fiction and musings from a gay black dude with delusions above his station
Patricia Dunn and I stayed up long nights back in college to put together an alternative campus newspaper. She had a friend who owned a computer – exciting enough in the mid-80s – but it also had desktop publishing software. We were in awe. I remember having to space out columns the old-fashioned way in…
Sunday, February 19, 2157 I found what looks like a large, concrete building along the shoreline. And as the sun shifted, I could see solar panels reflecting on its roof. So I started walking towards the shore and figured I’d let it guide me along to what I hoped was my destination. That’s when I…
My sister Betsy and her partner Sue got married today. They had been together for 14 years, but the wedding was a spontaneous thing. They were getting ready for work, getting the kids ready for summer day camp, the usual routine. Then they heard that the court struck down the gay marriage ban. Betsy said…
True confessions. As a kid I watched the Go-Go Gophers cartoon. It was one of those “shorts” that was part of a serial cartoon series, in this case the Underdog Show. The Go-Go Gophers were buck-toothed, anthropomorphic gophers dressed in stereotypical Native American garb, replete with feathered headdress. They were the last of their tribe and lived…
“Love him, and let him love you.” – James Baldwin Out of nowhere, my friend started making loud, “Eww!” sounds. Over and over again, “Eeeeewwwww!!!” I was like, what? He said he saw two men on the TV, kissing. I had missed it. He continued to register his disgust on our eardrums. My other friend…
Defenders of the death penalty like to claim that it is not about vengeance, but about justice. I completely disagree. The death penalty is wholly and fully about vengeance. Our most base instincts feed its existence. It is the ultimate comeuppance. Death penalty defenders maintain that it removes criminals from society so that they cannot commit crimes…
In January 2005, Harvard President Larry Summers made some observations about the proportional lack of women in the upper echelons of academia. First, he stated that women are too busy being mommies to devote the 80-plus hours a week necessary to achieve standing in the academy. Second, he stated, in the most obtuse language possible,…
Cliven Bundy for me has been nothing more than a sideshow freak. His sole useful purpose has been to demonstrate, yet again, how desperate the radical right is for a hero to champion in their unremitting war against their loss of privilege. Here we have random white dude who has been breaking the law for…
Those who use religion as a bludgeon to pummel anyone who fails to follow their dogma are getting desperate. Despite years of proselytizing, society Just Won’t Get It. States continue to grant marriage equality rights. Courts continue to overturn anti same-sex marriage laws. And to make matters worse, the dreaded Affordable Care Act had made…
Dinosaur. Dinosaur. Dinosaur. I’m lost. I enter rooms and forget where I am. I drive streets I’ve known since childhood aimlessly. I make wrong turns to correct other wrong turns. Robert called me when both Mom and Dad, in their turns, passed on. I had to call my other siblings once I got word from…
