Wrapping up oh nine

This picture was sent in by marriedtoamoho. Quite possibly the best part about this picture is that when she emailed it to me, she forgot to attach the picture and the only thing in the body of the email was the word “ASS”. This was shortly after becoming friends on Facebook and so I thought maybe she was calling me an ass and this meant that she didn’t want to be friends after all. Fortunately, a second email came (ASS II) and it had the above picture attached. It reminds me of the Mom Jeans commercial on SNL. I should do that wordle thing again after I post this to see if ASS is the biggest word on there. ASS.

I made it back from SLC. I flew in this morning and it feels good to be back. I wish I could express how much I love Portland. Part of that is due to the fact that I can already start to feel the inside of my nose healing after the cold dryness of SLC. (No, Ninny, I wasn’t doing crack in Utah) For those of you I didn’t get to see, I’m sorry. You know how the holidays go. My love for you will always burn (name that song/movie, it was one of my favorites growing up).

This is probably my last post of oh nine. I’m looking forward to 10. I’ve got some exciting things already in the works. I'll keep you posted. Peace out, suckas!

Just some thoughts

I’m still in the SLC. Today I had multiple experiences that have thinking about some things. I’ll start with the last experience. I read this post by John over at Young Stranger. I discovered John’s blog several weeks back when I read a guest post he did at Mormon Matters. The post on his blog that I read today is an exploration and questioning of why gay mormon men who are in gay relationships or are open to gay relationships completely remove themselves from the church. There are not many people in gay relationships who attend church. I don’t really want to explore the reasons for that in this post other than to say that it kind of contributed to stuff I was thinking about today. Plus, I think it gives some context for what follows below, so it would probably be a good idea to read it.

Another experience from today. I met a childhood friend and her family for breakfast this morning. She’s known me longer than anyone except for my parents. She was born two months after me and her family lived up the street. Our mothers did preschool for just the two of us. She feels like family in a lot of ways to me. She married an incredibly great guy, who I admire a lot. We were talking about lots of things and I said something about how I feel like one of the reasons I’m still active is because of the ward I’m currently in. There is a lot of diversity of thought and I’m able to be open about my sexuality and it’s not a huge deal. I feel like it adds to my overall well being and I love being a part of my ward.

Since the ward I attend is a young single adult ward, I obviously can’t attend it forever. Nor would I necessarily want to. I’ve thought a lot about how things will change when I move on to a family ward. I’ve created a unique situation for myself where I’m able to be open and my ward is loving and supportive of my situation. Part of me thinks that’s because it’s all a bunch of twenty-somethings. Ahem, with a few exceptions. :) These people have had gay friends or known gay friends at school. There are also a lot of people in my ward who don’t fit the typical mormon mold. I feel very comfortable and at home.

I think a family ward is going to be different. Generally speaking more cookie cutter people. Older people who haven’t ever personally known any openly homosexual people. People who are set in their ways and their ways of thinking. Most of my life I’ve been a conformist. I wonder how I will handle it when I make the transition. I’m to the point where I could no longer go back and be quiet about things and pretend not to feel the way I do to appease others. I’ve started blazing a trail for myself in the singles ward that works well for me and I think it will be more difficult to continue that trail in a family ward.

That’s all. Just things I’ve been thinking about while I’m in the SLC.

Christmas POW! #9

I made it to the SLC. I love that every time I fly to or from SLC I am on a flight with someone I know. It's a small Mormon world. So this very special Christmas POW! is brought to you by a lady at work. Well, I took the pictures, but she provides the kodak moment. Every year, during the weekend of Thanksgiving, she and her husband come in and decorate the department for Christmas. They haul in many large tubs of Christmas decorations of every variety. Porcelain villages, nativities, stuffed animals, garland, fake snow, nutcrackers, miniature Christmas trees. Anything and everything you can possibly imagine. Then they cover every open space on the tops of filing cabinets with it. The result looks like Christmas came in and hoarked everywhere. This picture is to give you a feel of the layout. This is just one of the filing cabinet spaces where Christmas tossed its cookies.




Here's what kind of looks like it should be a stable for a manger scene, but instead there's a carousel horse. It's hard to see in this picture, but the horse is impaled by a Christmas tree. Over to the right you can see some carolers by a streetlight. And a cow. NBD.

Here we have Mr. and Mrs. Claus. I swear she stole those two from my Grandma's house. Someone in my family back me up here. Didn't grandma have the exact same thing? As a matter of fact, my brother's family now lives in my grandma's house. Maybe these two came with the house?

Here are two nutcracker guys standing gaurd under some hot air balloon. When it's turned on it makes music and rotates. There are other moving pieces to her display and lights too. I heard a rumor that when she was gone for a couple of days she trained someone on how to start everything up in the morning and shut it down at night. This is real, you guys. Christmas is no joke.

And probably one of my favorite pieces is Santa. On a Harley. I think he rocks back and forth and sings Born to be Wild or something like that.

It's always funny when we have visitors on the floor and they see the spread. Some of them don't quite know how to react. Here's another entertaining tidbit. Last year after they came and decorated the floor, I had a dream that this woman and her husband had us all over to their house for a holiday party and her husband clipped my toenails. I think that came from a rumor I've heard that her husband cuts and colors her hair and even does it for her every morning. I imagine her husband to be Harvey Fierstein.

Merry Christmas!!!!

I got married this weekend!!

Well, I pretended to get married. I can’t tell you how ecstatic my bishop would be if I actually had gotten married. A friend of mine has a design blog called frolic! It was named in a London Times article as one of 50 of the world’s best design blogs. It’s no wonder. Did you click on the link? Adorable.

She recently did an article for Project Wedding about a simple, at home wedding during the holidays and asked me to play the part of the groom for the pictures that accompanied the article. As you can see, the bride was lovely. Too bad she has a boyfriend. And I’m gay. Otherwise, I’m sure we would make a magical couple.

The house that we did the shoot at was incredibly charming and cozy, as you can see in the pictures. I also thoroughly enjoyed watching someone so creative and talented at work. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have a honeymoon to go on…

Let's be big

By size I mean the stature of [your] soul, the range and depth of [your] love, [your] capacity for relationships. I mean the volume of life you can take into your being and still maintain your integrity and individuality, the intensity and variety of outlook you can entertain in the unity of your being without feeling defensive or insecure. I mean the strength of your spirit to encourage others to become freer in the development of their diversity and uniqueness. I mean the power to sustain more complex and enriching tensions. I mean the magnanimity of concern to provide conditions that enable others to increase in stature.

-Bernard Loomer

Spoiler Alert!!!

Last night I had a dream that I was hanging out with the cast of Brothers & Sisters. Not the whole cast though, it was only Sally Field and the girl who plays Justin’s fiancé. (Or should I say wife???? We don’t know because Kitty passed out dramatically at the end of the last episode in the middle of their ceremony!!!) Anyway, one of the male characters was also there, but I can’t remember who. I think it was either Justin or Kevin. All I remember is that we were hanging out on the set and laughing. I think maybe I was making a guest appearance and we were in between scenes. That’s how it is in the biz, sometimes you’re just waiting between scenes, joking around on the set.

On my way to work I saw a superhero car. It had all sorts of large, almost life size, decals all over it of various superheroes, like Captain America and Flash and so on. On the back of it, where you would normally see the VW or the Toyota symbol, it had a fancy looking metallic superman symbol. The license plate said “Kal-El”. It would have made for a good POW! picture if I had been able to get my phone out fast enough.

Speaking of good POW! pictures, when my sister and I were at the coast, we saw a dog with two broken hind legs. It was in some sort of doggie wheelchair with its back half hoisted onto some kind of contraption with two wheels. Weird. I wanted to take a picture, but the owner was right there and thought that wouldn’t be very nice.

Speaking of bad times to take a good POW! Courtney told me that once she went to breakfast and there was a lady there who didn’t have any arms and was eating with her feet. She wanted to take a picture, but refrained. See how classy my friends are? Maybe I should also have a DOPOW! where you submit a description of a picture that you felt too uncomfortable to take.

You might think I have a vendetta against Sarah Palin. I would call it more of a fascination with her (and not the kind where I scour the internet to find pictures of her in a bikini). Did you hear about this? Really Sarah Palin? You’re wearing a visor from your failed campaign in 2008 that you probably handed out for free to people at town halls? AND you scribbled out McCain’s name in black MARKER? Really? Can you not afford to go out and just BUY a new visor? You could probably get one for cheap at a dollar store. Seth Meyers, if you are reading my blog, you can use this on Weekend Update.

I’m looking at flights to go to Hong Kong to visit my sister and her family. It’s weird to say that she has a family because she’s my little sister, but she has a husband and two kids, so they are totally legit. The cheapest ticket is on Korean Air. I remembered, however, that I read about Korean Air in Outliers by Malcolm Gladwell.

Korean Air once had a disturbing record of crashes, attributable not to poor maintenance or any incompetence on the part of Korean pilots but to cultural practices of deference and linguistic indirection -- that is, it's up to the listener to figure out the speaker's meaning in Korean, while in English it's the speaker's duty to make himself clear. This was a deadly trait in the cockpit, when co-pilots were unable to bring themselves to tell the captain, "Sir, we're about to hit that mountain."

This ended up being about a lot more than just my guest appearance on B&S.

Going Rogue, Moho Style

I don’t know if I’ve ever mentioned this on my blog, but I am the ward mission leader in my ward. This was a very difficult calling for me to accept. It took some negotiating and convincing before I accepted. I don’t really like the church’s approach to missionary work. I think it’s too corporate. I’ve been to way too many training meetings with PowerPoint presentations and flow charts and numbers and graphs. Sometimes I feel more like I am in a sales training meeting, and I guess I kind of am, but it feels so gross to me. Also, I’m pretty laid back when it comes to missionary work. If they are really interested, they’ll come to me. If not, meh, who cares? I also, at times, find it hard to go to bat (yup, sports analogy) for an organization that I feel hasn’t always gone to bat for me.

Normally, my modus operandi (a sports analogy AND a little latin, where else are you going to get that?) is to accept without question and mindlessly conform. I can’t do that anymore. That’s why it took some negotiating and convincing. I laid my concerns out for my bishop and he said he had no problem and still felt like the calling was for me. I figured as long as he knew where I was coming from and we had an understanding, I could feel ok about accepting the calling. The experience has been one of doing things or not doing things in a way that I feel comfortable with. In a way that I feel is true to who I am. And while doing that, feeling ok about it.

We recently got sister missionaries in our ward. They are kind of intense but have good intentions. We met for the first time on Sunday and Ariel (rockstar ward missionary) was there. They told me about a girl they are teaching who had some doubts/questions. Ariel elaborated that those doubts included the role of women in the church and the church’s stance on homosexuality. Ariel and I exchanged smiles and afterwards she and I talked. We decided to visit the young lady and did so last night.

Before doing that, however, I had tithing settlement. I told the bishop about the girl who the missionaries are teaching and told him that Ariel and I were going to go visit her and discuss some of her concerns. I warned the bishop that this would probably include telling the girl about my own homosexuality. I also said I wouldn’t sugar coat things. There are lots of things about the church’s approach or lack of approach to homosexuality that don’t sit well with me and I wouldn’t pretend that I felt differently. I would, however, share my testimony about why I still choose to affiliate myself with the church and why, at the end of the day, I still love it.

My bishop is a good man. His first concern was whether or not this would put me in an uncomfortable position. The only other thing he asked was that I be prayerful about the whole thing. I think one of the best things I’ve learned from all of this is the importance of going through the process of wrestling, whether it’s with a church calling or relationship or project or whatever. Instead of automatically walking away or conforming, find that third option. Figure out how you can be true to who you are and what you believe and bring your own experience to enrich that calling or relationship or whatever you might be wrestling with. It will help you learn more about who you are and what you believe and will bring fresh air to that calling or relationship.

I was hesitant to accept the calling and my feelings about it have been up and down, but right now I feel good about what I’ve been able to do and that I haven’t been a typical ward mission leader (not that there’s anything wrong with that). How many ward mission leaders go to Sunstone symposiums with recent converts or talk frankly to potential converts about homosexuality. BOO-yeah.

Happy Hanukkah!

Every year for Christmas, we go out to breakfast as a department at work and have an ornament exchange. It’s like a white elephant exchange but with Christmas ornaments. I know. Lame. This morning was the annual exchange and fortunately, lots of people went rogue and brought more useful things to exchange like a Starbucks gift card or a bottle of wine or a six pack of Christmas beer. Well, useful for some people anyway. I, of course, ended up with the lamest 5 pack of Christmas balls ever. My coworker tried to help me look on the bright side and told me that I could unpackage the 5 balls and have an ornament to exchange for the next five years.

Last night I was debating what to bring for my ornament as I still hadn’t figured anything out. I had the idea of making a star out of popsicle sticks and then putting my face in the middle, like you make in elementary school for your mother. I even went so far as eating and melting a bunch of popsicles in my freezer for the sticks. I glued them together to make a star (pictured above), but this morning I ended up chickening out. It kind of looked like a star of David and I thought that might be offensive to some people if I brought a star of David made of stained red popsicle sticks with my face in the middle. Not that my face is offensive, but you know.

Instead, I stopped at Albertson’s on the way to work to pick something up. They only had a few tacky ornaments on hand. I had my choice between Spongebob, Transformers and Stewie from Family Guy. I was in a bit of a pinch so I just went with Stewie. We got to the restaurant and I sat at a table with coworkers D and M. When my ornament was chosen from the pile and unwrapped, M said, “Oh great, I better not end up with that one,” which he never should have said. That was the ornament he ended up with and the whole time he was complaining and saying how much he hated it. Pretty soon D joined in and then later said, “We better be careful, we might be offending Jon.” He said this jokingly and then asked which ornament I brought. I pointed at Stewie and said, “that one.”

R-E-S-P-E-C-T

I’m not even sure where to begin. It seems like I haven’t posted anything forever, but it hasn’t even been a week. My sister flew in Thursday morning and I took Thursday and Friday off work. We drove out to Cannon Beach after she flew in and spent the afternoon walking on the beach and eating lunch at the Wayfarer. We shared a burger and a salad and got this crazy good berry cobbler. The weather was surprisingly good. It had been freezing in Portland, and I thought it would be horrible at the coast with the wind, but it was surprisingly calm and not all that cold. We drove back to Portland and I got back in time to go to my dress rehearsal for the concert.

Friday morning we took it easy and lay (is that the correct usage? I always have a hard time with lie and lay) around and had some great conversation and then decided to go to the gym so that we could then feel ok about going to Grilled Cheese Grill for lunch. I got the Hot Brie. I am in love with brie. I have to go back and try the Jalapeno Popper though. It comes recommended by a lady who knows and it sounded so good.

Friday night was the concert and it went well. I almost fell down the stairs as I was leaving the stage for intermission, but fortunately I was able to regain my balance quickly. My favorite part was when the choir took breaks and we got to listen to the solos and duets and other small group numbers. There are some insanely talented people in the choir and I wondered more than once how I got in.

Yesterday was our ward Christmas program. Favorite moment of the day was when this girl was giving her talk and listing off familiar Christmas things and what they symbolize (candy canes and the shepherd’s crook, etc.) She got to “a wreath” and Ariel and I both started to snicker and turned to each other and said, “Aretha Franklin!” I’m not sure what she symbolizes, but then I remembered her and her hat that she wore at Obama’s inauguration.

Last night my friend Jarrett came over and we watched the finale of Glee. Favorite line: She’s the one they made me talk to when they found a dead bird in my locker.

Cigarette POW! #8

I decided to do an early POW! because the end of the week is going to be busy. This edition is cigarette themed! Weee!!! So this first picture comes once again from Desha and was taken in the Izmir, Turkey International Airport. Apparently, you can buy your cigs in bulk over there. If you want Desha to pick you up a couple of pallets, you're too late. She's already back in America. Plus, smoking kills.

If the whole smoking kills thing is new to you, and you are now wondering what to do with all the thousands of packages of cigarettes that you have at home. Here's an idea sent in from MNJ in TN. Cigarette art!!! Double weee!!! Apparently, this is a 5' by 5' picture woven from 5,782 packs of cigarettes. That's a whole lot of lung cancer turned into beautiful wall art for your home.

My concert is on Friday night. If you are in or around Portland and still haven't bought a ticket and want to, send me an email and I will get you the deets. Whoever sells the most tickets gets two nights in a condo on the coast!

What I was up to this weekend...

Friday night I went and saw Portland Cello Project’s Holiday concert at the Aladdin. It wasn’t quite as high energy as the show that I went to at the Doug Fir in August, but it was fun. It was ugly Christmas sweater themed (those types of parties seem to be all the rage these days), and I wore the above pictured sweatshirt. Please notice that the snowman is winking. Also, please note that even though the way my sweatshirt is bunching makes it looks like I have breasts, I don’t. (Wouldn’t that be the ultimate twist if I suddenly revealed myself as a large breasted woman!)

The fun part of the evening was looking around and trying to decide who was actually serious about their sweater. We had a hard time determining how serious the woman near us was who was wearing a tree skirt as a poncho.

My cold was lingering yesterday and so I decided not to go to church. I have to admit I was a little bit disappointed when I heard that the power went out and they ended up only having sacrament meeting anyway.

BTW, I’m still meditating. Not every day, but often. I haven’t had any really profound experience so far, but it’s a nice way to center myself before starting the day.

I also have a confession to make. All this time I’ve been leading you on and letting you believe that I have a Snuggie. I actually have a knock-off, and it’s called a Snuzzle. There, I feel much lighter now. I’m actually considering wearing it to work tomorrow, because it’s FREEZING.

Cell Phone POW! #7

This POW! comes from my friend Desha, who has been hanging out in Turkey and Greece for the last month. She said she found it on a beach on Hydra Island in Greece. I wonder what the masculine state is like. Would it be a fun place to visit? Probably not, I’m guessing there would be lots of Stuart Scott and SportsCenter.

Last night the choir I sing in sang at The Grotto. Every year during December they do a Festival of Lights. Think Temple Square, only Catholic. We sang in a small chapel there and the acoustics were fantastic. I was a little surprised at how good we sounded. The bad part though, is that anytime I had to flip into falsetto nothing would come out. The thought crossed my mind that I hoped I wasn’t getting sick. Sure enough, I woke up with a sore throat. I hope it passes quickly. We are performing again tomorrow night and our big concert is a week from today. In the meantime, I just want to cuddle up with my Snuggie and watch Glee.

I’m a floor warden at work. No, I don’t work in a prison, I’m just supposed to respond in case of an emergency. This morning I had to go to a two hour fire extinguisher training. The first hour included an incredibly lame video and a power point presentation. Although, this video was kind of cool. They certainly didn’t need to take 2 hours though. I thought the second hour was going to be a lot more fun because they told us we would get to do some “hands on” training. I took this to mean that we would use real extinguishers to put out real fires. This is what we did instead. Total let down.

We each got a turn with the BullEx Bullseye, and the guy doing the training was taking it way too seriously. He was coaching all of us like we were his little league baseball team. I stepped up to the extinguisher and he gives me the “C’mon, you can do this!” After I started extinguishing the fire he said, “C’mon, you gotta want this!” I almost stopped and let the fire rage so that I could turn to him and say, “Dude, I’m fighting a fake fire with a pretend extinguisher.”

Coming soon: a cigarette and a Christmas themed POW! (Those are two separate themes.)

Uncircling the wagons

We all have defensive strategies. Some of them were developed when we were young, as a way to cope with things we didn’t understand or were unable to process in mature and healthy ways. As we get older, however, those coping mechanisms outlive their usefulness and actually serve to hold us back. Case in point: when I was younger I was very uncomfortable around grown men. Actually pretty much any male, unless he was 10 or younger. At some point as a child I decided to just not interact with men. For many reasons (some known and I’m sure others not known) I decided there was too much risk emotionally. Not that I thought about it in those terms when I was little, but that’s how I see it looking back.

Obviously, that type of defensive strategy isn’t sustainable, given that roughly half the world’s population is male. As it turns out, if you want to lead any semblance of a happy healthy life, you need to learn how to relate to men. At some point I abandoned that train of thought and started to trust. This isn’t about me though.

I think the church developed a defensive strategy in its infancy that has long outlived its usefulness. I think the church has a persecution complex and as a result tends to circle the wagons a bit too much. The wagon circling began back in the early days of the church out of necessity. Back then it was a more literal circling of the wagons, but I think we still hold on to that in a more figurative sense. I think as a church we sometimes circle the wagons against anything unfamiliar to different from us.

One case in point is a post by Abelard Enigma. As far as I can tell, Abe is like the godfather of online Mormon homosexuals. You can put that on your resume, Abe. The story of the young man in his post is played out all the time. The story of people on the fringes who don’t fit the mold and have a hell of a time finding reasons to stay in the church. I don’t think members purposefully try to exclude those on the periphery. I think it’s just kind of an almost instinctual reaction that occurs as a result of decades and decades of cultural inbreeding. Words like “peculiar people” are worn as a badge of honor, but I think those words have taken on a different meaning than what was originally intended. I think in some ways it’s become more of an excuse for social awkwardness or feeling like we don’t fit in. I’m pretty sure there’s a better way of being a peculiar people than by being so socially isolated that we are only able to relate to those who share our own religious beliefs.

Another case in point: The church issued a pamphlet a couple of years ago called God Loveth His Children, which specifically addresses same sex attraction. The following counsel is given: “it is not helpful to flaunt homosexual tendencies or make them the subject of unnecessary observation or discussion. It is better to choose as friends those who do not publicly display their homosexual feelings.” I’m not even really sure what the first part means. Should I not be blogging about it? To me it has the feeling “it’s ok if you feel this way, but please try to pretend not to.” As far as the second sentence goes, it would probably be better for you if we weren’t friends because I am fairly public about my homosexual feelings. Is that what it means?

I guess my point is, I think we’re a lot more scared of homosexuality than we need to be. Sure, there are some homosexuals out there who flaunt and display in disgusting ways and with whom it would probably be better not to identify yourself with or look to for guidance as you try and figure out what it means feel the way you do, but there are also members of the church at the other end of the spectrum with whom it would also not be a good idea to identify with. I think each extreme can be destructive in its own special way.

I don’t think we are the small, persecuted church that we once were. The strategy of circling the wagons against those not like us has outlived its usefulness and I think actually holds us back. I think we can afford to be more expansive and inclusive without destroying the core doctrine of the church. Another thing I’ve discovered is that as someone on the fringe, I don’t have to shave off my corners to fit in the round hole. On the contrary, I have the opportunity to explore what great things the fringe has to offer and bring it back to share with the mainstream.

A birthday and Grilled Cheese Grill

This weekend I went to a birthday party for Ginger, who is a lady. She likes to remind me of this and it makes me smile every time. I don’t know who made what, but there was lots of deliciousness at this party. Little round pieces of goat cheese with spices on top. Asparagus in a blanket (like pigs in a blanket but asparagus). Bacon wrapped figs. I’ve never really been a fan of figs, but once again, we learn that bacon makes everything better. There were these yummy crunchy flakey pastry thingies that I think her roommate Alisa made. Alisa is a chef and I love it when they invite me over for dinner. She also made the birthday cake, which was a beautiful chocolate layered cake that included a thin layer of persimmon, with dried persimmon on top. That was my first experience with that fruit and it was delicious. Although I’m pretty sure you could have put a thin layer of just about anything in that cake and it still would have been heavenly. Okay, enough food porn.

We also played pin the fangs on Edward and I did a pretty good job, but Sheri beat me. Toward the end, Ginger gave us all party favor gift bags with confetti and whistles and sunglasses and temporary tattoos and little plastic dinosaurs. We also ate on paper plates with Black Beauty on them. Like I said, Ginger is a lady.

Last night I went to dinner with my home teachers and they also invited their other home teachees. We went to Café Vita, which was pretty good. I got a spicy salmon burger. Afterwards, some of us went to a food cart called Grilled Cheese Grill. They make various and assorted kinds of grilled cheese sandwiches. Check out their menu. Delicious. I shared a dessert sandwich with Stina. Cinnamon swirl bread with bananas, nutella and mascarpone. Sweet mother. Look at me, back to food porn.

Next to the food cart is a giant school bus that you can eat on and the table tops have collages of old school, school pictures and there was some crazy fun dance music playing as well and trivial pursuit cards on the table in case conversation is slow. This is why I love Portland. If you come visit me, I will take you there.

Yesterday I ate a dove chocolate from my coworkers desk and this is the message that was inside: Keep believing in yourself and your special dreams. Why’d it have to go and call my dreams special?

Also, I may or may not have worked out at the gym last night to the soundtrack of Confessions of a Shopaholic before dinner.