Tuesday, August 27, 2013

Proud.

Monthly Curtain Call
Something I Saw


When I was 13 years old, my mom told me that she was gay. My parents had divorced a couple of years prior and Mom and I were going through a lot of changes together. The biggest changes of all though were attributed to the fact that I was 13 and my world was changing. 

I stole my poor mom's thunder that day when we had an arbitrary fight between teenager and mom and Mom said, "you don't know everything about me, you know" and I retorted, "What? You're gay?" And stormed off to my room leaving my mom's mouth hanging open. 

We laugh about it now, and even then, my world wasn't shattered because my mom was gay, it was because she wasn't letting me do whatever it was I wanted to do.

What I didn't know then (and probably neither did Mom), was what growing up being an ally to the most important woman in my life would mean. 

And it was a struggle for the first years. We lived in a small town, I had struggled in that town a lot with my reputation to begin with, I wasn't athletic and didn't fit in with the cool girls. But I had great friends. Some of which are still great friends today. One of which moved all the way to the west coast to live in our basement suite. So we told a select few and let the rest of the world think what they wanted to think. It was a big moment for me at my high school graduation, when I knew I was getting the hell out of dodge, for my mom to wear a tux and bring her lesbian partner at the time to the ceremony. Nobody pointed, or stared, or even asked (well maybe they did, but I didn't care enough to notice) and then it was just out there. No more whispers and rumours in high school hallways. No going back.

The amazing thing about being the child of a gay parent, especially then, especially when that parent came out late in life, is that you come out too. And you keep coming out, to new friends, co workers and eventually the new family of your partner.

I saw this yesterday: 

And immediately joined the community. The resources that exist now that weren't even a glimmer then for gay families fill me with so much pride and hope.

When I was 18, I was lucky enough to meet two amazing little girls that had to go through it all yet. And I stood by them, we marched in parades, we went to family drag shows. We banded together and when the three of us put on pretty dresses and makeup we joked that 'gay skips a generation'. I remember having a conversation with an old boyfriend about how the youngest would have no father figure to scare of future boyfriends. And then he met Kell, who crawled out from under her pickup truck covered in grease and gave him the firmest handshake he's ever had and he took it all back.

And those two girls, they are in healthy happy heterosexual relationships. So am I. We weren't ruined.

So last year shortly after moving here, when Rob and I went to the Pride Parade as allies, alone, I felt very lost without my big gay family. Rob was lost in general, having never participating in Pride before. Not homophobic in any way, but his world was blown wide open :)

This year, my mom is here, and I am starting to find a big gay Victoria family of my own. I ASM'd the big Drag Show kick off to Pride, Cabergay, and while joking about never ever wanting to Stage Manage drag queens... Stage Managing is what I do and what I can give back, and it felt good to give back. 

But the most amazing Pride I've ever had was taking Mom to Vancouver this year for the their enormous Pride Parade in the Davie Street Village. We met my boys Niko and Adam and in all of my years at Pride, I felt like the Proudest Gay Ally that I've ever been.

Here are some moments from that:

My mom in the village where they were painting the boulevard in chalk rainbows.


Across the street from us were pranksters with water guns spraying the parade as it went by (they sprayed a drill sergeant police officer on his motorbike and got a stern talking to), most of the parade people were prepared and sprayed back. The best though was when the Vancouver FD stopped their truck, screwed on their hose and sprayed them down, creating real rainbows in the street!

BC Ambulance represent.

The best part of the whole parade for me, were the rainbow epaulets on the BCAS shoulders. Rob should be so proud to work for and be leadership in such a foreword thinking EMS community.
This brought tears to my eyes.


Orange Crush

So pretty.

This one is for Anne and Shauna, BC Corrections Officers! Loud and Proud!


My other favourite Pride Float, and also for Anne...

It's a Vancouver curling club!

Niko and Adam's landlord was festive.

Adam surprised us with a Pride candy apple from Rocky Mountain House.

We got to walk across Vancouver's new permanent rainbow crosswalks!




The festival goers.


And my absolutely favourite part of Vancouver, all dressed up for Pride.
I seriously visit these guys every time I can, they make me so unbelievably happy.
Which is actually sort of their purpose.

So you can imagine my squeal of delight when I saw them in their rainbows!
They were protected by a fence this time though, too much traffic with Pride and the International Fireworks competition, so I couldn't run up and give them a hug.

I'll give them an extra big squeeze next time. To thank them, for being so supportive.

Monday, August 26, 2013

First Ever Monthly Curtain Call

To try to keep my blogging up, I plan to post a roundup of the month in the last few days of every month. So here is my very first Monthly Curtain Call!

I'll start it off with Something I Ate!

One afternoon when I had to be downtown for something, I happened to be parked next to one of my very favourite diners in Victoria. QV Cafe & Bakery. There is nothing particularly special about it. It is open 24 hours and it was an old garage.

Which makes it very charming to sit in in summer time with the big garage doors open. It looks out across at China Town, and at night the gates and paper lanterns are lit up. One of my favourite views in the city.

And they have Amazing Enormous desserts.
This one was chocolate mousse for Rob.

And a homemade oreo cookie the size of my face for Max!

And I bought the world's largest cupcake.

Seriously. I had to give half of this way!

If you come to visit, I'll be sure to take you to QV's!

And of course we ate figs.

And more figs

And more figs

Did you eat anything interesting this month? Maybe some fair food or bush pies? Share your favourite food and recipes with me!

Too Many Mushrooms.

#MondayMealPlan

After overestimating the amount of food needed for the cast barbecue on Friday night, we were left with an abundance of portabella mushrooms. While I don't detest mushrooms, I don't love them. They are better eaten when I can disguise them in things, so this weeks meal plan is all about using up mushrooms.

Monday - Mixed Mushroom Soup - Rob cooked tonight, so I could go hang out with the beautiful Loukia at The Beauty Room and have my nails painted. Stay tuned for that update, its amazing!

Tuesday - Spaghetti and Garden Fresh Pasta Sauce - Rob's mom suggested a good way to use up the mushrooms would be to make them into pasta sauce. Since we are about to come into a lot of tomatoes, it seemed like a good plan to get on top of them now. I picked as many as I could find and tossed them in with zucchini, some of my baby eggplants, onion, my amazing green peppers that my teeny tiny pepper plant produced, garlic and a bunch of the leftover mushrooms and made two jars and another glad container of pasta sauce! Rob is away two nights this week, so pasta and pasta sauce make for an easy dinner for me. Along with the incredible bread Shima from the Smalltown cast traded me in return for fig jam.

Wednesday - Spaghetti and Garden Fresh Pasta Sauce  - More of the same, with a side of Gossip Girl. My nights are finally my own again and Amber and I are in serious girl time withdrawal.

Thursday - Sidney Street Market - One of my very favourite things about Victoria in summer are all of the markets. I think I've talked a little about the Moss Street Market on Saturdays, where we get lots of produce and our sea salts... and another favourite is the Sidney Street Market out in Rob's hometown. It runs every single Thursday night in the summer time and is several blocks long, filled with everything you can imagine, carnival food, artisan jewelry, home made kids toys, spices, pies and produce, live music. This is its last week, so Rob and hope to meet out there (if he is in from the ferry from Vancouver in time) for some greasy food and maybe some Saskatchewan Christmas gift shopping.

Friday - Barbecue - A wildcard, we have frozen hot dogs, turkey dogs, beef burger, chicken burgers and kebobs, mostly leftovers from our barbecue, so whatever I pull out first Thursday night I guess. This will be Rob and I's first Friday night in in I don't know how long!

Saturday - Fish on 5th - Samantha is coming! Samantha is coming! We have an unexpected much anticipated visit from our little Sam! In honour of this we will take her directly off her flight into Sidney for my 2nd favourite fish and chips in town, Fish on 5th. Only second to Red Fish Blue Fish downtown. Fish on 5th is open later and closer to the airport. Also indoors, so after Red Fish Blue Fish shuts down for the winter (in the summer months you can sit on the pier and eat your fish and chips while watching the float planes take off... Oh Victoria, I love you so) Fish on 5th becomes our regular fish and chips.

And once Samantha is here, this girl is taking some much needed time off ... to can all of those tomatoes! Stay tuned for tomato everything! Let me know if you have any amazing suggestions!


Sunday, August 25, 2013

#SundaySnapshots --- Smalltown: A Pickup Musical and two weeks of Theatre SKAM

Guys.. All I've wanted to do is write an amazing blog post about premiering a musical on the back of a pickup truck, and how little me managed to get the cheques written and two parties thrown in two days. And somehow in the midst of that canned an overwhelming amount of vegetables from the garden. An then throw another party at my house and stand in for the Stage Manager one night of the run, but this past two weeks I've been doing all of that, so finding the time or energy to write anything about it has been scarce.

So... Instead, a photo roundup, starting over two weeks ago when the Smalltown/Theatre SKAM truck became a reality.

The truck arrived.

And unpacked into a show.

The chairs were delivered.

We traded Figs...

For Ice Cream!

We Christened the truck
(it's hard to see here, but his name is Bob, in honour of Bob Milne -- Standing on my left)


We took the show on the road and previewed it in parks around the CRD.

While we scrambled to preserve everything we could.

I broke down and bought a canning set. Unpacking it was like Christmas and I had no idea how much it would revolutionize preserving.

Pickled Beans

Round 2.


We ate more figs. This time fried in oil and honey.

With a side of Cold Comfort Pina Colada Sorbet.


We baby sat our adorable niece.





Before heading into the run of Smalltown: A Pickup Musical... we threw the cast a pizza party.

With the help of some lovely board members.




The show opened, and we celebrated.

My lovely date, Pat Rundell
(and Kate photo bombing us in the background)


Jello Shots, love - the Playwrights.

Anna learns how to use draught taps.

Flowers from my amazing Best Friend.

We devised a rain plan (and were never once fully rained out!)

I did some Stage Management time.

We spent some (more) cuddle time.

I started refusing to want to get out of bed.

We got some more canning done.

(Pickled Zucchini!)


And we threw another party!
This time at our house. A barbecue for the whole cast and crew!

Saskatoon Berry Pie

Salad for everyone!!

Munro came to supervise.

And Ladies and Gentleman, this brings us to closing night!
and another party! off to ice the keg
Good thing too, Rob just showed me the forecast for the next week. Rain, rain and more rain.

Now that we have some breathing room I will try to find the time to actually tell you all about everything you see here.