Del Martin, lesbian activist, co-founder of Lyon Martin Clinic and the Daughters of Bilitis, first out lesbian elected to office in the National Organization of Women, and wife to Phyllis Lyon, died this past Wednesday.
She was partners with Phyllis for 55 years, and they got married during the first wave of Newsomized gay marriages a few years again, and then were the first couple to (re-) wed once same-sex marriages got the green light in the state of California this year.
Del sounds like not only a totally amazing person, who personally did a lot for the openness and acceptance of queers in this country (including me being able to conduct my wife hunt out here on the internets, for all to see), but also a wonderful and committed wife.
May we all, those of us who want partners anyway, be so lucky.
Rest in Peace, Del Martin. You kicked a ton of ass, and we are incredibly grateful for it.
Showing posts with label lesbian. Show all posts
Showing posts with label lesbian. Show all posts
Monday, September 1, 2008
Monday, December 10, 2007
My First Partial Offer
Well this weekend marked a milestone for SLWaW and a number of them for me, personally, but the most relevant of them was that I got a partial, mostly joking, potential offer for a maybe wife.
Someday.
She is gorgeous, over 20 years my senior, the girlfriend of dear friends of mine, and lives out of town. So there are some potential drawbacks (mostly the out of town part) and also a great deal more of getting-to-know in ways other than biblical. The road to wifey is neither short nor easy, well, at least it hasn't been for me. But I feel much encouraged by even casual interest in my proposition. It's exciting!
It reminds me of the rule I learned in my Arts Administration for the Independent Artist class (thank you Krista DeNio!): the guideline for promotion is a 10-1 ratio. If you flyer for an event, about 1 out of every 10 people who pick up a flyer will show up. Now I know that marriage is a little more specialized of an event than a Hanukkah-themed burlesque circus, or a plague of masturbating Pee-wees, at least in this town, but I figure after several hundred, or no more than a few thousand drunken offers of"oh, I'll be your wife!", something has got to pan out.
(The lovely lady in question was not drunk by the way, that's just how I envision future encounters or offers emerging: them drunk and clinging to their seething date, me Charlie Chaplining it out of there.)
Wow, I was just about to get so 90's lesbo. Well, I've been accused of being a 90's lesbo before, so I might as well go for it. What I was going to say was: as the fine film 'Go Fish'* taught us, "The Girl Is Out There."
So, one down, countless more to go. Hooray for the first, not-totally-single, step.
*As a 16 year old living in Baltimore, I went to the local small art theater no less than 3 times when Go Fish was in the theater. I clearly remember one time arranging for a mixed group of boy-girl couples and friends to go with me so I wouldn't seem so damn gay, though I'm unclear about to whom. (Same thing with 'The Incredibly True Story of Two Girls In Love'. As far as media went, if there were ladies who liked ladies, I ate it up, though I remember being a little confused at the time by the boxing butch.) Even at 16, I identified most with the butchy lethario, Daria. After at least one of my gleeful viewings I went, by myself, to the cute dyke cafe, the now defunct 'Cafe Diana'. My head swimming with Guinevere Turner's comely image, I got myself tea and cake and sat there amongst the lavender walls, glowing with feelings of satisfied lesbianism, about to burst with my own queerness, dying for someone to talk to me. Of course, no one ever talked to me, I must have looked like some very strange kid who (as Irene and I say about dudes in suits at the Lex, the local dyke bar) 'didn't know where I was'.
It turns out that I never really got the hang of 'lesbianism', per se, sexually I'm too curious and flexible, though I may be one in spirit. But it was the 90's, in Baltimore, and I still refused to say 'fag' out of respect and hadn't ever met a transperson yet and was desperately in love with my best friend and didn't even know I was goth. So lesbians, wherever I could get them, see them, be around them trying silently to make them love me, were it for me. No wonder I'm a 90's lesbian, I never really got to be one when that was all the queer I knew. Well, another psychological mystery solved. Ima go listen to some Ani.
Someday.
She is gorgeous, over 20 years my senior, the girlfriend of dear friends of mine, and lives out of town. So there are some potential drawbacks (mostly the out of town part) and also a great deal more of getting-to-know in ways other than biblical. The road to wifey is neither short nor easy, well, at least it hasn't been for me. But I feel much encouraged by even casual interest in my proposition. It's exciting!
It reminds me of the rule I learned in my Arts Administration for the Independent Artist class (thank you Krista DeNio!): the guideline for promotion is a 10-1 ratio. If you flyer for an event, about 1 out of every 10 people who pick up a flyer will show up. Now I know that marriage is a little more specialized of an event than a Hanukkah-themed burlesque circus, or a plague of masturbating Pee-wees, at least in this town, but I figure after several hundred, or no more than a few thousand drunken offers of"oh, I'll be your wife!", something has got to pan out.
(The lovely lady in question was not drunk by the way, that's just how I envision future encounters or offers emerging: them drunk and clinging to their seething date, me Charlie Chaplining it out of there.)
Wow, I was just about to get so 90's lesbo. Well, I've been accused of being a 90's lesbo before, so I might as well go for it. What I was going to say was: as the fine film 'Go Fish'* taught us, "The Girl Is Out There."
So, one down, countless more to go. Hooray for the first, not-totally-single, step.
*As a 16 year old living in Baltimore, I went to the local small art theater no less than 3 times when Go Fish was in the theater. I clearly remember one time arranging for a mixed group of boy-girl couples and friends to go with me so I wouldn't seem so damn gay, though I'm unclear about to whom. (Same thing with 'The Incredibly True Story of Two Girls In Love'. As far as media went, if there were ladies who liked ladies, I ate it up, though I remember being a little confused at the time by the boxing butch.) Even at 16, I identified most with the butchy lethario, Daria. After at least one of my gleeful viewings I went, by myself, to the cute dyke cafe, the now defunct 'Cafe Diana'. My head swimming with Guinevere Turner's comely image, I got myself tea and cake and sat there amongst the lavender walls, glowing with feelings of satisfied lesbianism, about to burst with my own queerness, dying for someone to talk to me. Of course, no one ever talked to me, I must have looked like some very strange kid who (as Irene and I say about dudes in suits at the Lex, the local dyke bar) 'didn't know where I was'.
It turns out that I never really got the hang of 'lesbianism', per se, sexually I'm too curious and flexible, though I may be one in spirit. But it was the 90's, in Baltimore, and I still refused to say 'fag' out of respect and hadn't ever met a transperson yet and was desperately in love with my best friend and didn't even know I was goth. So lesbians, wherever I could get them, see them, be around them trying silently to make them love me, were it for me. No wonder I'm a 90's lesbian, I never really got to be one when that was all the queer I knew. Well, another psychological mystery solved. Ima go listen to some Ani.
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