June 14th is Flag Day...and the First Day of Lesbian and Gay Californians Have the Option to Wed!

In the homes where I grew up, both in Maplewood, NJ and later in Portland, OR, in front of our home there was a silver-plated flag pole mount firmly screwed into the part of each house that jutted out on the wooden frame of the house, located near where the house was closest to the street. On every Flag Day, June 14th, my Dad would take the American flag out of the front hall closet, unfurl it (of course, each time he furled it carefully, and also burned one of our flags when it was tattered in a storm, as is the "right way" of discarding a flag), and with golden eagle pointing out toward the sky, he would put the flag in its special mount, step back, and salute. After all, he was an Air Force Reservist for over 30 years, retiring as a Lieutenant Colonel.

In California, June 14th is the first day that LGBTQ folks will be allowed to marry, legally, in the state.

As a proud American, and envious North Carolinian, I may go out and buy an American flag, mount it in front of our house in Chapel Hill, and along with the eagle, put streamers on the end, rainbow colored of course, celebrating this happy day of California's move toward upholding the rights of all people to wed, gay and straight alike. Click here for more on coming nuptials in California.

There is movement in the land. But a "fight" is always before us from those who would want to take away this day. After all, polls are showing that over half of the state of CA would approve a ban of same sex weddings.

The importance of standing up, rising up, and being known and counted and engaged in this fight is made dramatically clear in the recent inauguration of a memorial to the LGBTQ folks who died at the hand of the Nazi regime of WWII Germany. Seeing the play/movie "Bent", or going to the Holocaust museum in Washington, D.C., or to Yad Vashem in Israel, one is reminded of who died, and why: because many were silent in the face of extermination of others with the excuse, "thank God that's not about us," until, in the words of Niemoller, they came for us, and no one was left to defend us. Click here for that article.


Peace,

Brett