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Fearful Reading

March 14, 2014 by mountainmornings

As some of you may know, I signed up to follow the Parnassus Bookstore blog, Musing, almost as soon as it launched. I follow its editor, Mary Laura Philpott, on Twitter too. It’s a fun way to keep up with literary happenings in my daughter’s adopted city, Nashville. And a recent post on Musing made me wonder if I had ever been afraid to read something, anything. I won’t go to horror movies, but that’s different. I’m aware that I’ll read crime and mystery novels only on vacation – like the Girl With the Dragon Tattoo series – but me, afraid to read something? Never!

In “Reading (and Writing) Through Fear” Philpott reviewed a book that she admits she normally wouldn’t read. The Bear, by Claire Cameron, is written from the point-of-view of a five year old; a terrified child who has just witnessed a bear kill her parents. Certainly horrific territory, and granted it is maybe a book I would pick up in a bookstore, read the jacket, and put down. Not necessarily because I’d be frightened by the content, but when you have lost a family as a child, as I did in my first year of life, it’s not something I would want to read about. In the same way that Bob doesn’t like to see war pictures, since his work is sometimes like a war zone. He gets enough adrenalin in the ER.

But then, Philpott interviewed the author. Cameron said that before she had children she wasn’t afraid of anything, but then…

…my sons were born. The first time a babysitter came over to look after my six-month old, I stood outside the front door and could barely make myself walk away. It was, I realized, a new kind of fear. It’s one that comes alongside loving someone else completely, be it a child, partner, lover or friend. The world is big. It can be scary. And I couldn’t protect the people I love at every given moment.

While I was working on the first draft of The Bear, I thought I was writing about that — the fear of not being able to protect my children from everything. After I finished, I talked to a friend about the story. Knowing me well, she said that I was actually writing about my fear of not being a parent. What if something happened to me and I wasn’t there for them? The minute she said it, I knew she was right.http://parnassusmusing.net/2014/03/06/reading-what-you-fear/#more-660

So I bought the book. Because it’s always interesting to see how an author finds the authentic magical thinking voice of a child. And because I knew I was deep-down afraid to read it. And the only way to keep growing, is to challenge that fear.

And today I’m going to read The New Yorker article, “The Reckoning” by Andrew Solomon, about his interview with the father of Adam Lanza, the Sandy Hook killer. This really scares me, but I hope that some insight for some struggling parent out there will come through his words. When I heard Solomon say on a news show that Adam’s mother Nancy was more interested in Adam having a “good day” instead of a “good life” it sealed the deal. Sometimes a parent can live in so much denial, they begin to believe in the insular, sclerotic world their child has created. A world in which the bear is the child himself.  Unknown-1

 

 

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Overwhelmed

March 12, 2014 by mountainmornings

This getting back to normal business can be frustrating. Obviously it’s difficult waking up and not having a toddler waltz into your room to escort you to breakfast; or should I say the feast of fresh fruits and juices and any other breakfast food imaginable no longer awaits you on a breezy terrace with the ocean looking on. No, it’s back to making my own coffee and cutting up my own banana in yogurt looking at the mountains, all the while waiting for a single crocus to bloom…really, shouldn’t that have happened already?

So I did what any red-blooded American woman would do after finally getting over my flu-like illness. I went to the gym – I figured if I kept waiting for spring it would never come. Like the proverbial boiling pot. And on my way home just now, I  listened to an author on NPR about feeling time crunched because she was a working mom. Way to put my problems into perspective! My daughter was returning to her everyday life which included the usual; grocery shopping, cooking, cleaning and laundry and also a sick toddler and a job that was anything but 9 to 5. It was more like 11pm to 7am, then she’d get some sleep and wake up to write her charts while the Love Bug napped.

I thought she must be feeling overwhelmed about now. So I made a mental note to tell her about this book since its author was heartbreakingly good on the radio. Brigid Schulte, a Washington Post columnist, wrote Overwhelmed; Work Love and Play When No One Has the Time. She talked about her generation and how they didn’t want to have a traditional marriage, the kind their parents had where the woman was in charge of the home, even if she had a full or part-time job. She wanted a more equitable distribution of work – like one always loads the dishwasher at night and one will always empty in the morning.

Last one out of bed makes the bed, and even if he forgets to put the pillows back on the bed you don’t do it…you leave them on the floor. I don’t think men understand just how hard that is for us, not picking up pillows.

Eventually Schulte and her husband did get to that place of marital housework justice, but it was a shock to see how far they had slipped into a more traditional model. She had to rewrite her to-do list, which is surprisingly the cover art of her book. Because after writing down every single thing she was trying to cram into her days, she realized that if she didn’t plan for her own recreational time, it would not happen.

I was just with my father who’s had a stroke, and sitting in a hospital room really makes you remember: … We don’t have that much time; what do you want to make of your life here on this Earth? And so, my to-do list is really: What are my priorities? What is most important to me? And then everything else, everything my to-do list used to be, I call the other 5 percent — it shouldn’t take more than 5 percent of my time or energy. There’s a lot of stuff that I used to do that I don’t do anymore. http://www.npr.org/2014/03/11/288596888/not-enough-hours-in-the-day-we-all-feel-a-little-overwhelmed

In many ways the Bride is lucky. Her Groom does his fair share around the house and truly shares child care when he is at home. Maybe my SIL could use this book? In Mexico she said she never gets any down time. To which I foolishly replied, but doesn’t your daughter go to school every day? Because she said, “Yes, but I go to work.”

If I were a list maker, this would be my list for today: 1) make bed, 2) pick up tickets for Book Festival, 3) search for a purple crocus. And I only make the bed because Nell said even if that’s all you do in a day, at least you did something!

Breakfast Anyone?

Breakfast Anyone?

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#IWD

March 8, 2014 by mountainmornings

Happy International Women’s Day 2014!  http://www.internationalwomensday.com If I were sitting at a cafe on my favorite island in the French West Indies, I would have been handed a rose already. Instead I’m watching the snow melt this morning from my aviary and reflecting on that Virginia Slims ad; we have come a long way baby and we’ve got a long way to go.

“The story of women’s struggle for equality belongs to no single feminist nor to any one organization but to the collective efforts of all who care about human rights” Gloria Steinem

We Americans can feel smug when we read about countries where women cannot drive a car, or a woman cannot feel safe on a public bus from being gang raped. But if we truly pay attention, our sisters are under assault in a myriad of ways. A recent, hideous example is a misogynistic and homophobic judge in Arkansas – “Sluts are just whores in training.” Did I mention this is a family court judge? http://thinkprogress.org/justice/2014/03/07/3376181/sluts-are-just-whores-in-training-and-other-wisdom-offered-by-a-sitting-arkansas-judge/#

And then there’s the Army’s top sexual assault prosecutor being charged with…sexual assault. http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/mar/06/us-army-prosecutor-suspended-assault-claims

One of my favorite comedians, Sarah Silverman, schooled me on my retro-feminist views. In a YouTube sketch, she asks us to stop telling our girls they can be anything they want to be. I was guilty of this. I wanted the Bride to know she could be President if she wanted – thank God she didn’t. But why, why stop saying this to our daughters? Silverman said:

“Because it would never occur to them that they couldn’t.”

Over the years, I’ve written about and marched for reproductive freedom, because without that essential human right, women worldwide have shortened expectations and shortened lives. Pro Choice women are Pro Life women, we just continue to care about the lives of mothers and children.

Like the first woman rabbi, Sally Priesand, once said, I too look forward to the day we can stop making a news headline out of the “First Woman” anything.

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Time in a Bottle

March 7, 2014 by mountainmornings

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Time stands still for no man, or woman, except for this week – I wish it would just linger a little. Last week, we traveled from Eastern, through Central to Mountain Time in Cabo, losing two hours. And now we must fidget with our clocks again, Spring Ahead this weekend, and gain an hour of evening light. What’s a girl to do?

In general, “losing” an hour in the spring is more difficult to adjust to than “gaining” an hour in the fall. It is similar to airplane travel; traveling east we lose time. An “earlier” bedtime may cause difficulty falling asleep and increased wakefulness during the early part of the night. Going west, we fall asleep easily but may have a difficult time waking. http://www.webmd.com/sleep-disorders/features/coping-with-time-changes

So that’s why I was staying up till midnight after our vacation, my circadian rhythm had shifted with the sun. But returning home with a full-blown flu-like illness, which left me napping at odd hours and waking all through the night in order to try breathing, has left me wondering. How does all this this sleep-shifting affect our health?

If you’re alive, you know what sleep deprivation feels like. The Rocker suffered from one ear infection after another when he was born. For six whole months I didn’t sleep more than two hours at a time because I was nursing and being very stoic about help. When his ear drum turned the corner, and I slept for six hours straight, I told Bob he wouldn’t have to commit me after all. That’s the closest I ever came to crazy. That’s what most people who torture people for a living know; keep the lights on and the music blaring. That’ll do it.

I hope the Rocker has adjusted to turning around one day after returning to NJ, to fly to LA and pick up on Nicole’s tour out West. It’s really only an hour’s change from Mexico, and he’s young. *see below for dates!

In order to Save Some Daylight, we’ll all be waking up an hour earlier this Monday. We’ll be groggy and just slightly flustered, trying to compare the new time to the old, making sure all our clocks have been adjusted, our smoke alarm batteries changed. We might need an extra cup of coffee to get going. But think about the positive, those long summer nights to come…I like to think about that since we still have snow on the ground and a chill in the air in VA. I’m happy to put this polar vortex in the rear view mirror.

The experts say it should only take a day to adjust our bodies to a one hour time change. But they don’t say much about traveling through two time zones, getting sick and adding a dose of daylight savings time too. Let’s take this opportunity to refine our sleep hygiene. Get all those tech gizmos out of the bedroom, eliminate alcohol and caffeine at night, and develop some calming bedtime habits.

And for all parents out there with a baby, like our Love Bug, who likes to wake up with the birds, rejoice! Their circadian rhythm will finally align with yours, and “…peace will guide the planets and love will steer the stars.” Let the sun shine in.

Mar 6, 2014 8:00 AM
Singer-songwriter Nicole Atkins recently released Slow Phaser, her latest record. In commemoration, The A.V. Club has the premiere of the video for one of the album’s best tracks, “Girl You Look Amazing.” A riff on modern Instagram society, “Girl You Look Amazing” plays on the idea of a person having a seemingly fabulous digital life while, in actuality, actually being kind of sad.Atkins has some dates on the horizon—including some with Nick Cave And The Bad Seeds—and those are listed below. Slow Phaser is available on iTunes now.

Nicole Atkins Tour 2014

March 5—Bootleg Theatre—Los Angeles, California *
March 6—Soda Bar—San Diego, California *
March 8—Musical Instrument Museum—Phoenix, Arizona *
March 9—Outpost Performance Space—Albuquerque, New Mexico *
March 12—The Conservatory—Oklahoma City, Oklahoma *
March 13-16—SXSW—Austin, Texas *
March 17—Dan’s Silverleaf—Denton, Texas *
March 20—The Nick—Birmingham, Alabama *
March 21—Hi-Tone—Memphis, Tennessee *
March 22—High Watt—Nashville, Tennessee *
March 23—Terminal West—Atlanta, Georgia *
March 25—Evening Muse—Charlotte, North Carolina *
March 26—Ram’s Head—Annapolis, Maryland *
March 27—Johnny Brenda’s—Philadelphia, Pennsylvania *
July 19—Moody Theater—Austin, Texas ^
July 21—Mahalia Jackson Theater—New Orleans, Louisiana ^
July 23—DAR Constitution Hall—Washington, D.C. ^
July 25—The Mann Center—Philadelphia, Pennsylvania ^
July 26—Celebrate Brooklyn—Brooklyn, New York ^
July 29—Masonic Temple Theater—Detroit, Michigan ^
July 31—Sony Centre—Toronto, Ontario ^
* with Arc Iris
^ with Nick Cave And The Bad Seeds

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Insatiable

March 5, 2014 by mountainmornings

Ada reminded me on our Mexican holiday that a good friend of hers once called her “insatiable.” She’s also referred to herself as a “pot stirrer” in Yiddish, which I think means she likes to keep her spoon in everybody’s pots. It keeps things bubbling and cooking away – a good quality for a marriage and family counselor.

Our first night in Cabo, many of the passengers who were on her flight out of Newark, paid homage to my MIL at the table. She has a knack for meeting people, and coaxing out of them their deepest secrets. I was aware that she tried hard not to engage everyone at the resort, and instead concentrate on her family and friends.

But it’s almost like that show the “Medium,” a Long Island woman who walks into a deli and hears from dead people. She can’t help herself, the Medium’s psychic self invades every aspect of her day. For Ada, her therapist self is so much a part of her identity, it kicks into gear almost immediately. Every person has a story to tell, and she’s an excellent listener.

You can see how this trait is passed down. To Bob who has a third eye and ear, (remember how he spied KERF at the airport?) who is either a great multi-tasker or an incredibly well adjusted adult with ADD. To the Bride, who in preschool was “helping” all her little friends with their art projects; so much so that the teacher asked me to have a talk with her. Maybe it didn’t help that Ada offered a dollar bonus once elementary school started for each check mark on the behavioral side of their report cards…this was for the presumably negative  act of raising your hand too much and talking out of turn. Grandma Ada wanted to encourage such things. Get those pots boiling!

And to my little Love Bug who would sit on the steps in the pool and point her little finger at me, then point it down right next to her and say “Sit!.” Not easily distracted, she is a tiny dictator of the sweetest variety. As we walked in the sand on the beach saying “Ocean” over and over again, I could see another insatiable spirit with her Great Grandmother’s eyes. I fully intend to keep up the tradition of the pot stirrer report card!

Ada says “YES” to life. She is incapable of being satisfied or appeased, the definition of insatiable. She wants to take it all in, experience everything that life has to offer. I had trouble keeping up with her in Cabo. Granted I was under the weather, but even when I’m feeling fine my 90 year old MIL can run, or walk, circles around me. On the day of her birthday party, many of the men went deep sea fishing and came back with a 20ft marlin. The chef at the hotel prepared the delicious fish three ways, along with a Mexican birthday cake.

While the guys and one gal were fishing, the Rocker drove Grandma Ada, Hudson and some of the women, including me, into another town for lunch and sightseeing. We saw the Hotel California, a street festival, and wild horses running in the street. It was an enchanting afternoon. And wouldn’t you know, Ada and Hudson met and immediately befriended a couple from Texas who went to Baylor, Hudson’s alma mater. I’m sure they’ll be visiting them on their next trip to NY.

So when people ask me what’s Ada’s secret, it’s simply this. She continues to be engaged and active, to learn and to love, to keep her spoon moving. She is our treasure.

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Cabo and Humpback Whales

February 27, 2014 by mountainmornings

Tis the season for whale watching, and so our family has gathered here in Mexico to bear witness. Humpbacks have returned from the north to mate and give birth in warm water. They are showing off their skills like proper Olympians; breaching the water to turn and flip over on their backs like circus aerialists in the Sea of Cortez. And even though we can see their fins and spouts from the terrace in our resort, yesterday we boarded two boats to get up close and personal.

I heard one before I saw it. The sound is like an elephant underwater when it surfaces to breathe and trumpet its arrival. We had a baby following our boat and the mama was underneath. It would surface and flip its fin at us as if to say, “Hey guys, want to play?” The marine biologist on the boat gave us a crash course in whale life. Babies weigh about 2,000 lbs and are 12 ft long and put on about a hundred pounds a day nursing! Adults can live 60 years and weigh up to 30 tons. Our baby, she told us, was born last month.

Just when I was about to say we had yet to see a breach – when the whale propels its entire body out of the water – it happened. A bull, most likely the daddy, erupted from the surface and took everyone’s breath away. The show continued with the mama flipping her tail at us.

It was thrilling! Time stood still. Such beautiful, ancient mariners, a paradox of evolution, underwater mammals who must breathe air every 30 minutes, who jump toward the sun in their mating rituals were swimming alongside us.

Ada had never seen whales in their natural habitat, and neither had I. Thank you Ada Flora, for bringing us all here.

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It’s the Journey

February 23, 2014 by mountainmornings

You know that saying, “It’s not about the destination it’s the journey.” Bob and I travel well together. We’ve learned to pack light. And this time, for some odd reason, I was off by a day; all packed and ready to go a day early. This is a good trick for future flights, just fool yourself into thinking you’re leaving tomorrow. Try not to let anyone disabuse you of the facts or your folly.

It was still dark, the sun was getting ready to rise. We were just waiting for our first flight when Bob said, “Look I think that’s Kath over there!” Now I am a ‘mind my own business type of traveler’ and Bob is more of a ‘let’s see who and what everybody else is doing’ type of traveler. So I looked over at the cute blonde he was referring to and said, “That can’t be Kath, she’s all alone – no baby Maze, no husband Matt.”

Then I went back to checking on all the important news in my Facebook feed. And there she was, Kath our famous Cville food blogger with a post of her yellow bag and how little she has to carry without baby in tow. I glanced over and sure enough, it was Kath sitting next to a yellow bag in real life and simultaneously seconds ago in digital life.

She is so sweet. And we chatted up our trips – hers to a dairy conference (first time sans baby), and ours to a 90th birthday celebration for Ada with the entire clan. Yes we are all 19 people arriving at the same place at the same time to watch some amazing wildlife and fete one incredible MIL. The same woman who told me 34 years ago she would always be on my side!

We’re on the second leg of our flight after meeting some good friends in Charlotte. The Love Bug and crew are in transit, after sending me some super airport pictures. Nashville airport is like Disneyland for kids. I’m going to leave our destination up to your imagination, but suffice it to say, this journey continues to surprise me!

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Rabid Ratios

February 20, 2014 by mountainmornings

On a morning when most of the news involves the ecstasy of Russian Olympics and the agony of its bordering state, Ukraine (where the city of Kiev is about to implode), the ratio of 1:5 is what sticks in my craw. According to the White House, one in five women in college will be raped. I don’t know about you, but I found this to be rather alarming.

Equally infuriating is that one in three teenage relationships has experienced dating violence. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-26263171

Our little town has been singled out recently for two contradictory things: 1) Charlottesville has been voted the second most “Friendliest” small city in America http://www.movoto.com/blog/top-ten/friendliest-small-cities/; and 2) the One Love Foundation has developed a new App to help students and their friends assess their level of dating danger http://www.joinonelove.org.

Just weeks before her graduation from UVA in 2010, lacrosse player Yeardley Love was killed by her ex-boyfriend. Her mother and sister have started the One Love Foundation in order to address dating violence and educate students about the signs and symptoms of a relationship on the brink of chaos.

The “One” represents the number Yeardley wore on her jersey during her high school and college lacrosse career. The number has since been retired by the University of Virginia in her memory.

The Bride volunteered at a rape crisis center on her Duke campus. And I’ve just found out that my cousin Anita, in Richmond is being trained as a volunteer advocate for rape and abuse cases in her local hospital’s Emergency Department. I was surprised at my immediate reaction to this news; I was proud of her at once, while knowing deep down I could never do it.

It pains me to admit it, but I know I would want the women to immediately leave their abuser, to get a restraining order, to go into the witness protection program if need be and move to Arizona. I’d buy the plane ticket! This is most likely the same reason I could never see myself becoming a psychologist, like my MIL Ada or my brother Dr Jim, it’s just not in my DNA to suffer for days and weeks and years on end vicariously with patients.

It’s not that I don’t feel compassion for the abused, but I would have trouble feeling empathy. I cringed when I wrote this, so I had to look up the word – empathy “the intellectual identification with or vicarious experiencing of the feelings, thoughts, or attitudes of another.” And I guess it’s true, because I myself would be the first one out the door if a man ever tried to hit or rape me, I can’t really identify with women who stay. I learned to love from my foster father Jim Mahon, and it never included a raised hand or a harsh word.

And I get that the abuse comes on slowly, that the abuser is so remorseful and kind after the incident and soothes his victim into thinking it will never happen again; he just has to stop drinking so much or she just has to make his eggs a certain way. I know it’s a slow insidious dance of death – if not physical, an emotional disconnect from her family and friends that strangles any hope of salvation.

I wonder if an App can help a victim understand she is in danger, or can it help one of her friends in our friendly city to alert her parents or a counselor? If it can, then I applaud One Love, which means more than just a number on a jersey. If we never learn to cherish and love ourselves, we can never expect others to do the same.

yeardley

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Country Life Reconsidered

February 18, 2014 by mountainmornings

Driveway before the rain

Driveway before the rain

Sometimes we get the juiciest bits of information as an aside. Most journalists know this, we get the agenda to the meeting, but it’s in the stuff we hear in the hallway where we will sometimes find the true story. Or at least, an alternate story. This is why I will always and forever love secretaries; (whoops, the Bride called here) insert – because they knew where the bodies were buried!

Take for instance the latest edition of “This American Life” with Ira Glass. The Bride and Groom happened to hear him speak at the Ryman over the weekend, and coincidentally I caught his latest show in the car. Normally  I’ll catch up with Ira on his older podcasts while driving to Nashville, rarely am I listening live stream. But there I was, left listening the other night in my driveway to “Except for That One Thing!” #518

I was hooked right away. A young couple buy their first home in New England – Check! Bob and I bought our first home in Windsor, MA. They were trying to furnish it by going to auctions, because of course there were no real furniture stores or malls – Check! She got carried away with raising her paddle and put them into debt. I used to go to estate sales and get so frustrated because dealers would outbid me and then try to sell to me afterwards, making a slight profit. What happens next, when she finds the perfect dining room table on eBay, will surprise and delight you. http://www.thisamericanlife.org/radio-archives/episode/518/except-for-that-one-thing

And this is what Glass does so well with radio. We are better able to identify with someone we cannot see.  Judgement is suspended. Their story becomes our story. He manages to find that edge, where reality and humor can border on tragedy, that middle place where we find ourselves most days.

The place between arcane and insane.

Yesterday, I was visiting with my Richmond cousins and was almost trapped in the mud luge also known as my 1,000+ ft driveway when I returned home at twilight. Tires were spinning and my CRV was churning a mighty brown spray. Just a few short days ago Bob and I had sprinkled salt and sand down our steepest hill after the plow had scooped up most of the gravel and snow. I had just heard about my MIL’s weekend travails, cousins and friends sliding off her snow and ice-packed driveway sideways into the woods. A comedy of errors. And as I sit in my aviary listening to the slow and steady drip of snow melting off the roof, I thought of a new episode for This American Life –  “Life is a Driveway.” https://soundcloud.com/tadpoles-shouldnt-drive/rascal-flatts-life-is-a-highway

This is how Ms Bean feels about winter

This is how Ms Bean feels about winter

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Sochi, Snow and Somnambulance

February 16, 2014 by mountainmornings

What d’ya know! We actually did get a foot and a half of snow just in time for Valentine’s Day, and the next day it was sunny and melting. Unfortunately, I gave away my beloved cross country skis a long time ago, the pair I had kept in a sacred shrine in a NJ garage. In the Berkshires, I would just strap them on and take off into the trails behind our farmhouse at the edge of a bird sanctuary. Eventually, I gave up hope. We just never got enough snow at the Shore to matter, and I figured that moving to VA would be the end of my snow sporting days. Little did I know.

We do have a small ski resort here in Central VA. Really, I was surprised too. Wintergreen is where some people will go for the weekend with their kids and snowshoes and skates. It’s one county over, and a few miles higher in elevation, a short car ride although we’ve never been. I guess when you come from a landscape that was filled with snow and winter activities, the idea of actually paying for fun in the snow – snow that was mostly manufactured anyway – just wasn’t the same. And let’s face it, our knees are a bit rusty too. Still, watching athletes compete in Sochi…

I have to ask, what makes somebody want to hurtle themselves down an icy track at 60 miles per hour, face-down on a sled the size of an old iPad? The Skeleton, kinda crazy right? But it was one of those events, like car accidents, you can’t seem to stop watching. And the US beating Russia in Ice Hockey, brilliant! But Figure Skating left me switching over to House of Cards on Netflix. Now that was a rush, holey moley. Frank Underwood is the newest Soprano-like villain; a man you love to hate.  

I celebrated Valentine’s Day last night with my man, since he was working on Cupid’s night. He shoveled a path to the grill and we had an amazing dinner; some surf and turf, some cauliflower gobi with sourdough bread and of course Ben and Jerry played a supporting role at the end. We Virginians also celebrated a major victory in marriage equality. Our 2006 ban on same-sex marriage was struck down by a woman judge on Valentine’s eve: http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/newsdesk/2014/02/virginia-same-sex-marriage-ban-ruled-unconstitutional.html For a state that was supposed to be “For Lovers” and made its name in history by finally ruling that interracial marriage was in fact, constitutional, it was poetic justice.

Judge Allen began her opinion by quoting Mildred Loving, the plaintiff in the famous Supreme Court case Loving v. Virginia, which declared bans on interracial marriage unconstitutional, and went on to quote Abraham Lincoln, who said, “It can not have failed to strike you that these men ask for just … the same thing—fairness, and fairness only. This, so far as in my power, they, and all others, shall have.” She then applied his message to same-sex couples: “The men and women, and the children too, whose voices join in noble harmony with Plaintiffs today, also ask for fairness, and fairness only. This, so far as it is in this Court’s power, they and all others shall have.”  

Thank you Judge Arenda Allen! VA joins the progressive march to freedom for lovers everywhere. Proving it’s not who you sleep with, but the slow, sleepwalking pace of justice that will win in the end. So there you go Putin.  

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