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Showing posts from May, 2011

It's Not the Worst Thing in the World

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It was much different thirty years ago than it is today when things were more on the ‘hush hush’ if anyone happened to be gay or lesbian. Some called it “a phase” or if it was a female, some would mutter, “Well, she surely can’t get a man, so she decided to be a lesbian.” And that was that. No other explanation was given. It was a “mess up” - a glitch in their life. Of course, you had and still have those who insist that being gay or lesbian has everything to do with being sexually abused as a child. Pure bullshit for a true analysis. As a child, I remember my mom telling her friends the story of her married female friend who lived in the same building she did back in Brooklyn years ago. She left her husband for “the dyke” downstairs who used to come and do her plumbing. (Pun very much intended.) The real kicker is the last words of her story: “She kept going upstairs to fix things, and then befriended her. She must have influenced her somehow.” As though the thought of being a les

Controlling Our Emotions: Is It Possible?

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For a very long time, I played “the little victim cry baby” and complained about who did what and he said she said bullshit. And because I chose to “let” it affect me, it also affected a great deal on my overall health and well-being. It’s hard to turn your back on someone who is literally insulting you, bashing you or betraying you in some shape or form. The crazy thing about it is, the more you respond to it, the more it will increase. And I know most will say, “Well I had to defend myself” - and we all want to defend ourselves for reasons of “self-respect” - but in the process, are we actually hurting ourselves in the long run? Is it better to walk away from an abusive person (verbally speaking) or to stay and defend yourself - fight it out till someone wins? There are so many different opinions on this. I speak mostly about trivial gossip, rumors, people who just want to annoy you for a living. I literally had someone verbally bashing me day in and day out, and I felt this consta

Sushi Addiction

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At the age of fourteen, my family had taken me to this Japanese steak house up in Hillburn, NY called, Mt. Fuji for my confirmation. The place is just amazing. It sits on top of this huge mountain. As you drive up, you spiral around the mountain to get to this magnificent place. The views are as beautiful as you can imagine. They have big hibachi tables where a chef cooks in the middle, private booth tables where you take off your shoes and scoot yourself in as well as regular tables. They also have this huge sushi bar that’s to die for. I remember my oldest sister Dawn was a huge fan of sushi. She kept begging me to try it because she knew I’d love it. I ordered it as an appetizer, a couple of pieces of tuna and salmon on top of rice wrapped with seaweed. At first, I hated the texture. I couldn’t get past the concept of it being raw. I took a few more bites, and that was it for me - I didn’t want to experience this stuff anymore. But, it was the same sister who made me experience it a

Judgment Day: May 21rst

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May 21rst seems to have everyone scurrying to the supermarkets to get those non-perishable items, tons of water and flashlights, etc., etc... Maybe not everyone. That’s a bit of an exaggeration. Perhaps just those Christians who tend to misinterpret the bible at any chance they get. The CDC even gave the public notice on what to do on if and when zombies come to attack us, like Night of the Living Dead . First of all, the ‘thought to be’ end of the world - the apocalypse is not on May 21rst, however it is believed to be on October 21rst. May 21rst is the day where everyone on earth will be judged. Taken out of the CDC website , I was quite surprised of how serious they were taking this. Isn’t this a cause for panic? Or is it simply humoring those who actually believe doomsday is coming? “So what do you need to do before zombies…or hurricanes or pandemics for example, actually happen? First of all, you should have an emergency kit in your house. This includes things like water, food, an

The "T" in the "LGBT"

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The other day, I had an interesting conversation with my mom. We were talking about a friend’s son. He’s eight years old and wants to be a girl. Everything he does is maneuvered with a feminine touch. He plays with dolls, he prefers pastel colors for his shirts, but his mother tries to reinforce boys’ clothing so he won’t be such an outcast in school or get bullied. She worries about him, and rightfully so. Since my mother knows I have a few transgender friends, both male and female, she asked me, as a lesbian, if I thought our friend’s son was gay or if he was transgender. For me, I couldn’t possibly answer that. Only the son could...if willing...if with enough time. He seems to get along well with the girls in his school, yet he has a hard time socializing with the other boys. I said it could be either or, and just because he has more female friends doesn’t mean he’s gay. Perhaps the boys in his school fear the unknown - or what’s thought to be “different” than themselves. Kids can a

Rose-Colored Glasses

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To all the ladies out there: Have you ever thought to yourself after being abrupt with someone or having an emotional moment or two, “Is this a premenopausal episode or am I just a royal bitch on wheels? Especially in times of stress or when you’re going through a very rough period in your life, do you find you’re a bit short-tempered with the people around you? I remember years ago, I put myself in check. I was consciously aware of when I was going to ‘lose it’ and made better choices. It was the time I was writing my first book. I was closer with God, my faith in Christianity, and everything seemed so different as it does today. I admit, sometimes I even have to read my own book in order to put myself in check again. Sounds hypocritical, but I’m learning a lot from my own book - from my own past - to make better choices whenever I’m upset. I've always told my friends when they were either upset or angry with someone to wait 24 hours before responding. Write down what you would

Am I Right or Am I Right?

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There is no right or wrong, good or bad, and even “the right path to take”. There’s only your life. Your choices. Your opinions. Your beliefs. Everything else is fodder for highly opinionated people with no room for anybody else’s views. Most of us are influenced by the people we care for the most. Some unfortunately, are influenced by anybody and perhaps, views and opinions change more than day and night. For instance, if someone tells me that my lifestyle is wrong, I automatically judge them myself as insecure people with very little knowledge or limited tolerance for anyone who may possibly be different than them. If someone tells me that my political views are wrong - --prove it. If someone tells me my religious views and beliefs are wrong --prove it. The point is: nothing in life is concrete, unless scientifically proven. This is why we have words like: “opinions”, “beliefs”, “values” - and what might not be yours, may be somebody else’s. You can’t take that away from anyon

The Man Who Walks Alone Walks Faster: Mark C. Durfee

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There are very few authors that can hold my interest for an extended length of time. There are some bloggers who tend to drift off the main pathway of what they initially blogged for --and that’s okay, because I’m one of them. I must say, I’m most impressed with those authors, poets and bloggers who seem to continuously have content for a main theme of it all - their muse for writing - their “reason” to write, and on top of that, to correlate it to everyday life, whether people can relate to it or not. For myself, I prefer the type writing that can place me into a different world and place less focus on my own. One author that comes to mind is, Mark C. Durfee. I’ve been following his poetry for years and I recently just purchased two of his chapbooks: Stink and The Line Between . He’s a great poet and storywriter, all taken from his brilliant mind and what he experiences on a daily basis. He makes no apologies for what he says. He makes no excuses. It's raw. It's brilliant

Time to Leave Part II

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It’s funny. Ever notice when you’re either about to leave a job, relationship, a home - whatever it is - it’ll start testing your patience on a larger scale? And what I mean by that is - you will go through the ringer for some reason. Everything seems to go wrong all at once. It’s at the very end, and you’re almost out of a bad situation or, a situation that’s ‘best’ to get out of - and all the shit you were so sick of increases for whatever reason. Granted we’re out of here by next month. We loved it here/we hated it here, as I’ve stated in my previous post about this condo, but the little things that irritate me are multiplied by a thousand now. So, if you don’t mind, I need to bitch and moan once again about this problematic complex. I’m even going to bullet this bitch. (You can tell I've lost sleep and I'm a bit crass, so pardon me...) * Losing sleep. I have lost sleep for a number of reasons. The neighbors downstairs won’t stop galloping like a buncha’ wild horses. The d

Time to Leave...

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While going through a transitional time in my life, I found myself moving into a new condo in the next town over. The move was exciting: a new place, a different type of neighborhood and stores within reaching distance. Civilization. Although I had to get used to hearing other people around me, listening to cars pass on the street and the occasional love quarrel below, it wasn’t bad at all. Our neighbors were nice, mostly families, new couples starting out and the elderly. Sunday mornings, I used to love sitting outside on my deck watching this nice black family below all pile into their huge caravan to go to church. Each one was dressed up better than the other. Their children had beautiful dresses and suits on - something I’ve never seen in the churches I used to attend. Their laughter and overall joy they exuded was contagious. In my mind, I just kept thinking, wow, church was never that exciting. They must have been promised ice cream afterwards. Even as high up as I was up on my

Is Love a Temporary Madness?

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Years ago when I was struggling over a breakup, a good friend of mine really came through for me. She gave me emotional support, friendship, and most of all, she made me laugh a lot. It was the best medicine ever. She also said some really profound things that made me look at my situation a bit differently. Today, as I was cleaning out my desk for our big move soon, I found an email I had printed out from years ago. I’m not a clutter bug, but for whatever reason, I kept this printed out email for years, folded up and tucked into an envelope that was in my filing cabinet in an unmarked folder. When I read it, I went straight into my email online and found the electronic version so I could share part of it with you all. During that time, I was in the midst of writing my book and sharing my raw and emotional thoughts with my friend. We tossed around quite a few long-winded emails. This one email, I was always save... “I am looking forward to grandkids, and playing and retiring. I actually

Is Osama bin Laden Dead?

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As much as I hate to talk about politics, I have to say that I am so sick and tired of hearing people insisting that Barack Obama is lying about bin Laden’s death. “It’s all for his approval ratings” -- and then the conspiracy theory thugs who say it was all about the election drawing nearer. And as you’ve probably read through my blog posts and tweets, I’m not a huge fan of Obama, but more and more republicans are making themselves look like complete assholes, ie: Donald Trump. I get it. We were leery and didn’t trust many things about Obama’s mission, promises, “changes” and yes, agenda. Now I’m questioning: have we taken it too far? How many more times do we have to make complete fools of ourselves in order to see that Obama may not be all that bad? And, that question also goes for my friends who hold similar views as I do. It didn’t occur to me how bad of a rap Obama got, until it went a little too far. Now that he has done the ultimate “impossible mission” of killing Osama bin L

Assumptions

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While spending some quality time with my straight friends over the weekend, I was asked a very interesting question regarding a married couple who got divorced because the husband’s wife had fallen in love with another woman. “Deb, do they just realize they’re gay or did they know all their lives?” This is a tricky one because it crosses the borders of 'is it a choice or is it genetics'? While I do believe that there are some genetics in the works, I also believe that there are many instances where it definitely is a choice. Think about it this way: there are many gays and lesbians who choose to live a heterosexual life for whatever reason. It doesn’t necessarily mean they’re not happy, but it does raise some pretty interesting questions regarding their hidden desires. That question had to be answered very gingerly. I didn’t want to lump all ‘new’ gays and lesbians into one bulk. Is there even such a thing as "new" gays & lesbians? Everyone’s different. So