As you may have guessed, it’s been A Month. You’ll find no apologies here for my absence, just acknowledgement that it’s my busiest time of the semester. So I was looking forward to a well-deserved night out with friends last evening.
We joked about me blogging the night; I’m not going to do that. It was a fun, successful blending of groups, even. But I’d like to talk about what happened afterwards.
Pittsburgh, grow up. If you see two men in a car together, they may be friends, they may be lovers, they may be coworkers, they may be partners. They may even be married. GET OVER IT. This is now, this is life. And last night, those were my friends. My friends who had a brick thrown at their car simply because they were two men together inside.
Excuse me? I thought we had worked past this little issue. I thought all of the strides made on the national front regarding DADT, Prop 8 and (hopefully) DOMA were trickling downward. The little things were improving. The majority of people in this country now support gay marriage for the first time ever. But this isn’t about marriage equity, this is about TWO GUYS SITTING IN A CAR!
I’m so angry right now. And a little scared, honestly. It happened in my neighborhood, down the street from my house. That’s not the kind of neighborhood I thought I lived in. It’s not the kind of neighborhood I want to live in. It’s certainly not the kind of neighborhood I want my son to grow up in.
So now, as I head into my big event week on campus, I won’t think about last night as a lovely (and hilarious) evening with friends, a nice reprieve from work and stress, a wonderful visit. I’ll think about it as the night that I was reminded that my hometown can still be quite small-town. And I don’t like that at all.
I expect better, Pittsburgh.
having fun storming your castle 
Dear God in Heaven, are you serious?
One thing I’ve thought time and again as homosexuality becomes more and more normalized in our society is that it’s suddenly on the brain when you see two people of the same sex together. I, of course, am very open to loving relationships that have nothing to do with gender, but yeah, I’ll catch myself wondering all the same, something I never used to do. I can only imagine it’s the same for the bigots, who no longer see brothers, friends, roommates, neighbours, co-workers, army buddies, etc, but what must obviously be two gay guys doing whatever immoral gay thing gay guys do. I think we’re at a mid-point of awareness. The part where it’s worse before it gets better. But I have complete faith that it *will* get better. As long as we keep teaching our kids that love is love, the next generation will be just fine.
I hope you’ll be able to recapture the awesome of last evening. You deserve untainted awesomeness.
Wow, that’s awful! I live in a neighborhood of Pittsburgh where occasional crime happens and now that we have a daughter we are a little less laissez faire about it. We are working to be the cliched part of the solution, not part of the problem but it can be a struggle. Sorry your night was ruined!