Deanne made an incredible Thai dinner for us tonight. She even surprised us with an homemade lemon mirangue pie. The pie was… tempting… and I think Heather may be heading back to Maryland without me. Deanne is spoiling us rotten… unfortunately, she keeps trying to wash my jeans. I’m refusing mostly out of sheer contrariness – but she’ll probably win before too long. Today they went to the beach and got sanded on.
Tonight we watched the first two episodes of a BBC series called “Tipping the Velvet”. It was something I’d heard of before (though I don’t remember from where) – the Life of a lesbian in 19th century London – it’s been a bit hard to watch, but engrossing all the same.
Spanish MOSS!!!!
For some reason, though Heather’s gotten me hooked on both “Sex and the City” and “Friends” recently – the main character of “Tipping the Velvet” has got me far more … well, I’ve already used the word engrossed – but she’s got me completely drawn in. Her early explorations into relationships and survival in the Big City – her tales of betrayal and infatuation seem so much more genuine than those in other shows. It’s shown beautifully – in BBC fantasy cinematic style, and maybe that has something to do with it, with rich soundtrack and texture. Oh, and phrases like “You exquisite little tart!” – a very Amy phrase.
While we were camping we ran across a guy in the (as I write this, Deanne is IMing Annette using some AOL broadband bug character which keeps going “heeeeey!!!” and “heee hee hee hee” – and then Deanne joins in with her incredibly distinctive, incredibly infectious laugh – and concentration is ALL over)… ok… while we were camping we ran across a guy who’d been sleeping in his car, but with the recent Hellish weather, had bought a tent to come sleep at the KOA, solely for the use of the shower. We got into conversations over the television in the office of the KOA…. Heather and I happened to be in there when coverage of the Democratic Convention popped on, which of course reads as two young Dems focused on the excitement that is their party, riveted and watching.
That of course, got us into a conversation about politics. Now, we knew from within a couple of sentances that we were going to disagree a lot (Gordon sort of opened by telling us that we may be Democrats now, but that we’d grow out of it) – but he said a couple of things that made me think – more on the topic of religion, and conservative vs liberal religious thinking than on politics – and I really appreciate that. Unfortunately, I’m not so sure that I returned the favour, but I always appreciate someone who gets my gears turning.
At first we avoided “hot-button” issues, but eventually we touched on gay marriage – I was surprised that he wasn’t just adamantly against the whole thing, and that he was willing to have a conversation about the topic at all. He agreed that tax breaks and things like that should be pretty equal – he felt that there should be a semantic difference (“marriage” vs “civil unions”) – but he also believed that there should be some laws and protections and rights in place specifically to promote stable and procreative families.
Now, on the one hand, I sort of agree with that, because that would certainly be what is “best for our society as a whole” – stable family units is precisely what we’re lacking in America, and I think that that’s at the root of a WHOLE lot of problems. However, I’ve never seen any proof that a family unit of two gays and a child is less stable or less nurturing than that of a more traditional make-up, and in following with the American doctrine of “innocent until proven guilty”, I DO feel that things should be regulated or restricted until they are proven harmful… and of course, bad news for the right-wings out there, I think that some big psychologists council just declared Gay Marriage a GOOD thing.
Anywho – the conversation got really fascinated with the idea of liberal vs conservative religion – I usually think of only conservative people BEING religious… my liberal leaning friends tend to be “spiritual”, perhaps, or Unitarian, but not traditionally religious. The people who are very liberal but still go to church every Sunday tend to pick and choose their religion, as if the Bible were a buffet table of doctrines – I’ve always felt that if you pick up one bit, you sort of have to pick up the rest – that the whole idea of most Christian theology is that there’s Someone up there who knows better than you, and that for you to go and undermine His teaching by saying “yeah, I agree with that, but (for example) that whole ‘no sex before marriage thing’, not so much” is the height of hipocrisy. To believe God is omnipresent and omniscient and omni all sorts of other stuff too, and then to cut pieces out and say… well, omni about everything but THAT…
I liked the way Gordon put it (I’m paraphrasing a bit) – “A conservative believes that he is the creation of God, and a liberal believes that he is the great work of God.” The idea that the Conservative [Christian] is grateful to be placed on the Earth, and realizes that they are totally extant on the grace of God, and that they are there to do His bidding – but that the liberal concept of religion comes more along the lines of being some great peice of art of God, they can do no wrong, God is all-forgiving, and they are here to experience Life to the fullest.
Perhaps… the Conservative is given the gift of existance, and like a kid is gifted Life by a parent, and theyshould be respectful to that parent, and try to follow the rules set forth by the parent – because the parent has been around longer, and generally has a lot more knowledge and wisdom about their environment than the kid does (something I would NOT have acknowledged a couple of years ago)…
vs
The Liberal concept that they have been gifted with Life as a kid is given a bicycle – and they have been given this gift to enjoy, and you best get the best use out of it that you can – because you’ll outgrow it sooner than later.
Now, have no fear – I’ll get back to my usual road commentary of funny animals and flatulance in a bit – but I just wanted to write this out while I was thinking about it. I barely EVERY write in my Little Black Books anymore, and so the Journal has VERY much become a diary of sorts.
I’m not sure which line I fall under, I think politically I have very traditionally conservative views (though that does NOT at ALL equate with modern Republican thinking) – and I think spiritually I probably count as more of a liberal – but more because I’m not religious. I believe I’ve been given a great gift in Life, but I’m not sure that I’m beholded to anyone for it, so I AM going to use it to the greatest extent possible – but because I’ve met people and empathize with the rest of humanity, I attempt not to do wrong by them…
Gordon asked about where my moral compass came from – and a lot of it was upbringing, but a LOT of it has been impacted by going out and meeting people. My parents brought me up VERY unbiased, very clear-headed about racism and prejudice – but there were some subjects (like homosexuality) that weren’t touched upon, and I remember at the very beginning of high school, sort of being horrified upon my discovery of it’s existance. But upon meeting a number of gay and bisexual people – I grew to better undertand that you befriend and Love PEOPLE rather than their sexuality, religion, colour – what have you. Communication is facilitated by exposure, and I’m a little worried about the fact that our travels bring us into contact with very little other than the white majority of the country (in PG County, I don’t think I believed in the concept of blacks being a minority – but MAN seeing the rest of the country has rearranged THAT thinking) – and I worry about how that effects my capacity for communication with other people and other races.
Hrm – my brain is just meandering now. I’m just praying I haven’t managed to alienate anyone. We have very much fallen in with Wilmington lesbian culture down here, and so this is all very forefront in my mind.
hehe – Heather just fed Jessi some curry. She’s now furiously lapping water out of her bowl in the kitchen.
hehehe.
