I'll Call It Like I See It

by sheila morris

Category: politics

  • on International Women’s Day, I salute Pretty


    “I knew I was a lesbian, and I also knew I wouldn’t disguise who I was,

    because to do so would send the message to my son Drew

    there was something wrong with it.

    If I didn’t name it, if I didn’t share it,

    if I didn’t acknowledge it, if I didn’t own it,

    if I wasn’t proud of it,

    he was going to believe there was something wrong with it.

    That became my mantra.

    If I never in my life denied I was a lesbian,

    if I treated it as just a part of my life,

    then he would be okay with it.”

    Teresa Williams a/k/a Pretty   (1980s)

    Southern Perspectives on the Queer Movement: Committed to Home

    Today on International Women’s Day, I celebrate one of the women I most admire for her courage in her journey toward living an authentic life not only for herself but also for her son in the days before Will and Grace and Ellen. With obstacles on every side, without the support of the family who had always been there for her, this warrior mother stood up, came out and never looked back.

    What would I do without Pretty…her warrior spirit lives on every day.  I’m glad she’s on my side, too.

    Drew, Pretty and me 

    Stay tuned.

  • beam me up, scottie – it’s Women’s History Month!


    Last night I took a trip in time travel with Stephanie Rule who narrated a documentary called On the Basis of Sex which looked at the people, places and events that shaped the American woman’s odyssey to become an equal citizen in her own country. The documentary beamed me up, Scottie and I looked down and back to see images no longer fresh but just as real as my participation in the women’s movement during the late 1960s through the failure of the ratification of the Equal Rights Amendment in 1982.

    March is Women’s History Month, and we rightly honor the sacrifices of those women who refused to remain second class citizens and stood together to work for the common good so that all women might have freedoms to choose what happens with their own bodies, to choose who they love and marry, to choose where they work, to choose where they govern. I am Woman, hear me write.

    Women today also look back to remind ourselves of our courage and strength in the midst of adversity. Luanne Castle’s award-winning book Kin Types is an example of a contemporary writer who is not afraid of looking back.

    “Kin Types exhumes the women who have died long ago to give life to them, if only for a few moments. Through genealogical and historical research, Luanne Castle has re-discovered the women who came before her. Using an imaginative lens, she allows them to tell their stories through lyric poems, prose poems, and flash nonfiction.” (https://www.writersite.org)

    Storytellers and storytelling – that’s what made On the Basis of Sex compelling for me last night and then another woman merrildsmith had this quote in her Monday Morning Musings titled “Art through Time and Space”: (https://merrildsmith.wordpress.com)

    “I think the life of my community and most communities depends on the storytellers. We only know anything about the Roman Empire or about the lives of the people within the Greek polis from the plays that exist. We can find out from historical archives what laws were in place, but who they affected and how they affected those folks and those people – we only know from the stories and from the storytellers of that culture.”

    –Tarell Alvin McCraney, playwright, from an interview on All Things Considered, March 2, 2019

    I celebrate the storytellers today including Stephanie Rule who beamed me up with memories of game changing days gone by. Check her out on MSNBC.

    Stay tuned here for a post on the first woman elected to Congress, Jeanette Rankin, coming soon. I leave you with a profound thought I read  from yet another woman writer, Canadian Susan Nairn, on her blog “Polysyllabic Profundities” this morning:

    “But time has a way of taking moments and turning them into memories in the blink of an eye.”

    (https://polysyllabicprofundities.com)

  • red rants and raves over lady gaga and the president’s fixer


    Oh my, oh my. Sometimes I long for the wit and wisdom of The Red Man who, sadly, left Pretty and me three years ago this month at the ripe old age of 14. Red, our rescued Welsh terrier who became my alter ego for eight years through his blog Red’s Rants and Raves had an opinion on anything and everything.

    Pick a topic – any topic. Red readily shared his thoughts without filters or fancy speech. For example, one of his favorite phrases was Sweet Lady Gaga. Paw snaps and twirls, he would add for emphasis so imagine the field day he could have had with the 2019 Academy Awards Sunday night when the real Lady Gaga and Bradley Cooper sang their cozy, sexy rendition of “Shallow” which won the award for Best Song. Sweet Lady Gaga, indeed. Paw snaps and twirls forever.

    Another frequently quoted phrase by The Red Man was shit house mouse. Yes, shit house mouse loses something when I write it, but when Red uttered those words the occasion called for desperate exhortations, even demanded them. I feel certain the seven hours of testimony by Michael Cohen for the US House Oversight Committee today would be the perfect event for a vigorous shit house mouse.

    From the opening gavel, introductory remarks, closing remarks, banging of the ending gavel and all of the questions and answers in between, the nation had the opportunity to watch a spectacle of alleged criminal conspiracies reaching to the office of the president of the United States intermingled with a multitude of lesser sins committed by the flawed fixer who earned that name over a period of ten years serving as the president’s loyalist. High drama today on Capitol Hill. Shit house mouse.

    Stay tuned.

    The Red Man

     

     

     

  • hi-yo silver AWAY!


    And I’m not just talking horses here. The 2020 presidential election is off and running with a posse of candidates already declared for the Democratic primaries – a group marked by the conspicuous absence of silver hair. No more “old, male and pale” for the Dems.  I wish I had thought up that phrase. I really do. This seismic shift in the composition of the candidates makes me the happiest girl in the whole USA. Skippity doo dah yeah. Shine on me sunshine, right?

    Rep. Tulsi Gabbard (D – Hawaii) who is 37 years old with two deployments in the Middle East from her Army National Guard experience, announced her candidacy on January 11th. The next day Julian Castro, the 44- year- old former mayor of San Antonio and former Secretary of Housing and Urban Development under President Obama, announced his bid for the presidency in San Antonio to a cheering crowd of people that included his Mexican grandmother who inspired his passion for public service. Usted es el candidato – hooray!

    On January 21st, Martin Luther King Jr. Day, Senator Kamala Harris (D – Cal) who is 54 years old was the first African American to enter the race. She made her announcement to formally run via ABC’s Good Morning America. Another African-American Senator, Cory Booker (D – NJ), announced his intention to run on February 01, the first day of Black History Month. Sen. Booker is 49 years old.

    Two more female senators entered the presidential primaries in the past week. Senator Elizabeth Warren (D – Mass) declared on February 08th. and Senator Amy Klobuchar (D -Minn) on February 10th. who stood outside in a blizzard to speak to an enthusiastic crowd of supporters that listened to her while they must surely have wondered if they could vote right that minute and inside, please. Senator Klobuchar is 58 years old. Senator Warren is 69.

    Yesterday I heard an interview on NPR with Pete Buttigieg, the 37-year-old gay mayor of South Bend, Indiana who announced an exploratory committee for the presidency on January 23rd.; Senator Kirsten Gillibrand (D – NY) who is 52 years old announced a similar exploratory committee on January 15th.

    Oh my goodness. There was an old white woman who lived in a shoe – she had so many Democratic Presidential candidates she didn’t know what to do. Okay. She really lived in South Carolina which means this old white woman has to get woke and ready to vote on February 29th. in 2020 for the first presidential primary in the South, the one a mere three days before what is commonly known as Super Tuesday, and the first primary which has a predominantly African-American Democratic electorate.

    Rarely does the lesser known Carolina state enjoy more attention than in the time leading up to our primary…Cory Booker, Kamala Harris, Elizabeth Warren, Bernie Sanders, Kirsten Gillibrand, and Pete Buttigieg have all been seen in the Palmetto State in recent weeks and it’s still early, y’all.

    These folks aren’t the only ones running, either, but these are my favorites so far. The diversity of my favorites puts a smile on my face even as I write these words.  Old, male and pale…adios.

    Hi-yo silver, AWAY. Don’t let the White House door hit you on the way out.

    Stay tuned.

     

     

     

     

     

     

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  • which anniversary is this? better ask Pretty


    fun with friends at DeBordieu, 2007

    So Pretty and I are having dinner with our friends Nekki and Francie after the South Carolina women’s basketball game last night, and the conversation turned to our anniversary which is this Saturday, February 9th. I had invited them to go to dinner with us on our anniversary but that wasn’t working out so we opted to eat after the game.

    Nekki asked what everyone always asks about anniversaries – how many years are you celebrating?

    Nineteen, I answered quickly because I am the numbers person in our family who keeps up with birthdays, anniversaries, weddings, graduations, etc. Every family has a designated scorekeeper, and in our family I am known as the go-to person for important dates. Pretty is generally unreliable in these areas.

    Oh, Nekki said, nineteen years is really great. Pretty and I both nodded, although I noticed Pretty displayed a hint of eyes rolling at my answer. Then she said, no, it’s not nineteen, it’s eighteen to which I responded no I specifically remember the year was 2001 when we got together so anyone could plainly see our anniversary was definitely for nineteen years. Case closed, I added for emphasis.

    For those of you who can do “high math,” I will let you do the numbers or you don’t really need to bother because February 09, 2019 is our 18th. anniversary, and don’t you forget it. Please enjoy a few highlights of the past “on the road to nineteen” with us.

    family civil rights tour – Alabama, 2018

      SC women’s national championship, Dallas – 2017

    Number One Son Drew’s rehearsal dinner – 2015

    South Carolina Pride – 2016

    signing copies of Committed to Home at Francis Marion – 2018

    OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA

    the hideout, Wyoming, 2009

    in the beginning, Cancun, February 09, 2001

    family vacation – Gettysburg, 2012

    Valentine’s Day Poinsett Bridge with family – 2015

    Texas, 2013

    Happy Anniversary, Pretty – how do I love thee? I can’t begin to count the ways…or the years evidently…but my love will always belong to you. Thank you for every day. Case closed.

    Stay tuned.