My Altogether Basic Problems

In case you are a fan of same sex unions, weddings in general, or are just really itching to know what I look like (or my wife, as I haven’t posted a picture of her yet [she’s the adorable one in the suspenders]) here’s the promised wedding picture spam.

I posted these wedding photos because this was the most amazing day of my life. I’ve been married for about two months, and goddammit, it has been just the best, you know? Like, this woman, in these photographs? She’s incredible. She’s unreal. She’s kind and she’s thoughtful and she’s everything I never thought I deserved. She’s the woman who I get to spend the rest of my ridiculously lucky life with.

It’s so simple to me, to us.

But it’s so complicated to so much of the world. She and I can’t walk into the grocery store holding hands. I get tight-lipped when someone compliments my ring at work because I can’t determine if they are going to be “cool” with it or not. If they’ll report me for being “inappropriate” in our online survey. Again. My wife was fired from a job as a driver for a children’s occupational therapist because her boss saw us kiss at the mall— because she couldn’t have “that kind of person” around children. I walked myself down the aisle at my wedding because a church told my parents that it wasn’t possible for them to attend my wedding.

And we’ve had it so easy! Our lives have been blissfully carefree compared to so many. We have the most amazing friends and family and life is pretty fucking sweet.

But here’s the thing I wanted to tell you. This post I made, to try to just share my little square of happiness with my little square of the internet, has literally tens of thousands of notes. Tens of thousands. I’ve gained hundreds of followers and my inbox runneth over. And not a single message I’ve received, not a single reblog that I have been able to find, has had anything to say but amazing, beautiful, kind words of congratulations. No bullying. No trolling. No inappropriate offers or lewd remarks. Out of tens of thousands.

That’s not something I’m used to. It’s not something anyone in the LGBTQ community is used to.

Do you even get how amazing you are? You, the denizens of Tumblr. Do you understand that? I am so exceedingly proud of you, you wacky kids. You are all such incredible people, with such kind and open hearts, and I wish I could hug each and every one of your necks. 

So if you are having any sort of rough day, please know that there is this tiny lesbian couple in northeast America who likes you just a whole lot, okay? You’ve overwhelmed us. 

Tired swimmer rescued in Finland

During the first weekend of November, a Finnish man was kayaking on a lake in a thick fog. He saw something floating in the water, and when he got closer he saw that it was a Northern Hawk-Owl. It was clearly exhausted and the man lifted it out of the freezing water onto the tip of his kayak. The owl then crawled to his lap for warmth and burrowed under his lifejacket.

Since his original destination was too far away, the man decided to head for a nearby art museum on the lake shore. Once there he was eagerly assisted by both visitors and a museum guide, who took the bird in to rest and dry up next to a warm stove.  At the end of the day the owl had recovered and was released back into the wild.

How the owl ended up in the lake in the first place remains a mystery. It may have got lost in the fog, or have been driven out to the lake by Hooded Crows (if a flock spots a predatory bird they tend to chase it away quite aggressively).