I decided to bite the bullet and start the whole journal thing back up. It has been simmering in me for months, I just needed that combination of free time and something to talk about. This afternoon, the former was available, but the latter was not. Instead, I just thought I’d relate my afternoon to y’all.

The husband was away on a research trip to the City (eg, San Jose) for the afternoon, and I decided to take a little walk. The weather channel was predicting sun, but the reality was much better: a grey haze which turned to drizzle as the day went longer. I took a stroll up toward downtown, specifically desiring to visit a little newsstand in Union Square and see what kind of exotic Sunday newspaper offerings may be available. I was disappointed to find it closed, and had to settle for a Chronicle.

The Chronicle today featured its rebirthed “pink” section (the Datebook, or entertainment section), which seemed to be the only major story said section could come up with this week. I walked a few more steps and popped into the Starbucks to read the paper and consume a couple gingerbread lattes.

I enjoy Starbucks. I don’t especially know what about Starbucks is so much more enjoyable than other coffeehouses. Maybe the decoration. Maybe the mass-marketing of a “cultural attitude”. Who knows? Something has always drawn me to them. Of course, back in Fresno I would easily given preference for the independent little coffeehouse at which most of my friends hung out, but Starbucks has an unbeatable prodct line, and its ubiquitous nature makes it an easy, comfortable place. The genious of the fast-food model transferred to the warmth and ease of coffeehouse comfort.

I don’t want to get long-winded in this my fiirst entry since my more than year-long hiatus, so I’ll stop now. Not sure exactly which direction I’ll be taking this incarnation of my online journal, but this was a start…

Many other people have been commenting on it, and I think I need to thow in my own bits as well…

I think the primary reason for the divisiveness in the gay marriage ground is the fact that so many people (including, to their detriment, most homos) consider marriage to be a religious institution. Taken objectiely, and in global perspective, marriage is one thing and only one thing: creating a single family unit out of individuals who were previously not part of the same family (unless you’re from Chowchilla).

Marriage has historically and universally been a legal formality (legal in whatever sense it means for the individual’s respective culture) which creates the bond of family between (usually) two people who are not bound as such yet. It is so incredibly essential to all human beings because of this: it allows a person their only ability in life to choose their family. It allows one to create that great bond of love, responsibility and unity with someone they choose, rather than someone they were merely born bound to.

How can we allow ourselves to be denied such a right? Those who preach the exclusivity of marriage are basically preaching the old, dictatorial view of family as slavery: that we are not allowed to choose our family; that the most important people in our lives must be delivered to us by birth, not by right or choice. “Preserving the sanctity of marriage” is the calling card of the man who recognizes no individual rights - not even his own.

One of the many pervasive forms of slavery which has existed in this world throughout history was slavery based on class and caste: where you were tied forever to the bonds you were born in. The creation of a free society of individuals who act by choice, not by directive, should result in the elimination of such involuntary bonds. Some call the breakdown of the family in industrialized nations a tragedy. I call it inevitable: it reflects the rights of man. The rights which are being destroyed from the inside out every time we give precedence to “tradition” over the evidence and proof presented to us.

Fixing the archives to work with this site (and with Dreamweaver, linked style sheets and templates, as opposed to my old hand-coded journal) is quite the major task. It also makes me realize how fast my personality can change. The archives of my web journal are probably the longest-surviving journal I’ve kept in my life. And the oldest is only 2 years old…

Looks like two years ago I was a lot more dramatic about everything… And here I am one of the least dramatic people I know, so at this rate, soon I’ll be witnessing murder in the street and fail to find any significance in it.

There’s a turkey in the oven. I’m celebrating Thanksgiving with my husband today, since I’ll be with my parents for the actual date. The menu includes my garlic mashed potatoes (which I’m very snobbish about), a green bean casserole,David’s cranberry relish, biscuits, and stuffin’. Yum. Hope I can handle it twice in a week.

As my close friends and my hubby already know, this will be the last holiday in which I allow my parents to exclude my spouse from the event. I thought that after a couple years things would change, but they still want me to play the fraud, to talk on the phone as if my husband doesn’t exist, to visit them alone as if I’ve no preferred companions, and to avoid conversational references to my domestic life at all times…

It has to end at some point. I’m getting tired of allowing them to love a fraud rather than their real son. I honestly don’t understand what kind of comfort they could be getting from it…

That’s the dancing type of skank. A very happy Thanksgiving to all. I only wish I could have spent it with you…

The event was tolerable. My family is coming around ever so slowly, methinks… Followed on Friday by some foiled attempts at shopping, and a wonderful evening with Let’s Go Bowling. Captured once again in digital sound.

Tired, and ready for bed after a late-night jaunt to Taco Bell wiith my sister to replenish the calories burned off from the skankin.

Upon waking, I finish laundry and head to the hills for one more night with the family. After which, I will head home and leave behind this final reminder that I should never have had to choose between one side of my family and another this weekend. Sorry for leaving you alone all weekend baby. It won’t happen again…