Building Worldwide Community by Louis

We gay people have a choice. We can continue to be the eternal victims of religious fanatics or we can organize and become a world power. Let’s choose the empowerment option.

I recently sent an e-mail to Shari Wilkins, Program Director of the Center. I suggested the Denver Gay and Lesbian Center set up a foreign language club. I set up such a club at the Center on West 13 Street in Greenwich Village in New York City about 30 years ago. The announcement for the group was put into their monthly newsletter. 65 people showed up for the first meeting. There were so many people that the Center had to put us in the garden. I mainly listened to the suggestions of people who were interested. It was a very informative exchange. The main message was that an international style of education would give everyone a better understanding of gay liberation as a worldwide movement.

I kept the group going for about a year. A Lesbian couple from Switzerland showed up and shared their experiences. They said that in Switzerland, the laws were liberal because the Swiss culture believes in science, including more modern views on human sexuality.

One evening a good looking young man from the Catalan region of Spain showed up and explained the differences between Spanish, Portuguese and Catalan. Everyone was fascinated. At another meeting a small group of people from the Czech Republic showed up and tried to explain the basics of their language.

I kept the group going for about nine months until I got burn-out. It was kind of exhausting scheduling all the time. If groups like this could be set up on a permanent basis, it would be better.

Another group I set up was la petite Ecole française. I wanted to do grammar and such, but it just turned into a general French club where gay and Lesbian French people could gather in a safe environment. The first session of the group drew 35 people. I sort of let the group go where it wanted to go naturally. One evening a group of three gay ice hockey athletes from Quebec, Canada, showed up and told about their experiences as athletes at the Olympic Games that were taking place back then in Quebec or Montreal. Another participant, Gaston, kept us up to date on how gay liberation was going in Paris. He was in New York because he worked for IBM.

We also tried to keep up with ILGA, the International Lesbian and Gay Association. I believe they attempted to set up a permanent mission to the U. N.

I wonder how that is going. If ILGA could accomplish what they envision as their mission, our worldwide community could start registering human rights violations complaints with the U. N. about hostile legislation such as what is now happening in Africa and the Soviet Union. Then I saw a new group, International Gay & Lesbian Human Rights Commission. Is it for real? How does one obtain further information?

I think another important educational tool we need in the various Gay and Lesbian Centers is perhaps a retired lawyer who knows how to keep up with changing case law regarding our civil rights issues. He could make a monthly report to the community in the Community Center. Events like this were held at the Center in New York. Invariably, large numbers of people showed up to hear what is going on once the events were held.

Denver, 2013

About the Author

I was born in 1944, I lived most of my life in New York City, Queens County. I still commute there. I worked for many years as a Caseworker for New York City Human Resources Administration, dealing with mentally impaired clients, then as a social work Supervisor dealing with homeless PWA's. I have an apartment in Wheat Ridge, CO. I retired in 2002. I have a few interesting stories to tell. My boyfriend Kevin lives in New York City. I graduated Queens College, CUNY, in 1967.

Truth and Lies by Gillian

My mother had a saying.
Well, my mother was a constant fountain of sayings, but she had a favorite one about lies.
A truth that’s told with bad intent beats all the lies you can invent.
When I was little I thought these, and those of all her endless other aphorisms, were words of her own wisdom but later of course I discovered otherwise; these particular words were originated by the poet, William Blake.

Anyway, I grew up with something of an ambivalent attitude to truth and lies.
I learned, rather, that truth is something to be approached with some caution and used judiciously; the same can be said of lies.
Nothing in my life has ever caused me to change that attitude.
I was delighted when I found, recently, that J.K. Rowling of Harry Potter fame agrees. She says,
‘The truth. It is a beautiful and terrible thing, and should be treated with caution.’


The poet John Keats told us that truth is beauty and beauty truth.
Sadly, there is frequently nothing uglier than the truth.
Mahatma Gandhi said,
‘Even if you are a minority of one, the truth is the truth.’
Really?
It is what is true for me. It is what I believe or perceive to be the truth.
Another’s truth may be very different, just as our realities differ.

But I am talking of subjective truth, I hear you say: truth that is based on individual sentiment.
Gay parents are every bit as good as straight parents might be my truth whereas others may sincerely believe the opposite to be true.
What about solid factual truth?
The world is round. Yes, most of us accept that, but there are still those 3000 members of the Flat Earth Society who do not. The web page for this group proclaims proudly to have been deprogramming the masses since 1547. And before Columbus tossed confusion into the ring, many of us would have believed the earth to be flat.
Factual truths change.
Both sides of the current Global Climate Change debate avidly produce facts to defend their ‘truth.’
Before our very eyes endlessly we have politicians showering us and each other with facts which handily disprove those offered by another.
The British Prime Minister Benjamin Disraeli referenced three types of lies: lies, damned lies, and statistics.
How right he was!
There is, as Maya Angelou puts it, ‘a world of difference between truth and facts. Facts can obscure the truth.’
How right she is!

Thomas Jefferson, another great espouser of truth, said that truth can stand by itself, which I would have to question, and, ‘There is not a truth existing which I fear.’
I find many truths, or that which I believe to be true, quite terrifying.
A million in Rwanda, brutally murdered by their fellow beings? Maybe the number is not a complete truth, perhaps it was a mere 900,000 and someone rounded up, but I believe in the basic truth of the report.
How fearful is that? Climate change, speeding ahead and leaving us watching with our mouths agape?

Both truth and lies are murky, unstable things.

I rarely proclaim to have absolute knowledge of truth, and occasionally I lie, but I flatter myself that in all I have the very best of intentions

That’s about as good as I can get.

About the Author

I was born and raised in England. After graduation from college there, I moved to the U.S. and, having discovered Colorado, never left. I have lived in the Denver-Boulder area since 1965, working for 30 years at IBM. I married, raised four stepchildren, then got divorced after finally, in my forties, accepting myself as a lesbian. I have now been with my wonderful partner Betsy for 25 years.

Little Things Mean A Lot by Betsy

Now, let me see. Little things mean a lot. What ever in the world does that mean? It seems to me that if something means a lot, then it follows, does it not, that it is not a little thing, but rather a big thing. I guess it depends on how you evaluate a thing--a happening, an incident. But, to my way of thinking and/or feeling, meaning is what gives a thing its value and importance in life, and if it means a lot, that is, has a lot of meaning it’s big. So far, I can’t make any sense out of this statement “Little Things Mean a Lot.”

So allow me to try to apply the statement to some of the happenings in my life and see then if it rings true.

I like to enjoy a cup of tea every morning soon after rising. Being partnered with and living with a Brit, I am told by said Brit that I cahhn’t make a proper cup of tea. Being American (a Colonial) I simply am innately unable to brew a proper cup of tea and therefore must have my morning tea made for me and served to me. (By the way, I never realized until I met this woman that we Americans had this particular defect.) Well, needless to say, I do not mind one bit being waited upon by the love of my life, so I go along with her on my inherent incapacity and let her do it.

“Your tea is ready, My Darling.” Now some might consider this daily ritual a “little” thing. I suppose it would be if it only happened once or even occasionally. But it becomes a large part of my life when you consider it happens 365 days a year and then for approximately well, say, 20 years of living together. That’s over 7,300 cups of tea! That’s not a little thing. That’s big, monumental, a significant part of my life. And then double it because the scenario is repeated in the late afternoon. That brings it to almost 15,000 cups of tea -- no little thing indeed.

Well, I’m still trying to find a kernel of truth in the adage “little things mean a lot.” Maybe I could make the statement apply to an incident that happened only once and a long, long time ago. I can think of two or three incidents actually from my childhood. Insignificant really in terms of their outcomes affecting anyone’s life. But the very fact that I can remember them 60-70 years later makes them significant, I believe. So, the truth is the really little things are no longer in my memory and therefore mean nothing.

Who said “little things mean a lot, anyway,” I ask myself. Well, Kitty Kallen made the song a hit in 1956 or so. But reading the lyrics brings me back to my original conundrum: How can something that means a lot be regarded as little.

“Give me your heart forever and ever. Little things mean a lot.” Oh come on! Turning your heart over to someone for keeps. That doesn’t sound like a little thing to me. Even “Blow me a kiss from across the room” can be the most exciting, main event of the year if you’re attracted to the person. Not a little thing at all. Remember that feeling?
Maybe the author of these lyrics was thinking in terms of the entire universe when she wrote the words. Now I am getting somewhere. I think I can make this work. I get it now. WE humans living in this universe on this speck of dust called Earth are little things and we THINK we mean a lot. Some believe that Earth hosts the only life in the universe and that we humans are the only intelligent life. I don’t happen to believe that, but, surely, those who do believe that consider themselves to be more than little things. I’ve been searching my soul for the answer to that one for a long time and I expect the search will continue until my soul finds its final home.

Searching Google for the lyrics to the song I find myself glancing at an article written about the current presidential campaign. It’s the little things that will effect the final outcome of the 2012 election, says Prof. Steffen Schmit. Now that does mean a lot--I mean the final outcome of the election. It seems that the state of Ohio a swing state which historically always picks the president at election time--Ohio is trying desperately to figure out how to get Mr. Romney elected--that is the Republican legislature is trying to figure this out. It seems Republicans have worked out a system whereby counties which traditionally vote Republican have been given 3 extra early voting days--the weekend before the actual election. Counties that traditionally vote Democrat are not given those extra days to vote early. The Obama campaign feels that the 3 extra days should be given to everyone, not just those who favor his opponent. The little thing of 3 extra days is suddenly becoming a very large issue indeed when you consider that it could make the difference between winning or losing the state; and, as in the 2008 election, the difference between winning or losing the entire election.

I guess I will simply have to conclude that 1. things that mean a lot are not little, rather they are, in my view, BIG. And 2. There are plenty of little things in my life, but they are just that--little, of relative insignificance, and not full of meaning.

About the Author

Betsy has been active in the GLBT community including PFLAG, the Denver women’s chorus, OLOC (Old Lesbians Organizing for Change). She has been retired from the Human Services field for about 15 years. Since her retirement, her major activities include tennis, camping, traveling, teaching skiing as a volunteer instructor with National Sports Center for the Disabled, and learning. Betsy came out as a lesbian after 25 years of marriage. She has a close relationship with her three children and enjoys spending time with her four grandchildren. Betsy says her greatest and most meaningful enjoyment comes from sharing her life with her partner of 25 years, Gillian Edwards.

Mistaken Identity by Will Stanton

“Look!  It’s George Clooney!”  I was startled and quickly checked to see where the speaker was looking.  There was no third person present.  He was looking at me!  A case of mistaken identity.  The very next week, a trio of ecstatic teenage girls screeched, “Justin Bieber!”  Again, I immediately looked right and then left, astonished that Justin Bieber would actually be in my presence without my having noticed.  He wasn’t there; the girls were looking at me.  Again, mistaken Identity!

No, of course that did not really happen.  No one ever has mistaken me for someone famous.  I don’t resemble any of them.  Instead, I probably look more like the fictional person Dave Letterman jokes about, the old curmudgeon who shouts at the kids, “Get off my lawn, and take that mangy dog with you…and that dump that it just left on my grass!”

Instead, let me tell you about a remarkable story of truly mistaken identity, one that has been made into an excellent quality film and subsequently released on DVD.  I have shown it to friends.  I’ll tell you just enough of the story’s background, but I’ll leave the best bits for you to see for yourselves.  It’s title is “AKA,” that is, an assumed name, an assumed identity.   This actually did happen in 1978, and it is an autobiographical tale by writer and director Duncan Roy.

The main character is named “Dean” rather than Duncan.  His advantages are that he is a very handsome seventeen-year-old with high intelligence, capable of being a fast study, and he possesses a quiet, pleasing personality.  His disadvantages, however, are several and profoundly debilitating.  He comes from a very poor and poorly educated home with an unseeing, ineffectual, dysfunctional mother and a father from hell who intimidates and abuses both mother and son but, also, who has had a history of frequently raping the boy even to the extent of occasionally allowing a buddy to engage in the abuse.  The sad and painful consequence is that Dean’s feelings and thinking become severely distorted to the extent that he cannot relate emotionally or sexually to either females or males.  If people express sexual interest in Dean, he equates that interest with rape, whether he allows them to proceed or not.  

Two other points influenced Dean’s personality and his future.  He had hoped to be somebody, to go to college and to make something of himself, although this was disdained and unsupported by the working-class father.  The other influence was that his mother’s employment was as a waitress at a trendy London restaurant frequented by Britain’s aristocratic élite.  His mother provided Dean with a daily run-down of which celebrities had appeared at the restaurant, and she would sit at the kitchen table with him, pouring over the gossip magazines, pointing out pictures of various aristocrats including a Lady Gryffoyn, who ran an art gallery as a hobby.  

To prevent the mother’s belated discovery of his sexual abuse, the father throws Dean out of the house without money or any place to go.  Dean wanders about Lady Gryffoyn’s up-scale neighborhood, hoping to find her and ask for a job. Instead, he is picked up by an aging ingénue who sees Dean as obviously quite young and very innocent.  Dean stays for dinner, meets other guests who turn out to be outrageous queens who adore him for his youth and good looks.  They make quite a fuss over him.  He consequently feels appreciated and accepted for the first time in his life.  This is the beginning of Dean’s transformation.

Dean tries for a menial job at the art gallery.  On one hand, Lady Gryffoyn is an arrogant bitch, not used to doing anyone favors; however on the other hand, she had a reputation for enjoying the company of very young men.  He lands a job, gradually is accepted more and more by Lady Gryffoyn to the point of being allowed to hang about the house and to meet her aristocratic friends, and even at times to wear her son’s clothes while there.  Dean acquires bank credit and a credit card, privileges that he has no experience or desire to handle responsibly.  In this pre-computer age, he is able quickly to run up a large debt, acquiring the clothes and accoutrements of a gentleman.

Eventually, Dean meets Alexander, Lady Gryffoyn’s son, who is the same age as Dean.  Alexander is even more arrogant and disdainful than Lady Gryffoyn and verbally abuses Dean.  Dean quickly learns that this gentrified class habitually identifies their own kind by expensive, tailor-cut apparel, posh accent, sophisticated demeanor, how much money they are willing to throw about without the least concern, what private schools the young have attended, and whether the lads will be attending Oxford or Cambridge, at least to receive an easy “gentleman’s degree.”  They cruelly disdain everyone else.  Dean is painfully ill-at-ease and unsure of himself, but he quietly watches and listens.  His ability as a quick study begins to pay off.  Briefly left alone in the house, he explores Alexander’s suits, photos, along with anything he encounters that deals with Alexander’s life.   He loses his identifying working-class accent and gradually learns to imitate the sophisticated accent of British élite. 

Not permitted to remain at the London house and having attracted the attention of the fraud squad, Dean takes the advice of a young American gigolo to go to Paris.  The major turning point of Dean’s story is when he attempts to gain a job at a Paris art gallery but has had little experience and does not speak French.  He is dismissed with the polite but not encouraging statement, “I’ll take your name.”  After some hesitation, Dean finally says, “Alexander Gryffoyn.”  The gallery owner immediately springs to his feet and, with a great smile, welcomes Dean with open arms.  The aristocratic name works magic and opens all doors.  

Step by step, with the right clothes, the appropriate accent, and occasional little white lies, Dean is introduced to the crème de la crème of Continental élite.  This cream of society, however, is repulsively curdled.  These people are the sort often referred to as “Euro-trash.”  Some of them are British tax expatriates, avoiding paying taxes on their fortunes.  Others are remnants of European nobility, people with money but with no purpose in life other than to feel important and to party endlessly.  Alcohol flows, and cocaine is consumed as a matter of course.  

What continues to happen in Dean’s life for more than a year becomes even more remarkable and fascinating.  Popular, adored, catered to, Dean loves being, as his embossed invitations read, “Lord Alexander Gryffoyn.”   To his sorrow, however, he never has been accepted and loved as Dean, his real self.  

He eventually goes back to Britain to face the music.  His identity theft makes the news, replete with many photos of himself posing as Alexander.  Despite his having lived for a while under an identity that was false and not his true self, Dean ironically concludes that, in contrast to that snobbish SOB Alexander, he, Dean, had been a far better “Lord Alexander Gryffoyn” than the real one ever could hope to be.

This is all the teaser that I am going to give to you.  For you to enjoy all the most remarkable bits of the story, as well as see the more intimate scenes, if that is your “cup of English tea,” watch the DVD.  It is an amazing story of mistaken identity, well worth seeing.  And frankly, Dean himself is worth seeing.  I wouldn’t mind being mistaken for him.

© 9 January 2013   

About the Author

I have had a life-long fascination with people and their life stories. I also realize that, although my own life has not brought me particular fame or fortune, I too have had some noteworthy experiences and, at times, unusual ones. Since I joined this Story Time group, I have derived pleasure and satisfaction participating in the group. I do put some thought and effort into my stories, and I hope that you find them interesting.

The Interview by Ricky

In August of 1967, the Vietnam non-war was still in vogue and I had lost my student deferment so I went for a pre-induction physical for the Air Force. The first part was easy – catch a bus to Reno where my recruiter met me and gave me a bus ticket and a packet of information/directions to the induction facility in Oakland, California.

The second part was easy as well – get on the bus for a ride to Oakland. Next came the finding of the hotel where I slept free the night prior to my scheduled physical in the morning. After a juice and roll breakfast I walked to the induction center encountering a street-wise beggar to whom I gave $5.00 naïvely believing he would buy a healthful breakfast. Finally arriving at the center, I began the awful task of completing the background history and health history for both the doctors and the people who would be investigating my past for security clearance purposes. The forms were very long as far as I was concerned and really taxed my brain as to which and when I had childhood diseases and when and where I lived my entire life. If the recruiter had given me the forms before I arrived in Reno, I could have checked the information with my mother rather than causing my brain to fry trying to remember such petty details.

Then the totally unexpected question appeared just above the signature area. “Are you a homosexual?” Followed by, “Have you ever engaged in any homosexual acts?” I hesitated a while before answering these questions. By my then 19 years of age even though I was very naïve, I still knew that I did not want the “world,” especially the Air Force, to know that I did enjoy the guy with guy experimentation I had done. However, I did not know that I would not have been able to enlist if I answered, “Yes” to the first question and I did not want to explain anything if I answered “Yes” to the second question. I also did not want to lie. The long pause that resulted gave me time for my brain to form the following rationalization.

I did enjoy sex-play with guys and I was concerned that I had not “grown out of it” like all of my “play-mates” did. But, due to the fact that I had no access to girls (and I really did want to have sex with them in my mind but not my fantasies) I just figured all would be well once I was away from home and did have access. Therefore, I was not a homosexual, just a virgin. So, I answered both questions with a “No” and pressed on.

The next challenge was standing naked in a line of America’s finest youth and worrying about popping a boner because some of the youths were nicely hung and gorgeous to my libido. I was so nervous though that nothing below stirred.

I finished the physical before noon, caught the bus back home to await my report-for-duty date, and arrived late in the afternoon. My parents didn’t even know I had been gone overnight. I told my mother that I had enlisted about one week before I left home. It might seem cruel to have waited so long, but I spared her three months of worry. I was concerned for her emotions concerning the issue of not just leaving home but leaving home for a potential trip to a war zone. She clearly remembered WW2 and those of her neighbors who did not return alive. So at least this time, I was considerate of her feelings.

© July 2012

About the Author

I was born in June of 1948 in Los Angeles, living first in Lawndale and then in Redondo Beach. Just prior to turning 8 years old in 1956, I began living with my grandparents on their farm in Isanti County, Minnesota for two years during which time my parents divorced.

When united with my mother and stepfather two years later in 1958, I lived first at Emerald Bay and then at South Lake Tahoe, California, graduating from South Tahoe High School in 1966. After three tours of duty with the Air Force, I moved to Denver, Colorado where I lived with my wife and four children until her passing away from complications of breast cancer four days after the 9-11 terrorist attack.

I came out as a gay man in the summer of 2010. I find writing these memories to be therapeutic.

My story blog is, TheTahoeBoy.Blogspot.com.

Epiphany by Phillip Hoyle

Stay with me for a minute while I wander through the hallways of old church buildings where I worked and where my choirs sang. The choral year began with me making selections of anthems for each holiday and theme sometimes in consultation with the liturgical calendar although I did not work in a liturgical church. Still, making music in a modified gothic building made me conscious of the long-lasting traditions of church music and of the many reforms that music had undergone. And of course, I liked music from many ages and in many styles.

I learned that the liturgical calendar held some oddities. The year began soon after Thanksgiving, five or six weeks before New Year’s Day. Advent announced the coming Christmas celebration, but thanks to the endless playing of holiday tunes in malls, over airwaves, and at concerts, by the time we got to Christmas we had reached our tolerance. I thought it might be nice to save a three-wise-men song for Epiphany, but what meaning would it have for nice Kansans played out with such music? Christmas was over, the gifts open, and the trees trashed or stored for next year. I realized that for our church I’d have to modify my approach. So Epiphany drifted by without much notice, Epiphany that in western tradition (Roman Catholic and its reforming offspring) pointed to the baptism of Jesus and that in eastern tradition (Orthodox Catholic of various national identities) to the arrival of the Zoroastrian Magicians from the East.

Now stay with me a little longer while I tell you a bit about my religious experience. The Christianity I received came delivered intact. It honored the biblical revelation as being sufficient for all times and assumed that with slight differences in perception the good news was sufficient for all cultures. Yet the form of its understanding relied on an accommodation of an 18 century philosopher! It was systemized in a simple way and taught to children and adults as the truth. I was happy with it, studied the bible, sang the songs, taught its tenets, prayed to the God it taught in the ways it prescribed. That Christianity allowed for individualism—after all it was a 19th century accommodation of the Gospel and the Enlightenment. It assumed that the incarnation of God in Jesus Christ had occurred, that biblical epiphanies, such as the appearance of the risen Lord to the apostle Paul, were true. It assumed that the need for further revelation was over, the age of miracles concluded, and the truth already delivered!

It made sense to me. Its personal emphasis was one of belief as in the confession of faith represented by the public question, “Do you believe that Jesus is the Christ?” and by the time I came along, its existential element was caught up in the idea that you “take Jesus Christ to be your personal savior.” Assumed also was the idea that this belief would make you a better person and that you should pray and go to church regularly.

The system was a reform of the orthodox doctrines of ecclestical authority based on an apostolate, and so forth. It was also a democratic accommodation of church structure and authority that fit in with the American ethos very well. Special gifts of the spirit were generally relegated to the ancient past as no longer needed for faith in the modern age.

The very rational religion seemed official; I found it sufficient for a very rational me. Happily I went on my religious way and into religious work at which I excelled. One could say I had a very rational calling into the ministry of a very rational church.

But non-rational elements kept creeping into my systematic bliss, and some of them seemed blissful to me. Reading Christian theology written by English Dons, I wondered at their preoccupation with classical gods and myths. Why did their inclusion seem so important to them? I didn’t understand, yet in my own mind I heard and treasured the drums and chants of Native American tribes, their stories and folkways, and eventually I came to appreciate how they illuminated my Christian understandings. I spent a lot of time planning religious education events, and affective elements from other religious expressions made way into my designs. I directed choirs in the very rational church and one guest asked if ours was a charismatic church. “Why do you ask?” the senior minister queried. “Well, because of your choir director.” When he told me, I wondered if I seemed to her to be lifted into some kind of charismatic ecstasy. Well, I did get to dance in church.

Please, please stay with me. We’re getting to the story. At a personal level there were those homosexual stories I’ve told you about, experiences that for me seemed to hold so much godly content, that seemed so centrally to define who I was, experiences that revealed personal truths that ran counter to democratic voting-block opinions. My personal truths promised to interrupt the church’s general flow of power and tolerance thus leaving me quite vulnerable. The truth of my personal faith belied the tentative acceptance of gays by the rather liberal faith community I in which worked. Perhaps I was looking for some personal epiphany to redefine who I was in relationship with the now-seeming insufficiently enlightened Christianity I had long accepted. I started separating myself from the religion of my forebears. It wasn’t that I quit being Christian or turned my back on God, but that my Christianity became more personalized, luring me out of the institutional door, so to speak. Now it wasn’t as if homosexuality didn’t exist in the church. That seems obvious enough to our age. But the homosexuality was closeted and often frantic. It was as if everything about religion worked for homosexuals except the institutional rejection of them. That’s got to be a terrifying dilemma. One gay minister had an epiphany and organized what became the Metropolitan Community Church, a special home for LGBTs that eventually began to seek inclusion in the National and World Council of Churches only to be rejected. (Oh well, what’s new?)

I slipped quietly out the back door of the modified gothic buildings and made my way to the big city. I attended the MCC until I got over some of the initial trauma of my leaving both marriage and ministry. Then I began being irked by openly gay clergy. What was that?

Finally I had an epiphany. Mine was not a view of God sitting on the high throne of Heaven, of the resurrected Christ appealing to me in his very human body, but rather, a vision of the homophobia that resided deep within my heart, my body, my mind. It was the homophobia that lurked behind all the nice things I had thought about gay folk and about my gay self. The content of this epiphany—really an emotion-filled insight into myself—was that the culture had kept the upper hand even deep inside me. Slowly through this new vision of myself, I was converting into a self-loving gay human. My homophobia that got focused on a gay church and gay clergy really was my self-hatred that had to be removed, that had to be loved out of me by the God of love that I had long professed, and that had to be loved out of me by the open and costly process of loving men and being loved by them.

Well … I don’t quite know how to move this story to a close, but I do love you people who listen to my stories. I do love you people who so beautifully love gay me. For you are the embodiment of my great religious epiphany.

Denver, 2012

About the Author

Phillip Hoyle lives in Denver and spends his time writing, painting, giving massages, and socializing. His massage practice funds his other activities that keep him busy with groups of writers and artists, and folk with pains. Following thirty-two years in church work, he now focuses on creating beauty and ministering to the clients in his practice. He volunteers at The Center leading “Telling Your Story.”
He also blogs at artandmorebyphilhoyle.blogspot.com

The Storylines by Nicholas

A singer has settled into my neighborhood. I heard him the other morning as the first gray feathers of dawn lightened the eastern sky. Every morning very early he starts his quest way before I am ready to start mine for that day. Sometimes he’s close enough to wake me from a sound sleep—like outside my window. It’s a robin, I think, and he is looking for a mate. He will sing out his sweet, melancholy notes until he finds one.

It’s clearly a song he’s singing, not just bird chatter chirping away. There’s a melody and a pattern that he repeats over and over. In some sort of bird language I imagine him singing, “I am here. I am here for you. Come and find me or let me find you so we can make beautiful love together.”

This spring morning ritual comes from a bird not normally thought of as a songbird, like a canary. It’ll go on for another month or so and then the robin will return to his normal quiet with an occasional chirp or tweet. But for now he needs to communicate and let the world know where he is.

When Jamie and I designed our wedding ceremony, we included a favorite poem by a friend of ours. It goes like this: “When I have bidden/ farewell to Time,/ what claim might win me entry/ into Bliss? /Just this:/ foolish and sinful as I was,/ my true Love heard my song/ and I heard His.”

Songs, like poetry and other writing, are a form of communication and not just entertainment. Singing is one way we have of defining ourselves, reaching out to others, and establishing our place in the world.

Australian native people have a thing called the Songlines in which they navigate their surroundings by singing songs in a precise sequence to find local landmarks such as waterholes that tell them just where they are. These navigations also guarantee their survival in a vast and harsh land. Some songlines are short, some span long routes and use different languages. Beyond being a navigational tool, the songs also tell of a people’s place in the world. They are sometimes even called Dreamlines. Bruce Chatwin, a gay writer, traced many of the Aboriginal songs and dreams in his 1986 book The Songlines.

Every Monday afternoon, we gather here and sing our songs to each other. By telling our stories that are our individual songs, we announce our place in the world. We are defining ourselves by our stories, our tales, our songs. We are noting the landmarks in our vast landscapes as we say who we are, where we’ve been and what we’ve done. We are saying that we are here, we are here for each other and for whomever wants to join us. And maybe we have been there too. Watch out for that danger; be ready for great joy when you make it up that hill; when that happened to me, this is what I did about it. Our stories tell of our shared experiences as a community and a people. Our stories are creating, as well as reflecting, our lives.

To all those like us, we say, join the song. You don’t have to be a songbird to join in. You just have to want to let your presence be known so we can find each other in the dim light of a spring dawn in a hard land.

About the Author

Nicholas grew up in Cleveland, then grew up in San Francisco, and is now growing up in Denver. He retired from work with non-profits in 2009 and now bicycles, gardens, cooks, does yoga, writes stories, and loves to go out for coffee.

Getting Caught by Michael King

Somehow to write a story such as the one I’m about to write requires getting past the taboos that have haunted me my whole life and so I hope that I can finally be free. Being free means to me at this point in my life that I don’t give a ____ what anyone thinks about me. However that isn’t totally true. I still want to have acceptance, but I also don’t want to have to secretly pretend that I’m sugar and spice when I’m really an animal with passions, desires and have had some experiences that are perhaps not for prudes to hear about. I’m feeling braver already so here goes the story about getting caught. Maybe others have had secret desires that were unfulfilled. Well I have had many.

I didn’t have a language for it at the time, but by now have learned a little of the language used to describe one of my magnificent and wonderfully memorable experiences in a tea room.

I saw the young man as he entered the John a little before me. I really didn’t think about what might happen as, other that noticing him and seeing that he had a little budge hanging over his belt that was unusual for someone his age, my purpose was to use the facilities.

I was in fact using the facilities. As I stood there facing the wall and relieving myself I became aware that the young man was not doing the same. I proceeded to finish what I had come there for and glanced toward him when he surprised me by coming over by me and dropped to his knees.

As I said it was a magnificent and wonderfully memorable experience that compares with a few others that left an indelible impression on both my memory, but also on the fantasy world that many years later allowed me to be an out and open gay guy.

As the experience of being beyond time and space in an indescribable ecstasy subsided the only thing I could think of was to reciprocate. I don’t think I had any idea how to accomplish anything close to my experience. I hadn’t learned the skills or techniques but was certainly willing to give it a try.

There was no one around and just as I was about to begin the tearoom door opened. We both jumped and pretended to be using the facilities. I’m sure the security guard didn’t really see anything but probably couldn’t help but know that something had been going on.

We were caught, told to leave and never return. We left the mall and he went to his car. I started to walk home without the courage to introduce myself or make contact, something I still regret.

It was much later that I had the opportunity to share in similar experiences because I had neither the nerve nor the awareness of what I now remember as missed opportunities. I was so filled with hang-ups, misplaced feelings of guilt and was terribly naïve.

I’ve come a long way, baby! I am finally almost at peace with being the me that I am. I can accept, that I am sexual and sensitive and have urges and desire that are natural. I haven’t been to a tea room in years and am obviously openly gay. My children not only accept me as I am, but are pleased that I am in a loving and caring relationship. I think that the time I got caught was one of many things that had led me to the peace of mind and the pride I feel about being, as my daughter says, authentic.

Denver, 2013

About the Author

I go by the drag name, Queen Anne Tique. My real name is Michael King. I am a gay activist who finally came out of the closet at age 70. I live with my lover, Merlyn, in downtown Denver, Colorado. I was married twice, have 3 daughters, 5 grandchildren and a great grandson. Besides volunteering at the GLBT Center and doing the SAGE activities," Telling your Story"," Men's Coffee" and the "Open Art Studio". I am active in Prime Timers and Front Rangers. I now get to do many of the activities that I had hoped to do when I retired; traveling, writing, painting, doing sculpture, cooking and drag.

The Accident by Merlyn

Most auto accidents don’t just happen. If you study what caused them it comes down to driver error, badly designed highways, sloppy workmanship or manufactures cutting too many corners when they design the cars.

I had a good friend that was an engineer for GM way back in 1974. I got to know him when I was working at a Chevy dealership. He brought his mother’s car in for some warranty work. He was telling me about how he was waiting for the weather to clear up so he could fly up to a small town in northern Michigan to try to fix a Chevy van that the dealer could not fix.

The complaint was every once in a while the driver would have to push real hard on the brakes to stop the truck. Dealers were replacing all kinds of brake parts trying to fix the problem without success. No one knew what was causing it.

A few weeks earlier I had a van come in with a complaint that every once in a while the motor would be racing when he came to a stop. I checked everything and could not find anything wrong; I could not duplicate the complaint so I gave the truck back.

The truck came back in about a week later with the same complaint and this time I got to talk to the owner. He told me the only time it happened was in the morning on his way to work when he got off the freeway.

We kept the truck overnight and the next morning I was able to duplicate the complaint. I remembered that when I had tried to come to a stop the motor was going so fast I had a hard time stopping.

I was able to figure out that someone at the factory had left a little tube out of the carburetor and the only time it effected anything was if you drove at highway speed on a day when the temperature was below 30 degrees.

The engineer called the dealer and told them what to do and the next day he called me to let me know that the part was missing and that he did not have to fly there to find out what was happening.

GM came out with a bulletin stating to check for the missing part if you had braking or fast idle complaints. Over the years I found that part missing on at least 5 other carburetors.

In any industry there has to be enough death or injury accidents to justify a recall.

How many accidents happened when people were trying to stop on icy roads with the motor racing which caused them to lose control of the vehicle? The trucks with the missing part should have been recalled.


Denver, 2013

About the Author

I'm a retired gay man now living in Denver Colorado with my partner Michael. I grew up in the Detroit area. Through the various kinds of work I have done I have seen most of the United States. I have been involved in technical and mechanical areas my whole life, all kinds of motors and computer systems. I like travel, searching for the unusual and enjoying life each day.

Searching for El Dorado by Louis

A Dominican youth selling his paintings

A favorite place - Dominican Republic

(a) I apologize this essay sounds like an advertisement for tourism to the Dominican Republic.

(b) Favorite protégé: Leonardo R.

(c) Some people would say one’s favorite place is Boulder, Colorado, or pre-AIDS Fire Island on south coast of Long Island, New York. Another beautiful city is Charleston, S. C.

(d) The first time I went to the Dominican Republic, la República Dominicana, was 25 years ago. I paid money gradually into a scholarship fund established by the NHYC HRA, Local 371, for needy Hispanics to go to school. A worthy cause. This paid for a flight on American Airlines from NYC to Santo Domingo Airport. I went to a “luxury” resort in Juan Dolio, a section of the Caribbean Sea Coastline, on the DR’s south shore, about 10 miles east of Boca Chica and 15 miles west of San Pedro de Macoris. I sat in the pool and got free daiquiris and rum and cokes. I got photographed sitting on a burro or was it a burra? I had a ball.

(e) Then there was the side trip to Santiago and Punta Cana on the north shore of the DR. Two more beautiful sun-drenched cities.

(f) 2nd visit, 2 years ago. The name of the resort I went to was the Albatross. A business woman was also there, she described how she came to DR to relax. She previously went to Breckenridge, Colorado. My brother and I had just visited Breckenridge, CO. A coincidence.

(g) Another coincidence is the 60-year old barber in College Point in NYC. He goes to DR every chance he gets because he has a Dominican girl friend there. He goes to Boca Chica.

(h) One afternoon, I was sitting on the beach enjoying watching the geckos and sea gulls, when I noticed a man swimming in the water. I looked a little closer. He wasn’t actually swimming, he was taking a bath. When he got out of the water, he approached me and said “Hola”; I got red in the face. We got acquainted.

(i) Leonardo served as my guide although he could only drive in the areas of DR where the police had no jurisdiction, which, for some reason I do not know, is inland and covers a lot of territory.

(j) If you get stopped by a local cop, and it does happen more or less regularly, you have to hand over the equivalent of $3.00 or US $3.00. One cop told me they have to do this because their pay is not sufficient for them to buy lunch.

(k) I visited with Leonardo’s relatives. L. loves his mother, his aunt, his uncles, his cousins.

(l) His very petite elderly aunt looked sort of dried up like a raisin. But I knew that was the tropical sun that had made her skin a dark brown. She looked very different from what I am used to. But she looked fine. I asked Leonardo’s relatives if they had enough to eat. The aunt and uncle said they have plenty to eat. They harvest the veggies from their garden plots and they have chickens laying eggs, and pigs, and goats and bulls and cows for milk. The point is they were 3rd world dirt farmers, but they sort of lived well without any cash.

(m) They showed me where they live. In the U. S. I have noticed the popularity of tool sheds, sometimes designed like little houses in the backyards. In the DR a “casa” is the size of one of these tool sheds. Which was fine. They were living in paradise, right? So what does the size of their house mean? And then of course the hurricanes blow down big houses so easily anyway.

(n) I had a rented car so Leonardo and his (beautiful) cousin piled into the vehicle and led me on a little trip through the back woods where they all got pretty much naked and netted some fish in a babbling brook. They said that would be their dinner. I thought to myself, “How delightfully primitive.”

(o) In the DR, you can take a trip on a catamaran that takes you to a town about 30 miles east of Juan Dolio, called San Pedro de Macoris. I took the trip, more champán, more booze, more beautiful boys swimming. More beautiful tropical coastlines.

(p) Then there were the horse rides, the casino, the really ritzy resort , the Talanquera Beach Resort, at the end of the roadway in front of my resort, the Albatross. The Talanquera had a boutique selling Dominican style clothes; it had a French restaurant, an African restaurant decorated with a large black shield, more lovely primitive art, decorating the main hotel, an American restaurant. There were three reflecting ponds: the palm gardens pond, the flamingo ponds with beautiful pink flamingos eating shrimp; and the orchid pond with a magnificent floral display.

(q) The Talanquera displayed the local art which consisted primarily of gorgeous oil paintings. I am fussy about my art. The local artists enjoyed painting palm trees on beaches, scenes from the sugar plantation days of 150 years ago and abstract paintings depicting African themes of mother earth. These paintings are tasteful and magnificent. They are hung on the fences of all the tourist resorts. The colors are rich and vibrant.

(r) Once when I was sitting in the front yard of my pseudo-luxury resort, the Albatross, I observed the passing of a herd of wild goats. They were adorable, and, like the humans, they were enjoying themselves. The resort architecturally was substantial and lovely, but of course since we were in the 3rd world, one could not drink the water and the plumbing and electricity were iffy.

(s) I remember the week before I went to the DR in February of 2011. In New York it was a typical winter. I remember walking down the street being pelted with frozen ice pellets in my face. I said to myself it is time for DR.

(t) Unlike the Mexican diet, dominated by hot spicy tomato sauces, the Dominicans seem to prefer fresh fruits and vegetables. The tropical fruits are particularly tasty: mangos, guanábanos, guavas, tamarind juice, avocados and papayas.

(u) After a while, one wants to prepare one’s own food. This requires a short trip to the local supermercado, “Jumbo’s”. Leonardo and I went there. I told Leonardo to buy what he wanted. His favorite purchase was octopus tentacles. He said he and his family would really enjoy dining on this delicacy. For me personally, I never ate calamari and do not have plans on doing so. A chacun son goût.

(v) While I was in Jumbo’s shopping with Leonardo, I noticed an elderly blond American doing shopping with a young Dominican man who looked like a movie star. I knew instantly why this (I presume gay) American was enjoying the DR. Inwardly, I applauded his good judgment. Gather ye rosebuds …, right? I suppose the Pope would disapprove, but Oscar Wilde would have understood.

(w) I frequently had lunch in a nearby restaurant and made the acquaintance of several Italian businessmen who said they were investing in Juan Dolio to make it look like the Italian Riviera. Many of the other guests at the Talanquera were Italian, some Americans, and the French.

(x) I asked Leonardo if he knew how to read and write. He said sí. I thought Leonardo would be better off if he had a driver’s license, went to school to start to learn English and apply for a passport so that he could come to the U.S.A. For me that would have been a good investment. Leonardo agreed to all three of these projects but never followed through. We never found out how either how I could send him money other than via Western Union or Moneygram.

Denver, 2013

About the Author

I was born in 1944, I lived most of my life in New York City, Queens County. I still commute there. I worked for many years as a Caseworker for New York City Human Resources Administration, dealing with mentally impaired clients, then as a social work Supervisor dealing with homeless PWA's. I have an apartment in Wheat Ridge, CO. I retired in 2002. I have a few interesting stories to tell. My boyfriend Kevin lives in New York City. I graduated Queens College, CUNY, in 1967.

Hospitality - A Gay Youth, Remembering Earlier Times by Jon Krey

Back when I was an early youth, somewhere around the age of 8, 9, or 10, I began to recognize a difference between my emotional and sexual needs and those of my peers. I had no concrete idea what it meant since I’d always thought there was nothing odd or strange about mine. I just wasn’t very “into the regular scene.” It was hard to associate with most kids, any kids, male or female. I became emotionally secluded. Sports weren’t of interest and my physical self wasn’t up to snuff anyway being a scrawny kid. My self isolation haunted me, forever being an outsider always looking in at those I longed to play with. As this continued over the years, and it did, the more it became true. There came a short time of inclusion during the late Junior High and Senior High years. I made contact with the neighborhood duck-tail squad, the greasers, those so omnipresent in the ‘50’s. My interest in motorcycles and cars had always been, and that’s why they accepted me.
Cars and motorcycles were the “the thing” with them. It changed my acceptability, obscured any oddities of mine at least for that brief moment in time. A too brief period of hospitality was handed me. Then it all began changing. Girls were becoming an object of interest and then an obsession for the guys but for not me.

Inside I wasn’t at all like the grease covered duck-tailed guys with their leather motorcycle jackets and tight Levi’s. I desperately wanted to own a jacket and Levi’s like theirs but mom wouldn’t permit it because they were “just plain nasty.” Finally the critical age of puberty with it’s attendant emotional change for everyone arrived accompanied by an avalanche of total upheaval. The guys were becoming men; taller than me, frequently muscular, hairy, crew-cuts, ducktails had begun disappearing in town, “T” shirts the rage. How they loved showing impressions of their new manhood, through their tight Levi’s. That made me sweat, a lot! I had interesting, moist, dreams at night.

Guys were obsessed with the possibility of finding and seducing girls, while I dreamt of the same but with one of them. I got to be close to these young studs only in school occasionally but nothing more. They looked good, smelled good and when I had a very limited chance to just touch one, they felt good…heavenly! Needless to say I embarrassed myself with an erection from time to time. Too soon I was classified a social outcast, known as a weirdo, an object of scorn. There were others who like me weren’t accepted, straight and not, but it still hurt. Any hospitality accomplished by me had been rescinded, permanently.

I came to understand what the words some used to call me in my earlier years meant. Their use became much more frequent. I was a homo, a fruit, a faggot, a queer, something to be avoided at all cost. Back then that was all there was. I was a monster, loathed by God and man. The church and bible told me so, again and again! Wanting these beautiful young men romantically and sexually was just wrong, sinful and evil…end of story!

There was no hospitality left for me. I was shoved out of the box.

OK, that was then. Many years of fear, self rejection and self hatred have passed. But over those years, now, a new dawn seems on the horizon. I’m far, far better at being me now.

The word “gay” always puzzled me! The acronym LGBT doesn’t, but that word “gay” still seems odd. It meant and still means “full of energy, happy, of glee, a sense of being carefree. In a world where we’re still tormented by too many it doesn’t make too much sense.

It’s now in the press, heard in the media around the world. The Gay Community. Gay Pride Month with parades and parties. Pride is displayed or at least attempted around the globe. But the word “gay” was and can still be mentioned with contempt. A “gay” is a “self avowed homosexual,” some still interpret it that way. Yes it’s true we are, but that one nasty-assed statement always made me cringe and shrivel as it still can.

It’s a new day now. Countless others are like me. The old scars still exist in me and won’t disappear completely but in this day and age us LGBTQ’ers are becoming ever more in the public venue what with Gay Marriage. There is an opportunity of hospitality for me in my quickly approaching old age! “Just forget the past and reach out “get over it already”. I hear it too often.

Inclusion! Now! Something I never thought possible in my lifetime is happening right under my nose! I accept myself today with much less trepidation. I’m part of a growing community of people who are learning to live without shame, without so much fear although there are monsters out there that can and do haunt our lives. Every single time I hear the hateful rhetoric of yesteryear in this day and age I shake inside.

Damn it to hell, all I ever wanted was a boyfriend, someone to be with, to call my own; to be his in the same way. Though three long term partnerships have come and gone I’ve never achieved that most primitive of goals from early childhood. I’m still very much that smallish eighteen to “twenty something” year old boy, still looking, at the exalted age of 73. Will I be lucky before I finally fall over? I wonder and still hope.

I also wonder if any of us have really found that one special man or woman. If some of us have we should thank the same God our loyal opposition uses to condemn us.

About the Author

"I'm just a guy from Tulsa (God forbid). So overlook my shortcomings, they're an illusion."

Paradise Found by Gillian

One of the most wonderful hours of my life was spent in a church.

Now, to realize the enormity of that statement, you need to remember that I don’t do religion.
I stopped going to church in my early youth and have never felt the need to return except of course for the obligatory weddings and funerals.
I consider myself a spiritual person, but not in the least religious.

When I was told we were going to church this Sunday morning, I simply sighed and silently acquiesced. Betsy and I were in Hawaii, sharing a condo with a woman we had met during an Elderhostel week at the Grand Canyon. Liz was several years older than we were, had never been married, but we don’t think she was a lesbian. She just befriended us at Elderhostel and we kept loosely in touch via E-mail afterwards. Suddenly one day a message appeared inviting us to stay with her in her timeshare condo on Maui. She would also have a car. It took us three seconds to accept.

Liz was an “in charge” kinda gal! We had discovered in our first few hours in Hawaii that she had her agenda and we were expected to fall into line. Not that we had any complaints, once we got the idea in our heads. Free accommodation and transportation and our activities all planned out. What’s to complain about? We had a wonderful couple of weeks.

This final Sunday we were watching the waves while sipping our morning o.j. when we learned of the impending church visit and so reluctantly dragged ourselves off the beach to change clothes, pile into the car, and drive along a beautiful coast road to Keawalai Congregational United Church of Christ.

Oh, what a breathtakingly heartachingly beautiful spot!
Located right on the bright blue ocean and nestled in flowering shrubs and trees and coconut palms, sat this small church built of mellow burnt coral rock and roofed with brown shingles.
Beside it a small, serene, cemetery contained the graves of area families including many paniolo, Hawaiian cowboys. Several of the grave markers contained rare ceramic photo plates, none of which, amazingly, had been vandalized or stolen although the place is wide open to anyone.

This church was founded originally in 1832, the services being held in a church built of pili grass. The present structure was built, in 1855, completely of stone and coral from the beach and wood from the adjacent forest. Everything in the church is Hawaiian, since 1992 when the old floor of Douglas fir was replaced by native ohia wood. The land for the church was purchased for $80. One can only imagine what it must be worth now.

We wandered to the church, on a much worn path of beach sand, midst a motley crew. There were indigenous Hawaiian families in traditional and modern dress; there were residents obviously of more recent Hawaiian heritage, and a few, like us, conspicuous tourists. We were made immediately conspicuous by the fact that we all wore shoes or sandals. The permanent members of the congregation, and the minister, were all barefoot no matter how nicely they were dressed.
In the midst of our enchantment with this, came an unfamiliar sound. It was rather like a foghorn but as we approached the main church door we were further delighted to find two men blowing into conch shells, calling the faithful to worship. Inside the cool church we found palm fronds for fanning oneself during the service if required, more conch shells and palm fronds and local bamboo, and magnificent hand carved offering bowls and a cross, all made from local wood.
The windows contained no glass; were simply open to the soft ocean breezes, and the colorful birds flitting in and out.
It was a uniquely wonderful mix of pagan and Christian and we loved it.

I found myself dreading the beginning of the service. I was so at peace in that amazing place and I just knew that the advent of religious dogma would ruin it.
It did not.
The service was conducted in both Hawaiian and English and was as delightful as the setting.
But then came time for the sermon. Hah! Now it would all be ruined, said my cynical self.
Wrong again. 
The pastor spoke with eloquent passion in a very “what would Jesus do?” way, and of course the fact that I agreed with every word he said had something to do with the comfort zone in which I found myself. This was June of 2003, a month after the U.S. had completed its invasion of Iraq, which I certainly did not see as anything Jesus would do, and the Pastor left his congregation in no doubt as to his opinions. The words from this pulpit did not spatter me like shrapnel, which is sometimes the case, but settled firmly in my heart and I have never forgotten them.

To put icing on the cake of this wonderful experience, we had somehow stumbled into a baptism. At the end of the main service the church empties out for the short walk onto Maluaka Beach where the baby was treated to a short dip in the warm blue Pacific.
What a way to start out on life’s journey!

Much of modern Hawaii does not, for me, fulfill its claims of Paradise. It is, sadly, Paradise lost. But that tiny corner, surrounded as it is by gated communities and multi-million dollar mansions, provides a glimpse of what the real Hawaii once was. It is truly a tiny piece of Paradise found. 

Lakewood, 11/5/2012

About the Author

I was born and raised in England. After graduation from college there, I moved to the U.S. and, having discovered Colorado, never left. I have lived in the Denver-Boulder area since 1965, working for 30 years at IBM. I married, raised four stepchildren, then got divorced after finally, in my forties, accepting myself as a lesbian. I have now been with my wonderful partner Betsy for 25 years.