My two-cents worth and then some. An online journal by LP Brown.
I want to get something off my chest, so I’ll get right to the point. When you see two women or two men hugging in public it does not necessarily mean that they are gay. To paraphrase an old Flip Wilson adage, “What you see is not always what you get.”
Here is the situation. A female friend and I were standing outside a small office building talking with Jim, a male business acquaintance. A trio of young male landscapers were working nearby. My friend, who I will call Gail, told Jim that she and I were in complete agreement on a business decision. Jim said “I know. I know you two always agree.” “Definitely!” Gail replied laughing, and then impulsively she grabbed and hugged me. During our brief embrace, I glanced over her shoulder and saw the landscapers watching us. Two of them exchanged telling glances and one of them smirked before turning his attention back to his task.
I am a very intuitive person and sensed that they were thinking that we must be lesbians, simply because we hugged. Gail and I are business partners as well as close friends. However, neither she nor I are lesbians, nor are we bisexual. In fact, we both are in fulfilling relationships with our male soul mates.
Some of you are probably wondering why did I feel so uncomfortable over what I believed the workmen must have been thinking? It’s because I am well aware that although many people say that they are receptive to alternative lifestyles, everyone is not. Some people, if they are honest, will tell you that
In 1970, Erich Segal’s novel Love Story became a block buster romantic-tragedy film and many Baby Boomers still remember it as one of the greatest tearjerkers of our day. Love stories continue to be an appealing subject in any venue. There are hundreds of movies about it, books about it, and song, after song, after song about love. But an Iowa couple married for 72 years, who died an hour apart, may be proof of what Christopher Setterlund says in his poem, Love is Eternal.
In May 1939, on the night of the day that Norma graduated from high school she married Gordon Yeager. On October 12, 2011, Norma, then 90 years old and Gordon, 94 were involved in a car accident. The Yeagers suffered serious injuries including broken bones that sent them both to the hospital intensive care unit. With their beds set side-by-side, the couple joined hands and maintained their grasp even after Gordon died at 3:38 p.m.
Family members were perplexed because although Gordon was declared dead his monitor indicated that his heart was still beating. A nurse explained to the family that the Gordon’s monitor was registering his wife’s heartbeat through their still clasped hands. Norma died one hour after her husband.
At the request of their family, the couple was placed together, hand-in-hand, in a single casket during their funeral. Afterward they were cremated and their ashes mixed.
Now that’s a love story.
Sentimentalists may agree with what Setterlund so eloquently wrote, “Love is eternal, though breath may cease, love is the one thing, the one part we do not release.”
The mother of Denise Darbeau, hospitalized since last Thursday says that her daughter was just a “fun loving” 24 year old who now has memory loss and could have permanent brain damage. Darbeau and her girlfriend, Rachael Edwards, unknowingly ordered and received a double whopper beatdown from McDonald’s employee, Rayon McIntosh.
Following a verbal altercation which Darbeau sealed by slapping McIntosh in his face, the two women — perhaps fantasizing themselves to be Thelma and Louise — then charged behind the counter to confront the cashier. Apparently, the scriptwriter forgot to give the female duo their desired ending and did not give McIntosh a copy of the script, because he responded as any normal person does when threatened, he snapped; er I mean he defended himself. It wasn’t pretty. And I am certain it wasn’t the ending that Thelma and Louise had in mind.
McIntosh’s mother said her son was just trying to get his life together. That is a statement with which many of his supporters agree, regardless of his past. Many also reiterate that he was not out in the street robbing people and looking for trouble — he was working. McIntosh is still being held on $40,000 bond and has a December 2 court date. Rayon McIntosh Defense Fund.