AV: Here, Now

Howdy Write Bunch buddies!

Today I'm posting the column I just wrote for my San Diego Democratic Club newsletter column.

Last night Aida and I attended one of the most moving ceremonies of love and committment that we have ever witnessed. Two extraordinary individuals who are more like twin souls separated at birth stood encircled - literally - by a great wide community of folks whose commonality is our love for them.

In addition, I am eyeball deep in the campaign against Proposition 8, the proposed amendment to the California consitution that would eliminate the freedom to marry for gay and lesbian couples. It's a tough road, but it looks like we can win this thing.

So, here 'tis. besos, queridas ...

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President’s Perspectives - August 2008

Today I attended the beautiful and wondrous wedding of dear friends. There’s a lot of that going around these days and more to follow, if my calendar is any indication.

As I watched my friends pledge their lives to one another in the company of their family and friends, and receive the validation of the state, I reflected more than once on the long and difficult journey to the place where they stood encircled by the love of their community and steeped in the joy of the moment and of the years to come.

Yes, a long road for both of them and goodness knows that each of us sometimes are a little flummoxed and bemused when we stop and look behind us at the path we’ve taken to wherever we stand at any given moment. Some of us look at our lives and wonder, perhaps not for the first time, “how did that happen?” Perhaps we look at the person with whom we are sharing our days and ask how it was that our paths crossed? “We’re so different!” or “I didn’t even know you” or “How long were you living in the next apartment?” How does someone from one side of the globe, for example, find the hand of another all the way across the world? How do we end up side by side with the families we choose – or the ones that choose us?

It’s a mystery to me and I’ve been doing a bit of pondering the mystery these days. We seem to be at the edge of something so big, and yet so simple. Something all-encompassing, I believe.

Things are changing.

And it’s not just the weddings, as if that weren’t enough to shift one’s perspective several degrees. Although the sudden steeping of joy and delight around us is truly miraculous in so many ways, I think that it’s the fact that many of the faces I see around those blissful and solemn couples are the same ones I see around the table at phone banks and committee meetings and campaign walks and outreach trainings. They’re your faces.

I see you everywhere! How did you end up here? Did we all know each other? Who invited us? I look around and I see as many different paths to this place as there are people. Some of you arrived at this tiny place on the map from other countries. Some from perhaps the next city over, but from a tradition that’s worlds apart. Still others travelled from what felt like another planet. And some have always been here to welcome the new arrivals with a quick tour and a smile.

Regardless of the path, long and arduous or simple and short, here we are at the edge of … something. The map has been circled for us. This place. This time. We are here together to make it happen – to shepherd each other and our communities into the future.

Can we do any less than those couples who gather themselves up and step into the open road of the future knowing that together they can create anything. I think that, all together, here – now – maybe we can do more.

I’ll see you at the phone bank.

No On 8, Equality For All
www.NoOnProp8.com