Caitlyn Jenner

Cynthia, this wasn't all just for a reality TV show and it's not a joke. I had met several transgender men and women, but I really started to understand them a few years ago when I attended a Transgender Day of Remembrance and heard their stories and saw their pain. I also got to see their joy when they were able to express themselves in the way they were most comfortable, in the way that matched the way they felt inside. It was then I realized that if I was expecting straight people to understand me when I told them about my experience as a gay man, a situation they had no experience with and no way to experience it for themselves, then I owed it to transgender people, an experience I have no way to understand directly myself, to believe them when they told me who they were and what their lives were like. It's not unlike when you tell me about your experience as an African-American and as a woman in American. Those are two things I can never experience directly myself, but when you tell me about it I'll believe you. And I won't think your experience is a joke. Maya Angelou said when someone tells us who they are, believe them. Caitlyn Jenner is telling us who she is. We owe it to her to believe her. Peace.

Quote:

"The best use of imagination is creativity.

The worst use of imagination is anxiety."

 -DeepakChopra

Sunday in the Park with the Bears

Old Main Library of Cincinnati

Demolished in 1955.

Taking Out The Gay

A few months ago on cable television I saw Moneyball, the movie starring Brad Pitt about a baseball manager's quest to use facts and statistics, instead of instincts and reputation, to build a team. At the time I knew the movie was based on real events and I thought what a wonderful film, a great story and aren't Brad Pitt and Jonah Hill amazing.

It wasn't until after the movie was over and I was thinking about the main character and didn't I know that name from somewhere?  Billy Beane, Billy Beane; where had I heard that name before? And then I Googled it to be sure: He, famously, was one of the first professional athletes to come out as gay after he retired. Nothing of that is alluded to in the movie. In the film he's a single dad with a daughter on good terms with her mother.

The same is true of Robin William's character in Awakenings; the movie about a neurologist's experience with mentally ill patients experiencing moments of lucidity. The movie is based on Oliver Sack's book by the same name and chronicles his experience as a ground-breaking neurologist. While he writes candidly about his experience with love as a gay man in his new autobiography, in the movie he has no sexuality, straight or gay.

It strikes me as strange that nothing in the press, not even in the gay press, is mentioned about the neutered film portrayals of these unambiguously, famously gay men. This is strange considering the hue and cry that went up with Ron Howard's production of A Beautiful Mind starring Russell Crowe that reduced John Nash's bisexuality down to a passing glance.

The life of the 20th century's most famous bisexual, Howard Hughes, was similarly straightened in Marin Scorsese's The Aviator starring Leonardo DiCaprio, showing only one brief interaction with some effete men.

Awakenings and Moneyball both focus tightly on the main plot of the film, how the hero is trying to affect change, to improve the lives of his patients or the performance of his baseball team. And that would be fine except I can't think of one heterosexual character that was treated the same way.

Most biographical films include a wife or girlfriend or girlfriends to add a third dimension to the main character, to establish legitimacy and create empathy; she or he is interesting and good because these other people outside their work find them interesting and good. But in the case of Billy Beane, Oliver Sacks, and many other gay men and women, empathy and legitimacy are established by taking out their emotional life altogether and reducing their lives to two dimensions.

This not only is a disservice to these amazing people but robs gay people, and indeed all people, examples of smart, strong, driven, successful gay men and women who have made lasting contributions to our lives.

Read BrainPickings excellent review of Oliver Sack's On The Move here:

Moon Rise

Evening view from the top of the Copley-Family YMCA parking garage.

Quote:

“(Extreme entrepreneurs) fail in ways other people won't (and) they learn things other people don't.

  - Justine Musk

Fun with Snapseed

I'm liking black and white. It covers a multitude of sins.

Night Sky

According to my Sky Chart app this light in the sky:

... is Jupiter.

Morning Walk

Quote

Word of the Day

Hove;  past of heave.

“When the British had come up to the opposite side of the brestwork, having no gun, he picked up an empty barrel and flung it at them. Then finding an iron bar, he jumped up on the works and hove that at them.”

Library of America Story of the Week:  “Like a Sea of Blood”

Protests

   I can't condemn any of the protests in Ferguson, New York, or any where else. They have a legitimately grievous complaint and I don't know how I would react if my son or nephew or neighbor were killed in such a way.

   Just as every kid needs to respond to their parent's first request to avoid getting yelled at, we must respond to non-violent protests before anyone feels the need to escalate. The marchers at Selma were not violent. It was the fire hoses, dogs, and night sticks of law enforcement that were violent. We listened at first, but then we forgot. So now they're yelling.

   But beyond all of that; we, each of us, know in our heart what is right. We have a moral obligation to our God, to our selves, and to our fellow humans to proactively do what is right before any protests are necessary.

Quote:

“I did not have a good start in life, but I tell you what, I am determined that I'm going to have a good finish.” - Joyce Meyer

Quote:

 "A cloud does not know why it moves in just such a direction and at such a speed. It feels an impulsion... this is the place to go now. But the sky knows the reasons and the patterns behind all clouds, and you will know, too, when you lift yourself high enough to see beyond horizons." ~Richard Bach

Quote:

“Never waste your time trying to explain yourself to people who have proven that they are committed to misunderstanding you.”

 Marc and Angel Hack Life

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“You can't think yourself into better behaving, but you can behave yourself into better thinking.”

Troy D. Davidson

“Happiness is not something you postpone for the future; it is something you design into the present.”

“Do not fool yourself into believing that you must live the same day over and over again for the rest of your life, simply because it’s the responsible thing to do.

So many people live daily with unhappy circumstances, and yet will not take the initiative to change their situation. They somehow believe that conforming to their current circumstances will eventually lead to a life of comfort, security, and peace of mind, but in reality nothing is more damaging to their spirit.

 Happiness is not something you postpone for the future; it is something you design into the present. The very basic core of the human spirit is a natural passion for exploration and growth. This growth originates directly from our encounters with new ideas and experiences that intrigue us; and hence there is no greater destination in life than to have an endlessly changing horizon – for each day to have a new and different sun.”

 Marc Chernoff

Quote:

“Unused creativity is not benign. It metastasizes. It turns into grief, rage, judgement, sorrow, shame.

We are, by nature, creative.”

Dr. Brene Brown