Saturday, April 04, 2009

Gay Marriage and My Own Perfect Iowa

Although My Own Private Idaho is one of my favourite movies of all time, I'm always calling it My Own Private Iowa. But not anymore.

From now on I'm sure I'll be calling it My Own Perfect Iowa.

About several hundred people gathered Friday evening on the Pentacrest to celebrate the Iowa Supreme Court’s unanimous decision to legalize gay marriage — cheering, waving rainbow flags, blowing noisemakers and carrying signs with phrases such as “Victory for family values” and “Iowa is for lovers, really.”

Oh boy. I could say something about how a candle of hope is becoming a bonfire.














I could say so many other things. About struggle and loss. And what victory means to me.

But maybe I'll just run this video of a lesbian taking off her ring nine months after the death of her partner....



And let Andrew Sullivan say the rest.

If you believe her grief is worth less than a man's grief for his late wife, then you should oppose marriage equality. I support it in part because this widow's grief is as real as her love, and because the kind of commitment that marriage means transcends the boundaries of gay and straight into the zone of being fully, awfully, human:

Because that's what gay marriage is all about.

Not a piece of paper. Not a statement. Just LOVE fully, awfully, human.

Like it is for everyone else.

How hard is that to understand?

Oh never mind. Not tonight. Tonight the bonfire burns brightly.

In my own perfect Iowa...

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