FOR MY SISTER

Barack is the first president to be a lot of things: black, Hawaii-born, part Kenyan. But there is one other thing that is often overlooked.

We now have sworn in the first White Sox fan in the history of the presidency.

Go Sox!

I'M SORT OF UNCOMFORTABLE TALKING ABOUT THIS, BUT I NONETHELESS CANNOT SHUT UP ABOUT IT

For awhile I was writing about pregnancy. I wrote a couple stories, the play I am writing now has a pregnant person. Here's an excerpt from a play I wrote last year that I abandoned:

LIZZY
This is reality, mother! I am pregnant. With child. Knocked up. Corked. Embarazada.
JOAN
I don’t see why you insist on doing this to me. You have always had it in for me. Ever since you were a little girl.
HAROLD
(Incredulously)
Pregnant. Huh.
LIZZY
This has nothing to do with you. This is about me and what I want.
HAROLD
(HAROLD chuckles)
Well, Joannie? She’s certainly not a lesbian.
JOAN
Lesbians can have children Harold.
LIZZY
I am not a lesbian!
JOAN
It happens all the time.
HAROLD
Why do you know so much about lesbians?
JOAN
I don’t know so much. I know something, that’s all. About an alternative culture that I was perfectly ready to accept in my own daughter...
LIZZY
I am not a fucking lesbian!
JOAN
But now-- well, this is much worse than being gay. Did you hear me, Elizabeth? Much worse.
LIZZY
What about cancer? Would you have preferred that too?
HAROLD
I don’t know. I mean, not that I think being a lesbian is bad or anything...
LIZZY
Oh Jesus Christ.
HAROLD
But, I’m glad you like boys, Lizzy. I must say. That was a bit of a relief.
JOAN
Of course. Relief. I think that is the perfect word to describe the way that I am feeling right now. Relieved and relaxed.
LIZZY
Mom, calm down.
JOAN
Calm and serene and relieved. Right Harold? May I have a drink before I faint?

I seem to have gotten it out of my system, though. No one has been pregnant for awhile. Now I keep writing about race and racial tensions. One piece after another about it. I don't even realize I'm doing it until it's done. And the whole thing makes me uncomfortable.

Apparently, I'm not the only one.