On The Soapbox: Marriage, Race and God

I don't normally climb up on my soap box and preach, but this week I have three times been poked just hard enough to make that climb.  I am sure I will get a lot of hacked off readers for this, but the beauty of it all is I really don't care.

I loathe politics.  I am neither red or blue and I think politicians lie.  The other day I read some diatribe written by some dude that proclaims to be just to the right of republican.  His beef?  Gay marriage.  I refuse to reassemble his arguments here but suffice it to say his bottom line is that gay marriage is sick, immoral and disobedient to God. His platform included a proclamation to Republicans that if they were true Republicans, they would agree.  I don't remember the guy's name and I wouldn't print it if I did because I do not want to support anything he says.  If I were a Republican, I would be appalled that he is single handedly undermining the more relevant issues of the Republican platform.  I would stand up for the more critical issues of my party and leave love alone.  Love is not heterosexual and it is not partisan.

Cheerios has a commercial where a little girl asks her mom if Cheerios is good for the heart because daddy said it was.  The mother confirms - yes it is.  The little girl then goes to her father napping on the couch and pours a box of Cheerios on his chest (knowing that is where his heart is located.)  Cute?  You bet.  I love that commercial.  I saw it at least three times before it registered that the couple is bi-racial and the beautiful little girl is of mixed race.  I loved the commercial even more.  However, there has been a very public backlash against this commercial - name calling, complaints, outright proclamations of disgust.  I am shocked and disappointed. I thought we, humanity, had evolved from that.  And I wonder - IF the parents were both Caucasian and the little girl bi-racial;  the unspoken message that the couple had adopted her, would it THEN be acceptable?  Love isn't race specific.

Finally, I had a discussion with a friend who is heavily involved in her church.  I admire her dedication to her church family, I respect her deeply held beliefs.  She believes that those who have not accepted Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior as the ONLY way to salvation are damned to hell. And that's where we part.  I believe in God but I no longer attend any churches or belong to a specific religion.  I was once asked by a pastor why I had not become a member of the church I attended for quite a few years.  I told him that I could not stand up and proclaim that Jesus is the ONLY way to God.  I cannot believe that a loving God would create so many vastly different, beautiful people and cultures, so many different belief systems, only to make the sweeping majority wrong in the end.  The more I think about it, the more I feel like organized religion is a function of the mortal demand to manage God.  If God is love, He loves us all.

I do not feel a need to back-up my beliefs with Bible quotes, philosophical arguments or political facts.  It's what I believe and I don't have to justify it to anyone.  That is freedom.

Judi Coltman is an author of mystery books.  She is currently working on her fourth novel.  Follow her at 
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Books available by clicking on the covers in the sidebars.

The Susan Boyle Complex

One of the surprising aspects of finally obeying my muse and settling in to writing books has been the reaction of other people, many of whom I have known for a very long time.  I'm not kidding, people who have seen me at my worst (morning; sheet lines pressed against my face, hair bent in wonky directions, mascara migrated toward my nose), silliest (42nd birthday, Queen of my own birthday parade, driven in the back of a van up and down the beach, fuchsia gloves, blue sequined dress, official princess tiara and a cocktail in my hand - surrounded by my court),  or most serious (ok, I'm blank here) have suddenly muddled into these weird groupies uttering lines like, "Now, I know a famous author!"  Sometimes I think it must be exactly how Susan Boyle feels when people fawn over her.  Ok, so I don't sing like Boyle and the writing game is a little different than the entertainment game, but still. . .


Famous?  Not so much.  Unless famous authors spend their days like this:


Wake-up
Let dog out, wait while he sniffs every other spot he has already marked and ultimately decide he's not ready yet.
Watch morning news to be current on Kim Kardashian, Lindsay Lohan and Occupy Everywhere
Check email
Check Facebook
Check email again
Check Facebook again
Convince self to go to gym
Back to email
Second cup of coffee
Force self to go to gym
Return, remove stinky, sweaty clothes and start shower
Dog needs to go out NOW
Hastily cover naked body and crouch as you run through the house to door, attach him to lead and wait.  And wait.  False alarm
Return to HOT shower, wash and get dressed.
Emerge from morning stupor to begin a day of writing.
Find dog pile in living room and dog asleep on the couch.
Check email
Check Facebook
Repeat


Finally, Fight with publishing people about why Amazon and Barnes & Nobel have not picked up paperback yet.  Get assured it will be a few more days (like I was told 10 weeks ago).
I guess if that is famous. . .


In the mean time, I did make a little movie to promote In The Name Of The Father.  Please feel free to check it out and share it with EVERYONE YOU KNOW.  I want to be famous.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a0ArMOD7kYc

It's Not In The Parent Manual

It's not often that I find myself at a loss for words, but that very thing occurred just the other day when I was in the process of writing about yet another job I worked where hyjinx eventually ensues.  I was writing along at a pretty good clip feeling like I had the world by a tail when I stopped to look at my Facebook and my world tilted.  No, it really wasn't a tilt, it was a full on JOLT and it happened just like that.  To be fair, there is no humor in what I have to offer and I'm feeling like it might even be a two parter. 

I saw this post on Facebook and it stopped me cold.  It said, "R.I.P Nick, you are in a better place."  It only took a moment for me to confirm that Nick Smith, who just turned 21 last week and celebrated with a trip down to the college he left for 2 years ago - Baylor, had passed away; his battle with cancer finally over.  Nick was two years younger then my oldest and two years older than my yougest.  Byron is a small town and all of the kids know each other, but Nick was a runner as is Jeff and I spent many a track meet cheering for Nick all the way to the State Meet for two years.  Nick left for college an eager freshman but, it wasn't long before he was diagnosed with Leukemia and he spent the next two years fighting, learning and loving life  inspite of it all. 

What I find completely heartbreaking is his final posted status on Facebook.  He posted this the night before he passed: 

the foebodding [sic] spectre of spending most of the summer In a hospital getting sicker again is one I have neither the strength to overcome or that special someone to make the choice easier."

 I am a trained hospice volunteer. I have spent countless hours with dying patients and I have experienced the gift that the dying have to offer.   Even with the prophetic post, I didn't see this coming and when I found out, I came apart.  Maybe it is the mother in me who grieves for his mom, maybe it is the abruptness in which I found out or maybe it is the sadness in realizing that he had so much to offer the world, his friends and family that will go unfinished.  Whatever it was, my response surprised me.   I found myself walking that fine line of grief.  Do I remain stoic and strong so that my own child has someone to lean on ( and really, who am I fooling with that thought?)  Or do I show him the depth of my sorrow and hope he absorbs the truth: all mothers feel the loss when a child dies. 

Sometimes I hate being a grown-up.