scream it to the top of my lungs. It would not be a problem and therefore would not be an issue. I have two choices....stand up for who i am and support my community or hide and fear peeping out the window. That is where "I" live. That is "My" world....and it is sad.
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~ I've learned that people will forget what you said,
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09-13-2010, 11:33 AM
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#5 |
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Belle -
We live in a TINY town in the SW portion of VA - we are very familiar with your struggle in living an authentic life while protecting your, your family's (in our case, my son's) personal safety. I think, for the most part, folks are pretty non-pulsed by us. I think that I am more aware of our differences than most folks in our lil town. I like to think that by just living our lives we are changing some of the sterotypical ideas that folks have about dykes. We try to shop local and support local small business when possible and everyone we have encountered on a regular basis from repair folks to furniture store owners seem to gravitate towards us. The furniture shop owner has visited our home and when we were looking to special order some macdaddy leather sofas, she took us to her home to view the set she had purchased. Just last Sunday, the local mechanic and his wife, who I would have thought were stereotypical rednecks, stopped us in Wally World to ask if I could come by and talk about becoming their accountant since they are unhappy with their current one. Our neighbors are nice folks and we try to take them meals when we entertain - both are elderly and don't seem to have a lot of family. We have a rainbow flower thingy hanging from the rearview on the vehicle I primarily drive and an HRC sticker in the back window. We don't fly a rainbow flag in the yard although I did paint the columns on the porch a purpledy red color (Jess says its fuschia) and the new metal roof will be the same color when its installed. That's about as far as our "advertising" goes. I know how isolating the invisibility can be and often feel it if not accompanied by Jess - and I don't know how to resolve that inner voice without tattooing "dyke" on my forehead. I think you owe it to yourself to live as openly as you are comfortable with - and I will re-iterate that I think most of the "othering" comes from what energy I put out there. Most folks just walk on past without a word. Christie |
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09-13-2010, 12:06 PM
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#6 |
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ms belle...
i live in small town GA... for 30 years i didnt let myself be out and proud... when i finally did... i found out that really... most ppl dont care... look at your neighbors... take a good hard look... sadly i would point out even the younger males... if you dont see total ignorance... i would suggest that you let yourself be whoever the hell you feel like being... what is our lives if we arent living them the way we want? take a small step... see how you feel afterward... sometimes i think... we just have to be in this totally for ourselves... i hope there is no one that you are afraid of that close to you... if there is i would urge you now to get the hell out as soon as you can... no one should live that way... fear is terrible for our senses... p.s. would i be assuming correctly to think that you might have the same sweet southern drawl as the poor femme on the newsreel that lost her house?? |
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09-13-2010, 12:32 PM
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#7 | ||
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I guess today...I am just a little beside myself, so to speak. I've cried, prayed lit candles and I'm just so angry about what I read I just want to scream: I'M GAY TOO AND THERE ARE MANY OF US HERE.... I believe it comes from loving as humans from one to another when ANYONE is hurt. Then taking it a step further...they are "family" which gets my southern blood boiling that I didn't help in any way. I didn't fly the rainbow flag like I've debated on for years. Would that have helped? of course not, not them. But would it help the couple that moves in down the street that does live it openly and flys that flag? Maybe...that is where my head is today.... Small steps...good advice. .....and yes i sound just like that girl sorta kinda i suppose...would have to ask someone who has talked to me cause i sound completely "normal" to me....lol.
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~ I've learned that people will forget what you said,
people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel. ~ Maya Angelou |
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09-13-2010, 12:41 PM
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#8 | |
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Belle - Don't beat yourself up with "shoulda, woulda, coulda" - look towards tomorrow with "shall, will, can" As the old saying goes, Rome wasn't built in a day. It IS about small steps. Its taken the better part of a year to call out to Jess in the grocery, "Honey!!" without wondering if BillyBubbaJoeBob and SueEllenMayBob are going to follow us to the car and then home to firebomb our house while we sleep. The small steps ARE important and one day, you will be able to just be you without fear being in the forefront. You'll be zipping down the aisles of Wally World, openly holding hands without even thinking about it. |
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09-13-2010, 12:51 PM
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#9 | |
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...forgive me for the following.... And in honor of where my heart is today...hokey...naive...idealistic...hurting...bea ting...loving...simple...stengthening...learning.. .gay....sentimental and trying to understand this world i live in....I must post this because, well, I am what "I" am!!!!!
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