iPalimpsest

Coming out as a Gold Star is amazing. I'm about a third of the way through Joan Nestle's Femme-Butch Reader (A Persistent Desire) and thinking more about labels and stereotypes than I ever have before. I think coming out as a "55-year-old virgin" (Thanks Suze Orman!) brings the sexuality back into sexual orientation. With the marriage issue I internalized the nobody-wants-to hear-what-goes-on-in-our-bedrooms issue. It's a matter of privacy and marriage is about partnership and love, and not about sexual positions. But you know, it is, at least a little, about sex. I think lately we're trying to pull the sexuality out of the issue so that we can win marriage and adoption and other battles, but there's a whole war here. Butch-femmes in the 50s it seems to me were fighting the war, and those of us today are fighting little battles, and maybe compromising the war to win marriage and adoption and other rights. What we need first is to be able to kiss and hold hands in public. Without that, where's marriage?

Posted by kate at 8:44 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

What Mr. Windish calls a level of peril is possibly always in play, and this no doubt has something to do with the easily observed reality that a public kiss between two people of the same sex remains an unusual occurrence, and probably not because most are holding out for the chance to lock lips over a hunk of milk chocolate, roasted peanuts and caramel.
-- New York Times, 2/18/07

Talking about the upcoming film Gray Matters I realized that I'm relatively starved for lesbian media. The L-Word is great and weekly, and I love blogs written by lesbians, but really, there's so little PDA and so little media.

I came out at about the same time as Ellen, in a really liberal place, and I believe so strongly in visibility. But it's true, how often do I kiss in public? Not so often. Am I role model? If you see us librarians in love walking down the street, would you know we're gay? I'm not sure. In the relative safety of the Internet, I'm out. But in the real world? It's downright scary, even in NY.

Posted by kate at 8:44 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I was worried about paying $2.75 and shipping for cans of vegan cat food, and $20 for each bag of cat food (and yes, there is still concern about how much of a cat's diet really should be vegan-- thanks for the comments on that post), and now it all seems so insignificant in light of our newest vet bill.

Last year our vet said that one of our cats has tartar build-up and needs a cleaning. And we thought about it, and agonized because of the risks of the procedure, and finally decided that the potential problems (tooth extraction) weren't worth the risk of not getting her teeth cleaned.

So, this morning we brought her to our vet. And, I love these people. They're nice, and friendly and our vet went to UIUC (one of our cats is from the Champaign-Urbana Humane Society). But my, the pricetag was unbearable.

I found myself not worrying so much about whether she'll recover from the cleaning, and much more worries about nearly $500 in bills! For an examination, annual shots and a dental cleaning? My own doctor bills (even before insurance) aren't this much. Wow.

I still like this vet a lot, and they're close, and I trust them, and Zoe (cat with the tartar) actually looks calm in her (our vet's) hands.

Posted by kate at 11:43 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

In a Feb 07 NY magazine article about the biggest generation gap in 50 years, we see the face-off between the new generation blogging their lives, and the older generation, appalled at what they're finding online. GenX (I think I'm in the GenY subset) is the bridge.

I recently wondered, if I could send a photo of my Second Life avatar to my colleagues at work, if it's scantily clad? The Millennials probably wouldn't give it a second thought (how many of them have naked pics on MySpace? and so many avatars on Second Life have little monkey avatars sitting on their shoulders, or are accidentally wearing boxes). I feel old, that I'm considering putting tights and a turtle-neck on my avatar. And then I feel young because I'm on Second Life. And so it is the dilemma of us in GenX (esp GenY). It's tough being the middle child.

On another note... I love how librarians are using Second Life for collaboration. The possibilities here are endless.

Posted by kate at 6:59 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

"The state of Washington is a magnet for the eye of Sauron/righwing punditocracy right now. ....They've proposed a ballot measure that would require heterosexual couples to prove their marriages by producing an offspring within three years. Or face annulment."

-- From www.seattlest.com, 2/6/07

Here's the website for the organization (The Washington Defense of Marriage Alliance) initiating this.

Posted by kate at 10:42 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Ari and Shira brought us some vegan cat food, and our little darlings LOVED it. They didn't seem to notice the vegan dry food mixed with their regular dry food, and they sucked up the moist like roomba vacuums controlled by a wii remote that's getting flung across a room.

The thing is, they pretty much just love the sound of cans getting opened, so the packaging certainly didn't hurt.

I'm not sure what to do next. I love the cats, but am not sure we're ready for the expense of super fancy food, and I'm definitely not going to cook for them all the time... at least not while I'm working full-time and part-time in school.

So, for now, they're going to have to live with their generic (Whole Food supermarket) brand catfood. And, maybe, just maybe when NYU isn't billing us three arms and two legs every semester, the cats can have their gourmet pleasures.

Posted by kate at 11:03 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Almost eleven years later, a recount of Our First Date

We were nineteen years old, 2nd years at Grinnell, and both dating guys. Grinnell's got a pretty big Stonewall Coalition crowd, and is quite liberal... and so it's probably difficult to graduate without at least a same-sex kiss. Probably (I haven't got any actual stats) there's a high proportion of lugs* and that's certainly where I thought Jenny and I fit. So second year, on Disco night (March 9, 1996), I squarely fell into the questioning category**, with Jenny landing right beside me, and both of us saying, "this is isn't happening" to anyone who suspected. Then we went biking across Florida with some friends for Spring break... and you put two questioning girls in a hotel room together... and then we lived with our friend in St. Paul, MN for the next summer... and then studied abroad in different countries for our 3rd year at Grinnell (Jenny in France & me in Costa Rica). Usually, we count Disco night in 1996 as our anniversary, and we got married in March 2004, so March is definitely our month.

Although we'd been going out for two years by this point, I think our first real date was Valentine's Day our Senior year at Grinnell because the first two years were complicated by study abroad and denial. We went the traditional route and planned together so there'd be flowers, chocolates, dinner, wine (we were finally 21) and a teddy bear (who we still have-- our wireless network is named for the bear). Every year since, we always celebrate Valentine's Day. For many years we got an annual teddy bear, but later transitioned to jewelry & other romantic items because neither of us really wanted a teddy bear collection but couldn't replace past bears with new bear, and the collection was getting too big.

* Lesbians Until Graduation
** Maybe if you read iPal on Vday this year, we'll post pictures. Maybe. Well... probably because I'm thinking that more lgbt people really need to post our stories online (I know... tons already are, but there should be millions & billions). Visibility by the truckload.

Posted by kate at 8:22 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

After the depressing dying tennis player, custody battles and kidnapping, I wasn't sure about starting Season 4 of L-Word. But I'm not the only one who's loving this season's Shane in a Hugo Boss underwear ad. Ebay's got
a set of 8 1/2 x 11 photos of Shane, so far with 19 bids, up to $50. This season is just too unbearably hot.

One issue last week was whether Tina can still identify as a lesbian now that she's dating men. She claimed it's a political definition. I think she should get back with Bette and then the whole point will be moot.

Posted by kate at 10:27 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I think I might love my job. Hostos-CUNY's library just won ACRL's 2007 Excellence in Academic Libraries Award.

Posted by kate at 7:58 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

My first conference presentation. If you'll be in Princeton, NJ on March 15th, come and check it out:

Rhonda (a co-worker) and I are presenting Where's the Gap? Exploring the Technological Continuum in Academic Libraries

The topic is partly inspired by my boss asking if we needed a MySpace account for our library (no, in our case-- though I definitely think it's a good idea, in general), and so I had an intuitive answer but no framework for justifying my decision.

It's also inspired by a conversation Rhonda and I had about MeGen, and GenX, and where we fit in, and whether generational divides are really significant contributors to digital divides.

Posted by kate at 7:31 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)