So the last post, that was the rational part. (Of my response to HRC's new campaign for gay marriage rights.) HRC almost always appeals to the rational side of my brain, that's what bugs me about them. Then I pasted their little message into my browser and gave it a quick little read to see what kind of dopey legalistic spin that had put on this one, and I got to this line:

Finding a soul mate and building a life together is an integral part of the American dream.

Yeah, reading it back now, it still is partially the product of a grownup debate-team star. It could come right out of a legal brief: this is an integral part, it's the American dream. I must have glossed right over those words the first time. Because they slipped in a couple other phrases that reached up out of the screen and slammed a big burly fist through my heart: Soul mate. Building a life together. Dream. Finding a soulmate and building a life together may or may not be the American dream. I don't care. They're my dream. And they're missing. And there's this huge gaping hole in my life that's eating away at me every morning when I wake up because of it.

That's why I've been posting so much crap about gay marriage on this blog. Gay gay gay gay gay! What gay blog. Can't you ever talk about anything else? It's been much gayer than I ever intended or foresaw. I do have other interests. But lately, this one has suddenly be thrust into the forefront. The sodomy decision, the Canadian marriages, the MA ruling, my breakup with my boyfriend . . . That last one may not apply to all readers. But that's the one that really smacks me in the face, refuses to allow me to forget what I need, what I've got, and how far I've got to go. Finding the little bastard is the first assignment, figuring out what to do with him once we hook up will be the next trick.

I've always wanted to get married. For most of my life I thought I was a straightguy and I spent most of my 20s and over half my 30s trolling for a wife. I was sleeping with men part-time since I was 28, but until at least 37, I was still hoping to make it work with a woman. Of course I was. I wanted a wife, I wanted a marriage, I wanted a family.

Letting go of that dream was the hardest thing I've ever done in my life. Harder than recovering from the fall that crushed one of my vertebrae, harder than the year I spent in a bodycast recovering. Much harder than Army Basic Training or Officer Candidate School or living in the Kuwaiti desert for two years. Those seemed pretty hard at the time, but were nothing compared to admitting I was a homo.

Hard enough that I was sleeping with men for nine years before I could admit the obvious. Hard enough that I'd been secretly lusting after them for close to thirty years before I could admit the obvious.

So in a big scary shouting match with my shrink one summer morning, I suddenly saw how ridiculous the dream was and I finally let it go forever. But if I can't marry a woman I don't see why I can't be allowed to marry at all.

Who I marry is between me and him and God, and that's all that matters at the most basic level. I will marry a man, one way or the other, just like my current minor heroes Chip and Reichen.

But marriages transcend every other form of commitment, because they haul the outside world in to participate in the contract. A marriage is much more than promising one other person you'll stick by her until death do you part. You can promise that in the bedroom. Or in a burst of sudden rapture as the fading sun licks the Rockies on your first harrowing hike through the crest of Lemhi Pass. Marriage is about standing up in front of all your friends and families and God and the state and everyone and everything that matters to you, and promising in front of us that you'll honor that oath or look like a great big ass. It's the asswipe factor that gives the event its gravity. That and the legal repercussions. Marriage represents the most intrusive legal contract imaginable: everything that I have, everything I will ever obtain no longer belongs to me. It now belongs to this new entity merging two different people, relinquishing our individual rights and forging them into this new legal entity called a couple. A married couple.

Those two things, the asswipe threat and the legal entanglement, those are the forces that invest marriage with such power. Neither one may keep you together once you hate each other, but each one scares the shit out of you about the possibility. I know why I'm not married yet. Because I've loved a lot of people, and I've wanted to take a chance with a few of them, just not that much of a chance. Marriage takes on significance only because so much is at stake. I can have half of the marriage stake right now. Everything but the legal half. Reichen & Chip have half already. I want the whole thing. Desperately.

In theory I can already get the other half. My high school prom date shocked me a few years back by coming out herself. My first little lipstick lesbian. About two years ago, she moved to Denmark, renounced her citizenship and bore a set of twins. She got both halves, plus a traditional nuclear family, plus Denmark. But she had to find a Danish woman to do it. And renounce her citizenship.

I don't want to do either. I want to remain an American. I want to stay in America and enjoy life, liberty, and especially the pursuit of happiness. Liberty to marry, happiness with the man of my dreams.

If I could just find him.

Wow, who radicalized HRC? Suddenly so bold all of a sudden this past month. They used to be SO wussy on the issue of gay marriage, but suddenly they're out front. Now they're leading a petition drive on it. Time to grab their moment, I guess. Well, good for them.

They just set up a site called MillionForMarriage.org (that url just routes you back to the HRC "Action Center" subsite for this project). The headline reads:

Say "I DO" to marriage equality

Here's the full text:

With legal marriage now available to gay and lesbian couples in Ontario and British Columbia — and potentially in Massachusetts too — this is the time for every American who believes in civil rights and marriage equality to speak up.
 
Finding a soul mate and building a life together is an integral part of the American dream. Gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender Americans share that dream and just like every American family, they need the responsibilities and privileges that come with marriage.

Please say "I DO."  Sign this petition  -  and join the Million for Marriage movement today.

Please click over and support my tortured quest to land myself a husband.

I know I said I'm against demanding gay marriage at the moment. I still think I am, though I've been wracked by doubts ever since I wrote that. I'm afraid we might shoot ourselves in the foot if we don't lay the cultural groundwork first--that's where people like Chip & Reichen come in. (They really will turn out to be heroes for what they've done, I think, along with Jerry Bruckheimer, of all people, and whoever else at The Amazing Race and CBS let that happen.) BUT . . .

I am definitely in favor of rallying support for the concept. I am definitely in favor of demonstrating to the vicious powers that be that a lot of people in this country believe we should have the same rights they do. Especially this right, one of the most important things in my life.

I'm also in favor of a much bigger push for every gay man and woman in the country to start doing something I read about a few years back and have been only doing myself occasionally. On every form listing marital status, draw in another box below, married, single and divorced, and write in "Not allowed to marry," and check there. Or "Forbidden to marry" if you prefer. I think that's what people need to see. Millions and millions of actual people around them legally forbidden from marrying. That's the reality of what this mostly-great state of America is doing to some of us.

Of course we're not forbidden from marrying in theory. Theoretically, I can marry a woman. Which in practice is exactly the same as if we changed all the marriage laws restricting them to couples of the same sex, and then telling every straightguy: "What do you mean forbidden to marry? You're free to marry any man you want." Technically true, in practice a sham.

The thing that amazes me the most though, is that all the "Christians" and all the others lined up against gay marriage can't come to terms with the most obvious impact of their prohibition. Under their rules, gayguys are free to marry, as long as it's to a woman. And guess what, millions of them do. And guess who they are: your friends, sisters, your daughters. Oh don't think they haven't stopped. It's still hard as hell to admit you're a homo--even to yourself; especially to yourself. So millions of gayguys are still marrying your friends and sisters and daughters, and sometimes . . . sometimes it's even your dear old mom. Of course they don't usually stay married to them. It may last five years, it may take twenty, but eventually they usually face reality and come out belatedly and smash the hell out of a whole lot of lives. Dad may still be coming out to you any day now. Be careful what you wish for.

There's a FansOfRealityTV site with a thread dedicated exclusively to Chip and Reichen. It's up to 821 posts as of this morning. This will take you to the first post. To get to the last, look for the long row of yellow numbers just above the first post, and click on the highest number, off to the right. Currently it is 42.

(This will take you to all my Reality TV posts, which has been nearly all Chip & Reichen lately.)

Wow, no one knew. The surprise wasn't so much that Chip and Reichen came out on the Amazing Race tonight, but that they were still in. That explains why the producers never milked the coming out scene before. We had known they told the NFL wives, and I thought the models knew, so I assumed they had told everyone. (The crew must have been all abuzz about it. I'll lay money they were betting money on when the boys would come out--and maybe on how the virgins would react, but who would take that bet?)

How sad to have to keep that act up for most of the race. And what an added stress. We've heard Chip call Reichen honey twice now, and I had the distinct impression that's his standard name. No slipping up on that when the other teams are around. Always keep a safe distance, resist the urge to give him a squeeze or hold his hand, be careful about a pat on the back, better to go with a punch in the shoulder. That explains why they never kissed at the finish line, or rarely even hugged. Must be an incredible relief to let go of all that. And what a shitty thing to have to do to your husband, denying your love for him in a thousand different ways every day. It will be interesting to get their explanation in interviews later. I would not have taken them for the closet-case type.

Kind of surprising no one seemed to have a clue. Even after Reichen made his little announcement, no one seemed to grasp what he was doing with Chip. The "Christian" virgins were certainly shocked. And bitchy. Refusing to clap with everybody else for their first wedding anniversary. Those dirty looks they exchanged were hysterical.

What a great moment: Reichen trying to play Air Force hard ass, but losing control and breaking down. He's a sweethard, even if he is kinda cold. And it was great to see all the actual Christians so supportive.

Actually made the big lame non-elimination episode passable. Maybe the producers pulled Reichen and Chip aside early and said, "Would you mind holding off until this really boring episode we have planned, when nothing happens at the end except a big letdown?"

Phil did open the show with a "Who will be eliminated next?" Sly dogs. You're so used to hearing the same phrase with elimination in it, you just fill in the rest. The first time it ever happened I would have bet my life that I had heard him ask who would be eliminated that night, but I flipped back to the start of the Tivo, and there it was. " . . . next?"

Those two gayboys are going to be in big trouble if they don't settle down and quit playing so aggressively, though. They broke one of the cardinal rules of Third World travel: nothing will ever happen as scheduled or especially as advertised by a stranger with something to sell. They've been to Asia enough to know better. (At least Chip has.) They're trying too hard, wanting it too badly, gambling too wildly.

That's the second dumb gamble they've made on a flight. Have they not watched the earlier races? This game is all about conservatism, unfortunately. It's a fools bet in this game to risk fifth place for the possibility of taking first. First gets you nowhere. Virtually every leg, they're all bunched up together again at the first transport, so first place is the same as tied for last right after the elimination. The downside is way bigger than the upside. Especially for them: they're young, strong, fast and smart. They usually do well, so in a five-way dead heat, they've got a much lower than one-in-five chance of elimination. Risking a flight that might be 50/50, that's a one-in-two chance. Really dumb odds. What are they thinking?

I know what they're thinking, that's how I kept wanting teams to play the first race: Do something bold, take a chance and grab a strong lead. I’m sure that's how Reichen played it at the Air Force Academy, I'm sure they've both succeeded that way their whole lives. But that's not this game. They need to get with the program if they want to be our big gay heroes all the way to the end.