Come On, Liz!

So, what changed in the last 55 year about being gay or lesbian? It isn’t anything about being gay or lesbian, but society is growing up about the whole matter (with a little bit of help from science).
by Charlie Leck

It’s kind of a shame that the Cheney girls are having a bit of a falling out now. I wonder how their dad feels about the whole thing. You know what I’m talkin’ (writin’) about, don’t you?

Dick Cheney, the former Vice President of the United States used to have a bad-ass attitude about homosexuality (that’s gays and lesbians) until he found out his daughter was one. Then he was forced to sit back and ask himself a couple of questions and have a quiet, reasonable conversation with his wife about the whole business. Dick Cheney is a bright guy and he put the pieces together. He discovered that his daughter had a built-in sexual attraction to other women rather than men. He realized that it wasn’t her fault; and, it wasn’t his fault or his wife’s fault either. There are some pieces that no one’s put together yet and we just don’t know why this happens, but it does. If you give it real hard thought, you realize there is no blame and no fault here and there doesn’t have to be if we can also get it into our heads that there is no wrong in all of this – that it’s okay and we don’t have to condemn anyone or refer to anyone as a sinner or pervert.

The nation was very surprised when Dick Cheney showed up on television with a smile on his face and a sense of peace in his soul to tell the world his daughter, Mary, was and is a lesbian. He was pleased his daughter was going to marry another woman and that she was going to have a companion and be loved the way her mother and father loved each other. Hot damn, that was nice! It made lots of people reevaluate their own condemnations and nasty feelings and references. He went on doing his job as Vice President and everything was just really okay.

Dick Cheney has another daughter. Her name is Liz and Liz was proud of her father and she loved her sister, too, and she was happy for her sister and her life’s companion. She visited with them and their childrfen in their Virginia home and there was understanding, support and joy shared all around.

What a great story about an important and fine American family!

Well, wouldn’t you know, politics has messed it all up! It can happen. It has happened and it will continue to happen. In order to succeed in politics we often have to change our stances and alter our behavior. We have to nudge ourselves a little right or a little left. We must become a little more religious than we really are. We have to say nice things about people we don’t really feel to keenly about and we have to say nasty things about people we just really, in our hearts, admire. It’s just one of the damned bad things about politics and I would like, one time in my life, to vote for someone who hasn’t made those alterations or changes to his opinions in order to please a portion of the electorate he is chasing.

Take Mary Cheney’s sister, Liz, for example. Liz wants to run for the U.S. Senate out there in Wyoming (her father’s home state, where he is very famous). I refuse to believe Wyoming is as blatantly stupid as Liz seems to think it is. Liz, you see, has changed her tune on same-sex marriage and the right of gays and lesbians. Now she’s sayin’ that gays have been given too many rights too quickly and maybe we all oughta (that’s Wyoming for ought to) back off a little bit.

It’s hit the papers. Mary’s read it and it has taken her aback. She saddened and a tad bit angry even though she knows that politics is at the heart of it. Mary’s kids are a little confused about their auntie and Mary’s dad is layin’ low, trying to hide his embarrassment and keep his mouth shut.

And, the people of Wyoming are a lot brighter than the credit Liz is giving them. They know damned well about Mary and her wife. They know about the former Vice President. Most of them were even proud of him for backin’ up his daughter and for supportin’ her. By God, family is important in Wyomin’ and you better’in hell stick up for and with your family if you at all want to win the hearts of the folks from Wyomin’.

And, the people of Wyomin’ are learnin’ just like the rest of the nation that this business of bein’ gay and bein’ lesbian is not a matter of moral choice a’tall. It’s about what’s inside you and about the inclinations given to you at birth and it just ain’t the moral or immoral choice of anybody! No, sir!

Dick Cheney damn well knows it. So does his daughter, Mary, and so does his daughter, Liz. And standin’ up for that and being honest about that – and supportin’ father and sister – is one heckuva lot more important than being elected to the stupid U.S. Senate.

Come on, Liz!

Ω

Fifty-five years ago I thought, because my parents said so, that being a homosexual was both sinful and maniacal. The church said so, too.

Lois and Ellen lived up the street from us and I would see them walking down Budd Avenue just about every single day. They liked each other an awful lot. Even a little kid such as I could tell that. Lois dressed pretty much like a man. She always wore man’s slacks and a man’s shirt and tie and a man’s hat; but it was pretty clear that she was a woman. They were always plenty kind to me and Lois would often stop by in our backyard and thrown a baseball around with me for a little bit. Ellen would stand by and watch and laugh at us.

I knew what was going on even though I was a little kid and didn’t know hardly anything yet. And I liked the way they were kind to one another and cared for one another. I felt better about them and their kind ways than I did about several couples in town who were always mean and unloving to one another. I was very confused inside about what was right and what was sinful.

My dad liked Lois and Ellen, too. He’d often talk with them in our old general store and he laughed with them. And, when they left, he never once said anything nasty or bad about them to me or anyone else.

In high school, a kid I admired an awful lot and with whom I wanted to be a good friend, was a homosexual. We didn’t use the word “gay” back then. I didn’t know about his inclinations. I just thought he was one of the guys. He was bright and funny and he said clever things all the time. I wanted to be like him. He didn’t care that much for me because he thought I was nothing but a jock. It took us fifty years to find out we liked each other and for me to find out he was gay. It never mattered one little stitch to me about that. We became pretty good friends and I’m damned glad of it and I’m glad he’s free today to be whatever he wants to be and to love whomever he wants to love. And I’m glad he knows now that I’m more than some stupid jock. He’s what he is and I’m what I am and we respect each other for it and we enjoy one another’s company without being all uptight about it. That’s the way it should be.

Throwin’ somebody under the bus for political reasons just ain’t right. It ain’t, Liz!

  

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