I had the most Gone dream

I dreamed I was in my bedroom at my parents’ house when I saw some parking a small white car outside our house. Lo and behold, it’s Amazing Amy Eliot, played by Rosamund Pike in Gone Girl. I went to bed, wondering what she was doing.

Turns out what she was doing was spending all night peeling potatoes in some kind of revenge scheme. I don’t know what she had against me. I guess she had completed her revenge against Ben Affleck. When I woke up, Amy was standing outside my window menacingly. I told her the fact that she stayed up all night peeling potatoes was the most pathetic thing I’d ever seen.

She could not muster a counterargument. Who could?

Speaking of potatoes, I peeled a few and tossed the skins into our garbage disposal and it clogged the disposal. Who knew you weren’t supposed to put potato peels in there? I figured that’s one of the things they made garbage disposals for.

Anyway, some Liquid Plumber in the connecting sink and crisis averted.

Business As Usual

Exactly two years ago last Friday, when the Supreme Court struck down the Defense of Marriage Act and paved the way for gay marriage, I was taking my new husband to urgent care. Steve had a high fever and even though I normally blow off complaints of minor illness, this seemed more serious so I was worried. I left work and took him for treatment for what turned out to be tonsillitis.

On that day when the court further validated the marriage we knew to be valid, I remember thinking: “This is marriage at its essence. He needed me and I took care of him like he’s done a million times for me. Couples do this every day. Business as usual.”

Last Friday, as the Supreme Court removed the last roadblock to gay marriage throughout the country, I was in California on business, a continent away from my husband. I found out about the decision as I checked the Internet one last time before heading out for my conference. I called him later that afternoon and we discussed the court ruling and more mundane stuff: Is the pool looking clearer, how is the cat, what’s the weather for the weekend, how was your day.

Even on a day that momentous, in a sense our day was business as usual because we are lucky: We got married two years ago in front of very supportive family and friends who never made us feel like there was an asterisk next to our marriage. So we get to keep on being married with the added security that the court ruling has given us.

But as elated as I was, the court decision is even more for people in other states who have not been so lucky. Now they’ll get the privilege and the dignity of introducing their partners of forever as “my wife” or “my husband.” They’ve been supporting one another forever and they’ll keep on doing so, being there for a now-spouse who needs them.

Through this long and contentious debate over marriage, that’s the one thing all couples, gay and straight, have in common: You’re there for the people you love when they need you. Business as usual.

What are the Defenders defending?

Netflix is supposed to be making a series based on the Marvel superhero team the Defenders. I have no idea who is excited by this because the team is obscure to the general public. I also have no idea who will be on the team on the TV show but here is who the Defenders were in the comics.

The initial Defenders series ran during the Bronze Age, from the early ‘70s to the mid-‘80s. The Avengers are a club, the X-Men are students and the Fantastic Four are a family but the Defenders were different: They were famous for being a “non-team” of heroes who met irregularly and didn’t always get along. They didn’t work out in the Danger Room or meet in the Baxter Building or have Jarvis bring them tea in Avengers Mansion. They hung out off and on at Doctor Strange’s Sanctum Sanctorum and went their separate ways after the villain was defeated. Writers like Steve Gerber, Steve Englehart and JM DeMatteis wrote some really offbeat stories of the team fighting mystical threats and such. Once they had a subplot of elves walking around shooting people for no apparent reason, a story that wasn’t explained for years. Once they fought Satan. This was before Marvel backed off and called him just another demon — he was flat-out Satan in the original story.

The “big four” of the Defenders were Doctor Strange, the Hulk, Namor the Sub-Mariner and the Silver Surfer. Objectively, this is the most powerful team in Marvel. Doctor Strange is Earth’s Sorcerer Supreme and thus the planet’s most powerful mystic, Namor rules Atlantis, the Silver Surfer’s cosmic level powers come from Galactus himself and of course, HULK SMASH. I don’t think Namor or the Silver Surfer will join the TV Defenders since they are Fantastic Four characters but Doctor Strange and the Hulk are fair game.

The “little three” of the team were Valkyrie (Asgardian goddess), Nighthawk (basically a Batman knockoff) and Hellcat (Patsy Walker, a character who dates back to Marvel’s ‘40s romance comics, who has enhanced athletic abilities). They’re not as powerful as the other four but were more stable team members. By 1983, the big four left after the revelation that if they stayed together, they would inadvertently bring about the destruction of the world. Joining the team in their place were B- and C-listers like the demonic looking Gargoyle, the arrogant telepath Moondragon, Son of Satan (they fought his dad), the mysterious Cloud, Andromeda and former X-Men Iceman, Angel and the Beast.

Marvel canceled the Defenders comic in the ‘80s. They revived the title periodically, most notably in 2001, with the angle that the big four were cursed to come together whenever the Earth was in danger but they all hated each other and a spell made them crankier and more arrogant until they ended up taking over the Earth for its own good and got overthrown. People hated that run but I really enjoyed it.

I have no idea what Netflix will do with the Defenders series. I hope the show shies away from the popular kids like the Avengers and looks at some of the weirder corners of the Marvel Universe.

I guess I never did answer what the Defenders defend. Huh.

Caring Is a Zero Sum Game

Caring is a zero sum game, or so some guy in the comment section said.

Every kilowatt of brainpower we spend on the trivial bread and circuses in the world means less attention to the tiny lessons that you know are good for you. Ever tried to care about two things at once? Don’t bother because it can’t be done.

For every atom of attention you waste seeing white and gold or blue and black in that dress, you deprive us of a tear for nine murdered churchgoers. Whenever you speak for justice over underinflated footballs, another Syrian child collapses in a cloud of mustard gas. You cannot care about both at once. The math is impossible and you deserve every scolding you get that echoes off Internet walls.

What a world this would be, they say, if we never lifted our head from studying tragedy to rest our minds with the trivial. And how little tragedy there would be if all that condescending online self-righteousness could power even the smallest change.  

The Jig Is Up

It is with a heavy heart that I announce my resignation as president of the Delaware chapter of the National Association for the Advancement of Lesbians, Gays, Bisexuals, Transgender and Queer (NAALGBTQ) people. In the past few days, the public has become aware that I have been masquerading as a gay man for several years and so I cannot continue on.

The world has discovered that I am unequivocally straight. As a young boy, I used to use a pink Crayola crayon, not peach, to color my skin in drawings. This subtle but important distinction spoke deeply to how I identified myself.

I may look and act like a gay man but now I am embarrassed to say it’s all a façade. I have used high-end hair gels to make my hair look gay. I have also spent a lot of money on skin care products so my skin looks closer to homosexual. I paid much more attention to fashion than I would have if I lived freely as a straight person.

I have also affected a gay persona, going to clubs and such and expressing affection to my husband (he’s in on it). My gay cultural interests are all a cover for my deception. I actually can’t stand Madonna. Whenever I was screaming at one of her concerts, it was from pure aggravation, not excitement.

Pay no attention to the allegation that while I was a student at the historically gay Elton John University, I sued for discriminating against me as a straight person. This is false.

Again, I apologize. But I will continue to fight for whatever it is I’m fighting for by doing this. 

Incongruous

It is disconcerting. The incongruity of the situation is what strikes me. These first few days, nothing is where it should be.

Little things stick out: speaker cables on the coffee table. A colander on the floor. Paintings in the garage. Cards Against Humanity on the range top. But I've done this before and I know everything will eventually find its right place.

Larger things have been permanently altered, too. Light does not slap us in the face the first thing in the morning, with the new house rotated in a different direction. Couch and loveseat sit on opposite sides as before so now if we want to lie down while watching TV (and when don't we?), we lie facing the other way.

Even the cat knows things are out of whack. She excitedly prances around her new castle, sensing the furniture from before is now somewhere else. The world outside the big bay window is very different.

For now, boxes take the place of any furniture we have yet to buy and inside those boxes are hiding all the kitchen tools and paperwork and knickknacks we search for. It will have to do for now. Soon we will root through boxes and put our new world right. We have all the time in the world to get settled.

Elegy for Elsmere

It’s not like we’re going too far and we’ll still be around working in the garden. We also haven’t sold or rented the house yet so for now it’s a pied-à-terre. Still, with the movers coming tomorrow to take our furniture, this is our last night sleeping in Elsmere.

Steve and I have been referring to the new house as “the house” and the Elsmere house as “our house” or “home.” Tomorrow that will officially reverse.

I’m excited about the new house but will miss the old one. We have had a lot of good memories: Chatting outside with our neighbors, Christmas parties, watching thunderstorms from the deck, having family over for dinner, hanging out with the cats while watching TV. It was a good place for nine years, this house with red and blue and green walls. It will be emotional for me to leave, despite the fact that we are tied there (and will inevitably be back to hardcore clean and work out things with the new people).

Even though we’ve been planning this move for years, it’s still hard to believe it’s happening. What is really bringing it home is that I’ve started taking paintings and pictures off the wall. I had resisted doing that because it’s distracting to see all the bare spots. Now the walls look empty and the house looks bigger and has more echoes. God knows how I’ll feel tomorrow to see all the furniture gone.

The Elsmere house is the place I’ve lived the longest since I lived at home. I still have a lot of memories from my two apartments and it was bittersweet at first to leave them and sleep somewhere different. I remember everywhere I’ve lived with some fondness.

I am also very excited about the new house. We’ve finished painting and have some new furniture. We finally got in the pool after the weather cleared and the filter started working. We’re eager to have people see it once we clean up the hurricane of boxes.

I will also be excited to live in one place, rather than shuttling possessions back and forth. My God, we have a lot of crap. Like, a loooootttt.