I'm going to vote tomorrow - against proposition 2. Not because I feel strongly that I want to stand up for the gay community, though that will be a nice after thought. No, I am voting NO for my country's constitution, the constitution that promises that we are created equal and as such we are entitled to certain inalienable rights and, implied is the right not to be discriminated against. We cannot claim to love America and then say that there are some people who are not entitled to being treated as humans.

Do I believe that God did created a union between a man and a women as something unique and special, and consecrated by Him. You know, I do. But I also know this, God loves us - even those who will deny Him in this world. And I don't think it is a very inviting or fragrant invitation to His love to inform other people that they don't count; that who they love doesn't matter, that their hurt, pain, anxiety or fear is an abomination. Gay people love beyond sexuality. They love in the day in day out care of another person. To tell them they cannot be present with their partner in extremis, that they don't count is unconscionable. And this is just the most obvious of violation of their humanity that I am called, as a Christian, and as someone who loves others who are gay, to recoil. Proposition 2 is the wrong answer. Proposition 2 violates our national constitution. Proposition 2 violates us as Christians.

The memory is so vivid it comes with smell and sound. Early 80's, movie theatre, boyfriend, michael Douglas - the movie was "Wall Street". The sequence was Douglas speaking to a group and at some point in his impassioned speech he said ... "Greed... Greed is good."

In the theater there were whistles and yells of praise. I was a product of the 80's, I understood the perspective. Still I recoiled. What was being applauded wasn't simply getting rich, it was getting rich at ANY - ALL cost. This was a concept, that even my MTV saturated mindset recoiled against. And yet here we are ...

2005. Are we at a better place in the U.S.? Corporate greed has made the bottmline the merciless god of our day. We sell off jobs to India, Mexico, China, Korea, Vietnam. Anywhere where labor is cheap, laws are lax, healthcare is either non-existant or government funded. But who cares, the stock holder - read CEO circles - get theirs. In our country pensions are scuttled - oh well to those who are retired already and living off of it, you should have planned better. But how possible really, was planning differently? Those pensions were promised in lieu of pay. Money that as individuals they might have been able to invest "safely" was tucked away as a promise for later. And now that money is being yanked - a defacto retroactive paycut, but oh, well the tax payer will carry the burden for the PBGC. But please note, the corporate management frauds are taken care of, they have their golden parachutes, their separate retirement funds - funds removed from company books, so therefore immune to bankruptcy proceedings. You see, these brilliant business people, they need to be kept whole, you can't afford to lose talent. Greed is good.

So ... what is it that lead me here? Three boys, home schooling, life. There's a heart beat and just the semblance of rhythm. Breathe. In out. Right? That's all it takes?!

Okay the lesson I am grappling with. In my youth - sometime shortly after the dark ages - baseball was about the cute butts in tight baseball pants. It was about beer on a hot summer day in a AAA stadium, it was about people watching, it was about sobering up after the game by sitting in the parking lot with others in similar states of inebriation. It was NOT about baseball. This was a sport that made no sense to me other than background noise for what I described above. Fast forward.

I now have a baseball addicted son, and a husband who has made an inexplicable conversion. And I am struggling with that transition. You know a very wise group of people decided that parents should not drink while watching their children play a sport. And, no, I am not an exception. However, I have little experience in baseball without beer. And I certainly cannot admire my son's or his peers buns - waaaaay too creepy. So I'm grappling.