The electricity is scheduled to be started tomorrow (though I’m 99% sure it’s already on since the lights were one when we initially visited the house, it will just be switched to my name tomorrow), and the gas will be turned on Monday. I took Monday off in hopes of finishing moving anything we didn’t get over on Sunday, but will instead be waiting on the gas person because they could arrive anytime between 8 am and 4:30 pm and if nobody is there to let them in, then it’s a $44 charge each time they have to retry, which is nuts. Oh well, I found out we have about 7 people coming to help us move, so I doubt there will be anything left to move on Monday, and having the day off will allow me to start getting things put into place.

I’m slightly concerned about the water as I found out I need to go down to City Hall to start service in my name (since I’ve never had to pay a water bill before), so I’m going to do that tomorrow during lunch. I’m hoping (and thinking) that, like the electricity, the water is already turned on and just needs to be switched to my name, so we’ll have showers, sinks and (perhaps most importantly) toilets available immediately. If not, we have til Friday to be out of the townhouse (and I can extend that to any time until the end of the lease if necessary provided they haven’t found a new tenant yet), so we can run over there to take care of such necessities. Unfortunately, I know the internet will not be switched on until the 19th(!!!), which in some ways freaks me out (oh noes! life without the net!), but in other way will provide for distraction-free time to get the house set up.

All in all, I’m very excited and ready to go. It will be the first house (as opposed to townhouse/apartment) that either TheBoyfriend™ or myself have lived in during our independent adult lives. Can’t wait til tomorrow when I get that key in my hot little hands.

What if I really love my dog/daughter/house/tree/goat? Should I be able to marry him/her/it too?

After the Massachusetts decision, this was pretty much the defacto “argument” against gay marriage. For awhile though, it seemed the sheer ridiculousness of it had slowly pushed it into the repertoire of only the least educated and eloquent of the bigot brigade. Lately though it’s been making a bit of a come back across the board. The response is very simple. There is a clear objectively determined reason for limiting marriage by ability to consent (eliminating animals, inanimate objects, and children) and widening the gene pool (eliminating close incest).

Why can’t I marry 500 other people? I mean if we all love each other, that’s what matters right?

The irony of this argument is that the people using it most frequently consider themselves “defenders of traditional marriage,” and what form of marriage pray tell has a longer tradition than polygamy (or at least polygyny)? Seems to me that based on their self-identification, these folks would be major proponents of polygyny. All humorous irony aside, traditional polygyny (such as that still practiced by fundamentalist sects of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints) is rife with exploitation of women (usually beginning while they are still children), physical, sexual, and emotional abuses, and a host of other objectively undesirable traits.

That being said, there are a small minority of folks who have successfully engaged in truly polyamorous relationships (in which a group of more than two people love each other and wish to share their lives together). Personally, if they’re happy, I’m happy for them and have no objection to them seeking legal protections for their families, but (it’s a big but), civil marriage isn’t capable of offering them the protections they would need. As a lawyer, KipEsquire explains this point better than I could in his posts on the subject here and here, but if I can sum it up in layman’s terms; the legal institution of civil marriage (as powerful and expansive as it is) simply can’t meet the needs of more (or less) than two people. Marriage laws, as they rest on the books right now (sans arbitrary gender-specific language), fully meet the needs of same-sex couples (at least to the exact degree that they meet the needs of different-sex couples). A polygamist relationship brings with it a vast number of issues not currently addressed by civil marriage. Who is married to who (are all members married to each other, or is it a network of “sub-marriages,” in which one may be married to one spouse in the relationship but not one’s spouse’s spouse)? Who makes decisions when a spouse is incapacitated? How do divorces work? When it comes to polygamy and marriage, it’s not a matter of should marriage apply to polygamist relationships in modern society, but rather a question of can marriage apply to polygamist relationships in modern society; and the answer is a resounding “No.”

Marriage is about children.

Marriage is NOT about children. Straight couples incapable of having children (whether because of age, medical conditions, or even location) marry every day. I’ve heard it suggested that we allow the infertile to marry just to prevent them from running around having sex with everybody while not bearing children (in other words we chain them to one other person so they don’t pollute the rest of the population with procreation-less sex), but I don’t think that’s a notion that is even worth validating with a response. Of the thousands legal policies relating to civil marriage, only a small minority of them have anything to do with children. Clearly then, children are not a necessary element to a marriage.

But let’s, for a moment, assume that marriage IS in fact about children. It still doesn’t follow that gay couples ought to be excluded. The fact is that many, many, many gay couples out there have children (via previous relationships, adoption, artificial insemination, surrogacy, etc.). If marriage is about protecting children, why would one argue that the children with parents of the same sex are any less deserving of those protections. In fact, if marriage we’re truly about children, wouldn’t gay parents actually have MORE of a claim to marriage than childless straight couples?

Yet the “it’s all about the children” meme has legs and was even inexplicably cited as the dominant deciding factor in the Washington and New York’s Supreme Court decisions on the topic. The notion both of those courts put forth was that society has the right to encourage heterosexual marriage for the purpose of raising future generations. This misses the mark on two counts. First, of course, it starts from the invalid proposition that marriage is exclusively, or even primarily, about raising children. Secondly, and more importantly, it’s a ruling on a case that was not even in front of the court in the first place. The courts simply answered the wrong question. They were not asked if there was a state interest in encouraging heterosexual marriage, they were asked if there was a state interest in prohibiting homosexual marriage. The reality is that even if you accept the courts assertion that the state’s interest in straight marriages is to encourage the raising of children, you still have to explain how prohibiting gay marriages furthers that goal. Plainly, it doesn’t, and if it doesn’t, then you can’t legally deny the same rights to a segment of the population.

God hates fags, and marriage is a religious institution.

One of the great things about this country is that we enjoy the freedom of religion. That has allowed religions of all kinds to not only exist but thrive. Each of those religions has a different view of homosexuality as does each denomination within those religions and even each individual within those denominations. Given our freedom of religion, those religions and denominations which recognize marriages between members of the same sex ought to have their rights to do so respected equally as strongly as those religions and denominations which do not. The same separation of church and state that prevents religion from interfering with the government prevents the government from interfering with religion.

Certainly, the government has no business telling religious organizations how they may or may not conduct, record, and recognize their religious ceremonies, customs, and institutions. However civil marriage, both legally and traditionally, is a separate entity from religious marriage. Same-sex religious marriage already exists (among those religions and denominations which recognize it). The question being battled over in the courts and legislatures is only one of the civil institution.

I’m ok with "civil unions," why does it have to be "marriage?"

The Constitution (both federal and every state that I’m aware of) requires equal protection under the law, not just, really, really close to the same protection. Marriage is so inseparably woven into the fabric of our laws that any attempt to create a different legal status exactly the same as marriage is virtually impossible. This is already being shown in New Jersey where the legislature created civil unions "identical" to marriage instead of simply legalizing marriage for same-sex couples. Already cases are making their way back up through the courts in which couples in a civil union are being legally treated differently than a married couple. And New Jersey is the only state that even attempts to suggest that it’s civil unions (or domestic partnerships) are equal to marriage. The Supreme Court has decided that separate but equal is inherently unequal. It’s proving to be as true on this issue as it was on segregation.

Further, even if a civil union could be crafted that was 100% equal to marriage, why would such a thing be necessary? Is it not fair to ask the same question of the anti-marriage crowd; why so much fuss over just a word? Crafting such a civil union would require massive legislative changes on both the state and federal levels, likely costings millions or even billions of dollars. All just so the government can tell gay people, "while we’re going to give you the rights of marriage, we want to make sure that ou know that your relationships still aren’t as valuable to us as straight relationships?" That makes no sense. And if it did, could such a thing honestly be considered "equal" anyhow?

The government just needs to get out of the marriage business?

If you buy that such a thing would be desirable in the first place, this argument might be appealing in theory. In reality though, the government is in the marriage business, always has been, and it’s not going to change. As long as the government is in "the marriage business," it is indefensible for it not to extend those protections to all it’s citizens. For the record, does anybody ever recall hearing "get the government out of the marriage business" prior to gay marriage making headlines (or for that matter seperate from the gay marriage issue)? I think alot of people say this to sound like they want to treat everybody equally while still opposing gay marriage, but I have to say, to me, it comes across alot more as "I oppose gay marriage so strongly that I’d rather everybody do without then let gay people marry."

I don’t have anything against gay people, I just support traditional marriage.

Which tradition exactly is it that you support? Polygamy perhaps has the longest tradition behind it. Arranged marriages? Marriage for nothing more than social and political advancement? Marriage to children? All of these things have been part of marriage tradition at various times. As late as 1976, marriage provided legal absolution for men who raped their wives(!!!), in the United States. Is that part of the "traditional marriage" being defended? If it’s not, then why were those changes ok, but this one not? What is the criteria that defines "traditional marriage" because from here is looks an awful lot like "traditional marriage" is simply marriage with whatever changes society chooses to make to it as long as gay people aren’t allowed to engage in it (and if there’s a difference between that and having something against gay people, I can’t see it).

Gay people have the same right to marry a member of the opposite sex as straight people do?

Yeah, and black people had the same right to marry a member of their own race as white people did??? The logic between the two statements is entirely the same. In the 1967 SCOTUS case Loving vs Virginia, the court found "no legitimate overriding purpose independent of invidious racial discrimination which justifies this classification[.]" If all other arguments against gay marriage fall flat (and indeed, this post is at least an attempt to show that they do), how then can any honest court not similarly find no legitimate overriding purpose independent of invidious sexual orientation discrimination which justifies this classification? Especially if one affords gays and lesbians the status of suspect class as was done by the California Supreme Court (though I’d argue that prohibitions on same-sex marriage fail even a rational basis review). Absent a damned good reason, people ought to be able to marry who they want. To quote Mildred Loving, "That’s what Loving, and loving, are all about."

But, if you’re determined to not view gays and lesbians as a suspect class, and you insist that rational basis really just means any basis whatsoever however irrational), you’ve still got to contend with the fact that gender, as a class, requires at least intermediate scrutiny and prohibitions on same-sex marriage are undeniably examples of gender discrimination. Should a woman be denied the right to marry a woman when a man has that right? And since there are unequal populations of males versus females, it’s not even accurate to argue that both men and women are equally handicapped by the restrictions.

Gay people only want to get married to gain acceptance for their "lifestyle."

Guessing at the motives of groups you’re not a part of is dangerous at best, and certainly most gay people would dispute such an assertion as to their motives, but really, does it even matter? From the viewpoint of the government, it shouldn’t matter why a group of citizens wants certain rights, but only whether they are entitled to them. Most gay couples who would like the option to get married, want it to protect their families, solemnize their relationships, live under a set of rules that more closely match their place in society (two living as one), and gain acceptance from family and friends. Each of those holds a different priority for each couple, and all of them are valid reasons, but even if none of them were, the Equal Protection clause doesn’t end with "if you have a good reason." People don’t have to justify their claims to equality.

It’s an issue that should be decided by the voters, not "activist judges."

There’s a legitimate debate to be had over whether the rights of groups of people should be left to the (often fickle) whim of public opinion. For instance, was slavery OK when the majority of people would have voted in favor of it? And if we should vote on human rights, didn’t we already vote on this issue when the constitutions and amendments containing equal protection clauses were ratified? Seems to me that the people have spoken and decided that equal protection was something we wanted in this country. If they’ve changed their minds, then the only true remedy is to repeal those clauses. The bigot amendments that have passed have placed another level of complexity in their respective states by introducing a contradiction into their constitutions. A judge presented with a same-sex marriage case in one of those states will find themselves in the unenviable position of having to become actual activist judges because any decision they make would be a violation of one part of their constitution or another.

But the judges who have already made the decisions, were they activists? Unless your definition of "activist judge" is "any judge who makes a decision I disagree with, the answer is clearly "no." The judges were asked to decide if denying gay people equal marriage rights violated their constitutions’ guarantee of equal protection, and they decided that it did. What is so activist about upholding the constitution? What other job could a judge possibly have? When the law violates a citizen’s constitutional rights, a judge only has the option of striking either the entire law from the books, or striking the language from the law that runs contradictory to the constitution. Judicial activism would mean creating a new law that did not previously exist. That simply hasn’t been done in these cases.

I’ve heard it said that gay couples themselves should be working to win hearts and minds instead of suing for their rights. Gay people, by and large, are striving to win hearts and minds, but when one’s rights are being denied, where does one go other than the courts? The denial of equal marriage rights means that the law was broken in such a way that it caused harm to gay couples who wished to marry. If your neighbor stole something from you, would you contact your legislator and ask that they propose legislation to outlaw stealing? Of course not, because stealing is already against the law. Similarly, when gay people are confronted with a violation of equal protection, they don’t contact their legislator and as them to pass equal protection legislation; that legislation has already been passed.

I’d initially planned on taking today off of work, but, it kinda crept up on me and before I really thought to get it done, it was too late. It would have been a good day to take off to as it was a pretty busy weekend. My dad came up on Saturday to spend some time with me and take me out for dinner for my birthday. Which was nice but it meant that I spent Friday night cleaning house.

Yesterday, an old friend of TheBoyfriend™’s was in DC for a conference so we took a day trip up there to see him. It’s so refreshing to just get a significant change of scenery every once in awhile, if even for just the day (and it’s nice to be able to hold hands in public). Strange thing about DC is that, having never lived there or in the immediate area of there, I always randomly run into someone I know when I visit. Yesterday was no exception. As we were just leaving, actually getting our Metro farecards for the trip out (we decided just to park in Fairfax and ride the Metro into the city), I hear my name called, and turn to see someone I knew in college.

So we went hunting this weekend (we haven’t actually seen the inside of anywhere yet, just drove to check out the neighborhood and exteriors of the houses we’d seen ads for on the internet and to scribble down numbers to call from yard signs as we cris-crossed throughout neighborhoods that we wouldn’t mind living in that we suspected might still be in our price range. Learned a few things, half the city is for sale, but very little of it is for rent. What’s more, neighborhood-wise, our city is a strange little place. What’s more, our city is being “revitalized” meaning the lines between good neighborhoods and bad neighborhoods is getting a bit blurry. Many of the homes we looked at were in neighborhoods where nicely maintained and remodeled houses sat directly alongside of houses that looked ready to collapse. One was on a street that literally was split down the middle. Look to your left and you’re staring at middle-class America, look to your right and it’s the slums (I honestly don’t recall which side of the street the rental property was on, because the sketchy side of the street was sketchy enough to make us keep driving). Another thing I couldn’t believe is how few homes allowed pets. Now we’re not giving up our cats for a house (one we’ll only be in 2 years max, at that), but having them literally knocked out a good 75% of the homes we looked at. Even the rattier looking houses (some of which were so bad we wouldn’t have even considered them if we could have) said “no pets allowed.” A word of advice to those owners, if your house is about to fall down anyways, having a cat running around it isn’t going to hurt anything.

We still need to contact our main choices and get a tour of the inside of the houses, and there’s a few places we saw ads for in the Sunday paper that we’ve yet to check out, but so far we have two main options we’re considering. The first is the little yellow house in the picture on the right. This one is at the top, but inside, of our original price range (which, once we started looking, we expanded a bit). It’s neighborhood, while certainly not the wealthiest, is clean and decent looking, and the houses, while old, look well-maintained and in good shape. It has a mix of hardwood floors and carpet, and (as best we could see from the window) the kitchen floor is tile, though it could just be a realistic looking linoleum (we were just peering in from a window after all). Two major cons include that we’d have only on street parking, and the stairs you see in that picture are only half of them. The house is built on the side of a steep hill. There’s a path of steep stairs to get up to it, the ground the house is on is level, then in the backyard, there are more stairs as the hill continues to climb. That’d be hell on move-in and move-out day and in fact I suspect we might have to hire professional movers as I’m not sure the two of us could even get our largest TV up and down those stairs by ourselves (considering it took 3 people to get it into our townhouse on flat ground). Also, the stairs would pretty much be prohibitively steep for any visits from TheBoyfriend™’s grandmother. On the other hand, after a year or two of living there, I bet we’d have the cutest asses in town ;-).

The other option is a brick house not too far from the yellow house. This one we like a little better from the outside, but we don’t know much about as there’s no web listing so we’ll need to call the number. We don’t know the price, but there are a couple of other slightly larger houses we looked at in the same neighborhood (one on the same street), that were just barely over what we are looking to pay. We’re hoping that this one, being a bit smaller will also be a bit cheaper and therefore just inside our price range. We also have no idea what the pet policy will be (which is probably more worrisome than the price at this point). Still, I think it’s the favorite at the moment. While it obviously doesn’t meet my modern aesthetic tastes (like the house we’re building will), it still seems to fit us better that the yellow house in my gut. It’s just one of those things where I can kind of see us living in a house like this one (for a couple years that is) more so than in the vinyl-sided bit of americana that is the yellow house. Still we don’t even know if this one is a viable option yet.

And finally there’s a few more just outside the city we need to call on to find out about. Renting just outside the city will give us more bang for the buck, and considering where my office is, depending on where some of them are, it may not add to my commute at all (TheBoyfriend™ has to drive all over the area for his job anyways so it won’t effect him that way at all). Of course if we can’t find anything for what we want to spend, we’ll just stay where we are for now. It’s not like we hate it there or anything, just thought that if we were going to have to pay more anyways, we might upgrade a bit.

Now, as I said, BabySis™ left her job at Pier 1 a couple of weeks ago, but her manager had not taken back her employee discount card (as he technically was supposed to). So she offered to use her employee discount to take even more off for us. My mom is very good at making mountains out of mole hills and actually had to leave the store while we waited in line because she was so overcome with visions of her daughter getting arrested for using an employee discount where she was no longer an employee (which afterwards she kept referring to as embezzlement to which I would chime in, “no, it’d actually be fraud”). Meanwhile, BabySis™ had somehow not noticed the text printed in bold black letters on the front of her card which read “Expires March 31, 2008.” So we get up to the register and she hands the card to the person working the register who, also doesn’t notice the March 31 expiration date, and proceeds to unsuccessfully try and scan it. Failing to get it to take, he calls over another employee to try. She notices the expiration date and the conversation goes something like this:

P1 Employee: This is your old card, you should have gotten a new one recently from your store.

BabySis™: No, it’s the new one, I know because they just went from 20% off up to 25%.

P1 Employee: Well see it says it expired March 31st.

BabySis™: Oh, I didnt’ really look at it too closely, I don’t use it that much.

P1 Employee: That’s ok, we can just call your store to confirm.

BabySis™: (some what sheepishly) That’s ok, it’s already on clearance.

P1 Employee: Are you sure? It’ll only take a minute.

BabySis™: No, it’s already alot off, don’t worry about it.

Now I find this whole exchange to be quite amusing, and it’s all I can do to keep from cracking up laughing. My mom on the other hand is almost certainly sitting outside wondering what’s taking so long and imagining that police cars are about to rush up lights flashing and guns drawn to take out the girl with the expired employee discount card.

In the end, we didn’t get the employee discount (but still got the mirror as the clearance price was great on its own), BabySis™ didn’t get “found out,” and my mom made it through without having a total nervous break down. And the rest of their visit we all (more for the benefit of my mom than sister) took turns razzing BabySis™ about being a fugitive of the law.

My job has really picked up. That’s a large part of what’s been keeping me so busy, but it’s a good thing. For awhile now it’s been slow for me here. Not slow for the company, but there’s been a limited amount of work coming across my desk. So much so that I began to worry some about whether or not my particular position was going to continue to be needed. Not as stressful a situation for me as it could have been, because at the peak of my worrying about it, TheBoyfriend™ came home telling me that his company was casually looking to fill a position that, while not exactly my field, was one which I was qualified enough in that I’d have likely had little trouble getting the job. When feeling insecure in your job, it’s nice to know there’s another one available to you, should you need it.

It’s especially good when you’re looking to build a house, and we finally are. It’s been just over a year since the land surveyor was hired to come out and survey the property we are planning to buy a piece from. This guy is known for being quite slow, but he’s pretty much the only one in the area. Well, it’s taken him a year but he’s finally done. The only thing left to do is to sit down with seller and figure out exactly where the boundaries are going to be drawn, have it notarized and make the purchase. Then we can get a loan and start building. It’s exciting and a bit scary at the same time. TheBoyfriend™ (who doesn’t blog) has suggested that once the building process starts, we should start a blog to document the progress, so stay tuned for that.

We’re more than ready to move, especially since the owner of the townhouse we’re currently renting has discovered that we own cats. We’d neglected to mention them in the past because policy this renting company takes on pets is utterly ludicrous. I’m completely OK with a pet deposit. I understand that animals can cause damage and they need to be able to recoup that cost should those damages occur. What I think is ridiculous and unjustifiable is charging a one-time “pet fee” (we don’t get that money back) that is double the amount of the deposit and tacking on an additional $10 to each month’s rent. We could bring another human being on the lease (which would arguably actually cost the townhouse owner more since they pay water) and not pay a cent more per month, but not a cat that doesn’t cost them a penny. Ridiculous. But I signed the lease, so I guess I can’t really complain, just get this house built and get the hell out.

Off I went home for Christmas (I’m sure you can see where this is going, but just listen to the story anyhow). Now my family generally celebrates Christmas on Christmas Eve. This stems from the days when BabySis™, our cousin and myself were young children. It gave the opportunity for the family to have dinner and exchange gifts together while allowing for Christmas morning to be reserved for a lazy, opening gifts from Santa while sitting around the Christmas tree sorta thing. As BabySis™ and I grew older (and realized Santa had actually delivered all his presents to the house before Christmas morning anyhow), all the presents started being opened on Christmas Eve, because my grandparents were already over and my grandmother loves to see her grand kids open presents.

Anyways, the rest of the family had gone, leaving my parents, BabySis™ and her boyfriend, my grandparents, TheBoyfriend™ and I. It was time to open the presents from my parents, and of course, from Santa (in case you’re wondering, my mother always told me that if you stopped believing in Santa, he stopped coming, so I believe ;-)). It’d been a fairly light Christmas present-wise for me. I’m okay with that because I’ve often said, that now that none of us are kids, I’d rather forgo the gift-giving and just spend time together as most of the gifts I’d want are too expensive to give as presents and those that are cheap are probably things I’d already purchased myself. Add that to the fact that my aunt who is known for giving strange gifts was in rare form this year (I walked away with a “Fasta Pasta” which I can’t even use because it’s too big to fit in my microwave), and I was quite content to get relatively few gifts.

TheBoyfriend™ had grabbed his camcorder as Gift-Opening Part II approached, which I found kinda of strange since he’s never recorded a Christmas before (in fact, I think he’s used that camera that he just had to have all of 3 times). Still, beyond noting that he had brought it, I thought little of it (besides perhaps that I was glad to see him giving it a little use). Presents were opened, everything was nice even though my load was again unusually light. Then my mom found a tiny little box under the tree. It was to me, from “It’s a surprise.” Opening it, I found the key to my mother’s car and a note which read something along the lines of “No, you didn’t get a new car. So why the key? There’s a package for you in the glove box of your mother’s car.” Out to the car I went, retrieved another small box, and brought it in. It contained a note reading “You haven’t found it yet, check the microwave for the next clue.” In the microwave was a third box, this time a bit bigger, but as soon as I picked it up, I could tell by the weight that it would contain nothing but another note-bearing slip of paper. This last note read: “Look over in the corner. There’s a large box labeled ‘To: Pop’ [that’s what I call my grandfather], someone must have made a mistake! It’s really for you. Go open it.”

Finally, I tore the paper off this last present. Inside was an unmarked brown cardboard box, and opening the top of that, I saw just the bottom of the box of the actual gift. Just plain white. I flipped it over and began to slide the brown box off of the white one. Then I saw it. The image of a Mac Mighty Mouse, with it’s cord attached to a new (and super sexy) Mac slim keyboard, with it’s cord attached a shiny new iMac! That’s right (as you had probably guess in the very first paragraph), I managed to score the very present that I most wanted, but thought was least attainable. To make it all the sweeter, the timing was perfect as the motherboard in my PC had failed just two days earlier.

Turns out, it was all the brainchild of TheBoyfriend™, who wanted badly to get me that which I wanted more than anything, but knew it to be outside the scope of his budget. He had called my parents back in September and proposed the idea. Neither, he (nor my parents) could afford to get me an iMac on his own, but having hatched the plan early, my parents were able to get the rest of the family to all contribute what they otherwise would have spent on a gift for me. Even that wasn’t quite enough, but it managed to knock the price down to something I could afford (though it is the first present I’ve ever gotten with a balance due).

The coolest part of it all, surprisingly, isn’t that I’m sitting here typing this on my own brand new iMac (although that’s pretty damn cool). No, the best part is TheBoyfriend™ knew what I wanted the most, knew he couldn’t give it to me by himself, and found a way to get it for me anyhow. That’s the coolest part. Usually you hear “it’s the thought that counts” when you get some crappy gift. This time, it was the thought behind an incredible gift that perhaps meant even more than the gift itself.