I just came across two young fellas who have shared the story of their life and love in many YouTube videos. They don't look gay, they don't sound gay, but they sure as hell are gay. And so much in love. Beautiful.
The vids I've posted below are the most poignant to your Head Trucker, who used to be a great romantic - before life knocked the stuffings out of me. I always wanted the things you see in these videos - the rapturous love, the proposal, the wedding, the home, the happily ever after. Someone to build a life with, a shared life worth living, not an empty string of one-night stands.
But wantin' ain't gettin'. Sometimes, though, you get what you need. Keep trying. I had two husbands - as I like to say - before I met M.P. Despite rosy beginnings both times, they didn't work out: one left and one died. There are no guarantees in this mortal life, none. You pays your money and you takes your chances. (But it's better to try and fail, than never to have tried at all. At least you lived and loved.)
There's not many pics of us together. Here we are at Xmas 2010. I'm not really that much taller than M.P. - I'd just come in from outside and was still wearing boots, while he was wearing house shoes.
But then 18 years ago today, M.P. and I met for the first time, and we hit it off right from the start. We don't do all that sloppy stuff like you see in these vids. Been there, done that. Finances are tight, so we don't travel, don't go to bars or movies. don't even eat out. But we think alike, laugh a lot, take care of each other in sickness and in health, and we're content with what we have, despite the ups and downs of old age. A quiet life in a happy little home is enough for us two old boys; it's all we need and all we want.
As someone who well recalls a time when gay marriage was an impossible dream, it's quite touching to watch these young'uns start their life together, as I would have liked to do - a couple of regular guys in cowboy boots and hats getting hitched before a crowd of family and friends, heading off hand in hand in the prime of youth, in the pink dawn of love. As all young lovers should, straight or gay. Sweet. Very sweet.
A Ring for My Boyfriend (2016) (9:31)
The Proposal, Part 1 (2016) (10:25)
The Proposal, Part 2 (2016) (8:50)
The Wedding (7/11/17) (4;57)
Bonus: Zach has a deep, sexy voice, but I can't quite place his accent - it's Southern, but not quite Texan. It reminds me of Mark Collie's accent -- my first husband and I saw him in concert more than 30 years ago. Here's a song of his we used to dance to on cowboy night at the gay bar:
The Supreme Court ruled 7-2 on Monday in favor of a Colorado baker who refused to make a wedding cake for two gay men, as the New York Timesreports:
The court’s decision was narrow, and it left open the larger question of whether a business can discriminate against gay men and lesbians based on rights protected by the First Amendment.
The court passed on an opportunity to either bolster the right to same-sex marriage or explain how far the government can go in regulating businesses run on religious principles. Instead, Justice Anthony M. Kennedy’s majority opinion turned on the argument that the Colorado Civil Rights Commission, which originally ruled against the baker, had been shown to be hostile to religion because of the remarks of one of its members.
At the same time, Justice Kennedy strongly reaffirmed protections for gay rights.
“The outcome of cases like this in other circumstances must await further elaboration in the courts,” he wrote, “all in the context of recognizing that these disputes must be resolved with tolerance, without undue disrespect to sincere religious beliefs, and without subjecting gay persons to indignities when they seek goods and services in an open market.”
There was some confusion of thought among the learned justices, it seems. This dizzying schematic diagram shows their various opinions, dissents, and concurrences.
The gay couple, Charlie Craig and David Mullins, appeared on CNN yesterday:
Baker Phillips appeared on the Today show yesterday:
What I say: First, the ruling applies only to this particular case, and turns on the technicality of some careless remarks by members of the Colorado Civil Rights Commission when they were considering the baker's case. So nothing is settled yet, and there is no reason to get excited one way or the other.
Second, as shown by the divisions among the justices themselves, the larger question is a thorny one, and it will be difficult to weigh the competing claims of religious belief and sexual orientation in order to come up with a rule of law that will satisfy everyone, one that all reasonable people of good will can in good conscience support. As Justice Kennedy said in the majority opinion,
any decision in favor of the baker would have to be sufficiently constrained, lest all purveyors of goods and services who object to gay marriages for moral and religious reasons in effect be allowed to put up signs saying “no goods or services will be sold if they will be used for gay marriages,” something that would impose a serious stigma on gay persons.
I well recall in the legally segregated South of my childhood that every restaurant, cafe, motel, and ice cream stand had a prominent sign behind the cash register: We reserve the right to refuse service to anyone. As a kid, I thought nothing of it; only much later, as an adult in the post-civil rights era, did I realize that the message was code for "We don't serve Negroes, so don't even ask."
Of course it would be ridiculous, not to say unconscionable, for any business today to deny service to anyone on account of race, or religion, or ethnicity, or for almost any other reason except being drunk and disorderly, or unable to pay. And in fact, I would venture to say that most business owners of any kind are too eager to get some greenbacks in the till to worry about such things. As long as your credit card is good and you don't break up the furniture, you're good to go in our consumer nation, right?
And the laws should rightly penalize any business that discriminates against a paying customer for no good reason: whether you are selling lettuce or light bulbs, cars or candy, hamburgers, hotel rooms, or helicopter rides, your personal beliefs and opinions about the customer are irrelevant, and you treat everyone the same, selling the same goods or services to all comers (the exception being certain sales prohibited by law, such as selling booze to minors, etc.) This is a settled principle in our modern society, and rightly so.
However, when the goods sold are not essentially the same for all customers, personal preferences notwithstanding (a shirt is a shirt is a shirt; a cup of coffee likewise, and so on, and so on), then perhaps there is room for discussion--and especially, it seems to me, when communication is involved, or artistic talent (for at bottom, Art is always Communication of some sort, whatever else it may be). And if communication is involved, then the First Amendment, which we all revere, comes into play--and if that guarantees our freedom to speak our minds as we will, does it not also strongly imply the right not to speak what we do not will? Forced speech is not free speech, is it?
Let us get down to cases:
Suppose that you are a printer, and someone wants you to print up a thousand copies of a flyer for a KKK rally, something you find utterly abhorrent. Should the law require you to fill that order?
Or, say, you are a sign maker, and a very good one too, the old-fashioned kind who uses actual paint and brushes: if someone comes into your shop and asks for a sign saying "Death to Jews," must you (a Gentile, as it happens, with no anti-Semitic feelings) paint it or face the penalties of law?
Or again, if you are a seamstress specializing in custom-decorated clothing, and a biker brings you his leather jacket wanting "Fuck the Police" embroidered in great big letters on the back, should the law compel you to fulfill his request?
We could multiply examples ad infinitum here, but I think the point is clear enough: if you are in the business of selling communication in one form or another, should the law protect your scruples, whether based on religious beliefs or not--or force you to violate your conscience, and ruin you if you fail to comply? We are not talking here of great corporations selling housewares or hardware or trips to Tahiti, or the Moon--we are talking of individuals and small business owners whose livelihood is at stake. People who are just trying to make a living and get by, like everyone else. People who are, in the vast majority of cases, not bothering you or working against you, and not even thinking about you until you interfere with them.
Make no mistake: I sympathize strongly with Charlie and David. As my truckbuddies know from reading my story, I take a passionate, very personal interest in marriage equality, but not, I hope, an unreasonable one. Today we have liberty, we have justice, we have the right to marry, something almost inconceivable forty years ago when I came out. Let us rejoice in this magnificent turn of history, and not lose sight of the main thing: our common humanity. Let us not forget that we live in society with others, who also have a right to liberty and equal dignity under the law. The search for a wise, humane balance of competing rights and liberties is and has been the eternal question of American democracy from the very beginning.
Frankly, your Head Trucker is inclined to side with the baker. In the grand scheme of the universe, a cake is a silly little thing, a trivial thing, a ridiculous thing: here today and eaten tomorrow. If I were in the market for a wedding cake, I would certainly much rather take my business to someone who would bake it gladly and gratefully, rather than force another person to do it against his will and in violation of his conscience, which would do me and you and all of us no good at all, breeding resentment and even hatred. As history has shown times without number, in all ages and climes and countries, it is but one little step to go from oppressed to oppressor.
Of course, others may disagree with me, including some of my truckbuddies. But we must all find a way to get along peaceably--as we always have, eventually, in our history, usually through the high art of compromise. How shall we decide such things, and where should the line be drawn? And when I say "we," I mean straight and gay, religious and atheist, all the many colors of the human rainbow: for every story has two sides, if not more, and every voice must have its say. Is that not the first principle of democracy?
The Supreme Court has passed on the question, for now. So come, let us reason together.
Breaking news out of Alaska: Noted Christianist, TV dancer, and unwed mother Bristol Palin is pregnant - and unmarried - again. And her righteous, God-fearing, Bible-believing, gun-toting, born-again mother says that is just oh-so-wonderful, and best of all, God is totally fine with it, too. Heck yeah! Jump ahead to the 3:20 mark:
Meanwhile in Ireland, that country's first same-sex marriage took place today as Cormac Gollogly and Richard Dowling, a barrister and a banker, tied the knot in County Tipperary, after 12 years as a committed couple, as reported by the Irish Times. All good wishes to the happy couple.
I could say more, but I'll let you fellas judge for yourselves which story is praiseworthy and which is just total bullshit.
With special good wishes of love and joy for my truckbuddy Frank and his husband Leon, who married yesterday at their home in Connecticut after 26 years together - check out the wedding pics on Frank's blog here.
A flurry of legal developments happened yesterday, so now there are 32 states where people like us can marry: hit the links to read up on the mind-boggling good news.
And although this is not my idea at all of a proper do, I still had to get my hanky out - Kevin Patterson and David Larance have the first gay wedding in Arizona:
And here's a great piece on Karen and Nelda, the lesbian couple you see in the video above, who have been waiting since the freakin' Eisenhower Administration for the right to marry!
Finally, a sweet pic from Idaho taken earlier this week:
Grab a box of tissues and learn about these two lesbian couples who recently got married after many years together.
First, up in Iowa, the Quad City Times reports on the wedding of two nonagenarians:
Vivian Boyack and Alice "Nonie" Dubes say it is never too late for people to write new chapters in their lives. Boyack, 91, and Dubes, 90, began a new chapter in their 72-year relationship Saturday when they exchanged wedding vows at First Christian Church, Davenport. Surrounded by family and a small group of close friends, the two held hands as the Rev. Linda Hunsaker told the couple that, “This is a celebration of something that should have happened a very long time ago.”
The two met in Yale, Iowa, where they grew up, and moved to Davenport in 1947. Boyack was a longtime teacher in Davenport, directing the lives of children at Lincoln and Grant elementary schools. . . . Over the years, the two have traveled to all 50 states, all the provinces of Canada, and to England twice. “We’ve had a good time,” Dubes said. Boyack added it takes a lot of love and work to keep a relationship going for 72 years.
And from North Carolina, the Associated Press has this report of two ladies who recently married out of state after nearly fifty years together:
The couple have been active in the fight to overturn North Carolina's marriage ban. An independent filmmaker has made a movie about Lennie and Pearl, entitled Living in the Overlap, which you can read more about at the official website here.
As conservative and homophobic as Texas is and has been, the fact of the matter is that we gays are all over the Lone Star state, everywhere you go from big cities to suburbs to tiny hamlets in the middle of nowhere, ranches, farms, bars, churches, schools, stores, and everywhere in between.
From Dallas comes this remarkable story of a couple who have been going strong since 1961; and today, Jack Evans and George Harris are finally getting the church wedding they've always wanted. It won't be legal in Texas until the Supreme Court says so, but after 53 years together, they can't wait any longer.
Jack and George are the founders of The Dallas Way, a group devoted to collecting and preserving the historical record of the LGBT community in North Texas. Here, the couple participate in "Outrageous Oral," an ongoing oral history project:
Another video of Jack and George telling their fascinating stories:
Their story is a tribute to the enduring power of love. All good wishes to the happy couple.
Update: Dallas station WFAA reports on the wedding, with video:
The Dallas Morning Newsreported the story too, highlighting the challenge to Methodist doctrine that "homosexuality is incompatible with Scripture." Nevertheless, hundreds of guests attended, along with a dozen Methodist ministers from around the state.
What you Yankee boys and other furriners need to understand is that here in Texas, the Methodist Church is the natural choice for the better-educated and semi-liberal folks; compared to the Southern Baptists, the Methodists are almost like freethinkers. So this gay wedding - even though it couldn't be held on Methodist property - is really a sign of significant change.
Gay is bustin' out all over . . . . Oklahoma is a Bible-thumping, deep-red state - can you say Sally Kern? - but Darren Black Bear and Jason Pickel just became the first same-sex couple to marry there, courtesy of the Cheyenne and Arapaho Tribes. KOCO 5 News reports:
Update, 9 p.m.: Come to find out, Darren and Jason are actually the third couple who will be married under tribal laws there.
Together 46 years, Lewis Duckett and Billy Jones wrote coded letters to each other during Dr. Jones’s deployment in Vietnam. They adopted a baby, became grandfathers and then, finally, got married.
Matt Baume of the American Foundation for Equal Rights reports:
And here's some late news that Matt didn't get to: a North Carolina county clerk is planning to issue, but not sign, marriage licenses to six gay couples tomorrow. The N. C. attorney general has come out in favor of marriage equality, but says that won't stop him from vigorously defending North Carolina law against it.
Also noteworthy: Freedom to Marry is tracking marriage-equality litigation that is now underway in - can you believe this? - 16 states. Read all about it here.
And just to refresh your memory, here's where things stand at the moment - keep in mind that Hawaii, Illinois, New Jersey, New Mexico, and Pennsylvania could all be equal-marriage states by Christmas, if things go our way in the courts and legislatures - Michigan too, maybe this week:
Click to enlarge.
And finally - Olympic gold-medal diver Greg Louganis, 53, married his partner, Johnny Chaillot, 52, on Saturday in a sunset wedding in Malibu, California. Here's a great pic of the handsome couple:
Your Head Trucker is not a fan - can we talk? - of homemade wedding vows; the tender sentiments of two people in love are best kept sacred and unseen, like the marriage bed, in my view. Nevertheless, I know that millions of couples, straight and gay, are all into that kind of thing nowadays, and since this video is so beautifully edited and professionally produced, I thought you fellas might enjoy it. It happened in Los Angeles, earlier this year.
The important thing here is not so much the sentiment on display, but the visible creation of a union, drawing together not merely two individuals, but two families, and all generations. That is what knits us firmly into the the greater society around us as nothing else can, linking us to many more people than just one. It makes us part of the family - and beyond all the laws and all the courts and legislatures of the world, that is the greatest guarantee of our right to exist, to live and love freely, as the gay people we really are.
The Veterans Home in Chula Vista, San Diego, saw a historic moment on Thursday with its first gay wedding. WWII veteran John Banvard, 95, and Vietnam veteran Gerard Nadeau, 68, have been together for 20 years. They told Fox5 that they'd been waiting on the Supreme Court decision to allow same-sex unions in California before tying the knot.
"It was something we wanted to do for a long time," Banvard told ABC10.
The couple wanted to have the ceremony amongst friends, so on Thursday they were married outside the V.A. Home, where they've lived together for the last three and a half years. According to an ABC10 report, some of the residents who objected to a gay wedding notified Westboro Baptist Church who called in to protest to the V.A. Home.
"They used language I don't want to repeat," staff member Jim Karellas told ABC10.
But when time for the wedding came, none of the objecting residents and no one from the church came to protest, and the simple, yet historic, ceremony was only filled with love.
See the unembeddable video at the link, also the ABC10 news report here.
Some video of the first same-sex weddings in Taos, New Mexico, last Wednesday the 28th. Dignity may be somewhat lacking in these impromptu ceremonies, but the emotions are all that they should be.
While we're on the topic of marriage, Chicago Cardinal Francis George, while ranting against how "irrational" gay marriage is, admits that "the Church did not invent marriage"; but "nature gives us marriage," so that's why we do it. Say what?
It's also worth taking another look at this rather amazing chart of Biblical Marriage that I posted on the Blue Truck a year or two ago - at the link, you can download it yourself or share it on Facebook or Twitter.
And Mary Cheney, lesbian daughter of the former Vice-President who married her wife, Heather Poe, last year in D. C., today slammed her sister's announcement earlier this week that she is "not pro-gay marriage." Mary said:
For the record, I love my sister, but she is dead wrong on the issue of marriage. Freedom means freedom for everyone. That means that all families — regardless of how they look or how they are made — all families are entitled to the same rights, privileges and protections as every other. It’s not something to be decided by a show of hands.
Finally, in the atrium of the Kennedy Center in Washington, D. C., tonight Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg will officiate at the wedding of her good friend and Kennedy Center Director Michael Kaiser and government economist John Roberts (no relation to Chief Justice John G. Roberts). On the guest list are stars of opera and Broadway, as well as the cream of Washington society. Ginsburg is already scheduled to celebrate another same-sex wedding next month.
My God, fellas - can you believe?? A GAY WEDDING presided over by a SUPREME COURT JUSTICE?!! Holy fuck, we're sure not in Kansas anymore, Toto.
This brings the total of marriage-equality states to 13, plus the District of Columbia and five Indian tribes; thirty percent of Americans now have the freedom to the freedom to marry a same-sex partner. Seven other states have full civil unions or limited domestic partnerships.
Also this week, Gullup released its latest polling results, which show that 52% of Americans would vote for a federal law legalizing same-sex marriages across the country, while 43% would vote against it. The landmark Supreme Court rulings in June had no discernible effect on public attitudes as measured by this poll. Here's the breakdown by various groups:
Click to enlarge.
And here's a trendline showing the increase of support over time for same-sex marriage:
Oh my, what changes have happened in your Head Trucker's lifetime. A few weeks ago, I posted a clip of an interview with Jack Baker and Michael McConnell of Minneapolis, who after being married in that state - under false pretenses, it must be said - took their case all the way to the U. S. Supreme Court, and lost.
Now a clip has surfaced of their actual wedding, and the kiss they sealed it with - totally shocking to straight America by the standards of the time. WCCO in Minneapolis reports:
The narrator says the couple doesn't plan to get married after Minnesota joins the ranks of same-sex marriage states on August 1, because "they already are" married. But I hope they think twice about that complacent attitude: the courts already ruled their marriage invalid - and when only one is left, he will have a hard time collecting social security and other benefits on his husband if their marriage isn't all sewed up, nice and proper.
But now compare the tiny, rather closeted affair that was with the wedding of Dwayne Beebe and Jonathan Franqui in Pensacola, Florida, on March 30 of this year: presided over by a U. S. Navy chaplain, no less, and held in the community center complex of the historic district there, complete with a jazz band march down the street from the church to the reception.
Your Head Trucker marvels at how they found so many chunky chicks to play bridesmaids in bedsheets strapless minidresses, but he does like the rainbow color theme. All in a all, a very joyous and very public celebration of two men's commitment, unthinkable in 1971 - but what a wonderful development, we need many more like this, all over the country.
The couple were legally married in Maryland on January 1, but waited to have the big ceremony and celebration with friends and family in Pensacola, where Dwayne, a naval petty officer, was stationed. The marriage is not recognized in Florida, or in Dwayne's new posting in Tennessee, but it does give them access to all federal and military benefits.
Sandy Stier and Kris Perry are wed by the California Attorney General
Jeff Zarillo and Paul Katami are wed by the Mayor of Los Angeles
What a difference a day makes! While your Head Trucker slept Friday afternoon and evening, at around 3 p.m. California time the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals lifted its stay in the Prop 8 case and allowed same-sex marriages to resume immediately in the Golden State. This surprise development caught everyone off guard, since it had been expected that the appeals court would wait out the 25-day period before the Supreme Court's ruling became effective. However, legal experts say the appeals court was well within its rights, and the law, to lift its own stay on its own ruling.
The plaintiffs in the Prop 8 case lost no time in getting hitched. In San Francisco, Kris Perry and Sandy Stier were wed by Kamala Harris, California Attorney General, at San Francisco City Hall, and likewise down in Los Angeles, Paul Katami and Jeffrey Zarillo were wed at City Hall by Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa. The timing is doubly delicious since it is Pride weekend in those cities, and Friday was the 44th anniversary of the Stonewall riots in 1969 that sparked the gay-rights movement.
Much to your Head Trucker's astonishment and delight, the hard rock of homophobia is nowadays slowly being chipped away, even in the most surprising places - like small towns in the Deep South.
Two gals got hitched over in Laurel, Mississippi, a couple of weeks ago, complete with bridal gown, wedding cake, and an exchange of vows in front of family and friends. Of course, this kind of commitment ceremony - completely unrecognized by state law - has happened thousands of times all across the nation and the South in the last forty years, and maybe you've even attended some of them. But this time something was different: the local paper printed the story on the front page, along with a big picture of the happy couple, and a bolded quote that "love is love, it knows no gender."
Hoo-wee, did that stir up a wasp's nest of angry calls to the editor of the Laurel Leader-Call, who responded this week with an editorial justifying the paper's decision to run the story. Excerpt:
We knew going in that the gay wedding story was going to ruffle some feathers. We were well aware that the majority of people in Jones County are not in favor of gay marriage. However, any decent newspaper with a backbone can not base decisions on whether to cover a story based on whether the story will make people angry.
The job of a community newspaper is not pretending something didn't take place or ignoring it because it will upset people. No, our job is to inform readers what is going on in our town and let them make their own judgements. That is exactly what we did with the wedding story. Our reporter heard about the wedding, attended it, interviewed some of the participants and wrote a news story. If there had been protestors at the wedding, we would have covered that the exact same way . . . but there weren't any. We never said it was a good thing or a bad thing, we simply did our job by telling people what took place. . . .
We have stories about child molesters, murders and all kinds of vicious, barbaric acts of evil committed by heinous criminals on our front page and yet we never receive a call from anyone saying "I don't need my children reading this." Never. Ever. However, a story about two women exchanging marriage vows and we get swamped with people worried about their children.
Kudos to the courageous editor. And I hope the women and their daughter stay safe.
PS - In your Head Trucker's view, the editor's only mistake was running the story under a huge, all-caps headline. It's not like commitment ceremonies have never happened in Mississippi before (and probably even in Laurel).
Lord, make me an instrument of your peace. Where there is hatred, let me sow love; where there is injury, pardon; where there is discord, harmony; where there is doubt, faith; where there is despair, hope; where there is darkness, light; where there is sadness, joy. Grant that I may seek not so much to be consoled as to console; to be understood as to understand; to be loved as to love. For it is in giving that we receive; it is in pardoning that we are pardoned; and it is in dying that we are born to eternal life. Amen.
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We cannot all do great things, but we can do small things with great love.
and welcome to the Blue Truck, a blog for mature gay men with news and views on gay rights, history, art, humor, and whatever comes to mind. Plus a few hot men. The truck's all washed and gassed up, so hop in buddy, let's go.
CAUTION: For mature gay men only beyond this point. Some posts and links may not be suitable for children or the unco guid. You have been warned.
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My Story
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Churches say that the expression of love in a heterosexual monogamous relationship includes the physical, the touching, embracing, kissing, the genital act - the totality of our love makes each of us grow to become increasingly godlike and compassionate. If this is so for the heterosexual, what earthly reason have we to say that it is not the case with the homosexual?
It is a perversion if you say to me that a person chooses to be homosexual. You must be crazy to choose a way of life that exposes you to a kind of hatred. It's like saying you choose to be black in a race-infected society.
If God, as they say, is homophobic, I wouldn't worship that God.
Note, 9/15/26: For the past week, Blogger has not updated most of the posts in this sidebar. I don't know what to do about it. You can still access the websites below by clicking on the titles of each one.
