Do I wake or sleep?

Friday evening I went down to the Gene Frankel to see the last Planet Connections show I could, Doug's (our Tom in Sweeter Dreams) other show, Hummingbirds. Not bad at all--his performance was great, as were the two women. One of them (the two women) buttonholed me two weeks ago after Sweeter Dreams, raving about my performance and...touching me?! Not inappropriately but flirtatiously. I certainly wasn't offended but was wondering if I'd interpreted that correctly and later Duncan said "oh yeah, she was all over you." Okay, then! Anyway, she and the other woman, whom I'd seen in another PC show, Loose Women... (she was great) were both very strong. I couldn't hang out to compliment anyone afterwards, as I had to book way back uptown to catch the end of Jason's "Take Back the Park" viewing--I guess I'm sort of a mascot now!

I got there and it was a bit of a bust, due to the clouds. There were about 5 other men besides Jason--he introduced me and then he and I talked for a bit. After the interview came out the day before, Jason had emailed me, calling me "very brave" and he followed up on this. I demurred a bit--I'm not traumatized, and nothing lasting happened to me, other than radicalizing me even MORE about rape and violence against women. It's not brave, it's just facts. At any rate, he told me that he thinks the interview was not just on local radio, but on "All Things Considered"--which is national! Wow! He thinks this because some friends of his heard the interview in New jersey, out of range of local NYC radio stations. Pretty cool!

I got home and heard the AMAZING NEWS!!!! YAAAAAAAAYYYYY!!! So, so happy for all my gay friends and family--we truly are all brothers and sisters in the eyes of God! So happy that the New York legislators did the right thing. It is TIME! I started weeping, reading the explosion of joy of Facebook. Then the historian in me was even more moved reading what the legislators had said to explain their affirmative votes--this especially got to me:

Republican Senator Mark Grisanti then spoke about his struggle before coming to his decision to vote for the bill. "A man can be wiser today than he was yesterday," he said.

This is literally bringing tears to my eyes. This is how progress is made. This is how we make things better, not just for us but for those around us. This is the difficult, incremental process of social evolution. There has seemed to be so much anger and hatred for the past 20 years in politics--so many wedge issues, so much pointless divisiveness, so much cruelty. (Specifically, I'm thinking of shitty, godless Pat Robertson blaming 9-11 on feminism and homosexuality. That's not partisan, that's not ideological or true to your religious beliefs, that's just being a nasty, cruel piece of shit.) I'm not kidding myself that it's all ended--I know it hasn't. But by God, in the past 3 years, we've elected a black man to our highest office, and we've just doubled the number of gay people in this country who can be married. Even the setbacks are being nullified, like when Prop 8 was overturned in the courts. I love reading about the '60s--there was so much incredible heroism in the civil rights and anti-war movements, and so much history was made. It happened so quickly. My friends, these are our sixties. This is our time, our chance to change the world for the better. To grow, to accomplish--to change the world.

By the way, I just called my state senator and thanked him for voting yes on Friday. His assistant was thrilled, thanked me and told me also to email him, which I will.

Saturday was the final performance of Sweeter Dreams--Christine was there, as was my friend Linda, as well as Jason and Caroline. Jason was right up front laughing at everything, it was great. I had a little fun with the interview scene and finally FINALLY got a laugh on my throwaway snark on Joanna Remarque. I made two small adjustments--I emphasized my criticism of her in my first monologue just a little bit more, to set it up, and then in the interview I made the eye roll bigger and FINALLY got a laugh! I also added a new obnoxiously correct pronunciation--Spielberg is now Schpeelberg, the way the Germans would say it. Heather told me they all laughed backstage when they heard that.

After the show Jason and I got Mexican food and just had a nice long convo. I had plans to have dinner with Tim so I raced hom and got ready, then I met him at Houston's by the Lipstick Building (one of my favorite buildings in the city). We talked forevs, had a lovely time. He thinks the cop rape verdict is complete bullshit, BTW. We went to a bar for a nightcap and the Yankees game was on--they showed a guy sliding headfirst in slomo and I commented that I'd done hook slides (and of course regular slides) but I'd never slid head first, I was too nervous about messing up my face.

Sunday I slept quite late--finally got up and cleaned and got ready for my Sunday softball game. We played the Northwestern team and HAMMERED them. The final score was 12-1. Yikes! I hit .500, plus a sacrifice grounder. And I was part of a double-play--there was a runner at 2nd who was caught between the bases when our center fielder caught it. I yelled "Throw it here, he has to tag up!" And when I got the ball, ran his ass down, even though I could've just ran back to 2nd base. But what fun would that have been? :) It's more fun to tag them!

At one point I was on 1st base and someone popped it up to the infield--the 2nd and 1st base players weren't communicating too well, so I gambled, thinking they wouldn't catch it. Well, the 2nd basewoman DID catch it so I was in trouble since I hadn't tagged up! I DOVE back to 1st base just under the tag--so now I can say yes, I HAVE slid head first!

After the game 5 of us hung around for batting practice and then we went over to a bar when the Northwestern team told us they'd be. And--I think one of my teammates was flirting with me? Sometimes it's hard to tell. But he seems to direct a lot of attention my way--he's always teasing me or asking me questions, and then he was comparing our gloves (his is huge and expensive, mine is very old--I've had it since I was 8-9--and NOT-expensive) he said something like "I'll only buy her a good one if she goes on a date with me." Um, what?! I'm just saying, my female radar is pinging. He is cute, though. Anyway, we all had pitchers and maued wings. Nom, nom, nom...

I read an article on Salon.com about a new book that's coming out about women's gymnastics, a memoir by an athlete who competed in the '80s, Jennifer Sey. It sounds very interesting. Actually the article is an interview with the athlete herself who matter-of-factly talks about eating disorders, the de facto physical abuse and the inherent skeeviness of some of it.

Throughout the book, you make elliptical references to male coaches who are attracted to young girls and imply that your own personal coach, John, was one of them. What did you mean when you said that he was "lewd and lascivious" and "may have liked being near all the barely dressed teens, but … never explicitly let on"?

He was never inappropriate with us, but he was a really flirty guy, and we all saw that. And sometimes the women he flirted with were very close to our age -- 18, 19 years old, and we were 15 or 16. There were a lot of things he did that made me feel weird -- he was a weird guy. The conditions of the sport are strange, and that was what I was trying to say. Most men that coach women gymnasts have never been gymnasts themselves. So I always wondered, even as a child: Why do these men want to coach little girls? In some instances, it's purely financial. But I think in the minority of cases, there are men who are interested in little girls.

I've always wondered that myself! Steve Nunno and Bela Karolyi weren't gymnasts--I'm not even sure they were athletes! (I don't know that much about Al Fong's background but his coaching career has been pretty cursed--TWO dead gymnasts?) I always thought men who only coached girls have this need to be the ram among ewes--the unquestioned authority figure because girls are eager to please and will push themselves for that (this applies to younger boys as well, but IMO as boys get older they're more likely to rebel than girl athletes). And frankly, yeah, there is the skeeve factor--any guy who chooses to coach only girls (as opposed to a mixture of boys and girls) is always going to seem a little weird. Bela Karolyi creeped me out, sorry. Sure, he's been successful but his reputation is too controversial within the gymnastics community for me not to wrinkle my nose.

But what fascinates me about this article are the comments. Most of the comments are pretty thoughtful (other than the dullard who wrote "here's a thought
If it's so terrible quit"--gee, that's helpful! She'll just step in her time machine and go back to the '80s and quit, and then come back to resume her adult life.). But there are a few letters from respondents who attack the interview for what they see as bias, especially the headline. Fair enough, we can look at that--the headline is titillating, I agree, although I certainly think the issue of why these men choose to coach only girls, and the potential resultant risks, is a valid topic. But every now and then a tone comes across from some of the letter writers and I click on "Read other letters by [name of poster]." Oh mah Lord. Some angry little men out there. Check out this one guy, "Parson Jim":

[quoting an earlier letter] "The avoidance of teaching/coaching careers by men in many fields is exactly due to the sexism of this article and Sey's book.

"But the decline in male teachers has been taking place for decades, and feminist organizations have been fueling it for the same time with their hate speech against men."

Look around you, Mr. Feminist, and you will find hate in fellow feminists who preach "equality", [sic] but who are bigots or the worst type.

I clicked on "Read Parson Jim's other letters" and EVERY SINGLE LETTER is about this shit! Almost every single letter denounces feminism or asserts how bad American men have it compared to American women or denies the existence of male chauvinism/sexism/etc. (I read through the first ten pages of the guy's 60+ page archive of posts--there were maybe 5 letters that addressed other issues. I didn't want to read past the first ten pages--too creepy!) Oh my God, dude, CHILL. OUT. You will never get any action with that kind of bitterness seeping out of your pores. (Maybe that's the cause? Nothing pisses a certain kind of loser off like not getting some when he feels entitled. You know the saying, "a whore is a woman who sleeps with everyone. A bitch is a woman who sleeps with everyone but you.")

UGH. I seriously feel creeped out now. Hey dude, like it or not, feminism is here to stay, abortion is still legal and we're not shutting up. Welcome to the 21st century.