The Late Night Buzz

No, I am not referring to coffee in my title. I am referring to a sound that woke me up a 1:37AM last night. Something.... buzzing. My little feline was pretending to be night hunter and swatting at something near my head. Half-awake, I look over and see a large blackish object flitting about, banging into the nearby window. I watch for a few minutes, unable to make our what kind of insect it is. Resigned and awake, I move to turn on the light.

I see this:A yellowjacket. A large - yellow - buzzing - stinging - yellowjacket. And I am in my skivvies with lots of vulnerable, fleshy, half-awake body to tempt the offending intruder. And I do not like this.

I back away and dress myself. Jeans and long sleeves. Protect the skin! The yellowjacket has taken a fondness for the mattress and the wall next to our bed. I also note with scientific fascination, that the insect is attracted to the light of my reading lamp. I pray the wasp gets burnt by the halogen lamp, but it seems unaffected.

Still, I hesitate. I don't really enjoy killing things. Especially not when I might miss and enrage the stinging beast. So I leave it to our night hunter, our prowling cat Morgan.

Morgan, for her part, is fascinated and bored at the same time. Honestly, I don't know what else I would expect from a cat. She would stare at it... bat at it for a bit... then walk away as if she found something better to do. She once put her paw on it and then jumped back, as if surprised that it was moving. After watching the pathetic dance between cat and yellowjacket for a few minutes, I got impatient. Clearly my cat sucks as a hunter. I grab a notebook and wham it against the wall. The ensuing crunch is both satisfying and horrifying.

Here, for you all to review, is the yellowjacket that disrupted my precious, precious sleep And if you think I've just got some super-zoom thing going on, here is our friend with a quarter. Notice how this thing is ALMOST THE SAME SIZE AS THE QUARTER:
It was 2:13 by the time I had taken pictures, rearranged the furniture, and disposed of the body. Morgan was happily purring as I settled into bed.

Mike, for his part, had fallen asleep in the office and missed the whole thing. Jerk.

Tomato

You call that a tomato?


Now, this.... this is a tomato!


Yes, that is my hand holding up that beast. This puppy was one of the heirloom tomatoes I harvested from my backyard last year. I think the warm weather is making me nostalgic....

Marriage Equality

The following is a letter I wrote to my state senator, David Valesky, upon encouragement of a friend of mine. Senator Valesky supports civil-unions, but not same-sex marriage. If you are in New York State, or know someone in New York, please encourage them to write their state senator. Check out the Empire State Pride Agenda's website for a form letter submission.


Senator Valesky,

Thank you for your response. I've actually been following your campaign for sometime now. I voted for you back in 2004, and I remember it was a close race back then. I was happy to help you unseat the Republican incumbent. So now I guess I am asking a favor back from you. I don't know if its fair for me to ask a favor, but as I've learned, it never hurts to ask.

This "same-sex marriage" issue is about much more than a form letter for me. I am a man married to man. I think people call us one of the "California 18,000" or whatever. I had always planned on marrying my boyfriend and then a convergence of events happened. My boyfriend had gotten into SUNY Update Medical and we planned a vacation to California to celebrate. Then we heard about the CA court decision, and Patterson's decision to recognize out of state gay marriages. It felt like God himself was giving us his blessing. So I called over to Poland to ask my boyfriend's mother for her blessing in our marriage (God's blessing was good, but my future mother-in-law's blessing was important to me too!!). So we turned our vacation into an elopement, with my husband's brother acting as our witness.

During this past year I've been living with the strange double-standard of being in a same-sex marriage. When getting him insurance through my work, I was repeatedly asked to fill out "domestic partnership" forms. One question in particular on these forms asks "Are you married?" I felt it was insulting and refused to sign them. I was legally married and should not have to do anything different than any other legally married couple. Now I am a realist here, so I brought in a copy of our marriage license as additional proof of our marriage, but I refused to call him my "domestic partner" or any such thing. We are married and he is my spouse. Eventually, after calling over some people's heads, I was able to get him on my insurance.

It all sounds so banal now, but every time someone treated my marriage differently, and tried to call it a different name, if felt to me that my love for my husband was being demeaned. I was as if our love was somehow different because our bodies are different. It was stressful and hurtful. This is why I feel so strongly that love is love and marriage is marriage. There is not a difference, and anyone who cites religion is hiding behind their own fears. People have cited the Bible against inter-racial marriage, women's rights, and even against abolition. We, as people, are all somewhat afraid of the unknown. There is nothing inherently wrong with this. But when individuals are demeaned because of others' fears... that is unacceptable.

I also want to give you some background on who I am. I grew up in the Hudson Valley, and lived in Boston and Seattle. I moved to Syracuse in 2003 for graduate school. I met my husband while we were both in school. After graduating, instead of moving away, we chose to stay here in Central New York. We fought the brain-drain and bought a house in Syracuse that we've been fixing it up for almost 3 years. Our property was previously used for student housing, and we have since converted it to our home. I have been involved with the University Neighborhood Preservation Association, 40Below, and the Onondaga Creek Revitalization Plan. I volunteered for the Downtown Living Tours and have started a chapter of Slow Food USA in the CNY region. I am very engaged and care about this community.

Senator Valesky, I am, by almost all standards, the type of young person this region wants to keep. Yes, young: I am only 28 and my husband is 24. However, my husband graduates from SUNY Upstate Medical in a few years. While we love Syracuse, we've been seriously thinking about moving to Massachusetts or some other state that has taken the bold initiative to out-right acknowledge same-sex marriage. I hope you can show me that you want people like me to stay. I hope you can show me that my marriage, and my love, is as equally protected and recognized as any other person's.

PSM