Tip It! (3 page)

Me with those lovely lesbians Ellen DeGeneres and Portia de Rossi.

Take lesbians. I don’t know much about lesbians, but don’t you think it’s kind of a shame we always assume lesbians are kind of husky and mannish-looking? Maybe that’s because that’s what they’re shown as on television. But there are a lot of beautiful lesbians, too! Of course, when people see a couple of girls out together, nobody assumes they’re lesbians. Straight girls are famous for living together, going out to eat together, seeing movies together, shopping. They even call each other girlfriends when they’re really just friends. But when two guys are seen out together eating or at a movie, they’re thought to be gay. And I don’t think it’s right to assume that. Even if they are gay! [
Like when
Ryan Seacrest goes out to dinner with Clay Aiken. It’s wrong for people to assume anything
.]

But what I really don’t think is right is the discrimination and prejudice that gays still encounter. It’s shameful. And the nasty things people do, beating them up and stuff like that. People who do that are cowards, real jerks.

These guys and women who are brave enough to come out, I give ’em a lot of credit. A lot of gays who recognize me on the street and start talking to me will tell me that their parents have disowned them. That’s so sad. Usually it’s the dads. Fathers are apparently more upset, and the mothers come around most of the time, I hear. That’s why I was so excited to be with Kathy last year as a part of the West Hollywood rally against the gay marriage ban Proposition 8, which you might have seen because it was covered on Kathy’s show. I went even though I really don’t like to be in big crowds. But I got to be in a wheelchair at least—I don’t know how Kathy walked as much as she did. [
God knows I wasn’t the only one in four-inch heels that day
.]

Then, when I saw everyone with signs, I wanted one, too! So I got one to hold in the wheelchair that said
GAY MARRIAGE, I’LL DRINK TO THAT!
I thought that was funny.

But I was there because I had something to say as a parent. We got up onstage and I told the crowd I wanted to encourage parents to stick up for their gay kids when they come out, and that them wanting to get married is a wonderful thing. Because when I hear these sad stories from gay sons and daughters, I think the parents are the ones who lose out when they shun their own kids.

I could never cut off a kid. It would be
my
loss.

It’s got to be hard, but at the same time, what these young men and women are doing by coming out is also wonderful. I look at that “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy in the military and I think it’s nuts. I know there’s a lot of prejudice still, and I don’t think gays would go after straight guys in a military situation, but a good soldier is a good soldier. [
And a naughty soldier is even better
.] What the hell’s the difference?

That’s why it’s so great that the gays have come along like they have, establishing their own places, raising kids, and doing such a nice job at it. I think gay marriage is going to happen. It might take a little longer than the gays want, and it’ll be a fight, but that’s just because it’s a totally different concept for a lot of people—especially from my generation—and it’ll be hard for them to accept at first.

I’ve been asked how I can reconcile fighting for gay marriage when I was raised a traditional Catholic. Well, on one level, it’s pretty simple. We never talked about gays then! You were taught to be a good parent, to be a good wife or husband, not to cheat. Good things, you know? We knew this other gay couple in our condo building, each of the men had been married before and had kids. Then they came out, because they had to do the natural thing, and now the kids they’d had from their marriages were in high school. Well, when you’d talk with them, they’d discuss their worries about the kids getting with the wrong crowd, or into drugs, how they wanted their male kid—who’s straight—to meet a nice girl, and not one of these flibbertigibbets [
read: whores
], and how they wanted to put their kids through college and how expensive it was, but it was the right thing to do. And I listened and thought, “Gee, I feel like I’m talking to regular parents.” The same concerns, the same worries we all have.

Anybody who’s a good parent, I’m all for.

Kids have been damaged enough by all the divorce and cheating and stuff that goes on. Maybe it’ll be a lot better for them if gays get to marry. Being new at it, just being allowed to do it, gays and lesbians might treasure it a lot more, because it’s something they will have fought for. They’ll be on their best behavior, probably!

I still have friends who wonder why I feel this way. I don’t try to convince them, really. I know some wouldn’t mind it, if it wasn’t called marriage. A union, maybe. Nobody bats an eye at “He’s my partner” or “I’m her partner” anymore. But see, the words are different. And a lot of gays won’t accept that, because it makes them different once again. But don’t try to convince me we shouldn’t have gay marriage because straight ones are automatically better. Not with the amount of divorces I see.

Younger people accept the idea of gay marriage more, I notice. And that’s where it’ll have to be won. It may sound morbid, but it will be a lot better when our generation dies off!

So keep tipping it, gays and lesbians!

Now that I think of it, when we were growing up, gay people existed. They were around, but we just thought they were more colorful than other people. I love my modern gays but things were much different back in my day . . .

[
Kathy here. If you watch
Kathy Griffin: My Life on the D-List,
you’ll know that people are immediately drawn to my mom but whenever they get up close, there are a few terms she uses they aren’t familiar with right away. Here, I’m providing a helpful glossary of those phrases, with my own very helpful explanations for what those terms really mean.
]

“I’LL SPEAK TO YOU FURTHER”:
This means the meeting is over and Maggie is done discussing the subject, at least for now . . .

“YOU COULD EAT OFF THE FLOOR”:
Highest praise, the ultimate sanitary compliment for a homeowner or restaurateur.

“I WOULD GIVE MY EYETEETH”:
Used to describe something Maggie really wants. “I would give my eyeteeth to have dinner with that handsome Bill O’Reilly.”

“NEVER CARRY A BALANCE”:
Great financial wisdom that has kept her flush all these years, and has obviously gone unheeded by millions of people.

“DID YOU SEE THE ONE . . . ?”:
Used to describe a person, show, book, or movie that Maggie can’t recall the name of at the moment.

“TOUGH AS NAILS”:
Judge Judy, who else?

“DREGS OF SOCIETY”:
Avoid these people at all costs, they will only drag you down.

“I ALMOST DIED!”:
An expression of momentary surprise, not a grave, near-fatal medical condition requiring life-saving techniques.

“GIVE THEM WHAT’S WHAT”:
If someone offends or wrongs someone else, this policy is put into effect.

“TEENAGERS SHOULD START OUT EVERY DAY WITH A COUPLE GOOD WHACKS
,
NOT FOR WHAT THEY’VE DONE, BUT FOR WHAT THEY MIGHT DO”:
More excellent advice. Self-explanatory.

“I CAN TAKE A SHOWER OUT OF A TEACUP”:
Water conservation to the nth degree.

“THEY DON’T HAVE A POT OR A WINDOW”:
Used to describe a situation for poor people who can’t afford a convenient receptacle in which to empty their urine, or even a portal with a view, for the same purpose.

“YOU DON’T KNOW SHIT FROM SHINOLA”:
Used to let someone know that they are clueless and, specifically, that they can’t tell the difference between excrement and shoe polish.

M
y kids always like to tease me about my childhood, as I described it to them.

“You always sound like you were such a goody-goody,” they’ll say.

Well, I was, kind of! I loved to laugh, and I loved to talk, and I never had a desire to cause any trouble. Probably because I was scared of my dad. I loved him, and he was a great, wonderful man. But you know that old saying “My father will kill me”? All of us said that in our family. Michael Corbally ran a tight ship, and you didn’t want to get on his bad side! There was always my mother, Agnes, though, to thankfully see the gray where my dad saw only black and white.

She was the heart of that partnership, too, the one with the sense of humor. When you wanted something, you could go to Mom, and she’d say, “I’ll go talk to the old man.” Then she’d soften him up so you could get your way.

My wonderful parents, Agnes and Michael Corbally, parents of sixteen!

But when you’re the youngest of sixteen, you also get the benefit of a father who’s had plenty of know-how seeing what works and doesn’t work in raising kids, so he’d mellowed some. By the time I came along, the neighborhood grocery store that my dad started in Chicago after he emigrated from Ireland was doing great. We were a solidly middle-class family when I got to grammar school. It was my oldest brothers and sisters who knew tougher times and who had to work in the store after school. We younger kids didn’t have to when we were coming up. Of course, we were called spoiled by the older kids, and it sometimes seemed as if there were two families separated by experience and hardship, but everyone loved one another and fully supported one another through good times and bad.

I’m first-generation American. My father was a married millworker back in the old country (Ireland) until mill closings forced him to look for a better life in America. He had an aunt here who offered to sponsor his coming over, because you needed someone to help prove that you weren’t going to be a drag on the economy. Not a bad idea when you think about it. So he borrowed money from his aunt to start a store, and then Mom came over with—I think, because my memory of these stories isn’t the best—eight kids, including a baby no more than seven months old. Can you imagine that? She had only one niece to help her, too, and of course, they had to travel steerage, meaning they were in the bowels of the ship with hardly any privacy and little comfort. They were sick as dogs the whole way. In fact, if you’ve seen
Titanic,
you know how badly they were treated. And just like in that movie, some of the kids went up top to dance for the wealthier passengers, and got coins thrown at their feet. It sounds terrible, I know, but it was money.

My parents lost their first four children, two in Ireland and two in America. One died from burns because of an overturned pot of boiling water, the others to illness. The greatest number of children at any one time was twelve: Mary, Anne, Francis, Agnes, George, Pat, Angeline, Joe, John, Irene, Jimmy, and me. It meant I had quite a few siblings who felt like they could lord it over me. My oldest sib, Mary, was old enough to be my mother, and she often acted like one. I remember once on a slushy winter day heading over to see one of my girlfriends and running into Mary as she was heading home. As soon as she noticed I didn’t have galoshes on she grabbed me by the coat and said, “You’re not going out like that!” She dragged me home—my shoes and socks by this point were soaking wet—and I was yelling, “Leave me alone, you’re not my mother!” At that age, I saw it as being bossed around. Now I think she was looking out for me when my mother couldn’t.

There’s one sibling I don’t remember very well, Angeline. What I do remember is that she had tuberculosis, and she was in a sanitarium. She died when she was twenty-one. When I was really young, we used to go see her once or twice a week. But we could never go upstairs, because TB is so contagious, so we would wait till she came outside to the third-floor balcony and we’d talk to her from below. TB was a real concern in my day, and the Corballys didn’t have great lungs, so my brother Jimmy—the next oldest—and I were always getting tested at the county hospital. Thankfully I never got it, but my sister Irene contracted it and had to drop out of high school.

I got along great with my four closest-in-age siblings: Jimmy, Irene, Johnny, and Joe. Although for a while I did hate my brother John because he used to tease me about my red hair. He had this teacher with a hideous red wig, Mrs. Burns, and he called her Wiggy Burns. Well, he called me that, too, just to get my goat. “Ooooh, I hate him!” I’d go around saying. Then he ended up being my favorite brother. He’d call me “Wig” later in life, and I just loved it. But as a kid, I was ready to kill him.

Interviewed about my hair. They published home addresses for the men reading!

As you can guess, I wasn’t too crazy about my red hair, which I got from my dad. I always used to say it was auburn, but it certainly wasn’t that light, pretty red they call titian. I had freckles, too, and it just meant that when I was out, guys would yell, “Hey Red, how you doing?” Everyone thought it was pretty, but I couldn’t hear it. It’s true that you never like anything about yourself.

In fact, you know when I liked my red hair? When it turned gray.

My best friends growing up were my sister Irene, who was four years older than me, and Rae, an Italian girl I immediately took a liking to, who lived in our neighborhood, which was Presentation parish. Neighborhoods were really parishes then, and the name of the parish was where you said you lived. I would have said, “I’m in Presentation.” Or even, “I’m in Prez.” If you attended Resurrection church, you were in “Rez.” St. Thomas Aquinas was just “Aquinas.” Our Lady of Sorrows was just “Sorrows.” Although, “I live in Sorrows” sounds kinda unhappy, doesn’t it?

Anyway, Rae lived right down the street from me, and she was one of those friends you make where you click instantly. You say, “I don’t know why. I just like her!”

It was evident for anyone to see, though, why the three of us enjoyed one another’s company. We could see the humor in everything, and we always had one another in hysterics. Put the three of us together, and we didn’t need anyone else to have a good time. In church, if somebody was singing really off-key and close to us, it would be dangerous for any of us to catch the other’s eyes. Then we’d have to leave the pew to stop from laughing. Somebody with an atrocious outfit was another trigger. That wouldn’t even need eye contact. Just an elbow, and an “Oh my God” was enough. Another time it was a misprint in the prayer book: “Thanks be to God” instead read “Tanks be to God.”

My daughter has called it “the church giggles” in her act. Well, Irene and Rae and I could turn any situation into the church convulsions without any prodding.

Irene was particularly foxy about getting us to laugh. She could get Rae and me to make fools of ourselves, and then keep her composure while we were losing it. When she’d do this at the soda shop, they’d have to kick Rae and me out for laughing so much, while Irene got to stay! Then Rae and I would wait outside for Irene. “You always do this!” I’d say to her, still laughing, of course. [
My getting banned from talk shows is genetic. Mom was banned first, from the soda shop!
]

It’s like that to this day with my best girlfriends. We’re all still alive, and when any of us are on the phone with one of the others, we eventually have to hang up because it just sinks into hysterical laughter. Often over the stupidest things, stuff we’ve been laughing at for years. “When the three of you get together, you act like you’re twelve years old!” my kids will say. But I tell ya, what good is a friendship if you can’t still laugh at the same things?

Of course, when we all got married and raised children, then we’d usually be laughing about the trouble our kids were giving us! The way it would usually go is, each would defend the other’s children. “Oh really, Irene, your kid’s a bad one, huh? Did he stab someone?” But we always made sure never to end a conversation without a problem turning into a cause for laughter.

We also had our own secret language, which was helpful when we’d want to point out someone in the soda shop and make fun of them. [
Hmm, it seems like something else I do is genetic, as well
.] The problem was, it was all too obvious what we were doing, because we’d shift our eyes and lower our heads and speak under our breath, and it’s not as if we went to a lot of trouble to disguise the words. “Looksela at that onesela with the hatsela.” Or “Thatsela onesela at churchsela was a real bitchsela.” My gosh, do I even need to translate it for you? [
And you want me to apologize to the people I trash? I’m now going to apologize to everyone that YOU have offended, Mom, like that poorsela bitchsela
.]

Rae’s mom said it best about us. She was a sweet woman who spoke very little English—Rae, short for Raffaella, was first generation like myself—and would cook for us when we were hungry. (It’s how I found out about my favorite dish, spaghetti!) Anyway, Rae’s mom’d sit with us and listen to us talk, not understanding much, but knowing we were having fun. And when we’d start laughing, she’d look at us and repeat this song title that was popular then: “Cr-r-r-r-azy people!”

Laughing too much was about as bad as Margie Corbally got as a kid. I was never really rebellious, like some of my older brothers and sisters were, who reacted more strongly to my dad’s strictness. See, I loved school. I liked most of my nuns. What kind of nerd was I? I loved learning, and I loved sports. I was good at learning, but not so good at sports. I was short and uncoordinated, so as much as I loved basketball and volleyball, I was always picked last, or I’d beg for the teams to take pity on me and let me play. I might not have been good, but I played my heart out!

Me at twenty-one. I wish I had this thin waist again.

But while I never wanted to get in trouble, I did do one wrong thing in high school. Actually, it wasn’t
in
high school, technically, and that’s kinda the point.

Irene, sister and dear friend, before having her large family (nine kids)!