Rainbow Country Closets

(Artist credit:  Christian Lassen)

One of my favorite quotes from e.e. cummings is:

"To be nobody but yourself in a world which is doing its best, night and day, to make you everybody else means to fight the hardest battle which any human being can fight; and never stop fighting."

Chely Wright, a country singer, has come out of the closet.  A lot of chatter out there is hateful, cynical, and questioning her motives for doing this now when she is also pushing her autobiography and making the PR rounds.

A country singer coming out of the closet?!  Now that's a big deal.  It shouldn't be, but it is.  The country music industry is well renowned for it's very conservative bent.  And being gay and country is, in certain circles, an abomination.  Which is funny to me, because it's blatantly obvious there are many celebrities in the country music world who do, in fact, support gay rights. 

It's a sad sad world we live in when, instead of celebrating someones courage, someones long fought battle, and someones character; people bad mouth, spew forth opinions laced with hateful arsenic, and start quoting the bible that gay people are going to burn in hell.

I may not believe in religion, but I find it to be the highest mark of hypocrisy when religious people feel the need to preach God and love by day, and hell, damnation, and hatred by night.   Those who live in glass houses shouldn't throw stones.

e.e. cummings had it right.

Those who say that God loves everyone have it right.

Those who change the rules, make up their own interpretations, and support laws that condone discrimination against people who do not fit into their little narrow minded description of what it means to be a human being, are not, in my opinion, God's faithful servants.

Isn't life a hard enough battle for everyone without all this foaming at the mouth and judging of one another?  Diversity not only gives us more colors in which to see our world, but also challenges us and broadens our very worlds.

We should all take heed of e.e. cummings' very insightful quote ... and celebrate the fact that humanity is not made up of one color, but of multiple ones.  And not just multiple ones, but many different shades of each color.

I don't know about you, but I'd truly be a brain dead zombie long before now if everyone I knew or ever met was an exact cardboard cut out of everyone else.  I love the fact that in my life, I have family and friends of different races, ethnicity, religions, sexual orientations, disabilities, political views, etc etc.  We may not always agree one another, but you can be damn sure that we all care about one another and encourage one another to be who we are without apology or regret.

Kudos to Ms. Chely Wright for having the courage to be herself.  She fought hard for that battle.  It's a battle many of us fight every single day and being who we are and true to that is reason enough to celebrate.