To Peggy, My Horse, by EyM

Moments away in your humble little barn filled me deeply.  I savored the rich natural smells, and loved so well your big deep brown eyes,  and  the warm air from your soft nostrils.  So carefully you moved your big puffy lips to take my gifts.  These were moments precious and forever true.

Never was there a brown so lovely as your hair.  Never was there a cologne so soothing as your smell.  Never was a flower's aroma any sweeter than the hay where we communed.  I believe my visits were deep in your heart too.  You were my get away, my comforter.

I loved to climb on your back and hug you as you lay on the ground.  You made me laugh as you got up so smoothly that I could hang on and go up with you.  Looking back now, you always took me to the barn.  I suppose you knew I'd give you some grain and my little hand full of hay. 

When we saddled up and traveled from there, someone else was with us and talk took over.  I trusted you and reveled in those rides.  But the times alone with you at your hay window were more special.  Those were the secret healing heart times.  Thank you Peggy.  I think you understood that I needed you.

© 28 Sep 2015 

About the Author 

A native of Colorado, she followed her Dad to the work bench to develop a love of using tools, building things and solving problems. Her Mother supported her talents in the arts. She sang her first solo at age 8. Childhood memories include playing cowboy with a real horse in the great outdoors. Professional involvements have included music, teaching, human services, and being a helper and handy woman. Her writing reflects her sixties identity and a noted fascination with nature, people and human causes. For Eydie, life is deep and joyous, ever challenging and so much fun.

Doors, by Betsy

Ten years ago I was on the trip of a lifetime. This was not my dream trip. That is, it was not a trip I had dreamed of going on all my life. As I was approaching retirement several years earlier, I had dreamed of hiking the Colorado Trail. After all, I had helped build the trail as a volunteer on a couple of occasions when I had vacation time from work or a long weekend. Unfortunately I never could realize the trek of my dreams because of a condition in my spine which was causing pain when I was on my feet for long periods of time. The Colorado Trail Trek door was closed.

So one day I decided instead to take a cycling trip. The “Bike Trip Directors” website opened that door. It lead me to a group called Woman tours. Perfect, I thought.  The door to cycling had opened when I started participating in the MS 150 fund raising event years earlier. Now I wanted a trip that would take me to other places and for a longer stretch of time. Woman tours offered trips all over the U.S. and some in Europe and Asia. A simple trip in the U.S. was what I was looking for. This would open the door to something even bigger in the future maybe. 

So I laid the information and the maps out on the living room floor and called to my partner Gill to take a look with me. “Oh this week-long trip in the Mississippi Valley looks good. Or how ‘bout this one: 10 days on the Maryland coast, or the California coast.” So much to choose from. Gill is just shaking her head. “Look at this. Pacific to Atlantic two months across the southern tier of the U.S.”  “Well, yeah,” said I. “But I’m not ready for that. I need to take shorter trips first.”  Sometimes it takes someone who knows you very well--a loved one--to bring you down to Earth--to reality.  Her words were so true: “My Darling, you will be 70 years old this year. I think you need to do this cross-country trip NOW.”

The door thus opened to my trip of a lifetime, pedaling from San Diego, California to St. Augustine, Florida.  Sixteen women over 55 cycling for 58 days through 7 states averaging 70 miles per day. We would have one day off per week for rest and laundry. Pay up front and your food and lodging is covered for the entire trip except for days off.

Our group of cyclists from this adventure has had a reunion every year except for one. This year we will celebrate our tenth anniversary in September near Cape Cod. Our friendships have grown over the years. The cycling trip opened the door to many more cycling trips as well as the friendships created on that trip.  Happily Gill is included in the group even though she did not cycle. When I chose to do this trip, she told me she would drop me off in San Diego and pick me up in St. Augustine. I should have known. There was no way she was going to miss out.  Drop me off and then drive home. No way! She never intended to do that. She followed us in the van and gave unofficial SAG support the entire way. Oh, she would disappear for a day or two on a side trip to some interesting site. But she always showed up again especially when needed; such as, the day we ran out of water and could find no source nor was there any sign of Bo-Peep, our official SAG. Or the day we were freezing cold from the rain.

I have just recently completed transcribing my journal from this trip which I dictated at the end of each day of riding. Here is a short excerpt from 10 years ago almost to the day.

May10 Live Oak to High Springs, Fla. Day 55

Last night we were in Live Oak and I didn’t get a chance to record. We had a 100 mile ride yesterday and it was quite amazing. I really didn’t feel very tired from it. It was a beautiful ride. We have had lovely rides in Florida and we have been lucky in that we haven’t had much rain. Today we had one of the best rides of all.  We stopped about 20 miles outside of the town of High Springs at High Springs State Park. We went into the park to one of the springs and all went swimming. Great fun! It was a welcome break. It was only a 58 mile ride so we had plenty of time to enjoy the cool water.

We are at the Cadillac--a 50’s motel. Gill has been quite active with the group the last few days sagging and helping the Kiwi’s with their filming. She’s enjoying that a great deal except she will be camping in the parking lot again tonight.

I can sense some strong feelings among the group about the tour coming to an end. Since there are just two days left.  Etc.

May 13 St. Augustine Day 58

Yesterday was our triumphal entry into St. Augustine. We met at the fire station after an easy ride from Palatka. We were escorted by two police cars and a motor cycle, sirens blaring. We dunked our tires into the Atlantic, true to tradition, then we all ran gleefully into the surf holding hands and screaming making quite a spectacle of ourselves. We played in the water and hung out on the beach for a while. Some family and friends were there with flowers and greetings of all kinds and it was a grand celebration.

I was quite emotional as we rode ceremoniously into St. Augustine. It was an honor to be leading the group along with Mary and Glenna as the oldest members. I was quite proud to be one of the six who pedaled every mile with no sagging. A lot of that is luck.

 A group picnic followed by teary goodbye’s ended the day. Many would be on their way home before breakfast tomorrow. Gill and I decided to stay for a couple more days.

I am having trouble focusing today since I am so used to focusing on push my pedals every day. I’m sure I will adjust to normal life quickly.

The fact that we have just pedaled across the country 3165 miles has not yet fully registered in my head. I expect it will sink in at some point or maybe not. It’s a bit overwhelming. No question about it . It was the trip of a lifetime and a most extraordinary experience with a most extraordinary group of people.

There is no doubt in my mind. A door was closed to me when I developed a condition in my spine. But, I believe when one door closes another one opens up. When the hiking door closed the biking door opened. That’s why I love revolving doors.

©  27 May 2015 

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.

Acting, by Will Stanton

The word “acting” first brings to mind theater acting or perhaps movie acting.  I, however, briefly considered delving into a deeper subject.  I always have been fascinated with human minds, and I have been aware that people often put on acts in front of others throughout their daily lives.  William Shakespeare wrote, “All the world's a stage, and all the men and women merely players.”

The degree of acting varies greatly from person to person depending upon his perceived situational needs and depending upon his own nature.  I, for example, don’t care to engage in artifice; I’d rather be just who I am.  Acting takes too much effort, and perhaps I’m just too simple-minded to be clever at it.  Others, however, are like chameleons, saying and doing anything and everything they deem necessary to attract and influence other people.  An extreme example of that is the last three (especially Republican) presidential primaries.  Many people enthusiastically succumb to such manipulation, but I am repulsed by it. 

So, rather than my being repulsed and spending time talking about the vagaries of human nature, I’ll return to the more enjoyable subject of theater acting.  Here are a few snippets of theater occurrences from my early days.

My first experience being in a play was at age seven.  My elementary school was run by the local university, which provided student teachers with an opportunity to practice by assisting the regular teachers.  One young lady wrote “The Marshmallow Mushroom.”  I was an elf name “Muffin.”  I was a very competent elf.  I enjoyed the experience and still have the script secreted somewhere with all my keepsakes.

Two years later, the university was celebrating the sesquicentennial of its founding, and they had commissioned Alan Smart to write an historical play called “The Green Adventure.”  I played a pioneer lad.  Ever since that time, I never have looked at the script, but I have that one, too.

Of course, I participated in the infamous genre of high-school plays.  The usual botches and glitches occurred in all of them: forgotten lines, mixed-up scenes, stiff acting.  I was sufficiently unimpressed with our productions to remember them today.

I’ll never forget, however, what happened to my oldest brother.  That class put on the famous “Annie Get Your Gun.”  My brother was cast as Buffalo Bill.  The problem was the audience never did figure out who he was.  That is because the lead actor totally forgot his first-act lines and kept repeating the lines from the end of the second act to the point where the rest of actors just went ahead and skipped half the play.  So by the time my brother wandered onto the stage wearing a cowboy hat and a quizzical grin, no one knew who he was.  That role did not lead my brother to a career in Hollywood.

At the same time, the girl destined to become my brother’s wife was participating in a high-school play in Katonah, New York. They were performing “Arsenic and Old Lace.” As you recall, the loony brother who thought he was Teddy Roosevelt always assumed the responsibility of taking the supposed “victims of yellow fever” to the basement to be buried.  The stage was built three feet above the main floor of the auditorium, and a trap door provided access to the space beneath.  The play director decided, having no stairway to a basement that the trap door would suffice as the apparent entrance to the basement.  Of course, when “Teddy” dumped his victims down into the basement, they had learned to bend their knees to simulate descending into a deep basement.  During the first act, the trap door was covered with a carpet.  The problem was that, during the first act, the carpet was there, but someone had forgotten to replace the trap-door cover.  So in the midst of the first act, an unsuspecting student-actor walked across the carpet and immediately slowly sank three feet down into the floor where he remained standing, torso and head above the floor, and wearing a very surprised expression.  Fortunately the play is meant to be a comedy, however, the howls of laughter from the audience came at an unexpected time.

I tried participating in just one play as a college freshman.  The theater department had a good national reputation, so I thought that I would see what it was like.  I played the servant “Mishka” in “The Inspector General.”  I don’t recall seeing any mention of me in any newspaper rave reviews.  Apparently, I didn’t have the immediately recognizable attributes of stunning stature, handsome looks, and captivating voice to merit much attention.  The young stud who starred in “The Fantasticks” was a corn-fed Kansas boy whose natural talent and good looks guaranteed the role, even without any prior experience.  Apparently, I was destined to play character roles such as servants, extras, or just one of the elves.

There is one charming play that I sentimentally recall.  Although I never had the pleasure to be in it, I saw a wonderful production of it by my university theater department and, later when I arrived in Denver, by the young students at Arapahoe Community College.  The play was “Dark of the Moon,” a folk-play about simple back-woods people living in the Smokey Mountains.  Although the theme and setting may seem too antiquated for these modern times, it was remarkably popular for many years from the 1940s through the 1970s, so much so that up-and-coming actors such as Paul Newman eagerly wished to be part of the play. 

The story in a “nutshell” was that “John Boy” fell in love with “Barbary Allen,” a beautiful girl previously never seen in those hills.  It turns out that she is a witch-girl with no soul and who lives three hundred years, after which she turns into Smokey-Mountain mist.  Of course, the story has love, rivalry, and tragedy.  There also were occasional scenes at the general store with the old folks sitting around the pot-bellied stove with their musical instruments and singing Appalachian ballads that coincided with the story.  I became so fond of the story that I bought the script to read, twice, once because I loaned a copy to a friend who failed to return it. 

Now that I have reached my dotage, I recall “Dark of the Moon” with sardonic humor.  That is because I recall the youngsters of Arapahoe Community College doing their best to imitate the elderly, they themselves never having experienced the stiffness, pain, and other afflictions of old age.  They did their best, but somehow, they just did not look convincingly old.  And, I don’t think that additional experience acting would have made any difference.

© 2 Aug 2012 

About the Author 

I also realize that, although my own life has not brought me I have had a life-long fascination with people and their life stories.  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.

Believe It or Not, This Really Happened to Me, by Ricky

In the spring of 1969, I was in the Air Force and stationed at Hurlburt Field near Ft. Walton Beach in the western panhandle of Florida.  One day I was alone driving north along a road which was basically the top of a mile long levy which was dividing a swamp to the west from farm land on the east.  The road/levy was approximately 10-feet above the level of the swamp to my right.

I saw, about ½ mile ahead of me and traveling in the same direction, two boys riding on one bicycle rather unsteadily.  I was driving at the speed limit of 55mph.  In the distance way beyond the boys, I could see a school bus driving south coming towards us.

Suddenly, I heard a voice in my head telling me to “slow down”.  I was surprised because I know what my thoughts sound like and this “voice” was not mine.  When I did not respond as directed due to my surprise, the “voice” spoke again saying for forcibly, “Slow down! Those boys are going to fall in front of you.”  I immediately took my foot off the gas pedal and the car began to slow.

Sure enough, when I was about 40 yards away, the bicycle hit some kind of object near the edge of the road and the boys fell off the bike right in front of me.  As luck would have it, the school bus also arrived going the speed limit.  I was now going slowly enough that I was able to stop in plenty of time.  If I had not received the warning or heeded it, I would have had three choices.  Run over the fallen boys, swerve to the left and hit the school bus head on, or swerve to the right going off the levy into the swamp.

I got out and made sure the boys were okay.  I then had one boy ride in my car while the other one rode his bicycle to the end of the levy where the boys would turn onto a side street to their destination.  I followed behind the bicycle so no other car would hit him, if he fell again.  At the end of the levy, both boys thanked me and rode off to their destination.

I have not heard any “voices” since that time on the levy.

© 6 October 2014

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 was sent to live 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 9-11-2001 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.

Teachers, by Phillip Hoyle

Teachers: I’ve had a lot of them. Some I recall for their names, others for their engaging communications, still others for the lack of impact they made on me. From grade school I recall Miss Weenes whom we second graders called Miss Weenie, although not in class, and Mrs. Schaffer who read “Treasure Island” to us, my first novel; there were others whose names escape me, but I do recall the woman who taught us cursive writing in fifth grade leaving me with a rather readable hand and the rather effeminate man who taught music in fourth and fifth grades introducing us to Bizet’s “Carmen.” From junior high I recall Mr. Moon who at the board always pointed with his middle finger and who told memorable stories about science, Miss Oliver who taught Latin not only to me but to my older sisters and to my mother, the effective algebra teacher who also taught my mom and started geraniums in the windows of her classroom, and Miss Costello who sent home a mustard plaster recipe when too many students got colds. From high school I remember Mr. Martin the choir director, Mr. Snodgrass the band director, Miss Perkins the Latin teacher and drama coach, and Mr. Unruh the football coach and government teacher. In college, I remember Dr. Van Buren, President Lown, Mr. Secrest, and Professor Jamie Morgan; in graduate school, Mrs. Kiesgen and Dr. Lee; in seminary Dr. Duke, Dr. Routt, Dr. Hoehn, and Dr. Rowell. But that’s only the beginning of the list. I also had music teachers in piano and voice studios, art teachers at the Oklahoma Art Workshops, leaders of numerous seminars and workshops at hotels and conference centers, and informal mentors whose revelations and advice paved the way for a rich life of learning, work, and enjoyment. Trying to list all my teachers indicates I learned many things from many different instructors over a long life. I owe a lot to these people.

Mother taught us kids to respect our teachers although she well knew they had feet of clay. She supported them through her tireless work in the PTA but also challenged them when their behavior overstepped their role of teacher and nurturer of young people. So when I heard harangues from the pulpit that some faithless people scandalously thought of Jesus as only a teacher, I felt unsettled. Mom taught us that being a teacher was one of the very best occupations anyone could pursue. Of course, those preachers were defending the orthodox doctrine of the divinity of Christ. I was not concerned with orthodoxy and thought if Jesus back then or as a spiritual presence could teach anyone, he could be my teacher as well and earn my deepest respect. Like Mom, I liked my teachers. Two, though, stand out as the most influential: the first for inspiration, the second for technique.

I knew Dr. James Van Buren by reputation long before I got to school and took his demanding class, “Survey of Biblical Literature.” After that there were other classes in biblical studies, philosophy, theology, sociology, and literature. Studying in a small college, I got to make a rather thorough study of this professor who was both the hardest one to get good grades from and the one who opened worlds of knowledge most widely. I can say confidently that Dr. Van taught me how to run successfully on the liberal edge of conservatism. By ‘successfully’ I mean not only getting beyond political hurdles but also doing so while maintaining theological self-respect and integrity. He taught me to read broadly, to think openly, and to communicate creatively. For instance, he lectured on Christian humanism, Christian hedonism, Christian stoicism, and Christian Epicureanism insisting that Christian thought was not a complete philosophy in itself but a base from which one examined and utilized perspectives of the ages. He taught humor as an essential ingredient in the most serious communications and sex as a broadly celebrative dynamic of life. In Dr. Van’s approach God as the creator and approver of creation served as the starting point and essential part of a healthy approach to life, morality, and ethics. He insisted that creative and playful thinking stands as a necessary component in one’s life and insisted religion should never become a wooden legal transaction or set of rigid laws. He taught an appreciation for beauty through arts, literature, science, and everyday interactions with fancy and plain people. Poetry, storytelling, drama, and lively insights transformed theology into a process for living. The arts pointed to dynamic creativity in the name of the Creator.

This overweight professor rested a little notebook on his stomach as if it were a lectern. This enthusiastic professor lectured from the book of Job on the dances of whales in the ocean, leaping about like one of them himself. This insightful professor opened the way to Shakespeare, Milton, and Whitman. This scholarly professor had been granted a DD and then earned a PhD in English Literature, his dissertation an examination of Old Testament Apocryphal references in John Milton’s poetry. This superlative teacher supported in me my love for books and libraries and my proclivity toward creative thinking in matters of education and religion. I continue to think about Dr. Van Buren’s advice, knowledge, and approach whenever I try to solve problems or speak from my own heart.

I knew Dr. Karen Bartman years before she was conferred a doctoral degree in piano pedagogy. She served as the church’s music coordinator and organist where I worked as associate minister and director of the Chancel Choir. We made music together for several years before I studied in her piano studio. I recall this teacher for both her pianistic and pedagogical techniques—carried out with consistency, musical depth, and always the encouragement to keep making beautiful music. I’ll never know if I could have learned piano technique at an earlier age, but I did learn it in my late thirties under her tutelage. When I approached my 40s crisis (a la Goldberg and Sheehe), I became “angry with the gods of literature” as my friend Gerald put it and went on a yearlong book fast. I joined Karen’s studio to learn to play piano, knowing I’d have about three hours a day to practice, time I would not be reading books. I remained a student in her studio for two and a half years. Since childhood I had played—my father said banged—the piano but always with great limitation. Gerald once said I was quite musical but had no technique. After two years of Karen’s discipline I played a piece for my dad. He declared, “She’s a miracle worker; you’re not pounding.” Even Gerald seemed impressed at her work and my response, and Dr. Bartman said what she appreciated about teaching me—an adult—was that I always played musically.

This physically fit teacher sat at the keyboard with perfect posture and insisted I do so as well. This enthusiastic teacher with beautifully strong hands didn’t just give me scales and arpeggios to strengthen my hands but showed me how to execute them in ways that engaged listening, phrasing, and trusting that my hands would know where they were on the keyboard. This insightful teacher showed me how to ground myself at any point in a phrase, a measure, or a beat giving life to the composition in performance. This scholarly teacher helped me know Bach, Mozart, Brahms, Schubert, Schumann, Chopin, Debussy, Mompou, Shostakovich, and Prokofiev in ways I had never grasped even after extensive graduate study in musical style analysis. This superlative teacher inspired me to practice with confidence that I could play effectively and beautifully. Eventually I quit piano instruction and returned to books and writing. Still, I continued to practice and put to use my grasp of her technique when I played. From her I learned the value of technical proficiency. Her consistent teaching encouraged me to continue to develop as an artist and to bring artistry to bear in all my work.

In summary, Dr. Van Buren taught me to love life and the arts, Dr. Bartman encouraged me to find consistent techniques for any creative work I undertook. My life as a learner continues inspired and enabled by these two great teachers. There have been plenty more teachers, loads of learning, and lots of creative outcomes that today I celebrate along with this litany of my teachers’ names.

© 1 Nov 2011 

About the Author 

Phillip Hoyle lives in Denver and spends his time writing, painting, and socializing. In general he keeps busy with groups of writers and artists. Following thirty-two years in church work and fifteen in a therapeutic massage practice, he now focuses on creating beauty. He volunteers at The Center leading the SAGE program “Telling Your Story.”

He also blogs at artandmorebyphilhoyle.blogspot.com 

A Guilty Gift?, by Pat Gourley

In an effort to catch up with the group topics I am combining “Gifts from Afar” and “Guilty Pleasures”.  I am using the title of this piece “A Guilty Gift?” as a possible metaphor for my own HIV infection. Please don’t interpret the use of this metaphor on my part as personal “slut-shaming” since nothing could be further from the truth. Nor do I for a minute view my HIV infection as a gift.

I was most certainly infected in late 1980 or early 1981 and it could have been in the rectory of the Methodist Church in Aspen Colorado or as likely at the Empire Baths here in Denver. Either way I suppose that the behavior, most likely with my legs in the air, that lend to my infection could be viewed as the result of indulgence in a guilty pleasure.

By 1980 though I had long ago stopped viewing getting fucked as something to feel guilty about. It had become one of the true pleasures of my life. It did not start out that way though with my first bottoming experience being with a cop in Gary Indiana in the summer of 1968. Note to self from that experience: do not ever use shaving cream again as lube. This was a very unpleasant experience that I did feel guilty about for a few years actually. However, in large part on the basis of my first very positive sexual experiences with a dear man a few years my senior the previous year (1967) I was able to work through the guilt in time for my move to Denver in late 1972.  By the mid-1970’s I was a raging homosexual activist and enjoying the many pleasures of the heady sexual liberation that came with the blossoming of the emerging LGBT movement back then.

As I have written before I have often wondered if a mushroom trip one night in the fall of 1979 at the Empire Baths, that went a bit array, was not a premonition of a much bigger nightmare to come. Were the gargoyles that adorned the walls of the outdoor pool at the Empire Bath speaking to me, telling me that night to flee for my life or announcing the arrival of a “gift from afar”? Maybe both! A gift in the form of a resilient little virus called HIV.

It is now widely accepted that HIV in humans originated from a similar virus found in a species of chimpanzees in western equatorial Africa. This Simian virus was likely transmitted to hunters infected when butchering these chimps for bush meat and it then mutated in them into the HIV we know. Why this seems to have blossomed mid-20^th century is still conjecture but one interesting theory is that the European colonization of parts of Africa forced the native Africans off the more desirable land for farming and into the jungle areas where hunting bush meat became a necessary source of protein. That would be one bitchin’ bit of Karma wouldn’t it?

Hindsight can be a most potent and effective teacher. The proverbial “if I only knew then what I know now” is a frequently engaged mental exercise.  However, we really aren’t psychics so feeling guilty that we are not is a big waste of time. Living life to its fullest is inherently a risky proposition, and mistakes will be made.

 I think it is certainly true for many of us with HIV infection to view this virus as a gift from afar and that it is the direct result of a guilty pleasure.  That view I think though comes from very faulty thinking around health and illness, a view still very prevalent today. The unsound and simplistic view is that being healthy comes from being good and being sick from being bad. I would remind everyone that no one gets out alive or as the Grateful Dead so succinctly sang “if the thunder don’t get ya’, the lightning will”.

It may seem that I am blowing off the reality that my actions have had consequences. Certainly they have even if many of those actions were quite pleasurable in the moment and the consequences a real bite in the ass down the road. I accept total responsibility for my HIV but I really don’t engage in feeling guilty about it, certainly not now 30 plus years down the road. I am much more likely to feel very lucky to be alive today with this infection when so many in my life are not. Guilt I think can be viewed as a form of regret about something that has already happened and it is really a bit of toxic self-indulgence.

My main “guilty pleasure” these days is primarily an addiction to ice cream almost always eaten in the evening before bed. The “gift” if you will for my persistent indulgence in this sugar-laden fat bomb several times a week may very well be Type 2 diabetes eventually.

I was recently stunned by a comment made by one of the Physician’s Assistants in the Urgent Care Clinic I work. He had I think probably just seen a diabetic patient with unfortunate symptoms related to diabetes, a necrotic toe perhaps that would require IV antibiotics and maybe amputation. His rather forceful statement was:      “These days I would rather have HIV than diabetes”.

Needless to say this comment has stuck with me on more than one occasion when I am downing a pint of Ben and Jerry’s, this shortly after taking my evening HIV meds. Guilty pleasures and gifts from afar indeed!

© 17 May 2015 

About the Author 

I was born in La Porte Indiana in 1949, raised on a farm and schooled by Holy Cross nuns. The bulk of my adult life, some 40 plus years, was spent in Denver, Colorado as a nurse, gardener and gay/AIDS activist. I have currently returned to Denver after an extended sabbatical in San Francisco, California.

Terror, by Gillian

I don't understand terrorism or terrorists. I mean, intellectually of course I do. I understand what psychiatrists say about the factors causing people to become terrorists; but I can't get inside their heads. I simply cannot feel what it is they are feeling. With an estimated minimum of a thousand young people a month from different parts of the globe currently rushing off to join forces with ISIS, however, it's clear that creating terror holds an attraction for a significant number of people.

Not only am I completely mystified by that desire, or compulsion, to bring terror to others, but I am fortunate enough to be able to say that I have never felt true terror myself. That is not because I am remarkably brave and tough. Neither am I in denial of some unacknowledged terror. It is simply that I have lived my life in a place and time that has been terror-free. For me, that is. Not, alas, for everyone.

I can only imagine the utter terror I would feel, hiding in the bushes in Rwanda, waiting to be discovered and hacked to pieces by my erstwhile friends and neighbors. Or hiding in a room in Nazi Germany, waiting to be turned in to the Gestapo by my erstwhile friends and neighbors. Sadly, the list is endless. I would know what real terror was in Stalin's U.S.S.R and Mao's China: the Cambodia of the Khmer Rouge and on and on to today's North Korea and most places in the Middle East.

I say I can only imagine, but in truth I'm sure I cannot. I have lived so far from the horror of so many people's lives that I cannot begin to imagine what it would be like. I have lived in my own little warm and cosy cocoon, safe and secure. Oh sure, I've been a bit afraid occasionally. For instance, long before the advent of cellphones, on business in Florida, I got lost in Miami in the dark and pouring rain and my rental car broke down in a part of town which looked seriously uninviting. Walking home in Denver one night after dark someone followed me step for step. When I slowed, the footsteps behind me slowed; they kept pace if I walked faster. Nothing bad resulted from these minor incidents, and the most they made me feel was a bit nervous: just a frisson of fear. I've had health issues that made me feel much the same, but that's nothing approaching terror. They call it a cancer scare, after all, not a cancer terror, though I'm equally sure that being diagnosed with some horrific Stage Four cancer would certainly invoke terror.

The most frightened I have ever been, I think, were two instances involving airplanes.

One was on a flight from New York's La Guardia to London Heathrow. It was at the height of the Falklands "war," so it must have been 1982. I was working God knows how many hours a week at the time and as soon as I settled to watch the movie, which was Tora Tora Tora, I fell into a deep sleep. Over the mid-Atlantic we hit some really rough air, and even that didn't wake me, but a combination of things suddenly did. We were bouncing around so badly that one of the overhead bins bust open - it must not have been securely latched - and a hard-sided case fell out onto the woman directly in front of me. It must have been heavy as blood started pouring from her head and she began to scream. At precisely the same moment, a voice from the cockpit announced with regret that the H.M.S. Sheffield had been sunk with heavy loss of life. Well, you know what it's like when you are rudely awakened from a very deep sleep. You lust can't get your bearings. I was awash in confusion. My last memories, from the movie, were of air battles; planes crashing into the ocean. The name Sheffield bothered me because that's where I went to College. Were we at war? What was happening? Why was that woman screaming and bleeding?

Why was the plane pitching and reeling? Were we going down in the ocean? I'm sure this complete lack of any grasp on reality was very short-lived, but it seemed like forever and I was truly scared. But I think I was too confused to be really terrified, and I realized well enough that I was confused. Had we really been going down, yes, then I'm sure I would have felt undeniable terror, for real. I think, now, of those doomed passengers on that flight that went down in Pennsylvania on 9/11, and more recently the one that wandered off course around the skies for several hours before, they think, ending up at the bottom of the Indian Ocean; some terror involved there, I would guess.

The other time was when my husband of the time was flying us back from California in our little four-seater plane. There were the two of us and my two youngest step-children. We had just cleared the Sierra Nevada summit, heading East back to Colorado at about 8,000 feet in a clear blue sky. Suddenly an invisible hole in the sky opened up and we fell through it like a rock. My stomach hit the roof. The clipboard securing the navigation charts, which I always held on my lap, shot up and the metal clip gouged a big gash under my chin. My step-daughter started screaming. The hillside was coming up to meet us at a really frightening speed. The plane stopped falling as suddenly as it had started, and we landed at the first available spot to make sure there was no damage. There was a crack in one wing and in the tail, but not enough to stop us flying on home. We later calculated that we had dropped about 6,000 feet in very few seconds.

And it was scary, but it was all over before I had time to work up to real terror. Maybe it's just that my reactions are too slow!

I had planned to end there, but you know how these stories go. Sometimes they seem to take on a life of their own and go off on a tangent you had not planned to take. So we'll just follow.

Some of you may remember that several months ago I wrote about my dad, who, lost in a daze of dementia, created havoc by trying to liven up their electric heater, which was made to look somewhat like a real fire, by jabbing at it with the old metal poker. 

I was writing this current story, last week, on a very cold day, around zero outside. Somehow when it's that cold, it seems to seep into the house regardless of how you have set the thermostat.

I was cold. I huddled closer to the cozily-glowing gas insert fireplace and noticed that there was a considerable gap between two of the "logs." No wonder it's cold in here, I thought, and unbidden the next thoughts leapt into my head. I need to get the poker and rearrange those logs a bit, that'll warm things up.

Now that truly terrifies me.

© 24 Nov 2014 

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.

Cowgirls Come on Out, by EyM

Roy Rogers exuded cool. He wore his neck scarf knot to the side. Roy Rogers always impressed Dale Evans. So naturally when my little 8 year old wanna-be cowboy body and soul craved to impress a girl, I copied him. Sure enough that scarf sat over my jugular as I stood there wide-eyed looking into my Mother's dresser mirror. My exuberant rendition of a TV ad “Going out on a date in my Rocket V-8!” flew out of my mouth full blast and full volume. Shame followed long after with startling fear that I could have been heard. This magical mirrored moment undeniably marks my early lesbian feelings.

Before that, my Father completely perplexed me when he shamed me at age 6 for asking if my neighbor, a boy, could stay all night and sleep outside with me in the tent. It took years to know just what his problem was. It took even longer to know that it was all his problem.

In first grade, oh how I wanted to impress Susan. I lovingly wired rag strips from the rag drawer to a piece of broomstick I cut just for her. I strutted on my Schwinn to her house to present the wonderful homemade mop. I grasped the bag at the top of the mop head and thrust the stick handle out with great flair. But ugh, only the stick came out.

It’s icky that I still feel embarrassed by the failed mop mistake, and even worse to hold the fear that my Rocket V-8 date song had been heard. How messed up is that? How messed up was the mid 50’s world that dumped so much shame. Obviously, our work is just beginning if even one little cowgirl or cowboy heart feels shame for who they are.

My Dad never really got it. “Don’t hang out in the back of the church with the boys! It just doesn’t look right!” Boys got to be ushers. He didn’t know how much I was one of the boys.

This year, about 60 years later, you cowgirls Barrel Racers took my breath away. Watching you young women fervently running your horses around those barrels was delicious to watch!

That was me as a teen. What a great full circle awakening. Thank you cowgirls. I don’t care how you tie your scarves. You rock! You RIDE! Oh how you ride, right here in my heart.

© 30 Sep 2015 

About the Author 

A native of Colorado, she followed her Dad to the work bench to develop a love of using tools, building things and solving problems. Her Mother supported her talents in the arts. She sang her first solo at age 8. Childhood memories include playing cowboy with a real horse in the great outdoors. Professional involvements have included music, teaching, human services, and being a helper and handy woman. Her writing reflects her sixties identity and a noted fascination with nature, people and human causes. For Eydie, life is deep and joyous, ever challenging and so much fun.

Finding Redemption, by Don Johnson

Growing up Mormon is like growing up Jewish; it’s a way of life as well as a theology.  The way of life includes certain non-negotiable events, including (if you’re male) a mission for the church and marriage and family.  I served my mission in French-speaking countries from age 19 to 22, married, and had a family with three children.  In hindsight always at some level knew I was gay but never came to terms with it until 1979 at the age of 38.  

After struggling with owning my identity for many years, I eventually came out to my family, ended my marriage, and left my church.  

I began attending coming out meetings with a group of gay men in Denver, leading me to participate with a group of them in the first March on Washington for Gay and Lesbian Rights in 1979.

I had requested excommunication from the Mormon Church, which procedurally includes a trial.  My trial was scheduled for the morning of that march.  With the time difference between Washington and Colorado, my trial ended as the march began, 7 a.m. Boulder time and 9 a.m.Washington time.  

As my friends and I parked and headed toward the assembly point for the march, I was vividly aware of the time, and as we stepped onto the mall, I looked at my watch and realized that the trial was over and I was out of the church.  This was highly emotional for me, and I began to quietly cry.  

At that very moment I looked up and two men were unfurling a banner that said “Gay Mormons United.”  The synchronicity felt like an affirming message from God.  I ran over to the men and blubbered out my story.  One of the men took me in his arms and held me, and stepping back, he shook my hand and said, “Congratulations, Welcome home.”  And all the pieces fell into place.  

The march ended at the Washington Monument, which was open to the tourists, and for a moment in history, the odds were changed and I was part of the majority and the straight tourists were the minority.  I realized that they were intimidated by our presence and were quietly looking at the ground.  I thought to myself, “I have spent my whole life looking at the ground.  Never again.”  

Upon returning from the march to the University in Boulder, I came out to my colleagues at the University and then to my students in my very large (500 students) Human Sexuality class.  

I had been advised against being public by many people, particularly regarding the impact it might have on my career and future.  But from the point of view of personal integrity, it felt as though if I had not come out to my class, it would have been the equivalent of running a marathon and not crossing the finish line.  

The public coming out led to both television and newspaper coverage, which in turn produced a large number of contacts from gay Mormons, gay married men, and closeted people in general, who for the first time had a name of someone they could contact.  This process has become one of the most gratifying experiences of my life.  

As trite as it might sound, I’m still thoroughly convinced that the single most important political act each of us who is gay or lesbian can do is to come out in every possible setting.  

In coming out, I lost my traditional church and biological family and gained an immense new family of choice of gays, lesbians, and allies.  “I once was lost but now I’m found.”  My redemption came on the Washington, D.C. mall in 1979.  

© 1 Sep 2015 

About the Author  

  

Don was born in Twin Falls, Idaho in 1941.  He grew up in western Idaho outside of Boise.  He was raised in a Mormon family and followed that cultural script, including undergraduate and MA degrees at BYU (Brigham Young University), and a Ph.D. from the University of Minnesota.  He did a mission for the Mormon Church in French-speaking countries and married and had three children.  He became a psychotherapist at the Counseling Center at the University of Colorado in the 1970s and came out as a gay man in 1979.  Since his divorce, he has been involved in national marches on Washington, PFLAG, national speaker on developmental issues for gay and lesbian youth, Founder and President of Boulder County AIDS Project, taught human sexuality at the University of Colorado, and is currently retired and living in Denver.

Details, by Betsy

It takes all kinds to make the world go 'round. Some come up with the grand schemes and ideas.  Others must find a way to work out the details and put the schemes and ideas into practice. The devil is in the details.

Consider the recent election campaign and what is going on in Washington today.  The ideas were put out there, affirmed by the people, but now, no one seems to be able to work out the details to put those ideas into practice. Clearly differing political ideologies is the reason the details cannot be worked out, but there is a middle ground to which some are unwilling to travel unfortunately.

The details end up being more important than the grand idea.  The Republicans are proposing to avoid the fiscal cliff and raising government revenues by closing current tax loopholes. However, they are unwilling to reveal exactly which loopholes should be closed.  So they expect the Democratic administration and Democratic Congress members to accept such a plan which either has no details written in it or those details are being kept secret?  That, of course, will never be acceptable.  The details make all the difference between an economic policy which is good for the country versus a policy which would be devastating.

Take climate change also, for example. There are very few people who do not realize or will not admit that human activity is influencing the warming of our planet.  Many people including some world leaders propose that just cutting back on the burning of fossil fuels would and should be a priority, but that idea is not being implemented.  Why?  The details.  Just how do we cut back on burning fossil fuels. Where do we start?  It can be done, but no one can work out the details to the satisfaction and acceptance of all.

The problem is that when the details are spelled out, it becomes clear that everyone will have to give a little, bend a bit, be flexible--some more than others.  So it is with tax reform as well.  Is it not better to sacrifice one or two of the details for the good of the whole?  After all, if the whole, that is, the planet or one’s source of livelihood whether it be Social Security, pension, the stock market, bank and corporate profits--if the planet becomes uninhabitable by humans or the global economy collapses, details become meaningless.

© 10 Dec 2012 

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.