We went on vacation, which consisted of many hours of beach time and precisely zero hours of true relaxation. But that's the way we like it. Every year I take my daughter to surf camp. She loves it. She's pretty good too. When she actually tries to get up and isn't making excuses. But that rant is for another day.
We went to Jax Beach, which is our general place to visit because I have so much family there. Plus, I never have to rent a room. Which makes it like the cheapest ten day vacation anyone could ever have. And I'm frugal if I'm anything. Or poor. Either way, cheaper is better. Also, not the point of this post.
This year, we took several newcomers. Three to be exact. Three people who have never been to that part of Florida. One who had never seen the Atlantic before, but she is only 9, so I give her a tad bit of leniency.
One of the newcomers was my friend, Shelley. One evening, after being on the beach all morning and part of the afternoon, we decided to go "downtown" to visit a few shops and spend some money. Well, the whole evening started out with me having to use the potty so, so very bad.
While everyone was visiting a shop, I walked across the street to a restaurant to see if they cared if I used their restroom. Since they were so gracious, I decided to buy a drink from the bar. From that point, I should have known it would be an interesting endeavor, but no. Why would I listen to my instinct? How dare that conscience tell me to just drink my drink, pay and walk away?
Normal people would drink their whiskey and ginger ale and leave a nice tip and go back to join the rest of their group. I am not normal. I called them over, told them the drinks were great, the menu looked awesome, and the place wasn't crowded, so our rowdy little girls wouldn't be able to disrupt many. This is where it went bad.
All of us, four young girls, three adult women, were enjoying our food and drinks outside on the patio when a few dumbass guys joined. Our first thought should be, "who in the hell walks over, sits down at a table where three women are eating, and just joins in their conversation?" That wasn't our thought. My mind was on ordering another drink. Their minds were on, well, I'm not sure.
One guy, who was apparently flaming, was the worst one upper one could ever imagine. I was so distracted by him saying things like "I know the owner of that store, you girls should take those shells back and we'll go get some for free off the beach." And, "when I was swimming with sharks, one came up really close and scared me so much that I actually walked on water." I was so distracted by that, I missed things like him being a crossdresser. And one of the girls saying "but I bought a blue starfish?" As if to ask if there are any blue starfish on the beach just hundreds of feet away. She surely hadn't seen one earlier that day.
When he was talking about walking on water, I wanted to ask him if he were a carpenter. He wouldn't have even understood, so it's probably best I didn't take a chance to be snarky. After we got home, since my gaydar is out of batteries, the children informed me of his stories of crossdressing. Which I apparently hadn't even bothered to listen to. Yeah, this guy, not appropriate for kids. At all.
The other guy, well, he was busy hitting on Shelley. To the point that some time during the evening, he opened his pants so that she could see his schlong. Now, the word schlong here is rather misleading as it contains the word "long." And I'm not usually one to bash on a man's size since it is genetic, and well, my genes made me have like the ugliest feet I've ever seen on any non-neanderthal. Either way, it isn't the fact that this limp was a shrimp. It is the fact that he is apparently so proud of his friend that he decided to show it during "girls night out." If you have the nerve to show off your sausage, wouldn't you rather it not be a vienna?
In the end, we all learned a few lessons. 1. I suck at knowing who is gay or straight. 2. Random guys at restaurants that are so tactless that they will interrupt your not-so-cheap dinner are probably not the type of people that should be allowed around children. 3. Feet size are definitely not an indicator of penis size. 4. Family vacations with Meg always, always have at least one night of total hilarity.
The good thing about this was that we laughed and had fun for ten whole days. There wasn't one day where I didn't laugh my ass off about something. Even if it was because in the back of my mind I couldn't wait to tell you guys about limps and shrimps.
Your Sun-kissed,
Meg
P.S. This post really does no justice to the awesomeness of that one evening.
P.P.S. Eat more chocolate.
Showing posts with label The Gay. Show all posts
Showing posts with label The Gay. Show all posts
Friday, August 17, 2012
Thursday, May 10, 2012
Don't Judge Me - I Think I Caught The Gay!
“Don’t judge me” is something we say often. Usually it is preceded by a story similar to “I was drinking margaritas on the back patio when I locked myself out of the house and had to pee in the bushes. Don’t judge me.” But this is not at all what the Don’t Judge Me of today means.
Sean Harris, the senior pastor of Berean Baptist Church has made comments that went public and then viral about raising gay children. His comments allegedly alluded to abusing your child to prevent them from being gay. Or at least to stop it in its tracks. I admit that I haven’t seen the whole sermon, so I can’t comment as to whether he was serious, or if he even said something along the lines of “if your son is gay, beat him with a stick.” I do know that in one segment he used the words “butch” and “bent wrist.” I’m pretty sure he wasn’t using these terms to warn people they are derogatory. I’m pretty sure he was using them in a derogatory fashion.
Now, I admit that I say things often that I shouldn’t say. I call Tim a gimp. I say things like “that’s retarded” or “I feel like a midget.” However, I never use my words to suggest that a group of people are all the same, or shouldn’t be allowed to be what they actually are. When someone hears this man say “if your daughter is too butch,” that daughter is busy saying “don’t judge me.” When a young man hears him say “bent wrist,” he is busy saying “don’t judge me.”
One of the problems I have with this is the fact that this pastor is generalizing. He is stereotyping. If there is anything I have learned from my gay friends, is that they never fall into my pre-conceived stereotypical views. The constantly prove me wrong. That they are non-conformists even in the most non-conforming way. They do it so well, they make hipsters look like the French in a world war. Yet they still continue to need to shout “don’t judge me!”
I always assumed that my first gay guy friend would be my new shopping partner. In fact, I had it all planned out to perfection. We would wake up, go get brunch (notice I did not say “eat”), get some trendy lattes at an over-priced coffee joint, then the shopping would ensue. Then I would hear things like “the new Manolo Blahniks are sweet” or “gurl, you look like a hot mess in that’ put it back before Greenpeace comes to save you.” I never knew the first gay guy I’d ever come to truly know would be so, um, what word am I looking for? Not stereotypical for sure.
Needless to say, I was sadly mistaken. I was even more mistaken when my newly acquired lesbian friend was so “butch” that she baked cakes and did girly shit like that. What the fuck was this world coming to? It was twisted, and perverse, and you know what? I liked it. In fact, I love that now, I don’t judge. I see people as people and I respect them as so. In the end, I may not have a new shopping buddy, but I also learned that The Gay isn’t really contagious. It isn’t like the flu. (Just to clear things up, I never truly thought I would catch The Gay. It is a running joke based on how a co-worker reacted upon learning that someone else was gay.)
Some of you may be shocked by this, but I’m a Christian. Not a great one. Probably not even a good one. But I think that’s what makes God love me. Because I’m fully aware of my imperfections. I also think that God wants us to quit judging. I think he made all people, gay or straight, equally. I think it is His place to judge people. Not ours. I also think that He loves that I will let Him take that responsibility. He wants it. He doesn’t want us to have it. We are biased. We say “don’t judge me!” yet we still judge. He sees our bias, our closed-minded views, how we don’t perceive all facts. He sees that and tells us that before we make the mistake of judging, that we shouldn’t even bother. It is a waste of our time. It causes hate, it causes anger, and sometimes it even causes war. He takes on that job, and for that, I’m grateful.
In the end, I think we should all remember that no one likes to be judged. We don’t even like to be judged if we trip while checking the mail or show up late to our son’s baseball game. We definitely don’t want to be judged based on our relationship status. This world is full of too many haters already, so the next time you see me, please don’t judge me.
-Meg
Sean Harris, the senior pastor of Berean Baptist Church has made comments that went public and then viral about raising gay children. His comments allegedly alluded to abusing your child to prevent them from being gay. Or at least to stop it in its tracks. I admit that I haven’t seen the whole sermon, so I can’t comment as to whether he was serious, or if he even said something along the lines of “if your son is gay, beat him with a stick.” I do know that in one segment he used the words “butch” and “bent wrist.” I’m pretty sure he wasn’t using these terms to warn people they are derogatory. I’m pretty sure he was using them in a derogatory fashion.
Now, I admit that I say things often that I shouldn’t say. I call Tim a gimp. I say things like “that’s retarded” or “I feel like a midget.” However, I never use my words to suggest that a group of people are all the same, or shouldn’t be allowed to be what they actually are. When someone hears this man say “if your daughter is too butch,” that daughter is busy saying “don’t judge me.” When a young man hears him say “bent wrist,” he is busy saying “don’t judge me.”
One of the problems I have with this is the fact that this pastor is generalizing. He is stereotyping. If there is anything I have learned from my gay friends, is that they never fall into my pre-conceived stereotypical views. The constantly prove me wrong. That they are non-conformists even in the most non-conforming way. They do it so well, they make hipsters look like the French in a world war. Yet they still continue to need to shout “don’t judge me!”
I always assumed that my first gay guy friend would be my new shopping partner. In fact, I had it all planned out to perfection. We would wake up, go get brunch (notice I did not say “eat”), get some trendy lattes at an over-priced coffee joint, then the shopping would ensue. Then I would hear things like “the new Manolo Blahniks are sweet” or “gurl, you look like a hot mess in that’ put it back before Greenpeace comes to save you.” I never knew the first gay guy I’d ever come to truly know would be so, um, what word am I looking for? Not stereotypical for sure.
Needless to say, I was sadly mistaken. I was even more mistaken when my newly acquired lesbian friend was so “butch” that she baked cakes and did girly shit like that. What the fuck was this world coming to? It was twisted, and perverse, and you know what? I liked it. In fact, I love that now, I don’t judge. I see people as people and I respect them as so. In the end, I may not have a new shopping buddy, but I also learned that The Gay isn’t really contagious. It isn’t like the flu. (Just to clear things up, I never truly thought I would catch The Gay. It is a running joke based on how a co-worker reacted upon learning that someone else was gay.)
Some of you may be shocked by this, but I’m a Christian. Not a great one. Probably not even a good one. But I think that’s what makes God love me. Because I’m fully aware of my imperfections. I also think that God wants us to quit judging. I think he made all people, gay or straight, equally. I think it is His place to judge people. Not ours. I also think that He loves that I will let Him take that responsibility. He wants it. He doesn’t want us to have it. We are biased. We say “don’t judge me!” yet we still judge. He sees our bias, our closed-minded views, how we don’t perceive all facts. He sees that and tells us that before we make the mistake of judging, that we shouldn’t even bother. It is a waste of our time. It causes hate, it causes anger, and sometimes it even causes war. He takes on that job, and for that, I’m grateful.
In the end, I think we should all remember that no one likes to be judged. We don’t even like to be judged if we trip while checking the mail or show up late to our son’s baseball game. We definitely don’t want to be judged based on our relationship status. This world is full of too many haters already, so the next time you see me, please don’t judge me.
-Meg
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