Gay Marriage.....to polygamy?

My friend and blog partner, Elmer's Brother, sent me the article below, from The Economist, and attached this comment ........"And so it begins. Gay marriages are becoming legal and now the arguments for other non traditional families. And the advocates of gay marriage said this would never happen." (and others said it might)

Please read the article and tell us if you agree........thanks.

Marriage and liberty

Why pick on polygamists?

Jul 22nd 2011, 20:41 by W.W. | IOWA CITY

 

JONATHAN TURLEY, a law professor at George Washington University, is representing the family featured on the reality show "Sister Wives" in their legal challenge to Utah's law against polygamy. It's a big, unusual family. Kody Brown is "married" to four women and father to 16 children. "One of the marriages is legal", Mr Turley writes, "and the others are what the family calls 'spiritual.' They are not asking for the state to recognise their marriages. They are simply asking for the state to leave them alone." Mr Turley goes on to make what I find to be a persuasive case.
The Browns have been subject to a criminal investigation for more than a year, but are not accused of child abuse or any crime other than having a particular kind of unusual family. Mr Turley notes that other families with similarly unusual structures are not picked out for persecution by the law. "It is widely accepted that a person can have multiple partners and have children with such partners", Mr Turley observes. "But the minute that person expresses a spiritual commitment and 'cohabits' with those partners, it is considered a crime." This certainly seems arbitrary. Indeed, the law positively encourages de facto polygamous families to organise into multiple households lacking the cohesion and economies of our culture's idealised single-household family.
Imagine the family of a twice-divorced, thrice-married woman with one child from each union. Let's say she's a stay-at-home mom who has custody of all the kids, and gets child-support payments from her first two husbands. So, children with three different fathers live together in a single household, supported by a portion of three different mens' income. How is this not de facto polyandry? How significant is it, really, that her first two husbands don't happen to live with their kids and her third husband? Suppose they move in. What then? Is it okay as long as they pay rent? As long as they no longer love the mother of their children, or vice versa? I say it's okay as long as everyone involved says it's okay.
Mr Turley wonders why civil libertarians haven't been more vocal in support of the right of polygamists to be left alone:

The reason might be strategic: some view the effort to decriminalize polygamy as a threat to the recognition of same-sex marriages or gay rights generally. After all, many who opposed the decriminalization of homosexual relations used polygamy as the culmination of a parade of horribles. In his dissent in Lawrence, Justice Antonin Scalia said the case would mean the legalization of “bigamy, same-sex marriage, adult incest, prostitution, masturbation, adultery, fornication, bestiality and obscenity.”

But isn't polygamy, as it actually exists, a backward practice hostile to the interests of women? What about fundamentalist Mormon compounds in which children are raised in isolation, indoctrinated/brainwashed, teenage girls are married off to their uncles and impregnated, while surplus boys are ejected without the tools to cope with the outside world. Mr Turley replies:

Of course, the government should prosecute abuse wherever it is found. But there is nothing uniquely abusive about consenting polygamous relationships. It is no more fair to prosecute the Browns because of abuse in other polygamous families than it would be to hold a conventional family liable for the hundreds of thousands of domestic violence cases each year in monogamous families.

I think this is the right way to think about it. I would add that conventional monogamous marriage was in fact an abusive, exploitative, patriarchal arrangement until very recently. In 1993, North Carolina was the last state to recognise spousal rape as a crime. (end of article)

(the author of this piece is not named by The Economist.  I can't blame them)

Our Australian blogger friend MK once wrote this comment at another blog and I thought there was a lot to it and so I print it here::
On the subject of gay marriage, from my personal view, the argument against it is the slippery slope one. If you allow two women to marry because they love each other, well you have to then allow 3 women to marry or four men, a brother and sister for example.

Marriage to me is a key component to the success of western civilization, we should not fiddle with it for the sake of satisfying a small minority of people. I know gay marriage alone has not led to the downwards slide of the west, but the overall undermining of marriage, morality and commitment most certainly has made its contribution.
z

Wedded bliss....got any input!? :-)

Dear geeeZ-reading friends, I'll have no Sunday Faith Blog this weekend, so please say a prayer for good health and great happiness for my nephew and his beautiful bride! I'll be at the wedding and will return Sunday and your comments will stay on moderation.  I'd love to come back to a chain of MARRIAGE ADVICE  I can send to my nephew if you have a minute?!  I'll publish them for you all to see when I'm home. Thanks for everything. Have a great weekend........

thanks!
Z

xxx

Another liberal and another cheapening of LIFE

I'm going to get some of you upset........humor me, I've had this on my mind for some time:

Big news! Elizabeth Edwards is 'relieved' that her husband, John Edwards, has finally announced "This child is mine." Aren't you all relieved, too? Hardly. Who cares? Except that this story is just another in a chain of stories of liberals demeaning LIFE, the preciousness of sweet new babies, parenthood, the beauty of two-parent families, happy marriages, etc etc etc. How many more stories like this do our teens have to hear before they stop believing in the sanctity of life? Follow me here...............

Then, we have Jerry Springer who promotes shows with themes like "Ma Sistuh is datin' mah Fathuh" (I got the accent right off the video...check THIS OUT), and "I had sex with your Mama!" (oh, how PROUD you are!...not a little sarcasm here on my part)....the link has any amount of sickening videos...such "GREAT ENTERTAINMENT!" (more sarcasm) Now, liberals have said to me "But, this is REAL LIFE, this is what's going on!" My answer is, "Why revere it, give it air on TV...and, oh, by the way?.... I KNOW NO ONE LIKE THIS...AND HAVE NEVER KNOWN ANYONE LIKE THIS." You'll hear liberals say "But IT SELLS!" I say "It SELLS because this is FREAKSVILLE!" They come back with "It's REAL LIFE!"

In my opinion, ART (TV, media, newspaper stories, etc.) has begun to dictate LIFE and it should stop. Liberal opinions of single mothers, etc., has given PERMISSION to people who celebrate things unhealthy for society today. Can anybody not point to the FACT that there are FAR FAR more children born to single mothers today than before? WHY? Before, it was SHAMEFUL (yes, I have the guts to say it if some others won't...I LIKE the word SHAME and feel America did a lot better when the left hadn't made the word so forbidden because somebody might get hurt feelings or...gasp!...GUILT!) SHAME, in the long run, helped lives run better...helped people make healthier choices if they look back on what they might have chosen for themselves. Is that an accident? (Jerry Springer's shown on French TV right after High School kids get home....you should hear what people think of it. Aren't you PROUD? And the LEFT wonders why "THEY" hate us?...REALLY??)

MAURY POVICH apparently still has a show (I'd seen it a few times years ago and just Googled and there it is..still running)....The MAURY STORE has infant outfits that say "I MET MY DADDY" and grown up T Shirts that say "I AM NOT the Father" .........would you be PROUD to wear one? (yes, I'm kidding) I watched a few Maury shows a few years ago to see what he does...it was DNA test after DNA test, daily......then, every day, revealing WHO THE FATHER WAS! As if this poor child is a BASKETBALL to be thrown around and OH, the GLEE in those punk faces when it WASN'T THEIRS! "IT?" And there sat the 15 yr old mother, crying............and will go home and raise that child. And we wonder why America has problems?

Seen the HIGH SCHOOL REUNION show teaser on TV ads every few minutes?..... REAL PEOPLE necking, the girl wrapped around the guy's swim-suited body in a pool ...aren't you embarrassed to be watching when you know these aren't actors? ick. (These are shows that Conservatives produce? (ya, right)
Then, watch HGTV and see "Ben and Gina are looking for their FIRST HOME TOGETHER...." Of course, Ben and Gina are single, but what the heck, we're getting USED TO HEARING THIS...we're becoming INURED TO IT...drip drip drip.....it goes into MY brain, your brain, our kids' brains.

What's going on? See, we can't complain because we'll hear "But that's REAL LIFE...WHY NOT show it?" or "WHAT are you, in the DARK AGES? Get a clue!" or "What a PRUDE....teach your kids right and this stuff won't affect them!" (Won't affect them? I thought you said it's COOL?)

Is Liberalism as responsible as I think it is? You tell me. Do I think all Conservatives live uplifting lives of values which promote healthy and happy children? (no, but the numbers of Conservatives doing that is higher). Oh, another liberal harangue to my criticism is "Who am I to say Conservative values are better?" I'm nobody. I just look at the facts and extrapolate. And, of course, "who am I to say what MORAL IS?" Right? Can we survive as a country with no definition of MORALITY? Oh, I forgot....some leftwingers believe the only MORALITY is NEVER GOING TO WAR. well...but I'm trying to make a point here, so let's not go there. ***

Your prudish, priggish little friend, Z, is throwing this out for conversation............What are your thoughts? *** The ABSOLUT VODKA ad is from THIS BLOG. I had no use for the Harry Reid allusion and didn't notice it until I published it here, frankly...I just liked ABSOLUT AMORALITY for my post. Wanted to give credit where credit's due on the image.
z

Sunday Faith Blog......And Happy Father's Day

"Heavenly Father, My faith is in thee, my expectation is from thee, my love goes out toward thee, I believe thee, accept thy Word, acquiesce in thy will, rely on thy promises, trust thy providence. I bless thee that the court of conscience proves me to be thine. I do not need signs and wonders to believe, for thy Word is sure truth." (From The Valley of Vision, A collection of Puritan Prayers and Devotions)

Happy Father's Day, gentleman bloggers. Cherish your dads, all of you who still have them....Happy Fathers Day, Dad. I miss you very, very much. Some day, I hope to tell you just how much...Some day, I hope to have my hand in yours again.

Please read Law and Order's Father's Day piece...you'll be so glad you did. And Mustang has written a poem you'll want to read.

z

A tale of a young sailor......something to lift you up

From fellow blogger, fellow America supporter, and dear friend, Heidianne...I got this email last night:

thank you to all of your for your prayers for my son, jesse. he received his final waiver from the u.s. navy on friday and today he received his date for re-joining the navy.

he will be leaving on 22 december 2009 – unless they can get an earlier date which the recruiter is working on - he will have to complete the final 11 days of basic training that he missed when he was separated for his collar bone injury. yea!!!!(z: it says "rejoining" due to an injury...he'd done all but 11 days of basic training and then things got goofed up!)

I wrote Heidianne back:

You tell him even ol' Z, who doesn't know him, is SO PROUD OF HIM.

God bless your boy.xx

To which this wonderful boy responded:

Please tell her I said Thank You and that it is an honor to be able to serve her and all who support us in This Country.

Love you, Mom.

To which I say "Thank you, Jesse, for your incredible attitude and love for America...and thank you, Heidianne, for having grown up such an amazing son!"

We need more like Jesse. I'm betting some of you know fine young men like Jesse....I'd love to hear about them. I know we all would.

Thanks, Heidianne and Jesse, for allowing me to brag on him and you AND for being who you are.

z

A New Priscilla's Post...Schools and Unions, the beginning:

I asked Priscilla to write a piece based upon stories she'd told me about unions and her childrens' schools 40 years ago. This is when things started to go bad....this is when Miss Landers left our schools for good.

It was spring of 1969. Most of the teachers at my childrens' elementary school had spent days telling the children about going on strike, forming a union and essentially, putting their spin on it. The students didn’t learn much concerning their curriculum during that period of time.

My daughter’s teacher did not engage in this. The reason being he did not agree with it, and did not join the strike. My son’s teacher, however, did. My son, who was eight years old, was clearly worried and upset, although he felt relieved when his teacher told the class she would not leave and go out on strike. He liked her very much.

When he had apprised me of what the class was being told, I went to the school and spoke with his teacher, telling her I thought it was inappropriate to be using class time on their union agenda and what they wanted to gain from it. That, after all, these were eight year olds, and they shouldn’t have to deal with this sort of thing. She was polite, but, noncommittal.

I decided at that point that I would walk with him to his classroom, instead of dropping him off, just in case. He kept telling me, it was ok because she wasn’t going to walk out.

Sure enough a couple of days later, the teachers were on their picket line outside the school, including his. The principal wanted all the children to go to the auditorium, but I told him I was taking my son home. I wasn’t going to have him warehoused in the auditorium all day, and the principal agreed that since I was there it was fine to take him home. As if he could stop me.

When we got in the car, my boy began to cry, looked at me, befuddled and said, “mommy, she lied to us”. I said “I know, and that was wrong”. I hugged him and we went home. I was hopping mad, and two days later I was on the sidewalk with other parents demonstrating against the teachers and the union. I had taken my son to a friend’s house because I didn’t want him exposed to this activity.

His teacher nastily yelled at me, “well Mrs. Pris, you’ve come a long way”, and I walked across the street with my sign in hand and told her, “I didn’t lie to my son, you did”. Another parent, a friend, had followed me and walked with me over there with the teachers while they told us they had a right to strike, as we told them this was hurting the children, and that public employees did not have a right to strike.

We walked back across the street. The teachers yelled and called us “scabs“, “go home”
“get out of here,” “you’re ignorant”, There was some foul language as well which I will omit. A couple of Moms yelled back, “go back to your classes”, but for the most part we ignored their insults. Many of us mothers were on the executive board of the PTA, including me, and had worked with these teachers, helped them out, raised thousands of dollars to buy equipment for their classrooms and playground, and generally got along great. We gave them a faculty luncheon every year to show our appreciation.

When the school secretary arrived in her car and tried to pull into the driveway the teachers pounded on her car, yelling at her, tried to stop her from pulling in, and behaved like hooligans.

The office secretary was a lovely woman who worked for the principal, and was not obliged to go on strike, but, they didn’t care. Children were lined up on the other side of the fence, watching all this. The principal was cowering in his office, instead of keeping the children away from this chaos.

He called me into his office to ask me to please convince the parents outside to go home, and told me, “you wouldn’t want to be called scabs would you?” I told him they could call me whatever they want, I wasn’t leaving and neither were the rest.

He ended up handing me the union contract to take home and read. I didn’t ask for that, and was surprised. Yes, he was a stupid man.

I returned it the next day after reading it until two in the morning. Among other things, included in the contract was a demand that they have more say regarding the curriculum. I explained that we voted for a school board to do that.

When the strike was over, my son had missed a month of school. They wanted us to send our children to school during summer vacation. I refused. So did others. The atmosphere at the school was never the same as it had been before. No more the friendly occasional chats between those teachers and PTA moms. We were treated pretty badly.

When the time came to plan the faculty luncheon we were informed by the representative teacher they would tell us what they wanted to eat. The luncheon was a pot luck provided by the parents. I told this teacher we weren’t taking orders and would do what we always did.

None of them ever volunteered to help out with the fundraising activities again. The school was now totally politicized. They tried to begin their own parent’s group, to edge out the PTA. They ended up with a parent’s advisory board, but the same women who were active in PTA, were on that.

The union was responsible for ridding the school of the dress code, which many of us opposed them in doing, and tried to stop, but it was out of our hands. The flag at the next evening program at school was no longer on the stage where it had always been. My husband gave the principal an earful and the flag was put back after that and not removed again.

All in all it was a sad situation. The union has become more and more powerful, and parents have had less and less influence, until today I feel parents aren’t really that welcome on school grounds, but tolerated.

In recent years, I picked up my grandson at school every day. The place was practically devoid of most teachers five minutes after the final bell rang. The curriculum is developed and put into practice as if parental concerns don’t matter. There is no continuity between school and home. Parental authority is undermined even challenged, and sadly, many parents have abrogated their responsibility in many ways too.

I have to say, I lost a lot of respect for teachers as a group and judged on a more individual basis taking nothing for granted.

I still maintain that the children are not sent to school to provide jobs for teachers and administrators; they are sent to school for those people to provide an education for the children. The politics involved in all this leave the children as merely pawns in an ugly and political game that is more about power than education.

Z: And, of course, I know Pris would agree that it's also become more "indoctrination than education". That seems to be the 'education' of our days. And you can see how it started.....imagine teachers having children see THEM in civil disobedience? Or, put a technical legal term aside, maybe it isn't that at all, maybe it's just plain forgetting about manners and how children should look up to their teachers, not see them acting like children? In the Leave it to Beaver days, a bit before my school days but not much, children looked up to their teachers and teachers relied on the parents for input and help.

Thanks, Priscilla...good insight, a true tale of how we missed the boat. Frankly, I'd take everything about life on LEAVE IT TO BEAVER over ROSEANNE any day of the week. In about every way. But, sadly....so many Americans took the slob's route of least resistance. Easier to scratch your *** than put gloves on and look presentable. Easier to let the kids just get by than really take an interest. I'm generalizing, but.........

z

This is a joke, right? WHAT?

check out the flag, okay? it's not photoshopped.

Report: ICE agents pressured to meet arrest quotas

By GILLIAN GAYNAIR, AP

LANGLEY PARK, Md. – U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents arrested 24 Hispanics at a convenience store in Baltimore two years ago after their supervisor told them to "bring more bodies" because they were behind their annual quota of 1,000 arrests per team, according to an ICE report released Wednesday.

The immigration rights group CASA de Maryland, which has accused ICE of racial profiling in the 2007 raid, released the agency's internal investigation report and said it shows that the agents acted improperly.

The report contradicts some sworn declarations made by ICE agents involved in the sweep, prompting the agency's Acting Assistant Secretary John Torres to ask for an investigation into inconsistencies, ICE spokeswoman Ernestine Fobbs said Wednesday. Meanwhile, CASA officials have called on Department of Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano to review the agency's enforcement policies.

"Government agents should not be in the business of judging people based on the color of their skin, clothing and employment, which is what seems to have occurred here," the Rev. Simon Bautista Betances, vice president of CASA's board of directors said Wednesday. (Z: What else can they do to round out as many ILLEGALS as possible?)

CASA officials have charged that ICE agents ignored blacks and whites at the 7-Eleven store as they rounded up all of the Hispanics, even crossing the street to detain Hispanics waiting at a bus stop. (Z: Is this the same guys who ignore dark swarthy skinned people at the airport and question Finnish grandmothers so it they're not profiling? How many blacks and whites are illegal in comparison with Hispanics?)

Soon after the raid, Sen. Barbara Mikulski (D-Md.) asked for an investigation into whether the ICE officers racially profiled the people they arrested. ICE's internal probe found the allegations to be unsubstantiated, Fobbs said.

"I have confidence that the new Department of Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano will fairly address this and other immigration issues," Mikulski said in an e-mailed statement in response to Wednesday's report. (Z: Ruhroh)

Of the 24 men arrested in the raid, one proved that he was in the country legally, 19 were deported or voluntarily returned to their native countries and four remain in immigration proceedings, said Justin Cox, an attorney with CASA representing some of the men.

The ICE agents involved in the raid are part of the agency's fugitive operations program, which tracks down violent criminals living in the country illegally. Agency records from the program show that beginning in 2004, the teams were assigned to arrest at least 125 fugitive immigrants. In 2006, each team's quota was increased to 1,000 fugitive arrests. (Z: isn't that a GOOD THING?)

"Our current enforcement of the immigration policy based on quotas lead to the separation of families and civil rights violations," said Gustavo Torres, CASA's executive director. "The evidence speaks for itself." (Z: Wait..so if an ILLEGAL snuck into our country, it's our responsibility not to separate him from his family? Couldn't they maybe STOP breaking laws if they were threatened with separation? They don't seem to mind separation when the men come here without families, which is what's normally done)

The debate over the raid centers on whether the agents had probably cause to detain the men or whether agents targeted them simply because they were Hispanic.

In sworn declarations, some officers said they stopped at the 7-Eleven to take a break after several hours of arresting fugitive immigrants in neighboring counties. When the agents arrived, they said Hispanic day laborers surrounded their vehicles asking for work and, when questioned, admitted they were in the country unlawfully.

However, in the report, some officers later told ICE investigators that the men mumbled or said nothing when asked about their status. Some also said that their supervisor had instructed them to beef up their arrests, the report said.

Cox said some of the day laborers testified that agents did not ask them about their status and ignored non-Hispanics passing through the store. (Z: Are they supposed to stop EVERYONE??)

"I think that this validates all the concerns that the immigrant rights community has been expressing for the past couple of years," Cox said.

Z: Are they kidding? Is this a JOKE? Does anybody have concerns about what illegal immigrants have DONE to our country? They're not happy? WHAT? I COME from immigrants..we ALL do....but my people are VERY new here...not telling how new for privacy sake; I LOVE immigration. My grandfather came at 9 and had the language licked in 3 months and became a successful man. My people never went on welfare, even the ones who weren't as successful as Grandpa. My people love this country and my mother made the King Family Entertainment Specials during the Bicentennial look underdecorated! We had STANDARDS in America regarding immigration then. We had laws, and stringent requirements! WHAT HAS HAPPENED? And THE ILLEGALS HAVE CONCERNS? ??

z

Tante Nana

Tante Nana lived a quiet life in a town in Northern Germany. It's a beautiful town, small and charming, with a university there. She had an older sister who died a few years ago, and they occupied two very large, nice homes, sharing a huge backyard between them, on the canals in that city. Those canals led to the North Sea. The two sisters kept a sailboat on a lake nearby their city and took it out together until they were both in their early eighties!

Tante Nana was married once, to a distant cousin, and had two children, a girl and a boy. The thing about her life that intrigued me enough to write about it here is that she was so SOLID. She was born and lived her whole life within one city block. The large house on the canal was the house she was born into. When she married, she made the 'big move' into the huge house on the main street in town..... just around the corner from the canal house. There, she raised her two children and lost her husband at a very early age. She continued living there, downstairs in this very old home with her two children, while her husband's brother lived upstairs with his wife and two daughters. It was that family upstairs who welcomed Mr. Z into their home when his mother died. He had lost his father when he was 2 years old, so this family meant a lot to him. When his aunt died two years after his mother, Tante Nana became the female figurehead of the whole family and was always loved and respected for all she did. By the time I met her, twenty year ago, she'd moved back into the house she'd been born in and left the house on the main street to her son's family.

We once went to Germany and surprised her at a birthday party the family held for her. It might have been her eightieth. She couldn't stop saying Mr. Z's name because she was so pleased to see him! It felt so right to be there for her and it felt so good that she'd been so pleased with our surprise! The year before that, we had spent half our honeymoon in Hamburg and visited Tante Nana, in her town not too far away, on one of those nights. She had a fabulous little wedding party for us with about ten relatives and amazing food! Even Los Angeles hadn't yet caught on to serving delicious individual hors d'oeurvres off the end of large silver soup spoons but Tante Nana's caterer in that small town had! Elaborately garnished bite-sized delicacies on silver platters were served and we had a terrific time. When we went to pay the bill the next morning at our hotel, after one of those delicious German inn breakfasts of sliced meats, soft boiled eggs, warm breads, sweet butter and jams, we were told it had been taken care of. Tante Nana's generosity knew no bounds.

Tante Nana was always interested in hearing what we were all doing and I got to thinking today about what she did. She started traveling when she was older, mostly to spas throughout Germany, but I wondered what she did all those earlier years of her long life. I guess she did what women did in those days; she shopped and cooked and kept a home. She helped her children with their school work, she was there for whatever extended family needed, she arranged birthday celebrations, she lived a quiet life in which the days passed without much excitement but, I hope, much fulfillment. Mr. Z remembers that every single Sunday's lunch was roast veal, boiled potatoes and peas. Every single Sunday, the same lunch, served around Tante Nana's dining table for the 2 families who occupied that big house.

A favorite memory from Mr. Z's time with those families was the weekends on their motorboat, Puck. Uncle Erich, Tante Nana and her children and her sister, Uncle Erich's 2 daughters, and Mr. Z, and a guest now and again, would spend Saturday night on the boat! Tante Nana would have packed nudel (pasta!) salads, cold sausages and breads, beer, and water for the kids. In the harbor in Bremerhaven, they'd see big ships, like a ship called The United States, the second largest passenger ship after the QE II at that time. Uncle Erich would always make sure they'd moor next to a big tugboat, with people on them he knew, and Mr. Z and he'd play cards with the captains late into the night.

Tante Nana took her position as matriarch of the family seriously and handled it with grace and dignity. Her solidity, that way she took life seriously, but with a smile on her face, and was always there for family, is why I loved her and why I wanted to write this today, two days after her passing. She's one of the last people, I guess, in the Western world, to have lived in one city block all her life, a phenomenon not rare at all until the last fifty years, I'd guess. With so much moving and so many more divorces and so much changing of jobs, living one's whole life in one block doesn't happen much anymore! People move on, they leave. She didn't. Who knows, maybe she always wanted to! But, this was the life she knew, this was the life that passed by quietly, and a life that leaves many people behind who'll never forget her and all she was and all she did.

Tante Nana was blessed with a long and healthy life. She'd have been 98 this coming November, and hadn't really had a sick day all her life, but she'd developed dimentia about five years ago and had been put in an old age home....about 1 block from that one city block in which she'd spent her whole giving, loving, respectable and solid life.

Mr. Z is grateful for her always being there for him and for her affection. Tante Nana's son went to University in Munich with Mr. Z and, Mr. Z tells me now that, as absurd as it sounds for 2 guys to send laundry home by post, they did! And, every time he'd open his little suitcase with the newly returned, cleaned and folded clothes, there was a delicious dry sausage in there from Tante Nana, too! These are the things people remember, these are the things that make life good. THIS is the kind of thing that filled her days. She had a good life.

We'll miss you, Tante Nana...it feels nice and fitting, and even important, to share you and your life with our friends here.

z (the photos are of the boat, the PUCK, the house Mr. Z moved into after his mother died, and the street that was right across the street from his high school)

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It's my Blog Anniversary, and I'd like to thank some very grand people!

This is my one year Blog Anniversary.

There are three people and one group of people I would like to particularly thank.

The first person I'd like to thank is Elmer's Brother. Some of you know him and his blog. He asked me so many times to start a blog and I thought he was absolutely NUTS. I knew I didn't have the techie gene and I figured any woman my age who still doesn't understand how a TV works and has trouble with a DVD player shouldn't go near a blog! Finally, Elbro said "I'll build it, just tell me what you'd like." So, I did. And he did. During the process, he was patient, talented, kind and amazing. He's continued to be so with any slightest problem I might have...and there have been a few! I hope he knows how much I love blogging and how much it means to me that he enabled the whole experience. Thank you, Elbro, from the bottom of my heart. I should mention that Elbro and I share a deep faith and that's been a big blessing to me. (I got to meet Elbro's family when they came to LA for another occasion and we stole them away for a nice walk on the ocean bluffs and dinner at our house...fabulous family, wonderful time together!)

I'd also like to thank Mr. Z for his undying support, enthusiasm and encouragement. He was in on this from the beginning, too, in such good ways, and I'm so grateful. Also, I'm so happy that he's written such good pieces for us all to read and learn from, and that he's taken such beautiful scenery photographs for us to enjoy! What a great addition to geeeeeZ all of his work's been! I am really thankful to my dear husband for so many things AND his blog participation!

Third, I want to thank Priscilla. I met Priscilla at Frontpagemag. com, and since I started this blog, she's been such a wonderful addition here to the comments page, the terrific email finds she's alerted me to and, especially, Priscilla's Post. Priscilla has a great conservative mind, knows her history, writes well, and is just an all-around great thinker and person. And she LOVES this country! I couldn't be prouder than I am for having her support and faithfulness at geeeeeeZ! (Priscilla and her terrific husband live not too far from here and we've been able to meet a few times and have had great times together...!)

There's a Small Band of Brothers (and sisters...you know who you are!) who, along with Elbro, helped me get started in ways I had never expected. They welcomed me wholeheartedly and so graciously, taught me, nurtured my baby blog, and they have been here supporting me from the very, very first days and I believe that, without them, I don't know if I'd have met many of you! These are brothers and sisters to me, and I love you, guys. Thanks for so much!! I owe you a LOT and I know it, and I SO appreciate each and every one of you.

And THANK YOU, readers and commenters here.... Your blogs are fantastic and it's humbling that you come here to participate at mine. Thank you very much. You're all terrific, I honestly have a real affection for you ALL, and I hope we share many healthy, happy years of blogging together.

So...thank you, ALL! This is getting CORNY, but I couldn't help it!....It's been fun to indulge in publicly thanking all of you...but, now, back to your blogs! We have a COUNTRY TO SAVE!! God Bless America....And I thank God for all He is to all of us. We'd be nothing without him!

Love and thanks to you. Imagine if we could ALL get together somewhere and talk and laugh and solve ALL the problems of the world? I guess our blogs will just have to suffice for now, right? Well, they do far more than that already, don't they! THANK YOU for everything.

Z

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My Gay Cousin

You'd have liked him. He was at least twenty years older than I am, and really not a cousin, but in my family, when someone's family's been close to another family for years and years, they get 'family names'. We call the older ladies in those close families "Auntie", for example. You probably have that kind of thing in your family, too, right? Something we've lost in America these days is that kind of respect, but some of us remember, I'll bet. Funny....but I just remembered, his mother was one of those dear ladies we never did refer to as "Auntie"....she was always "Mrs. X...." because she was SO dignified, so sort of 'regal', as well as respected. But, she was every bit as close to me as those "Aunties". When she died, she left everything to her family members....and to me. 3 sterling silver bracelets for me...because I'd loved her and respected her enough to visit her in the old age home she'd been moved to in the last few months of her life. I never, ever wear those bracelets without thinking of MRS. X.

Back to my cousin. He was probably gay. We think. He never talked about it, he never complained about it, he was just a wonderful man, period. He loved the arts, supported young musicians, and sang quite well, too. He was very involved with his church and very much loved by all he knew there. He had a friend whose name I'll also leave out for privacy sake. He was dignified, kind and fun. My cousin brought him to various concerts and banquets, and we all liked them both, though we didn't see the friend too often...he knew when to bring him and when it might not be the best idea. And I'm sure my cousin didn't mind.

This wonderful cousin had a large and loving family and was very good to them in every way....he also cared very much for his friends. He owned an 'ethnic' delicacy/food store, having inherited it from Mr and Mrs X, and worked there all his life, hiring Mexicans once other family members had retired and he was in full charge. When he died very unexpectedly, the Mexicans who worked there adored him so much for his kindness and thoughtfulness to him all those years that they were offered the purchase of the place and they did buy it. I don't know the business details, but that's what I do know. They also supplied the funeral dinner and a recent memorial dinner, on the anniversary of his passing. They supplied it. On them. They loved him that much. They are thriving in this business now. An 'ethnic' specialty store owned by an American-born fellow now owned and run by Mexicans, quite beautifully. The wave of the future? I don't know. But, if it is, I'd say this is a positive wave. A nicer, more productive, family-oriented bunch you couldn't find. And oh, do they appreciate the opportunity their ex-boss and America offered them!

My cousin never marched in a gay parade, he never wore effeminate clothing, he never held his friend's hand in public. As far as I know, he never held his hand in private...how do I KNOW? But, the talk, kind and adoring in spite of the subject, was that he and his friend were 'close'.

With my cousin, it was his spirit, his kindness, and his caring, which will remain in our hearts. I was reminded of him yesterday, when my mother said "You know, I missed getting X's call today......it reminded me of how much I miss him and how good a man he was........with these fires, he'd have called and asked if I was safe. He always called me if there was the slightest thought that something might be amiss with me or my neighborhood..."

That was my cousin. I think he probably took more pleasure in giving me the 3 silver bracelets from his mother than he did being left her estate. He'd been touched that I'd gone to visit her, but really, that was for ME. I loved her and took a lot of pleasure in seeing how much she appreciated my visits.

He lived his life as the man he was, never wearing his preference on his sleeve, always there for us, always respectable, always his very dignified and happy self. Another thing that reminded me of him today is this article at my buddy Clark's blog. It's a piece by another very dignified American, a gay cop commenting on the terrible way other gays are reacting since Prop 8 passed in California. I recommend you read it.

Let's remember that not all gays are unfulfilled, in-your-face, mean, angry or violent...or anti Christianity. For my cousin's sake. Thanks.

z