I'm risking getting my gay card suspended by giving you all this glimpse behind the rainbow curtain, but I've decided the risk is worth it. So fasten your seatbelts for "the Gay Agenda: Thanksgiving 2011":
•Pick up the free-range turkey we ordered last week from the meat market.And there you have it: The Thanksgiving Gay Agenda revealed.
•Make sure the guest room is ready for our son Jamie, who is arriving home for his first Thanksgiving as a veteran (15 months in Iraq and a tour in Afghanistan.)
•Stuff the turkey, bake the pies and chill the white wine.
•Set the table with Louise's grandmother's china and Susan's mom's tablecloth, and make sure there aren't any water spots on the wine glasses.
•Welcome friends and family. Give thanks for all we have received, and ask God to keep us mindful of and responsive to the needs of others.
•Eat some turkey. Have some pie. Watch some football. Tell some stories. Argue about some politics.
•Call Louise's Uncle Joe in Denver and Susan's Uncle Don and Aunt Shirley in Florida. Eat some more turkey.
•Polish off some more pie. Complain because we've eaten too much. Again. And then make a turkey sandwich for the road.
Take that, Western Civilization! How are you doing, Institution of Marriage? Are your foundations shaking? Is the undermining almost complete? Or does our Thanksgiving agenda just look a whole lot like yours? Of course it does.
Because here's the deal: I don't pay gay taxes, I don't fold gay laundry, and I don't take out gay trash. On Thursday morning I'm not going to stuff a gay turkey or bake a gay pecan pie. And I don't have a gay marriage. I have a marriage.
A love-honor-and-cherish-in-sickness-and-in-health-until-death-do-us-part marriage. An argue-over-whose-turn-it-is-to-empty-the-dishwasher-or-clean-out-the-litter-box marriage. A set-the-table-together-on-Thanksgiving-and-wipe-the-water-spots-off-the-wine-glasses-together marriage.
What I don't have are the 1,138 federally protected rights some of the other married couples sitting around my Thanksgiving table have -- including health benefits, family medical leave, social security benefits, income tax status, estate tax benefits and the uncontested right to be "next of kin" to each other if we need to. And securing those by ending marriage discrimination is definitely on the agenda.
So this Thanksgiving 2011, when we sit down for dinner, we will have a whole long list of things to be thankful for at my house. For friends and family. For food and fellowship. For sons home safe from war today and for the hope of peace on Earth someday. For the privilege of being part of a great nation conceived in liberty and dedicated to the proposition that all are created equal. And for the hope that someday soon, the Thanksgiving Gay Agenda will include giving thanks for marriage equality taking us another step closer to actually being a nation where liberty and justice for all really means all.
Happy Thanksgiving!
6 comments:
Happy Thanksgiving to you too, Susan.
Clearly subversive! No wonder you scare the "Christian Right!" Not a single heretic burning, no theft of church property, or any decent activity; how dare you?
;-)
Happy Thanksgiving to you and your family from the Western Springs subversives here in the Midwest.
FWIW
jimB
Don't stuff the turkey. It takes longer to cook and sometimes dries it out.
@Matthew ... Seriously?? Not the way my wife cooks it ... and the stuffing is THE BEST PART!! :)
Another gay agenda published, designed, no doubt, to frighten those who think the "homosexual agenda" is more sinister. Would that more gays publish their agendas.
Happy Thanksgiving, Susan, to you and all your family.
We risked our marriage by attending a Thanksgiving feast hosted by our lesbian BFF friend of 50+ years. Printed lyric sheets for "We Gather Together," sung before the meal. Homemade pumpkin & pecan pies. But the stuffing WAS THE BEST PART. 48 hours later, we are still married.
Post a Comment