Gay Means Happy

I have to share that I was amazed by the young feminist and LGBT communities of students that sponsored our show this past weekend at a fairly conservative midwestern college. These committed, brave, staggeringly smart, lovely people worked their butts off to bring us in and support an underdog community of individuals who really seemed hungry for a dose of on-their-team comedy. But it was in the after-show hours that I got to see a glimpse of a possible future for our country: less anger, more “this is who I am… deal with it.”

I think about my 8 year old who is growing up with gay cousins and friends of the family, mixed race marriages and adoptions in what is now my own little familial united nations. I knew we had really done something right in creating the next generation of nothing-phobes when last year, during the Olympics’ ice dancing events, he turned to me and asked in a wholly incredulous tone, “Why are they always a boy and a girl?” Needless to say I called my cousins immediately to report the good news: this generation is going to look at our generation the way mine looked at our parents’ generation and said, “Really? Separate water fountains? Are you kidding?!!”

I have tremendous hope for gay civil rights in the next ten years when these little kids, too, grow up to be activists. Or simply just not indoctrinated with homophobia.    With my son, I happily launched into a nice chat about the film “Blades of Glory” (a comedy about 2 male ice dancers partnered up) and came up with some bogus explanation that you just really need one person to weigh less…I didn’t talk about homophobia. I will, I promise. But I’m not ready to kill his innocence. Not yet. It’s such a nice fantasy planet to live on for a while.