Big shout out and thanks today to my friend and fellow wine professional and activist Michael Whidden for asking me to join him on his American Tributaries Podcast.

Listen on YouTube here or below.

Michael contacted me after I published a post in March entitled “Stop telling me I’m a bad person because I live in Texas.”

After having an encounter with a now former friend who made some extreme, severe comments about our family’s life in Texas, I asked the two people who read my blog to consider that “state boundaries do not represent monolithic ethical, moral, and aesthetic divides. There are all kinds of people in [my adoptive state] Texas, just as there are all kinds of people in California (including plenty of ultraconservative racists, among others, in my home state).”

I was thrilled to get a chance to discuss the unfortunate episode. Thanks for checking it out.

I also wrote a song about my experience. Warning: it’s profanity laden. But it really captures the absurdity of those situations.

The only thing that mattered to the person in question was that I live in Texas. Nothing else about my persona interested them. As it turns out, there’s a lot more to me (and everyone) than just geography.

Thanks for checking out the song as well. Heartfelt thanks to Michael for having me on his show.