do you carry the words around like a key or change?

I am preparing myself mentally for the last episode of the L Word and the blog that will follow. I know I've talked to some of you about how I feel about the L Word, but I really cannot stress enough how important it has been in my life over the past 5 years. It's more than just tv. For me it fully transcends it. Because it's not just a tv show, it's fucking groundbreaking, and for that reason it has a place on the Gay History timeline.

For me, it is the first time, ever, that something in the media was talking to me, Natalie, the young lesbian searching for her reflection. And there it was. I saw pieces of myself, and not just as a device to inspire erections in young men, like in other television programs briefly flirting with lesbian characters. These women were real, they were legitimate, they were well-developed and outspoken and fucked-up like real people. And they loved women. Truly. And some of the women who played them were lesbians themselves. And I fell in love with all of them the way you fall in love with art that moves your soul.

It has been five years. The L Word was with me in Kansas City, when I was confused and stupid and young and I thought I knew what love was. I was not fully developed in my lesbian identity. Frankly, I was still trying to be straight in a very strange way that I now realize was harmful not only to me but to my compatriot in attempted heteronormativity. The things I have learned in five years. Even in the past year. Big change. Radical.

And all the while there has been this television show, bringing up real issues. Heart-issues, for me. Gender and sexuality and Deaf and things I care about. The L Word told me with every breath it was ok to be myself and love who I love and I should not be ashamed and never let anyone make me feel I am less-than. Less than good. Less than whole. Less than beautiful. Less than a perfect creation of the universe. Less than everything I feel I am and want to be.

It's about possibility. The world can seem so closed-off and unreachable, sometimes, when you are a minority. It's like you speak only French and everyone else is speaking Japanese, and sometimes they are talking at you or about you, but never to you. And then, all of the sudden, you find someone who speaks your language and acknowledges you and looks you in the eye like you matter. When you are acknowledged instead of being ignored (or openly hated) the world opens up a bit. You become visible. Visibility is the number one most important step in the fight for equality. The cure for fear and ignorance, which are the seeds of hatred, is education. The more people are exposed to gayness, the less mysterious and scary it becomes. When it begins to be viewed as "normal" it is harder to villainize.

I don't think you even know, you guys. I cannot impart it to you properly. I don't have the words to make you understand my feelings in this particular situation. But maybe you almost feel it, just a little. That's all I can hope for, a modicum of comprehension on your part. Then I won't have failed completely to explain the importance of a silly tv show to you, noble readers (all three of you).