Shelved!
Published by totallygone.com on Thursday, February 19, 2004.

So 1,600 gay and lesbian couples got married over the Valentine's weekend, and I didn't. I was in Napa catching up with my friends Michelle and Terri, lamenting our singular state and reminiscing over the ones who got away. We consoled ourselves with some local Merlot, the hilarious Bend it Like Beckham, and the sensationally boring Swimming Pool. The latter was inflicted upon us by M. because she's soon to make her film debut with one of its stars in a pseudo-Bollywood flick called Hari Om, filmed last year in Jaisalmer, where Michelle was talent-spotted, in between her camel trips and early-evening lolls at the bhang shop.
Like a Horse and Carriage
Today, Monday, is Presidents Day, so it was super-smart of the mayor to choose a weekend where the predictable resistance would be delayed by an extra day, enough gay and lesbians would be loved-up by the Valentine's thing, and drunk enough to do something reckless, too. Stupidly, I missed going down to City Hall to watch them all lining up in the drizzle, waiting to be wed. This whole gay marriage thing is long overdue, of course, and is a tremendous publicity coup for Gavin "Winsome" Newsom, whose charm, looks, and large campaign funds swung the mayoral election his way a couple of months back, beating the somewhat dishevelled (and, quelle horreur reputedly grimy!) contendor Matt Gonzalez. Rumour has it that the hair, rather than the ideological differences, swung the vote, and in a state where the governor won on recognition alone, that's not hard to believe. Recent events in Massachusetts have made a major election issue of gay marriage for the first time, not to mention international headline news, and Newsom's timing could not be better. It's impossible to overstate how powerful the San Franciscan gay lobby is, bearing in mind that it's not elsewhere in the world, but remember between twenty-five and thirty-percent of the city identifies as gay, lesbian, or bisexual. Never mind "I'm not gay but my boyfriend is" - add to that your bank manager, plumber, carpenter, dentist, surgeon, opthalmologist, street-cleaner, firewoman... Originally percieved as the more conservative of the two candidates, Newsom has now won the hardened hearts of SF's more cynical gays (the ones who didn't vote for his shellacked hair) by cocking a snook at the establishment, and they love him. At least, they do this week. Even the least marriage-friendly queers (the "we're not breeders, why pretend to live like them?" brigade) have been touched by the sentiment and spectacle of it all; at the LGCSF's "Love Bites" cabaret on Friday night, where my friend Nick gave a superb and soulful solo rendition of 'Frank Mills' catcalls and whoops were given to a couple who'd married that afternoon, and on Saturday morning, en-route to the dry-cleaners, I was heartened to see a lesbian couple walking up my street, one in traditional white with veil and train, the other as a rather plump penguin. After only eighteen weeks here, I've already half-forgotten that the rest of the world lives, as far as issues of gender and sexuality are concerned, somewhere in the middle of the last century, so rather than dashing for my camera, I vacillated for about five minutes over whether it was worth getting a shot. One becomes so "oh, yeah..." so quickly! At my place of work, the person who gets called to heft the heaviest loads is a deaf, transexual, polyamorous bisexual with big biceps and neon red hair. Let's call her Sophia. My colleague Michelle had a private giggle last week when Sophia complained about having been "outed" by another of our colleages. "Outed as what?" I replied, running through the possibilities (and trying to work out if there was one I'd missed).
"As a bisexual," Michelle replied.
"Oh, of course" I replied. "It's the only thing that doesn't immediately scream at you..."
The best of it is, though, that the only heterosexuals in the house are three monks and the housekeeper - the rest of us are all queer. Even Ruby, the dog. (She's just a plain ol' lesbian).
Like a Horse and Carriage
Today, Monday, is Presidents Day, so it was super-smart of the mayor to choose a weekend where the predictable resistance would be delayed by an extra day, enough gay and lesbians would be loved-up by the Valentine's thing, and drunk enough to do something reckless, too. Stupidly, I missed going down to City Hall to watch them all lining up in the drizzle, waiting to be wed. This whole gay marriage thing is long overdue, of course, and is a tremendous publicity coup for Gavin "Winsome" Newsom, whose charm, looks, and large campaign funds swung the mayoral election his way a couple of months back, beating the somewhat dishevelled (and, quelle horreur reputedly grimy!) contendor Matt Gonzalez. Rumour has it that the hair, rather than the ideological differences, swung the vote, and in a state where the governor won on recognition alone, that's not hard to believe. Recent events in Massachusetts have made a major election issue of gay marriage for the first time, not to mention international headline news, and Newsom's timing could not be better. It's impossible to overstate how powerful the San Franciscan gay lobby is, bearing in mind that it's not elsewhere in the world, but remember between twenty-five and thirty-percent of the city identifies as gay, lesbian, or bisexual. Never mind "I'm not gay but my boyfriend is" - add to that your bank manager, plumber, carpenter, dentist, surgeon, opthalmologist, street-cleaner, firewoman... Originally percieved as the more conservative of the two candidates, Newsom has now won the hardened hearts of SF's more cynical gays (the ones who didn't vote for his shellacked hair) by cocking a snook at the establishment, and they love him. At least, they do this week. Even the least marriage-friendly queers (the "we're not breeders, why pretend to live like them?" brigade) have been touched by the sentiment and spectacle of it all; at the LGCSF's "Love Bites" cabaret on Friday night, where my friend Nick gave a superb and soulful solo rendition of 'Frank Mills' catcalls and whoops were given to a couple who'd married that afternoon, and on Saturday morning, en-route to the dry-cleaners, I was heartened to see a lesbian couple walking up my street, one in traditional white with veil and train, the other as a rather plump penguin. After only eighteen weeks here, I've already half-forgotten that the rest of the world lives, as far as issues of gender and sexuality are concerned, somewhere in the middle of the last century, so rather than dashing for my camera, I vacillated for about five minutes over whether it was worth getting a shot. One becomes so "oh, yeah..." so quickly! At my place of work, the person who gets called to heft the heaviest loads is a deaf, transexual, polyamorous bisexual with big biceps and neon red hair. Let's call her Sophia. My colleague Michelle had a private giggle last week when Sophia complained about having been "outed" by another of our colleages. "Outed as what?" I replied, running through the possibilities (and trying to work out if there was one I'd missed).
"As a bisexual," Michelle replied.
"Oh, of course" I replied. "It's the only thing that doesn't immediately scream at you..."
The best of it is, though, that the only heterosexuals in the house are three monks and the housekeeper - the rest of us are all queer. Even Ruby, the dog. (She's just a plain ol' lesbian).
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