In which the political becomes deeply personal

When I moved to San Francisco after college, I had as many gay friends as straight ones. We went dancing together, cooked each other dinner, teased each other mercilessly about our boy and girlfriends and sat up late into the night when one of us was sad or lonely or brokenhearted.

None of us thought yet about marriage or children: we were just excited about our newfound freedom, about the future, about living in a city that accepted everyone at face value and in which so many things seemed possible.

And then my friends started dying; first one by one, and then faster and faster. The Castro was surreal: a once-vibrant neighborhood filled with gaunt 30-year-old men with canes.

One day my friend Phil showed me a picture of a birthday party, I think it was. Eight of his friends and him, all smiling goofily into the camera. "I'm the only one left," he told me. He was 34 years old.

I was walking in the Marina the other day and I saw a bunch of young guys holding "No on Prop 8" signs. One handed me a flyer, a guarded smile on his face. "Can I ask for your support in voting no on Proposition 8?" he asked.

"Of course," I answered, and then, as if we knew each other, "I can't even believe you have to ask me that." But what I meant was that now, in 2008, after Stonewall and Harvey Milk and AIDS and just everything, in this city that I love so much, I simply cannot believe that a young man ten years my junior has to look at me and ask THAT question.

[And I cannot believe that my friend Debra, who's been with her partner for 23 years--23 years!--has to ask us to support her right to marry. From where I sit, we should be asking her approval.]

So I asked for a sign for my window, and saw him relax, almost imperceptibly. I remembered a cold October day in 1992 in Washington D.C., gazing out at more than 30,000 quilt panels made for people gone far too soon, a rising sense of panic at the magnitude of the loss.

I can't even believe they have to ask. I can't believe we have to vote on this.

When I got home, an email was waiting for me from my friend Lee Caraher, who lives right here in sunny Silicon Valley. Here's what she said:

I was putting a no on 8 sign in my yard and a car of young men drove by and it slowed down and 2 of them yelled "f*****g faggot" at me -- and then drove away. I was stunned -- I'm still stunned.

Here's her story. Please read it.

Everyone deserves their chance at happiness. Everyone. With so many injustices in the world, this is such an easy wrong to right.

Original post to Silicon Valley Moms Blog. Susan Etlinger writes about the pleasures and terrors of raising a child on the autism spectrum at BabyCenter's Momformation and at her personal blog, The Family Room, which includes resources for families and friends of kids with special needs.