Never Give In...

 I am the guy who came out to the entire school in his senior speech and got a standing ovation for his courage. 

I am the girl who kisses her girlfriend on the sidewalk and laughs at those who glare. 

We are the couple who planned and studied and got a damn good lawyer and BEAT the state that wanted to take our child away. 

We are the ones who took martial arts classes and carry pepper spray and are just too dangerous to gay bash. 

I am the transgender person who uses the bathroom that suits me, and demands that any complaining staff explain their complaint to my face in front of the entire restaurant--and shares with my other trans friends which restaurants don't raise a stink. 

I am the mother who told her lesbian daughter to invite her girlfriend over for dinner. 

I am the father who punished his son for calling you a fag. 

I am the preacher who told my congregation that love, not hate, is the definition of a true follower of God. 

I am the girl who did not learn the meaning of "homosexual" until high school but never thought to question why two men might be kissing. 

I am the woman who argues (quite loudly and vehemently) with the bigots who insist that you do not have the right to marry or raise children. 

We are the high school class who agrees, unanimously, along with our teacher, that love should be all that matters. 

I am making a difference. Hate will not win. 

If you agree, repost this. Do it. You don't have to be afraid. You can handle it. You're stronger than you think.

The Cold Within

 Six humans trapped by happenstance

in black and bitter cold

Each possessed a stick of wood,

Or so the story's told.

Their dying fire in need of logs,

the first woman held hers back

For on the faces around the fire

She noticed one was black.

The next man looking 'cross the way

Saw one not of his church

And couldn't bring himself to give

The fire his stick of birch.

The third one sat in tattered clothes

He gave his coat a hitch,

Why should his log be put to use

To warm the idle rich?

The rich man just sat back and thought

Of the wealth he had in store,

And how to keep what he had earned

From the lazy, shiftless poor.

The black man's face bespoke revenge

As the fire passed from his sight,

For all he saw in his stick of wood

Was a chance to spite the white.

And the last man of this forlorn group

Did naught except for gain,

Giving only to those who gave

Was how he played the game.

The logs held tight in death's stilled hands Was proof of human sin,

They didn't die from the cold without,

They died from the cold within.

Happy Birthday To ME!

That is right today is my Birthday, another year older and apparently wiser (um maybe that is debatable). 

Either way, I am another year older and it just feels a little surreal. It is hard to wrap my head around it to degrees in part because I don't have my dad here with me anymore, just Norman and my mom's side of the family.