Say “gay” all you want (but please don’t say “DeSantis” (or “Texas”))

Transformation Tuesday: grow up, move on, nothing to see here

When I think about transformation, I think about the single long word as one with multiple definitional manifestations and implications of all sizes and import. I think about how transformation happens, in small bits and in big arcs, and how some of it I see coming and some of it I see only with the benefit of hindsight. I think about it as I think of life, as a thing of change over which I have different degrees of control and influence. There’s personal transformation, cultural transformation, societal transformation…it’s endless, really…so with that as background and brain context, it’s no small wonder that this week’s post is a smorgasbord of things transformational—in one way or another, in varying shapes and sizes, and with wildly and widely differing degrees of impact. As I get my thoughts in order, I find myself thinking about how the same place is never the same place, as evidenced by these pictures. Same spot, different day, different time, different place, same place.

And these. Same different thing.

When I look at these pictures, I think of them in a way akin to the concept that it’s impossible to step in the same river twice, or the slightly deeper twist on that, that the same person can’t step in the same river twice.

But enough of the “philosophical”.

Before I get to my “headline content” I want to address a few niggling transformation-related matters, and will start by talking about the big old elephant in the room: the Pandemic and the Terrible Twos. You read that right, it’s been two years (and two days) since COVID-19 was declared a pandemic in the US. While so much has changed in those two years (time marches on!) the feeling of being in perpetual limbo (previously described as going through days that feel encased in gelatin, still true) persists, and I’m mentally fragmented by all of it. I long for times I can’t quite actively remember and I’ve no clue when the future is coming…yet the future is now. At the beginning of COVID people kept calling it the “new normal,” but 2 years later, life is recalibrating, as a decidedly different normal. It’s such a bizarre in-between time and I’m kind of starting to understand Dali’s “Persistence of Memory” and all those melted clocks in the middle of nowhere.

As a matter of fact, my brain felt like it was turning into one of those liquefying timepieces yesterday when I had to book not one but two work trips in back-to-back weeks in early April…jarring me into actively remembering how much I loathe being away, say, W-F and then M-W. The grind. The logistics. The stress. All of it. I do miss being out on the road in general, but not at such an aggressive pace. Plus I’m rusty. Corporate AmEx, where are you? Cost code? Preferred airlines? What the what?

Speaking of melting clocks, another matter on my mind is that of time transformation, namely DST. What a 60-minute hunk of baloney that is. Our digital timekeepers magically erase an hour of life, we manually do the same for our ovens and microwaves and coffee makers (or whatever other primitive unconnected devices support us as we limp through life) and then we spend days in a fog, only to emerge joyfully (?) into a bright and brilliant sun albeit accompanied by a feeling of displacement and a warped wondering about what happened. Was I the only one who felt like I had flown around the world forward and backward at 7:40 last night? It’s like my eyelids went right down with the sun. This morning’s a bit better, but how can one disappearing hour wreak such havoc?

Anyhow…onto the things that, per today’s headline, shall not be named.

Here’s the thing, “we” like to talk. “We” like to talk about how progressive “we” are. How far “we’ve” come. How open minded “we” are. “Look how much better things are,” “we” say…well I say, “Look at how far we have to go.” The progress “we” brag about? It’s sadgress. And nowhere is that reflected more in society right now than in the “Don’t Say Gay” bill in the Sunshine State or in witch hunt for families of trans kids in the state that is synonymous with “what the actual f-ck?” and that rhymes with “Nexus.”

I could go on and on and on, but I’ll cut to the chase. Progress involves learning and growing, and you can’t have those things without words. Not talking about things is toxic. For a million and one reasons but in this case because silence makes people who are “other” feel “less than”. Things that are criminalized are inherently bad things. Being born into a body that makes people feel a stranger to themselves, something over which no one has any control? Not a f-cking crime. Introducing hate is never ok, and it’s never progress. Transformation is an ongoing forward (and generally positive) thing—and when people deliberately try to halt progress and advancement, when they deliberately try to suppress and oppress, that's where we as a society must draw the line. That’s not transformation or growth. That’s regression and it’s infuriating and embarrassing.

So say “gay.” Support people who feel “other”. Let them know that “other” never means “less than”. And speak up every chance you get in opposition to any of these bills or laws or movements that make hate ok.

Can’t do that? Grow up. Live and let live. Move af-ckinglong. Butt out. And leave me alone.

The whole things is positively infuriating.

Repeat: we still have so far to go, so let’s keep going.

Subject change to more pleasant things as I give a special birthday shoutout to one of the greats when it comes to friendship, love, and laughter. You might not be able to drive 55 but you can turn 55, and you can have plenty of fun, sip some tequila, and just laugh in Father Time’s face while doing it. Because what else are you gonna do anyway? Happy birthday—and beware that Ides of March! (I mention this for the obvious passage of time reasons, but also because this friendship is a reminder how choices change lives. Were it not for a shared desire to have a “good” dorm room for junior year, we’d never have set ourselves on a path for a lifetime of laughter. Choices big and small are key contributors to transformation…but so too is chance…and that’s the juggling act that is life, managing and balancing all the things inside and outside of control, big and small, important and inconsequential…of deciding which balls to keep in the air and which to let fall…it’s all right there, simultaneously in the palm of our hands and in the hands of someone or something much bigger. Just have fun with it.)

Thinking about turning 55 gives me pause…and I’m compelled to take advantage of said pause to think about purpose. In this moment, in this sea of change, is this the right thing, at the right place, for the right reasons, this life I am choosing to live?

It’s a heavy but necessary question we must continually ask of ourselves if we want to transform and grow. Our happiness depends on it.

By way of wrap up, as we approach the Irish High Holiday that is St. Patrick’s Day and I consider the transformation of my own understanding of my genetic makeup (thanks Ancestry!)(I’m 38% Irish, not 25%!), I wish you all the luck of the Irish, and do hope that the road rises up to meet you, the wind is always at your back…and that the extra hour of sunlight shines down on your happy faces, illuminating your hearts, and showing you the way—whatever your way is. Sláinte.

I’ll never find the words to describe how much it means to me that you’re here with me, though I can thank you, sincerely—so thank you. Love you too.

Enjoy one of my all time faves from an Irish artist, and have a great week: