Why I haven't been sleeping.

[crboltz]

I was nervous and not sleeping before the election worrying the prop. 8 would pass. It did. I assumed that after a few days (maybe a week), I could put my life back together and move on. I have become functional, but I have not become well. I had a couple of hours of driving to focus on my thoughts (both a good and a bad thing).

Comments

[crboltz]

I guess the way I should have said it is "Beyond my close friends (which includes you), I'm not sure how people voted" I think part of why things have been hard for me is that I lack a social network in Fresno (which is nobody's fault but mine). And I have switched to projecting the state wide stats on Fresno, because the fresno stats are 2 out of 3 people don't think I'm equal and that is very very hard to handle. I am far more comfortable in my self when I am in LA because the people here are people I know very well. I have only a hand full of very close friends in the Fresno area. So many others that I know I don't truly know well enough to know if they overcame the prejudices of where they live.

Add to that that both academia and the arts tend to be (despite all their rhetoric to the contrary) very cut throat, two-faced, back stabbing industries, I'm just never sure. The politics between teachers and artists and students means you can never be quite sure of peoples opinions. It is only the unambitious ones (like me) who have the freedom to express what they truly feel. I only withhold my opinion if I think it would be damaging (which means most of my co-workers know where I stand on anything, because if I am silent it means that my opinion could get me in very hot water politically)

I do understand (and see) gender discrimination daily. We have a mucky muck* at the school who will latch onto, and support the most idiotic ideas from a man, and instantly reject really good ideas from a woman. I try to avoid dealing with this mucky muck, and yet, I am occasionally sent in because the mucky muck will listen to me. Which means I am (very improperly) getting credit for brilliant ideas that are not mine. (Although I try to make sure everyone below the mucky muck knows where the idea came from and that I was merely a humble messenger.)

*= someone who is high enough ranking to make my job miserable if they found I was writing about them

[crboltz]

And one more thing....

Thank you for calling me on over arching statements that are very disrespectful to my friends. It is too easy (as is evidenced by the the public debate on Prop 8) to make broad statements that are only fractionally true and assert them as whole truths. Despite my anger, rage and fear about my rights in the future, I really really don't want to sink to that level.

Thank you.

[kclightman]

Chris, I'm really glad to hear that current friends are excepted from these statements, because for the past few weeks I've been at a loss for words. I can't tell you how much it has hurt to hear you say you don't trust me or think I could have proper feeling for you, because I am straight. But if you don't really mean everyone, then that's a huge relief to me.

[the_celestia]

1) Thank you, because I think of you as a close friend even if we're not geographically close enough to see each other often.

2) I can understand this, having spent most of a summer in Bakersfield (which strikes me as politically similar to Fresno). Arrrgh. Yes, I have a 'male' job (and had a different 'male' job before this one). No, that doesn't automagically make me a lesbian. You know they don't get it when they think your JOB defines your sexual preference!

3) And now we know why (in addition to lacking the requisite talents), I am not an artist or a teacher. You've just made a good point though and I'll be enquiring of my 'focus group' (several RN friends) as to how much politics I may have to deal with at the RN level in a hospital setting, because intense office politics is something at which I am full of fail.

4) Wow, that's bad. Though I must admit there have been times I've been sent to present specific lighting options because 'interior designers' will often take that advice better from a female than a male. This is sort of a form of gender issue (they don't want to 'cave' to the electrician, who is male) but it's somehow OK to agree with me (another female who should be interested in 'decor', when honestly as long as it's clean I mostly could not care less).

[the_celestia]

(Ugh, it didn't post at the right point in the thread, the above is in answer to your first comment, this is for the second).

I want you to know I am very sincerely on your side. Quite a lot of we straight but not narrows are, though certainly not as great a percentage are willing to take the time and get out there to peacefully protest (I did!) and contribute to the cause as fits their ability.

But most of all, I want this for you and J, because you are a piece of my life, and have a special place in my heart.

Hugs