A North West View

With all that is going on in Washington state with the marriage equality bill, and the campaign that is already is underway to overturn it, it is hard not to get sucked up into the politics and debate that is swirling around it, even more so when your gay and thus the subject of said debate; and this is where I find my self sucked into the storm.  Maybe for some getting sucked into that storm is something that has no affect on them, not even in those quite moments late at night, early in the morning or those stolen moments during the day when all you have to occupy yourself with our your thoughts,  but for me that is not true, allowing my self to be sucked in dose have an affect on me, some good some bad and some just not quite ether, however I also believe however that you can't truly live if you just stand outside the fire.

What is it with those that oppose same sex marriag e, otherwise know as marriage equality, when they feel like dancing around religious indignation they suddenly start pulling out the argument of   " Marriage to me is a word with specific meaning. To call something else by the same name is , I believe, a problem in semantics, confusing and illogical . Insisting on calling different things by the same name is to lose the language." ( emphasis  added) as if people and their love for each other are like an kitchen appliance or some other inanimate household object?  This is something that really gets under my skin and makes my blood boil. I mean I really just can't  comprehend  how some one can talk about other people like that!

So many of you may have already heard that marriage equality in the great state of Washington, my home, is already under attack by the anti gay rights lobby, we have two legal fronts that they are trying to attack us from, one being threw the referendum process, for which not even 3 hours after marriage equality was signed into law they had submitted their referendum which is now officially Referendum 74, R 74/Ref 74 for short.  They have the 3 month period starting with the end of this legislative session, in other words until June 6th, to submit 120,557 valid signature (non duplicate, signatures voters registered to vote in the state of Washington) and of the initiative they have until July 6th to tun in  241,153 valid signatures as well.  but the Initiative has been in the works (it was filed back in January).

So I just got back from my trip to see the showing of A Right To Love: An American  Dream, I want to do a quick review, although one that dose not really give anything away about the film. That and I want to share about the trip as well and throw my own commentary in behind some current events that I have not had the time to write about ether because I was busy preparing to take my trip of I was on the trip.

There is a reason that I sort of suddenly dropped out of the picture when it came to the updates on the fight for marriage equality in my state (Washington) which by the way is scheduled to have a committee vote on the legislation, that that state Senate passed last week, this Monday with it coming to a floor vote before the whole house possibly latter in the week.  However it is not due to a lack of keen interest and desire to see said legislation implemented into law, but my utter drop off in commentary has much more to do with being sick and tired of  reading the articles and especially the comment sections of the article on this issue.  As for the articles it always seems that they have to include the usual handful of rabidly anti marriage equality commentators, and well we all know what they have to say on the issue.

Well we are just one vote away from marriage equality in Washington, with the announcement by state Senator Jim Kastama of his support of the legislation, that leaves us with 24 of the 25 votes needed to pass SB6239.  Not only are we now one vote away but today Microsoft officially came out in support of the bill as well, and posted a very well written  persuasive and eloquent (for a corperate blog) expression of support.  Which as has been mention in a previous post has been a key in garnishing the final needed votes to pass equality legislation.   Of course still being one vote away success can not be taken for granted simply for the fact that until that one vote is locked in the line could come down one vote short for us too, but there is much reason to be optimistic and bask in this little victory.

It seems as much as I would like to lose weight I keep undermining those goals lately as I seem to be emotional eating up a storm, which of course has me again starting to gain weight and pack on the fat.  Which really only makes me feel that much more worse because it is not what I want.  I at the very least want/ed to get back to the weight I was before (my last nasty bought of depression) which was 195lbs and was still over my ideal weight.  Of course not only is this a problem of its own but it is also an outward sign of emotional distress with in.