headline

"Ms. P., I am scared." She speaks, always, in wide-eyed declaratives; she never sees any gray. She does, however, see what they all call, "the Mexican news," a Univision program full of double exclamation points and horoscope breaks and what seems to me to be news of the weird between the real headlines; it makes for an interesting world view.

She tells me with a kind of sober excitement, "It's here." I confirm swine flu. And I acknowledge her facts--she's not wrong, exactly--and we talk about population and percentages and the biology of a virus in an oddly hushed half-circle: a model for an imaginary class of students who are truly engaged. Perhaps they trust me a little too much. But by the time lunch ends I've done my bit to lower the fever. But I'm still curious to calculate our odds--of quarantine, if nothing else--so I question an expected arrival.

"Hey, did you grandpa come up here yet?" In our world, I admit, family reunions have just become more interesting.

in retrospect

I wouldn't mind a little manufactured teenage drama. A little he-said she-said would-he did-he ask her out. A bit of I-forgot-my-homework, a dash of can-you-believe-her-hair. A side of and-then-and-then-and-I-would-never cut by how-could-he-even-dare. I would take all that eye-rolling, whispers, and passed notes in straight-up even trade for the kid caught between divorced parents, the runaway, and the drugs. For the lingering affects of past abuse, for the brushes with the law, for the bad bad choices oft repeated, truancy, and petty theft. For "sometimes I think I wanna die." For the After School Special come to life.

good girl

"So, Ms. P.," says some teacher, dropping a familiar name. "Is she yours?" she asks, with a gesture towards my end of the building.

And when I nod, she tells me that she had just lately met a girl whom I've known for six years. When she says, "She is just. . ." it's hard not to interrupt because I know where this is heading.

"She is just the nicest, most polite girl. . ." begins the litany of Good First Impression. I readily agree, identify the younger sister, give credit to their mother. I mention that she's my candidate for the upcoming Night of Excellence, and I have to chuckle at the vague implications of, "She could be anyone's!" even as I dismiss them. She could be,though if I didn't choose her for this honor-any-deserving-student night, nobody else would. Their loss; my gain.

Tomorrow or maybe the next day, depending on the printer, the girl under discussion will get an invitation, an announcement of her award. A surprise, and a first, save the occasional honor roll. I expect at some point to hear, "Ms. P., what exactly is this?"

And I'll get to tell her what I hope she already knows, that I admire her attitude, her accomplishments, her choices, and her persistence. That I think she deserves a place among The Best. Unlike so many others who will be recognized that night, she's not exactly looking forward to graduation. The future is too uncertain, the likely gap between what she wants and what she'll get too big. Government paperwork's a bitch. I hope the medal she'll receive becomes more motivator than consolation, but in the meantime, at least she'll have it while we figure out the rest.

mystery caller

"It is ME!" she says, unnecessarily, in a voice not heard for nearly a year. I was prepared for her greeting, given the international digits that crowded the Caller ID, but still I smile in wary recognition.

"How are you?" I ask, meaning, "What do you want?"

And she tells me of wanting to move to America-- San Francisco, maybe, or LA--and how her mother, I'm pretty sure, will pay to get her there, or at least to stay away from here. I scan through the mental list titled What Could This Have to Do With Me? I scratch off "school", erase "money," draw a line through "immigration questions." I could never do anything about any of those queries, but I could kinda see why she'd ask them.

"So. . ." I begin.

"My mom says I can't get an apartment."

"You can't sign a contract if you're not 18," I concur, ignoring any and all buts and maybes.

"My friend is 18."

"Okay," I say, noncommittal, noncommittal, noncommittal. It crosses my mind that an advantage of e-mail is that I can prove, kinda, what I didn't tell her.

"I have to search for an apartment next week," she continues. "I will call you then."

I rewind the conversation, backtrack, think it over. Have I contributed, assented, agreed? I have no idea why she called her personal Google to ask that simple question, or what she thinks is next, but I admit, I am intrigued.

eyewitness

The kids tell a story, or they did, for too long of a while, about me moving faster than they'd ever seen me move. I was snatching a cell phone from a girl who kept pushing it; it was a triumph of one-upmanship and stealth.

This is not that story.

It is, instead, a story of red-and-white streak from the door to the far corner. Of a file drawer yanked out, and a lunch tossed in.

A lunch. A sandwich, and breadsticks, and an apple. A lunch.

And the time it takes for me to form a question-- "What?" and "How?" and "Why?" all competing on my tongue--the door again opens, far more deliberately now. The posse has arrived. And the perpetrator is out and then in again, and I rise to take my turn.

"Don't do it! Don't do it! Ms. P.!" Volume low, urgency high.

And I hope my look back to the culprit says, "Are you nuts?!" Because good grief. In seconds, I've ratted him out. But the time it will take to get past the fact that he thought or expected or even hoped that I'd lie to cover up a petty theft, even without a half-dozen other witnesses? I have yet to calculate.

"What have I ever said or done that would make anyone believe I'd do that?" I ask the onlookers, "What?!" A shrug. A shake of the head. Blank stares.

inbox

HI.HOW ARE YOU.

That's the subject line of her first missive in months. And being full of keen insight or an aversion to the poorly punctuated and insistently capital, I feel the trepidation gathering even before I click to reveal a message that resembles the work of some especially maladroit spammer:

"I need you help.
em.....
I want to go back now.
BUT,have some trouble.
I hope talk with you.
Can i have you phone number."

"Oh honey," I say. "Haven't we been through this before?" (And didn't I teach you better than that? I can't help but think, though she's been gone longer than she was here.) But regardless of her intentions, or her troubles, or how she thinks I could possibly help her get back from China sans parental consent-- if I had the tiniest fraction of my presumed powers, I swear I'd deserve my own comic: The Misadventures of Ms. P--regardless, I know exactly how my end of this conversation would go:

"No."

"I'm sorry."

"No."

Bookended, of course, with "HI.HOW ARE YOU," and an internal, "What the heck? What is she saying? Is she serious? I don't understand." in two languages at once.

I would rather not.

But my work number is on the school website that I know she's previously perused, and I don't want to alienate, really, and who knows what her story is. So I tap out the the digits, calculate a thirteen-hour time difference and hope for silence while half-expecting an immediate ring.

Not yet.

4.20

I can see it, or I can imagine: the drama, the recrimination, the tears. A Monday, a week--a lifetime, it must feel like--shot to hell in the first rays of dawn.

"I feel lousy," he says, later, after this warning: "I fucked up." And something in his tone and the droop of his shoulders makes me bite back the scold as his profane lapsed-Catholic confession spills out. He's disappointed his parents again. I hear regret when he says, "My mom was all crying. " I hear regret when he trails off, "and my dad. . . " I tell him I'm encouraged that he feels as he does because it shows that, in the end, he cares. He's late, so I send him off with a pass, ask his counselor to check in and go on.

And she calls him down but he doesn't go; at lunch he reappears in my room. I expect him to tune out, feet up, earphones on, at the round table in the back. Instead he unwraps the burger that he slips out of his pocket at a desk shoved up against mine. As he eats, he asks what I would do if my daughter made the same choices. I am no fount of answers, but I take that as a cue. I tell the truth as I know it, describe consequences and options. I empathize, to a point. I thank him for listening and he thanks me for talking. A door seems propped open, at least.

By the end of the day, he'll be back in the corner. Silent, and pretending to read. I sit and let him stew.

Don't try this at home

I assume they edited out the emergency room scenes, but holy crap. I couldn't look away.

trouble

This is the problem with a secondhand story: the facts don't tell anything. So when I hear that you "blew up" over at the alternative school, I don't know how to take it. I wouldn't put a carefully orchestrated explosion past ya; I know you didn't want to come back. But surely you didn't really mean to be expelled. Did ya? I'm curious, but that's about it.

Perhaps that in itself is unfair. You have stuck gamely by your "I didn't do anything" story; it's entirely possible it's true. Except for circumstances and that positive test that came back to bite ya. If it hadn't, you'd still be in school. You wouldn't have gotten 45 days to hang out with those who are, perhaps, more experienced. More intransigent, for sure. But you did and you were and now you're out until August. A semester lost, perhaps more.

Meanwhile, those who have more serious--more actual--problems will work through the system, cycle back. Their schoolhouse door is likely revolving; all through high school, at least, as long as it lasts, they won't be much affected by paperwork and rules and procedures. It's a lifestyle, it's chosen, it's kids who don't change. I wonder if you will, if already you have.

Cinderfella

"Ms. P," he says, "the weirdest thing just happened to me." I prepare to be underwhelmed.

But in a tone full of wishing-it-true--hesitant, and not quite believing--he tells of being pulled out of class and offered a free prom ticket.

"She said to come see her tomorrow, but I don't know who she is." As luck would have it, I do; my colleague raises money all year to patch the gaps between need to and would like to and can. This time, it's his turn. I walk him down to get the rest of the scoop, and as we hook him up with a tuxedo discount, I watch him do the math. He works, I know, but I think he hands over his check. I resolve that he not be disappointed: at this point, I would be, too.

"Listen," I say, as we walk out with the coupon, "Go home and figure out what you have and what you need, and between us, we'll make it happen." No way is he getting this close and not going. He thanks me simply, and, he means it.

Tonight he'll be wearing his father's suit: best case scenario, according to me. He's content, and he's going, and nobody's out a dime-- maybe he'll be the one kid who's not let down. But I woulda, and I woulda been happy to do it. Fairy godmother's a sweet gig.

Chasing the Daylight

The chamber of commerce should have sent a photographer over to capture the reflection of the sunset on the pond. The silhouette of dog-walkers, the glint off a feather, the early-season dandelions for now seeming festive. The silent float of a kite above the creak of a swing 'til the flutter and dive and recovery. A pick-up clang off the rim, the sweet sound of bat hitting ball, and a neighborhood woman, music clenched in her fist, silenced, running uphill and into the wind.

in business

At first glance, they look professional-- two-color business cards for a landscape company. But as I gather up the dozens he's left behind I feel irregular edges and notice the sway of the stack. He could have had better for less, I can't help but think, but I can't deny the self-made effort.

"So you'll do anything, eh?" I had teased when I noticed construction and carpet instalation (yes, with one l) added to the cards with a familiar hand.

His gesture says, "What else can I do?" His words are, "I am a Mexican." He's too proud to be resigned but aware of his place in the system he's trying to beat. Today he feels he has an edge. The number he'd worked and paid taxes on was finally defunct, so now he's resorted to cash. And some sounds-iffy-to-me-arrangment about the equipment he's buying, something about $4000 and working for the owner when he needs a job.

I ask him a few more questions, raise an eyebrow at his prices, feel both proud and wary at once. He's a 19 year-old making his way, one way or the other. It seems near impossible, but I could be wrong.

Packers 2009

There was once a day when I reserved a Green Bay hotel room for every home game once the schedule came out. I just wanted to ensure lodging for the one game I would eventually attend.

Perhaps it's a sign of the post-Favre times that I barely took notice when the schedule came out today. Or, more likely, it's a sign of my enthusiasm that my son will reach the top of the season ticket waiting list in his late 50s, which will be the new 30s by then. That I'll require a handicapped seat is actually a plus!

More immediately, I'm sure tempted by the Bishop's Charity Game on Aug. 22 when Freddy Jackson and the Buffalo Bills visit Lambeau Field. Though, damn, I've seen enough real games that preseason football doesn't much appeal to me, Freddy is likely to see a lot of action as he looks to be the Bills' starter at running back for (at least) the first three real games.

Then again, I saw the Coe College product excel in a real game last season in Kansas City. Buffalo returns to Kansas City in mid-December, but it's the same day the Packers play in Chicago. Granted, I wasn't in Kansas City, but I didn't have any luck the last time I tried following the Packers in Missouri.

As for the Pack, they open at home against the Bears. Jay Cutler cuts his NFC Norris teeth at Lambeau Field. It's a nationally televised Sunday night game, which I'll be content to view from my couch in high-def.

Then it's Bengals (no), Lions (NO!), Vikings (hmm), Cowboys (HMM!, but nationally televised, so, no), 49ers (ho-hum), Ravens (Monday Night Football!), and Seattle (no more). Maybe I'll reconsider my pre-season opposition.

The road schedule offers two national telecasts. A Monday nighter at the (former) Dome of Doom in Minnesota and Thanksgiving in Detroit. (Guess I should host this year.)

Road games within reach include St. Louis in late September and Chicago in mid-December.

But, wait. The "regular" season ends Jan. 3 at Arizona. Bet it's a lot warmer there then it will be here.

faking it

The cold rain says March; the calendar says April. And Monday, naturally. I'm tired and distracted and the only energy in my system is coiled up and ready to spring at the first unsuspecting for nothing, if that's what it takes. I venture the length of the building, aiming for the lone sugared soda machine. And once on the way and once on the return I reassure an acquaintance that I'm fine. I sit down with the water I bought in order to feel better, not worse, later. I sigh and survey my small lot. They who are always here are not, those who are never here are. False absolutes, but that is the gist. My work, in those nonsensical words, cut out. I fight my worn-out impulse and strain to be gracious; perhaps she does the same. For an hour or so later, she's caught up, corrected, complimented, and we are both ready to go on.

Dowd: Demi in Des Moines?

Demi in Des Moines?
By Maureen Dowd

SAN FRANCISCO

California’s having an identity crisis.

Once the West Coast glowed with prosperity and was the harbinger of hip new things. Now it’s in the grip of recession and repression. California’s cool has been stolen by, of all places, Iowa.


White-bread, cornfed, understated Iowa was the first state to ratify the black rookie Barack Obama and has usurped the role everyone thought California would play as a leader in the fight to give gays the right to marry.

Now it’s flyover country that’s starting high-flying trends.

The mayor of Des Moines, Frank Cownie, called the San Francisco mayor, Gavin Newsom, to leave him a message about the Iowa Supreme Court decision.

“That caught me, candidly, by surprise, proverbially flat-footed,” Newsom said in an interview at City Hall. “It was around April 1st, so I thought, honestly, it was an April Fool’s joke.”

It seemed so topsy-turvy.

“It’s pretty extraordinary,” the Irish Catholic mayor said, in an office filled with Kennedy memorabilia and the ghosts of the Harvey Milk-George Moscone murders. “Now you have four states that are legally sanctioning same-sex marriage, and New York and California are not among them. Who could have predicted that?”

The Dream Factory is being left in the dust by the Field of Dreams.

Matt McCoy, an openly gay Iowa legislator, was so excited by the court’s unanimous decision that he posted a video inviting everyone, “gay and straight,” to come get married and settle in Iowa.

Max Mutchnick, the co-creator of “Will and Grace,” who married the entertainment lawyer Erik Hyman in Beverly Hills just days before Proposition 8 passed last November — theirs is among the 18,000 or so marriages now in legal limbo — was tickled by the idea of Iowa as the new California.

“Will we see David Geffen rollerblading in the Des Moines skywalk?” Mutchnick mused. “Will paparazzi chase after farmers looking for candid shots? Will Ashton and Demi be BlackBerrying friends from their corner table at Applebee’s? Will there be a new line of Kiehl’s products for goats?”

Mutchnick, who is raising twin girls with Hyman, frets that President Obama may be behind the country on this issue, and that the Obamas do not have enough gays around them.

“If more homosexuals were in the Obamas’ lives,” the writer said, “there is no way Michelle would have worn a twin set when she met the queen.”

Newsom is running for governor, even though his cause foundered, and he may have trouble wooing those blacks and Latinos who supported Prop 8. He doesn’t like the image of California reeling backward and “becoming the first state in U.S. history to use the Constitution to strip people’s rights away.”

The dashing mayor, now 41, was a pariah at the 2004 Democratic convention because some Democrats thought his operatic parade of gay marriages had helped W. and Karl Rove buzz the base and eke out a victory against John Kerry.

Over what he called a “Vitamin V” vodka at the St. Regis hotel here, Newsom’s predecessor, Willie Brown (who prefers Jerry Brown for governor and thinks Newsom should run for lieutenant governor) disputed this, laughing: “You think John Kerry lost because Gavin Newsom married people? No way! It was because he was on that sky-diving piece of equipment. Wind-surfacing. He was wind-surfacing all over the world.”

Newsom said he hasn’t sat down with Barney Frank, who warned the mayor to win approval in court before issuing marriage licenses, but that he had reconciled with Dianne Feinstein, who said Newsom had pushed the issue “too much, too fast, too soon.”

While he says he doesn’t like being a chew toy for Ann Coulter, Bill O’Reilly and the religious right, or getting ugly Twitter messages or obscene gestures from people at airports, he asserts that his brazen approach in 2004 made it harder for Democrats “to speak from both sides of their mouths to justify their position that separate is equal,” and caused a “softening” in discrimination.

“People watched and saw a human face,” he said. “They saw somebody who looked like their next-door neighbor and said, ‘That’s not the person with chaps in the big gay parade.’ ”

He said he has been rereading Martin Luther King’s “Letter From Birmingham Jail” and feels he needs to “do more, now and better.”

“If we didn’t do it in 2004, do you think the party would have wanted us to do it in 2006 during the midterm elections to take back Congress?” he said. “God forbid. 2008? Well, it’s another presidential year. And now people are saying 2010? That’s another critical year to hold Congress, and we’ve got statehouses across the nation. 2012? Another presidential year. 2014? Another Congressional year. Wait does almost always mean never. That was Dr. King’s point.”

here and gone

I walk in to my room and she's perched on a stool, my telephone pressed against her ear. She speaks softly and replaces the receiver.

"Hi," I say, sounding surprised, but pleasantly. I speak as if to a bird taking its first steps after landing, not wanting to scare it away.

I wait, because it seems the thing to do, and she says something, shyly, about her in-school suspension, a left-over from the last time she was here. At the bell, I send her off more kindly than I sometimes do.

I had not yet heard about how far she had gotten, but I wondered all the same about whom she had on the phone. Later, I hear from the voice of authority and a principal, too. The details of her absence filter through. I decide that the next day I'll bail her out of in-school for the morning; it will make my life easier, maybe buy some goodwill. Something's not right, and somebody should help her, or listen, or be there. The time comes, I make the call--and she's gone.

"I will gladly pay you Tuesday for a hamburger today."

He comes in and tosses a quarter on my desk. In his mind, I guess we're even. I thank him and add it to the change in my drawer; I bet he asks for it back before noon. He's a skinny seventeen year-old who passes for younger, and he eats his way through his day. Every day he picks up the free breakfasts and lunches, styrofoam trays of pizza and potatoes and a brownie that he always discards. He eats in my room as half of them do, and when he finishes, he asks the same question:

"Ms. P., do you have a dollar?" I ask him if he's still hungry as I fish in my wallet, and every day he says that he is.

Every day he promises, "I bring you money tomorrow," and every day I agree. Now and then, he gives me a handful of coins and bills, the sum either of what he owes or, more likely, he has. As long as he's trying and as long as he's eating, I'm fine with our arrangement. But oh, how I wish he had ever seen Popeye just so he'd get the reference.

Foiled!

I lean into the doorway, all bemused triumph. "I think we're done."

"And why is that?"

So I recount the story that began this morning, the one about the revolving door. The one about phone calls and e-mails between our district and the one neighboring, about a here and gone family, about the registrar announcing, "They're back!"

"I'm on my way," I said, when I finally got the message, when I returned from--imagine this--teaching my class. And when I got to Guidance, I see three familiar faces: they'd be prodigal, if they'd ever been gone. I do not speak to them, which should have been, perhaps was, clue number one; instead, I consult with the staff.

"They say they never moved."

"Not true!" I say, all up for the challenge; I share the back story that justifies my certainty. I liked these kids, but the new house is out of the district, and that, as they say, is that. It's not personal, but I'm a little insulted; do I appear that easy to fool? I take the insufficient paperwork that they've produced today-- mail from December doesn't prove an April address--round-up an authority figure, and go. As we slip into the conference room, all The Man and The Weasels, for a fraction I consider where to sit. Facing the boys and their uncle--I decide against good cop--I listen to the lie.

"Nicely played," I'm tempted to say, as the kid keeps his face straight. I won't miss that kind of skill. He promises that they'll return with what is required--"No problem," -- to come back to the school they prefer; I refrain from snagging a sleeve and whispering, "You know that I know."

Minutes later all points become moot, the checks and the follow-up unnecessary as my cross-town colleague calls with the latest. It seems the family called her--representative of their rightful school, like it or not--from our parking lot--I love that--and requested another appointment to enroll.

Runaway

Four nights. Coming up on five days.

The feeling is strangely empty, not unlike her locker or her chair. Two days of missed school has caught no one's attention; it's her pattern, at this point, her rule. Perhaps that's why the talk has been muted, the whispers less urgent. Or perhaps no one really believes.

We assume, we hope, that she's still in town; we wonder if anyone knows. We are skeptical of the boyfriend's denials. We tick off the names of those she calls friends. We expect the phone to ring; it's so unlike her to stay silent. But still and so far, not a word.

"Ms. P., I'm going to tell you a story that will make you cry," was my introduction to the story of a girl gone missing. It hasn't, and I don't expect that it will. Instead I feed her friends lines to recite during the please-be-inevitable phone call. Assurances that she's not in trouble, that we just want her safe. It feels rote because I'm faking it. Of course I care, but I don't know what I'm doing. How to coax a runaway home was not in my training. But odds are, when she surfaces, she'll call someone I know, and I'll be the adult that they turn to. They'll again lead me out into the hall, and they'll spill out the please-don't-be-drama as I lean on the door, and I'll try to say the right thing.

a little too true

xkcd.com

Basic Fairness

Unanimous ruling: Iowa marriage no longer limited to one man, one woman

By JEFF ECKHOFF and GRANT SCHULTE
Des Moines Register

Basic fairness and constitutional equal protection were the linchpins of Friday’s historic Iowa Supreme Court ruling that overturned a 10-year-old ban on same-sex marriage and puts Iowa squarely in the center of the nation’s debate over gay rights.

The unanimous, 69-page decision maintains a church’s right to decide who can be married under its roof, but it runs counter to the expressed opinion of a majority of Iowans who believe marriage is defined as the union of one man and one woman.

The landmark ruling is guaranteed to send shock waves through politics in Iowa and beyond. With no appeal as an option, opponents say their only hope to overturn Friday’s decision is an almost-certain bid to amend the state constitution. But that path, which would eventually require a public vote, would not yield results until 2012 at the earliest.

Enactment of an amendment requires approval by consecutive General Assemblies of the Legislature — a General Assembly lasts two years — and a vote of the people.

In the meantime, Iowa remains one of three states in the nation, and the only state in the Midwest, where gays and lesbians can legally marry. The ruling takes effect April 24. Iowa has no residency requirement for marriage licenses, which virtually assures a rush of applications from out-of-state visitors. The ruling opens the marital door to an estimated 5,800 gay couples in Iowa.

The Rev. Mark Stringer said he cried when he learned of Friday’s decision. Stringer performed the only legal same-sex marriage in Iowa when he officiated a 2007 ceremony in the brief window between a Polk County judge’s ruling and the subsequent court-ordered delay so the Supreme Court could weigh in.

“It’s really an astounding moment under our history,” Stringer said. “What really excites me is that Iowa is the first in our area of the country. We are being a leader in civil rights, which will be part of our state’s history.”

Friday’s decision stemmed from a 2005 lawsuit filed by six gay and lesbian couples who were denied marriage licenses by the Polk County recorder’s office. The seven justices affirmed Polk County Judge Robert Hanson’s ruling that Iowa’s ban on same-sex marriages treated gay and lesbian couples unequally under the law.

“We are firmly convinced that the exclusion of gay and lesbian people from the institution of civil marriage does not substantially further any important governmental objective,” the court said in an opinion written by Justice Mark Cady. “The legislature has excluded a historically disfavored class of persons from a supremely important civil institution without a constitutionally sufficient justification.”

The ruling appeared to dismiss the option of civil unions as a marriage alternative, finding that “a new distinction based on sexual orientation would be equally suspect and difficult to square with the fundamental principles of equal protection embodied in our constitution.”

Friday’s decision also addressed what it called the “religious undercurrent propelling the same-sex marriage debate” and said judges must remain outside the fray.

“Our constitution does not permit any branch of government to resolve these types of religious debates and entrusts to courts the task of ensuring that government avoids them,” Cady wrote.

“This approach does not disrespect or denigrate the religious views of many Iowans who may strongly believe in marriage as a dual-gender union, but considers, as we must, only the constitutional rights of all people, as expressed by the promise of equal protection for all.”

The Polk County lawsuit, Varnum vs. Brien, was financed by Lambda Legal, a gay-rights group that has fought similar battles across the country.

“We won! It is unanimous!” Lambda attorney Camilla Taylor exclaimed when the decision was announced. “Today the dream becomes reality … and the Iowa Constitution’s promise of equality is fulfilled. Iowans have never waited for others to do the right thing. ”

Lambda chose Iowa because of the fair-mindedness of residents and the courts, leaders of the group have said.

But Iowa also offered several strategic advantages, according to Drake University law professor Mark Kende, who described the ruling as “very well reasoned” and predicted it will have national, possibly international, influence.

“There’s a perception of Iowa as a fair, reasonable and decent place,” Kende said. “We’re not perceived as being overly Republican or overly Democrat.”

The decision could create new, interstate legal battles, he said, when couples who flock to Iowa to marry might not have their vows recognized in other states that prohibit same-sex marriage.

Opponents, some of whom showed up outside the judicial building early Friday to await the ruling, hung their hopes on a constitutional challenge that legislative leaders said earlier this week was a long shot.

Lawyers said Lambda’s decision to sue based solely on state constitutional claims means the case was guaranteed to end in Iowa, away from a more conservative U.S. Supreme Court.

Polk County authorities acknowledged Friday that they have no plans to ask for a review by the state high court. An appeal to federal court is not an option, since the Iowa Supreme Court is the final word on matters of Iowa law.

Public opinion is a different matter. A February 2008 Iowa Poll conducted by The Des Moines Register showed that most Iowans believed marriage involves one man and one woman. However, the poll also showed that a majority of Iowa adults supported civil unions that would grant benefits to gay couples similar to those offered to married heterosexuals.

For several Iowa couples, Friday’s victory sparked movement on long-held plans. Kate and Trish Varnum, two of the lawsuit plaintiffs, announced their engagement at a news conference.

“Good morning,” Kate Varnum said. “I’d like to introduce you to my fiancee. Today, I am proud to be a lifelong Iowan.”

Several blocks away, Diane Thacker’s eyes filled with tears when the ruling was read to a crowd that had gathered outside the Iowa Judicial Building.

“Sadness,” she whispered. “But I’m prayerful and hope that God’s word will stand.”
Thacker said she joined a group of gay-marriage opponents “because I believe in the marriage vow. I can’t see it any other way.”

Friday’s decision is expected to take formal effect when the Supreme Court issues a legal order to carry out the ruling in three weeks.

National interest in the decision is believed to be at least partly responsible for the 1.5 million people who deluged the Iowa Supreme Court’s Web site before 11 a.m. Richard Socarides, a former senior adviser to President Bill Clinton on gay civil rights, said that the ruling could mean as much to gay couples outside Iowa as in.

“I think it’s significant, because Iowa is considered a Midwest state in the mainstream of American thought,” Socarides said . “Unlike states on the coasts, there’s nothing more American than Iowa. As they say during the presidential caucuses, 'As Iowa goes, so goes the nation.’”

Others saw it differently.

• Doug Napier, a lawyer for the Alliance Defense Fund in Arizona, said the Iowa Supreme Court “stepped out of its proper role in interpreting the law.”
The 1998 Defense of Marriage Act “was simple, it was settled, and overwhelmingly supported by Iowans,” Napier said. “There was simply no legitimate reason for the court to redefine marriage.”

• Maggie Gallagher, president of the National Organization for Marriage, a New Jersey group, said, “Once again, the most undemocratic branch of government is being used to advance an agenda the majority of Americans reject.”

• Bishop Richard Pates of the Des Moines Diocese urged “the voice of the Iowa people to rise in support of a constitutional amendment which clearly upholds the definition of marriage. We will then join the deafening chorus of citizens in every state, 30 to date, who have voted to preserve civil marriage as it has been recognized and defined since the beginning of recorded history for the benefit of marriage, families, children and the common good.”

A Truism

To wit: not teaching kindergarten is no guarantee that one's students will not insert various objects into bodily orifices.


But someone getting the end of a Q-tip stuck to his eardrum was definitely a first.

Q & A

"Ms. P, I have three questions," she announces as she walks through the door, and she ticks off her list right then. The date of a meeting, a detail of an assignment-- asked and answered, done and done. And then:

"When somebody donates their organs, is their funeral paid for?"

I cock my head and pause. She anticipates the question. "Somebody told my mom that, and she told me to ask you." As Designated Authority on Organ-Donation Policy, I cannot help but smile. That and ponder why and how this query arose: is a frugal parent planning ahead?

I satisfy her with my what and why, then Google up the same answer from a more legitimate source. My student is happy because I proved her right; I'm pleased for a different reason. I've never been sure where I stand with her mother, and somehow I take this as a sign.

the downhill slide

Someone has started the countdown, and now I'm doomed to remember it, or blessed: 39 more get-ups. Thirty-nine more drives over, and thirty-nine more drives back. Thirty-nine more twenty-minute lunches. Thirty-nine more days to plan. One holiday, there at the tail-end. One more set of grades--no, two. Twenty more curriculum units that will somehow be composed. Fourteen more freshman to prepare for. One more round of state tests. All of April and most of May-- five snow days to make up. Easter and The Birthday and (oh please let there be) Spring. Prom and Commencement. And then, hallelujah, done.