Nearly Wordless Wednesday: Favorite Places

Holkham Beach, Norfolk, UK

America

I was proud to vote today because I am happy to live in a country where we have the right to elect our leadership.  Whether your person won or not, that is something to be thankful for and to never take for granted.  Sing it Hugh.

Voting No

Come on, you know this had to be a political post.  I could talk about who I am voting for in the presidential election tomorrow, but that's probably obvious.  I can give you a clue--I have two agenda items that are most important to me: the environment and GLBT rights. I honestly look at very little else.  Truth be told, every questionnaire I have taken makes me a Green Party voter but I made that mistake in the 2000 election (sorry AJT!), so I'm not going to do that ever again (or until we get rid of the two party system).

But I digress.  I am writing to you today to talk about the proposed amendment to the Minnesota state constitution to add the definition of marriage to be the union of one man and one woman.  I could come at this from so many angles on how wrong this amendment is, but I want to address the people who want to vote yes to this for religious reasons.  In a perfect world, the government would not define marriage.  In a perfect world, the government would have a say about civil unions and leave marriage as a ritual for religious purposes.  That way, each church can decide who they will and will not marry.  And then, you can decide which church you do or do not belong to based on how you feel, religiously, about the issue.  But the church should have no power over the rights of citizens, gay or straight.  That, folks, is why we have separation of church and state.  Unfortunately, we have this term 'marriage' that hovers in that gray area.  Many people think of marriage in a religious sense, but marriage is also bound by law and often defined by the law.  Eventually it is my hope that the fight will be not to define marriage in the state's constitution, but to get rid of the word marriage, replace it with civil union, and make that the legally binding contract between two people that leads to the rights and benefits that your gay brothers and sisters are fighting for.  And yes, in my world, civil union is not defined based on opposite gender partnerships.  Marriage in a church in and of itself with no civil union paperwork behind it would hold no legal standing.  Marriage would be something on top of the civil union: civil union gives you rights as partners, marriage gives your partnership the blessing of your church.

But, here we are in 2012 and that is not how it is.  Marriage is the term being used, and marriage is the term being defined.  So therefore we should not limit marriage in the constitution to be between one man and one woman because that will limit the legal rights of gay partners, and that is not fair.  Religion has no place in this argument.  At the end of the day, this is all about equal rights in the eyes of the law, not in the eyes of God.  If you vote Yes, you are saying gay people are somehow lesser citizens.  Let us be better than our ancestors who treated black people as second class citizens.  We are all humans.  Black, white, gay, straight.  At the end of the day, that is all that should matter.

True fact.

Some rules aren't meant to be broken

This is going to be a short one tonight as I just don't have the energy to rant as much as I would like.  A tragedy took place at the Pittsburgh Zoo today.  A two year old fell into the African wild dog (also known as painted dog, African hunting dog) exhibit and died.  Unfortunately, one of the endangered dogs was killed as well.

Here's my rant--this tragedy was completely preventable.  The mother was seen holding her child up on top of the railing to give him a better view.  People, zoo barriers are there for a reason. They aren't there to piss you off because your view is blocked or your perfect photograph is ruined.  They aren't there for your kids to climb on like monkey bars.  Mostly they are there for your safety.  Sometimes they are there to protect the animals from you.

The rules are not made for someone else.  They are made for you.  For a reason.  Please follow them.  My heart goes out to the family, but also to the staff of the Pittsburgh Zoo.  I hope they are not blamed, or even worse, sued for what happened.

African wild dogs at Lincoln Park Zoo, Chicago.  Photo by me.

My love/hate relationship with running

Here's something you might not know based on my Facebook posts: I hate running.  OK, hate is a strong word, but it's not something I get out and do because I love it.  I do it because it loves me.  I don't need special equipment, I can do it anywhere, and just a few months into starting running again, I've dropped 20 pounds.  I can't turn a blind eye to that!  But when I'm out running, it takes all my willpower to keep going.  I hit more mental walls in a three mile run than you can believe.  I usually can push through them.  Not always.

Yes, I used to be a runner in a prior life.  I ran cross-country two years (freshman and junior) in high school, but here's a secret: I didn't love running then either.  I liked it, but I liked being part of that team more.  That's why I ran--that and I sucked at volleyball.  I was a jock, I had to do something.  And I'm glad I did--because the years I didn't run, I managed cross-country because our team was like family.  But it was never a love for running that kept me going, and it isn't a love for running that keeps me going now.  It's the love of the feeling I get when I'm done running that keeps me going.  That and the 20 pounds.  And the fact I'm not out of breath when I walk up a flight of stairs anymore :)

Getting water during the Vibha 5K, October 2012

The story of Juarez

As most of you know, our senior dog of 17 years, Juarez (aka Pepper), passed away this week.  Having had her for the past 11 formative years of my life, it is so strange (and difficult) not having her around.  So for those of you that don't know the story of how I got Pepper, I thought that would be a good post for tonight.

I went to grad school in Richmond, Virginia.  Shortly after graduating (I think I was still in training?), I moved into an apartment that allows dogs.  Needless to say, I was at a point in my life where not only did I want another dog, I needed one as well.  And...I've always been a sucker for special needs dogs.  So I was surfing on the web and found this great little 3-legged dog.  I contacted the rescue to see if I could meet her, and they said that she was being adopted out by this lady (we'll call her Magda to protect the innocent) and that I needed to contact her.   So, I contacted Magda, and made arrangements to go meet the tripod.  Now Magda had a lot of dogs--in fact, she ran her own rescue out of her house.  Time and knowledge has made me realize in reflection that she was (or is), in all likelihood, a hoarder.  And like most animal hoarders, I truly do believe she means the best for her animals.  She just doesn't have the resources to take care of them all and in the end, it can be an ugly thing.  She was very protective of her animals--in fact, she didn't think I would be a good fit to take care of the tripod (she had part of her intestines removed because she ate her collar--this was the concern, not the lack of leg).  Looking back, I realize that there was probably no one good enough in Magda's mind to take care of Tripod.  But that is okay--because it leads to the next part of the story.  

So Magda says to me "there's another dog here I'd like you to meet" and she goes to let him out of an enclosed area where there are about 10 dogs are milling about.  The dog comes bolting out and races across the lawn, happy as a clam to be free.  Completely ignores me.  I was squatting down on the ground watching him zoom around when suddenly a little black dog comes and crawls into my lap; turns out, she had escaped with Happy Boy when the gate opened.  That little dog was Pepper.  She chose me.  How could I say no?  Pepper had been with Magda since she was a pup.  She was 6 when I adopted her; that tells you a lot about Pepper.  She had been adopted out once before but did not get a long with the person's dogs--turns out when the other dogs were getting petted, Pepper would squeeze in between so that she would be the one getting petted.  She was used to fighting for attention--you would be too if you lived with dozens of other dogs for your entire life.  I was a naive dog owner, and Pepper never got any sort of training.  She did not like other dogs, and I didn't trust her around all people.  In other words, she was far from perfect.  And perfect at the same time.  

And that is the story of how I got Juarez, the cartel leader who took a large piece of me and my heart when she left us.

Juarez, taken this summer by Paige Reyes

NaBloPoMoWho?

So my buddy over at Cranial Vault posted on the FB about NaBloPoMo, or National Blog Posting Month.  I've been wanting to start a blog for awhile to just have a random outlet to write in (even if no one ever reads it).  And doing a blog post a day for a month seems as good a reason as any to jump right in.  I might have to use some of the cheesy prompts to get me started, but I have a few ideas as well.  But for tonight, I will just leave you with this picture of the Rottweiler.

Suzy Q at Newport State Park, Door County, Wisconsin