Margaret Gerhardt Linton 1937-2011

Mom - Margaret Linton - with her gandson Garrett Gastil at Garrett's graduation June 2011

Well… I hope to write more about her soon and for a while… but a brief post to put it out there into the world that mom isn’t around any more.

Her four children, now adults, and her eldest grandchildren, my sister’s sons and daughter, have been at her side for the last few days, which mom spent at bed 2 of the Cardiac Care Unit of Western Medical Center in Santa Ana. Mom fell a week ago, Thursday July 21st, sustaining massive damage to her brain. She underwent an operation on Friday July 22nd and never regained consciousness.

She always told us that she never wanted to live on life support… and even requested that if any of us ever encountered her in an open casket that we should immediately run up and kick it shut. It was very difficult for her to spend time in hospitals… so… though we still harbored some hope of some sort of miraculous recovery… this past Friday, we all talked about what to do, and came to the conclusion that, if her condition didn’t take a dramatic turn for the better (or worse) that we would withdraw life support on Sunday – today.

Thinking of Mom

Margaret Gehardt Linton - sitting at her front porch earlier this month

As I write this, my mom’s in the hospital… unconscious… unlikely to awaken. She’s definitely alive… but it’s also unlikely, even in the fortuitous case where she revives that she’ll be herself… she likely has brain damage, likely severe, likely debilitating.

So I’ve been thinking that I should write about her. 

Savage Happiness

Skipping Towards Gomorrah by Dan Savage, Plume Books

As I mentioned in the previous post, I’ve been enjoying Dan Savage, kick-ass advice columnist. I just finished his book Skipping Towards Gomorrah. While I don’t recommend it quite as highly as his  Savage Love sex advice columns, it’s a great read.

It’s basically a meandering critique of the hypocrisies of the socially conservative right-wing “professional virtuecrats” ie: William J. Bennett, Robert Bork, Pat Buchanan, Dr. Laura, Alan Keyes, etc. He really nails all of them… but then again I think that we all have inconsistencies in what values we believe in and hold tightly  (and I wouldn’t want Dan Savage’s razor critique on my personal foibles.) 

Dan Savage is my Favorite Advice Columnist

(spoiler alert – this blog post includes some sexual content including adult language! yay!)

Dan Savage writes Savage Love – a great advice column with a focus on great sex. I fondly remember reading the Savage Love column in the back pages of the L.A. Weekly. Reading the Savage Love column was, for me, a bit of a guilty pleasure. It was sandwiched in the ads for adult massage and escorts. It was all about sex, and full of explicit language, and so direct, forthright, and so so so sex-positive… As in, of course, we’re all kinky sexual beings, enjoy it! and Savage Love is funnnnny.