January 2013 – Sage Telling Your Story

January 31, 2013February 26, 2019

The Fairies by Cecil

Their home was sited in a burrow beside the South Platte River between 15th and 20th Streets. It was away from the river’s edge and across the sidewalk where so many of the Big People ran, walked, and bicycled. The trees. shrubbery, weeds, and grasses ensured that their door was invisible except to the most diligent searcher. Once in a great while a dog off his leash sniffed it out. Most often on those occasions , the impatient owner would call the dog away while Oberon and Puck would sit quietly and not knowing what the dog would do. If he were a digger, enthusiastic with his freedom from the leash and the confines of the small condo of his master, the animal might do some damage to the passage way. But they weren’t scared for their personal safety having planned their castle with two escape hatches opening at least ten feet away from the main entrance.

The two had reveled in a golden day of Indian summer with the leaves like so many flambeaux. Early on, they had gathered driftwood, which had washed from who knew where in the high Rockies already covered with their first coating of snow. Crossing the sidewalk to avoid the Big People required careful planning, but years of training and experience had taught them how to avoid if not their enemies at least their adversaries. The sticks of future firewood were now stored away. A few more weeks of harvesting this crop of the river would have the wood room chuck full.

After lunch, the two had flown over to Sixteenth Street to see the sights and doings of the Big People. Oberon had watched two men playing a good game of chess until Puck, not being a chess aficionado, pulled him away. Oberon at least once a week played chess with Old Casimir. Nobody knew how old he was. Probably didn’t know himself, but everybody knew that he was old. During their last visit the old man had told about the little steamboat that had steamed up and down the river on hot summer nights carrying some of the Big People. Usually somebody would bring a ukulele, a banjo, or a guitar -sometimes even all three. They’d sing songs like LORENA or SHINE ON HARVEST MOON not too well, but it was nice listening to them.

Oberon and Puck had flitted down Sixteenth window-shopping. Naturally, Puck found a T-shirt he wanted.

“I’m going to get Esmeralda to make me a shirt like that.”

“How you going to pay for it?”

“Oh, I’ll just baby sit Carlos; she’ll be glad to get rid of him for a day.”

“Let me know ahead so I can escape. I’ll go fishing for minnows so we can have them for supper.”

“I don’t understand why you don’t like children so. After all, you were once one yourself.”

‘’Yes, and I remember what a troll I was”

“Oh! You were never so bad as Ivan under the Fifteenth Street bridge even before he became civilized. I could never have fallen in love with such a creature.”

“Don’t try to pull your lovey dovey trick on me. I’m not going to stay around this house all day just to hear you going getchy getchy goo and Carlos shriek every time he wets his diaper which happens far too often.”

“You’ll leave me to the mercies of Maria.”

“What’s she got to do with anything?”

“You know what a racist she is wanting to see that we fairies don’t all die off. Every time I have Carlos over, here she comes telling me that I should have a family of my own.”

“Just tell her you don’t have the right machinery. With Esmeralda and Abendigo around we don’t have to worry about fairies of any variety dying out, How many kids has she produced?”

“Lordy, I don’t know. Gave up trying to keep track after number six, the red head. Whenever she brings Carlos over, she let’s me know his name.”

“What will you do if it’s raining outside?”

“Haven’t done it in a long time. Go down to the Bale of Hay Saloon and hide up under the eaves. When a drunk comes out, I’ll make myself visible to him.”

“You know we aren’t supposed to appear to the Big People!”

“Doesn’t matter. What would you do if you saw a twelve inch fairy while drunk? True, it might scare you away from the bottle, but would you tell anybody about seeing him? Your friends would just say, “He’s finally got the DTs,” and the bar tenders would eighty-six you permanently.”

“Why, Oberon, you sound like a one man temperance society!”

“There’s nothing temperate about my trying to escape Carlos.”

While Puck was cooking supper, Oberon sat in his lounge chair watching the television. Obviously, they couldn’t have a regular set down in their house. It was an Ipod that a Big Person had lost in Confluence Park. The weight was too heavy for them to fly it to their house, so they had lugged it across the South Platte, over Cherry Creek, and then down the sidewalk to their home. Vulcan, who knew most everything about the Big People’s goods, had shown them how to operate the thing. Now it was a part of their lives teaching them much about the Big People. True, the batteries died from time to time. Vulcan had taken Oberon to one of the Big Man’s storehouses and showed him how to get replacements. He had to fly out the door while it was being opened by a customer. Even though they had no money, fairies were not supposed to steal from the Big Men. Oberon paid by washing the upper windows of the storehouse.

They had already known that the Big People came in different colors. Some dressed differently. Others lived where they couldn’t see the mountains; still others built their houses by really big rivers which had big waves that splashed continually against the bank. Some waves were really big, much taller than any of the Big People.

After they had started watching the television, they had become almost adept enough to be considered bi-lingual. Every night after cleaning up the kitchen, they sat in their separate lounge chairs and focused upon the flickering figures upon the screen. The two had been following the Gay marriage debate amongst the Big People with a personal interest and an absolute confusion.

Puck had declared, “I just don’t see what the fuss is all about. When we two joined, the He-She’s didn’t have a tizzie. They just ate, drank, and danced like us, the He-He’s and the She-Shes. Certainly Abendigo and Esmeralda with their ever increasing brood were not affected much less harmed.”

Oberon joined in with, “I reckon that some Big Men always need something to bitch about. This is even better than most topics because it has nothing to do with them. If any changing has to be done, somebody else will have to do the changing.”

“Say, I’m out of glitter for my wings and you didn’t remind me while we were downtown. You might think I’m dowdy without a full coat of glitter.”

“To show you how I feel about your glitter let’s go to bed for a session of He-Heing.”

They didn’t even put on their night shirts.

About the Author

Although I have done other things, my
fame now rests upon the durability of my partnership with Carl Shepherd; we
have been together for forty-two years and nine months as of today, August
18the, 2012.

Although I was born in Macon, Georgia
in 1928, I was raised in Birmingham during the Great Depression. No doubt I still carry invisible scars caused
by that era. No matter we survived. I am talking about my sister, brother, and I. There are two things that set me apart from
people. From about the third grade I was
a voracious reader of books on almost any subject. Had I concentrated, I would have been an authority
by now; but I didn’t with no regrets.

After the University of Alabama and
the Air Force, I came to Denver. Here I
met Carl, who picked me up in Mary’s Bar.
Through our early life we traveled extensively in the mountain
West. Carl is from Helena, Montana, and
is a Blackfoot Indian. Our being from
nearly opposite ends of the country made “going to see the folks” a broadening
experience. We went so many times that
we finally had “must see” places on each route like the Quilt Museum in
Paducah, Kentucky and the polo games in Sheridan, Wyoming. Now those happy travels are only memories.

I was amongst the first members of the memoir writing class. While it doesn’t
offer criticism, it does offer feedback.
Also just trying to improve your writing helps no end.

Carl is now in a nursing home, I don’t
drive any more. We totter on.

January 30, 2013February 26, 2019

Holding Hands in Church by Phillip Hoyle

When I was a kid, Buddy and I held hands in church. We didn’t do it just once, but often. I’d cross my arms with my hands underneath, then lean against Buddy’s shoulder. He’d do the same, and we’d interlace our fingers. Although the act usually occurred during the sermon with us sitting in the back of the congregation, our leaning into each other was clearly visible to the preacher. He didn’t see it, I suppose. Perhaps his eyesight was poor or he simply didn’t want to deal with what may have been happening between two boys in his congregation.

The touch surely indicated that we were special friends. At least, we were friendly. Buddy was an outgoing jock; I a skinny weakling with personality. He was humorous, fun to be with although sometimes arrogant. Still, we had a great time, especially when we spent nights together, evenings full of sexual exploration and pleasure.

I learned from him more than just how to kiss and have sex. This young teen shared his ideas about girls, a recommendation of the underarm deodorant I still use, the need for exercise and sports I never followed. A wise teen myself, I realized I was somehow a replacement for his older brother who had left home. I had no brother.

We became more than friends. I don’t think either of us experienced infatuation, a crush, or puppy love, but we had sex. Enthusiastically. The experiences began with back rubs, progressed to kissing, and then to more explorations. Like most boys, we were not cautious. We didn’t think much about what we left on sheets or blankets, didn’t think about our moms or about the social ramifications of discovery. We just had fun together.

That was about it. Ten months into our affair, Buddy’s family moved away, and I went on with my life. I dated girls and really liked some of them, but I didn’t fall in love or hold hands with them in church.

* * * * *

Things changed in college with the young woman who would become my wife. We prayed together in the privacy of the prayer chapel, leaning into one another there. I taught her how to kiss when we made out in the car or in the cloak room of the administration building of the Bible college we attended. We liked each other and realized we were in love. Finally I had found someone to hold hands with again.

For many years we learned from one another, shared the rich experiences of a full life with children, friends, family, and congregations. We kept up a sexual exploration that increasingly brought satisfaction. Even with the richness of our relationship, its shared values and work, and its serious commitment to one another, I seemed to need more.

* * * * *

I met a man while attending graduate school. We couldn’t get enough of each other’s company, walked across campus sharing ideas and hopes, talked endlessly while sipping warmed-up coffee in his apartment. I knew I had fallen in love with this man. I wanted to hold him, to do the things I had done with Buddy, but I did not. Sitting alone on his living room couch, we sometimes did touch, rubbing each other’s feet and, you guessed it, holding hands. That was the extent of it. Neither of us verbalized our feelings although we both recognized that they were strong and loving and, we both hoped, lasting.

* * * * *

Years later I separated from my wife and soon after that from professional ministry. I moved to Denver to live as a gay man. During my first months living alone, I attended the Metropolitan Community Church. Each Sunday I would weep during some part of the service perhaps when I glanced across the faces of the many gay men seated there or when the singing roused a feeling of solidarity with gay believers or when the preacher’s words challenged the wider church to be loving, supportive, and open to gay people. Eventually I achieved a modicum of healing. I quit crying but then became annoyed with the language of the liturgy. I sought religious community elsewhere, looking for a church that would accept me and make sense to me. Perhaps I didn’t try hard enough for eventually I quit attending services altogether. My recovery continued outside the church: my community place, a coffee shop; my support group, friends I met there; my ministerial service, massage to clients who came to my practice. With these non-church groups I built a meaningful life and a purposeful career.

In Denver I have lived with three different men who provided me good relationships. Two of them were lapsed Catholics, the other a back-slidden Methodist. We kissed and had sex many times. We held hands but not in church. We never went to church. They felt no need, and I didn’t want to be irked. Sundays come and go with little thought of attending service, but I wonder if my religious healing will ever be complete until I again hold hands in church and this time openly.

“Hey,” I guess I could ask my back-slidden Methodist buddy, “what are you doing this Sunday?”

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.”

Read more at Phillip’s blog artandmorebyphilhoyle.blogspot.com

January 29, 2013February 26, 2019

From the Pulpit by Merlyn

I’ve been running from the pulpit ever since I was eleven years old. I grew up having to go to a united brotherhood church and never missed a Sunday from the time I was six years old till I was eleven, and I had a five year perfect attendant pin to prove it.

I was taught that everything was a sin. Dancing, drinking smoking, any kind of sexual activity including masturbating would send me to hell.

Every summer I was sent to church camp where I remember all of us kids crying as we went up to the pulpit to be saved. Then there were the tent revival meetings where we all had to be saved again and again.

The thing I remember the most about going to church was sitting there on Sunday watching people. My aunt would be sitting there with her husband even though everyone knew she had a lover; my favorite uncle would be there too, but his gay boyfriend would wait outside in his car. Everyone would be singing the songs and acting so holy when they did communion.

I hated having to waste every Sunday morning acting the way they did.

When I was eleven I started making money on a paper route and working for neighbors. My parents made me pay board. I loved it; I did not have to do chores anymore.

As long I paid my mother every Saturday I was free to do whatever I wanted to do.

I stopped going to church.

I started to love Sunday mornings, it was the only time I had to masturbate without someone catching me.

I don’t think I have been in a church more than 20 times on a Sunday morning in the last 57 years.

Spiritually I used to wish I could have the blind faith in one of the gods that other people worship but being honest organized religion has never worked for me.

It took me most of my life to realize that any real spiritual peace that I have ever felt can only come from deep inside of me.

There’s a feeling deep inside that gives me peace. I know I do my best to live my life and treat others the way I want to be treated. So I don’t let anyone make me feel guilty when I mess up.

I have had a near death experience that taught me that everything will be ok. I do not think anyone really knows what happens to us after death actual takes place.

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.

January 28, 2013February 26, 2019

Closet Case by Micahel King

Denial can be unconscious and costumed in so many different and creative ways. I look back on at least sixty some years of telling myself who I am, what I think, what I believe, how I feel, what I want, and an infinite number other adaptations to identity. Now of course I am the same me that I have always been and will always be, but my self-concept and my attachment to definitions of selfhood have run the full spectrum and back again. Wow, isn’t it fascinating what the ego can come up with? And when in full defensive mode the distortions or imaginative propaganda that we try to kid ourselves with is downright funny and occasionally quite sad.

Many of the costumes I have worn over the years are still hanging in the back while all the newer ego outfits are easier to put on or take off. These identity outfits include those I will gladly wear to most any occasion while others I reserve for those special occasions when I want to appear in a particular way. Of course if you’re like me you will have a huge wardrobe. That’s fine. It gives us the ability to be interesting and have character. The trick over a lifetime is to have an assortment of clean, neatly pressed and just plain honest, up front outfits that cover most any situation in a somewhat suitable way.

Now that I can wear my outlandish ear adornments with bright colorful paisley shirts and unusual patterned and multicolor sweaters that when in combination tells the world that I am a somewhat eccentric, flaming queer with no second thoughts.

O.K. I will be fair. There was a time when I was just as flamboyant but tried to pretend that since I was a father and had girlfriends that no one would suspect my innermost desires. Well not too long ago when I finally had my first boyfriend I told my daughters. They all said that they had known since they were young. So why did I keep so many of my most interesting outfits hanging there, practically unused for all these years? I admit that I have either thrown out or given to charity (that’s a line of bull, isn’t it) many of the adornments and outfits that no longer fit. I still have more possible looks than most people I know. I do drag and had lots of fun with my grandson, daughter and son-in-law being catered to by my lover in the audience. I’ve come a long way, baby! Most of the time my closet door is wide open. It really isn’t my style to think of myself as having been a closet case. I may have been able to keep my job, get promotions, have the friends that I avoided, etc., but at the time I wasn’t feeling that I could be the me that wears whatever I want and not try to cover anything up. Since I do need a warm coat in the winter, I try to make sure I have the right color of fuchsia scarf to clash with my red coat and Tibetan bead earbobs over the purple paisley shirt and computer knitted multicolor sweater with purple socks to match. Why did it take most of a lifespan to be and do what I feel most comfortable with and that is as honest as my ego will let me be. I do think my ego is having a hell of a lot more fun now that there is no need for defenses. I often get complements on my many outfits.

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, 4 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.

January 25, 2013February 26, 2019

My Deepest Passion by Ricky

Forward: I wrote this memory in response to the topic “My Deepest Passions” while I was visiting my brother at South Lake Tahoe in the summer of 2011. He was a terminal cancer patient. I emailed it to our story group leader who read it to the group.

Prior
to these past weeks my deepest passions were reserved for politics and undoing
the damages done to America since the passage of the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Amendments. At this point in my life,
having lived at South Lake Tahoe these past several weeks, my deepest passion
is for my youthful memories of my life at the lake. Perhaps you can tell from the four postcards
you should be viewing today and over the next two weeks, if Phillip and Stephen
keep bringing them, as I asked them to share the photos with you all.

This
morning around 8:30AM, I arrived at Emerald Bay and spent the next 2 hours
taking some photos (none as nice as the post card photos) and reliving my
memories from when I was 10-years old living at the bay and serving as the deckhand on my parent’s 38-foot cabin cruiser tour boat; the Skipalong. I walked the very short trail to the top of
Eagle Falls (photo op) and then down the steep1-mile trail to Vikingsholm
(photo op) and an additional 3/10 mile trail to the bottom of the falls for
another photo op. After all that, I
walked the same 1-mile trail back to the parking lot. The uphill trek seemed like 3 miles instead
of the actual one mile. I had to take
baby steps to make it in reasonable time and to keep my heart from pounding.

I
was surprised at how strong the feelings of regret, past happiness, and longing
that filled me. Regret for not returning
and staying after my first enlistment in the military; past happiness over the
memories of a 10-year old; and longing for the intervening lost years of
residency. I visited all the homes I
lived at while I did live at Lake Tahoe (all three of them). The last one is vacant and amazingly the
entire side of the block my home was on is still exactly as it was when I
left. It is like living in Central Park
in New York City as the house is the only one on the block and is all open in a few places and wooded in the
remaining).

Memories
of elementary and high school; working at the county campground; my boy scout
troop activities and campouts; my original desire to be buried in the top of
the mountains to the south at Star Lake; and the time a few of us uninvited scouts went to Idaho
and “crashed” the Boy Scouts’ World Jamboree, are just a few of the memories
that resurfaced.

The
result of all this is that I really don’t want to return to Lakewood, but I will when my business with my
brother is completed.

I wish you all a great life and lots of creativity in writing or telling your stories. – Ricky


My parent’s tour boat.

Vikingsholm, Emerald Bay, Lake Tahoe, CA

Eagle Falls, Emerald Bay, Lake Tahoe, CA

My first home at South Lake Tahoe on Lapham Street.

My second home at South Lake Tahoe on Birch Street.

My last home at South Lake Tahoe on Red Lake Road.

© 29 August 2011

About the Author

Emerald Bay, Lake Tahoe, CA

Ricky was born in 1948 in downtown Los Angeles. He lived first in Lawndale and then in Redondo Beach both suburbs of LA. Just days prior to turning 8 years old, he was sent to live with his grandparents on their farm in Isanti County, Minnesota for two years while his parents obtained a divorce (unknown to him).

When reunited with his mother and new stepfather, he lived one summer at Emerald Bay and then at South Lake Tahoe, graduating from South Tahoe High School in 1966. After three tours of duty with the Air Force, he moved to Denver, Colorado where he lived with his wife of 27 years and their four children. His wife passed away from complications of breast cancer four days after 9-11.

He came out as a gay man in the summer of 2010. He says, “I find writing these memories to be very therapeutic.”

Ricky’s story blog is “TheTahoeBoy.blogspot.com”.

January 24, 2013February 26, 2019

Cooking by Colin Dale

As a kid, cooking terrified me, and I wasn’t a kid who terrified easily. It wasn’t the doing of cooking so much that terrified me, but the idea of cooking. The idea of cooking scared not the crap out of me but the identity out of me.

You know how with many languages–actually with one fourth of the world’s languages–there’s such a thing as grammatical gender? In these languages, all objects–not just those with obvious biological gender such as men and women, bulls and cows, but all objects–are classified by gender. That’s why, in a language like Spanish for example, we have not only ‘el hombre,’ masculine for ‘the man,’ and ‘la mujer,’ feminine for ‘the woman;’ but also ‘el machete,’ masculine for ‘the machete, or big knife,’ and ‘la mesa,’ feminine for the table. Languages using grammatical gender most often use only two: masculine and feminine; a few, like German, also employ neuter. English doesn’t mess around with grammatical gender. We English-speakers don’t bother classifying all objects according to masculine, feminine, or neuter. That’s why first time language learners studying certain foreign languages often find the business of grammatical gender completely crazymaking.

But grammatical gender is a matter of language and therefore a terror only for language learners. The idea of cooking, when I was growing up, presented a different kind of terror for me, not a language terror but a terror linked more vitally to biological gender: let’s call it self-conscious gender.

I should say in calling it self-conscious I’m not suggesting a condition of shyness or awkwardness–although, in my case, shyness and awkwardness were certainly both there to be seen. I’m thinking more of self-conscious in the sense of how one sees oneself, how one takes the measure of oneself. So, when I say, as a kid, I was terrorized by self-conscious gender, what I’m saying is that biological gender, as well as the socially approved sexual orientation linked to that gender–were much on my mind. Something I suspect we all experience: I didn’t know how to see myself. I didn’t know how to take the measure of myself.

What, you should be asking, does all this have to do with cooking?

In my childhood, much as in Spanish, all objects were classified by gender. For example, sports–baseball, football; not necessarily tennis–were like ‘el machete,’ the big knife: masculine. Household chores, like cleaning and cooking, were like ‘la mesa,’ the table: feminine. I’ve suggested first time foreign language learners often find grammatical gender completely crazymaking. Well, believe me, for a kid growing up for the first time, self-conscious gender can be just as crazymaking.

My family, my relatives, my schoolmates were all I had for a reference frame–as with studying a language, that Beginners’ Spanish textbook is all you have to go on. Within my reference frame, cleaning and cooking weren’t the only things classified as feminine. The list was a long one. It included fussiness about clothes–feminine, too much time spent grooming–feminine, a fear of getting dirty–feminine–although gardening, which was bound to get you dirty, was definitely feminine–feminine too was avoiding bullies, or showing an interest in the arts–music, dance, or poetry–and absolutely feminine was taking pleasure in the outdoors, not, of course, as a place to play touch football–that was masculine–but the outdoors for itself, for the grasses, the trees, the birds and changes of season. All of these were dangerously feminine.

Puzzling to me was seeing a few of my schoolmates take up some of these feminine interests–something I hadn’t the guts to do. I had schoolmates who drifted into the arts. Others who seemed to enjoy dressing nicely. A few who weren’t particularly aggressive. It wasn’t until years later that I figured out these schoolmates could make the choices they made because they weren’t terrorized by self-conscious gender. These schoolmates, the ones painting pictures, playing piano, reading books–some even cooking–from an early age, these schoolmates were able to take the measure of themselves, to see themselves–and to be comfortable with what they saw.

I have spent so much of my life looking over my shoulder, not only in my childhood but also deep into my adulthood. In fact, there are still moments when I take a quick glance. What am I looking out for? I’m looking out for–what shall I call him?–the Accuser. The Accuser, should he show up, will point and say–loudly so all can hear–‘Aha, I’ve found you out! Now we can all see what you are. There’s no pretending any more.’

I knew as a child–even as a teenager–if I should so much as show the slightest interest in one of these feminine behaviors–going on a nature hike, writing a poem, avoiding a bully–learning to cook–the door would fly open and there would be The Accuser, pointing and saying loud enough so that all might hear–my parents, my aunts and uncles, my teachers, my schoolmates–‘Aha, I’ve found you out! Now we can all see what you are. You’re a faggot. Or, worse yet, maybe even a girl. There’s no pretending any more.’

And so I overcompensated. I lived a super masculine life–deliberately–although not necessarily because I wanted to. I stayed away from boys who–as my parents might say–were ‘that way.’ Although I fled playing team sports and instead hid in my room reading books, I was always very careful to make light of my reading and to show a great interest–entirely fake–in spectator sports. For effect, I smoked a pipe, although you’d never catch me in a suit and tie. When the opportunity came along–although I was secretly trying to dodge military service–I elected a regular, as opposed to reserve, commission (i.e., more manly), opted for a combat arm, and deported myself reasonably well in Korea and Vietnam.

Self-conscious gender made me, you might say, what I was never meant to be: a warrior–albeit a reluctant warrior.

So, where does this leave me? It leaves me right here. Sixty-seven years old. I’m happy. I live a good life. I do go on nature hikes, although don’t ask me to identify a bird. Sports? Well, I do get together with friends to watch the Broncos, but I do it mostly for the pizza and the conversation. I’m an avid reader; I don’t make light of it; I’m proud of it. And some of it’s poetry. As for suits and ties? Well, I’m a jeans guy. Although I know it makes absolutely no sense, there’s still this leftover voice whispering in my head: suits and ties are for men that are “that way.”

What about cooking? I still don’t. Or so rarely it hardly counts. If I do cook, it’s only to give the Accuser one more shot. It’s to give him a chance to come into my kitchen and say, ‘Aha, there you are, trying to cook! You’re not a cook. The whole world knows. There’s no pretending any more.’

About the Author

Colin Dale couldn’t be happier to be involved again at the Center. Nearly three decades ago, Colin was both a volunteer and board member with the old Gay and Lesbian Community Center. Then and since he has been an actor and director in Colorado regional theatre. Old enough to report his many stage roles as “countless,” Colin lists among his favorite Sir Bonington in The Doctor’s Dilemma at Germinal Stage, George in Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? and Colonel Kincaid in The Oldest Living Graduate, both at RiverTree Theatre, Ralph Nickleby in The Life and Adventures of Nicholas Nickleby with Compass Theatre, and most recently, Grandfather in Ragtime at the Arvada Center. For the past 17 years, Colin worked as an actor and administrator with Boulder’s Colorado Shakespeare Festival. Largely retired from acting, Colin has shifted his creative energies to writing–plays, travel, and memoir.

January 23, 2013February 26, 2019

ABC’s of Life by Donny Kaye

It
seems that life is about mastery. In my
mind, Mastery is not to be confused with perfection but rather the ability to
actually experience life as it presents, moment-by-moment. Mastery connotes
experiencing life effortlessly, without resistance and in the spirit of
surrender. By surrender, I am not
suggesting submission or irresponsibility.

There
was a time when I experienced life in a very black and white manner, with little
tolerance at all for the shades of gray that constitute actually living life as
it presents. My personality needed knowledge and control to assure me that I
was on some predetermined “single” pathway.

There is a part of me that
would like to believe that life can be guided by a list such as The ABC’s of
Life, however; my experience suggests that about the time I master A, B and C,
life requires guidance from X, Y and Z!

If I
were to create such a list, the wise one within would begin with
ALLOWANCE. As I use the term allowance,
I’m not thinking of the seventy-five cents a week for taking out the trash or
cleaning off the dishes nightly from the dinner table. Allowance is a pre-requisite of being able to
meet life’s challenges just as they present.
Allowance is a way of looking at my life events not as obstacles to
getting what I want but rather as stepping stones. Allowance cultivates trust. Trust that everything that appears appears as
it must. Trust that comes through the
experience of allowance, allows for certain things to fall away from my life as
well as for certain things to come into my life.

The
B in A, B, C, is just that, be! Being is
about cultivating a capacity to be present to what is. Being allows for an informed response to what
is, rather than the experience of constantly reacting with either agreement or
disagreement. The constant reaction to
what appears begins to lessen and a true sense of wonder serves as the lens for
viewing life’s experiences.

Change is constant, becomes
another critical aspect for me in understanding life. I have found that when I am able to surrender
to the changes that are life, I am better able to stop resisting and instead,
allow what life’s experiences bring to me. Change is constant! What must I do to create the ability to
remain flexible in my thinking and my actions?
To allow and be, requires flexibility and surrender to the realization
that change is inevitable.

My
years of experience in this lifetime, and quite possibly, previous life times,
make the development of a full list, A-Z daunting and perhaps impossible to
create. As an educator, I remember using
excerpts with my staff from the book, Everything I Needed to Know, I Learned in
Kindergarten.

As I
look back on that listing of essential learning from kindergarten, I am
reminded of the following ABC’s of Life, by Robert Fulghum:

·
Share
everything.

·
Play
fair.

·
Don’t
hit people.

·
Put
things back where you found them.

·
Clean
up your own mess.

·
Don’t
take things that aren’t yours.

·
Say
you’re sorry when you hurt somebody.

·
Wash
your hands before you eat.

·
Flush.

·
Warm
cookies and cold milk are good for you.

·
Live
a balanced life – learn some and think some and draw and paint and sing and
dance and play and work every day some.

·
Take
a nap every afternoon.

·
When
you go out in the world, watch out for traffic, hold hands and stick together.

·
Be
aware of wonder. Remember the little seed in the Styrofoam cup: the roots go
down and the plant goes up and nobody really knows how or why, but we are all
like that.

·
Goldfish
and hamsters and white mice and even the little seed in the Styrofoam cup –
they all die. So do we.

Everything you need to know is in this
list of ABC’s somewhere.

And
then remember the Dick-and-Jane books and the first word you learned – the
biggest word of all – LOOK.

LOOK! I must develop my capacity to
witness my life, without bias or expectation, and always with a sense of Wonder
for what is. Realizing that “what is” is
precisely the life event that is needed for a certain life lesson.

I
am not suggesting a naive or Pollyannaish outlook on life but the creation of a
life which when viewed by the witness within is viewing the life experience
with clarity, through a lens which does not distort, nor color everything as
rose colored glasses might.

In
David Whyte’s poem, “No Path”, he states in his opening line, “There is no path
that goes all the way. Not that it stops us from looking for the full
continuation.” To exist with an expanded sense that there is no one way, be it
right or even direct, but the experience of life from the perspective that
everything belongs is entirely possible and practical.

About the Author

Donny Kaye-Is a native born Denverite. He has lived his life posing as a
hetero-sexual male, while always knowing that his sexual orientation was that
of a gay male. In recent years he has
confronted the pressures of society that forced him into deep denial regarding
his sexuality and an experience of living somewhat of a disintegrated
life. “I never forgot for a minute that
I was what my childhood friends mocked, what I thought my parents would reject
and what my loving God supposedly condemned to limitless suffering.” StoryTime
at The Center has been essential to assisting him with not only telling the
stories of his childhood, adolescence and adulthood but also to merely recall
the stories of his past that were covered with lies and repressed in to the
deepest corners of his memory. Within
the past two years he has “come out” not only to himself but to his wife of
four decades, his three children, their partners and countless extended family
and friends. Donny is divorced and yet
remains closely connected with his family.
He lives in the Capitol Hill Community of Denver, in integrity with
himself and in a way that has resulted in an experience of more fully realizing
integration within his life experiences. He participates in many functions of
the GLBTQ community.

January 22, 2013February 26, 2019

Is that the Rocking Chair Creaking or Is It Me? by Nicholas

I don’t have much to say about fingers and toes. I have the usual number of each and none hold any fascination for me. My digits perform the usual duties and pleasures just fine, require the usual routine care, such as clipping of nails, and have yet to pose any problems. No story there.

Other body parts, however, are getting to be more challenging these days. Yes, I’m of that age where body parts, though still the sources of many pleasures, do require attention. As someone once put it, when I wake up now everything is stiff except what used to be.

Aches and pains rove around my body from head to toe, stopping most frequently in my lower back. But other areas have put in their demands for attention as well. For a while I had to deal with plantar fasciitis—what used to be called heel spurs—which appeared and disappeared mysteriously. There’s little relief, except for some ineffective exercises and angrily cursing, until it just goes away.

To celebrate enrolling in Medicare, my body decided to launch a whole new issue by blowing out my knees. I came home from a trip to San Francisco, a great city to walk in and up and down, with aching knees. The ache went away and then it didn’t and then it went away and then it didn’t. Now except for walking, standing, sitting, kneeling, stooping or laying down, I’m fine. Running is out of the question, but that never did appeal.

So, I saw a knee specialist doctor who informed me that this was just part of growing older and just happens to a lot of people regardless of injury or prior abuse of delicate joints. I was showing early signs of osteoarthritis in my knees. Early?, I said. What’s it going to be like when it’s late? I’m hobbling around now. He told me not to climb stairs or walk up or down hills (but I am going to San Francisco), use ice for other than cocktails and take Aleve.

He told me to put off any surgery as long as possible. No argument there. I’d rather keep my old knees than get new ones. Luckily, the thing I enjoy most—bicycling— is about the best thing I can do to combat the degeneration. And I have a whole new set of stretches to do each morning. And there’s always Aleve and ibuprofen and maybe glucosamine to help.

Well, what can I say except that getting old sucks. Sure, it’s better than the alternative but it still sucks. This is the first experience I’ve had of physical limits due to aging. Suddenly comes the realization that I’m not making all the decisions here. Choose as I might to be active, that activity might be reduced because, well, I just can’t do it anymore—like spend hours on my knees tending my garden. Now limitations mean changing how I live each day. My independence is being questioned.

Since my ego hurts far worse than do my knees, I refuse to give in. My response is not to just fall onto the couch and grab the TV remote even though I am fully entitled to do so. I’m doing the regimen of stretches the physical therapist gave me though I don’t much like them. And I’m cycling and spinning as much as I can. And the ice—which actually feels good even if it doesn’t do much.

A friend who has also been dealing with this stuff and is in his 70s still takes five-mile hikes, limping along at his own pace. So, I say screw it. I’m not into five-mile hikes but I will take my walks along the ocean shore when I’m in San Francisco next week and will probably walk up too many hills to get to that fabulous restaurant at the top, but that’s what I’m going to do. And when the time comes for a knee replacement—which I hope is years away—I’ll deal with that.

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.

January 21, 2013February 26, 2019

Reflections on Bayard Rustin for MLK Day, 2013 by Pat Gourley

“The barometer of where one is on human rights questions is no longer the black community, it’s the gay community. Because it is the community which is most easily mistreated.”

Bayard Rustin, 1986.

I grew up in an all white Irish farming community and went to Catholic schools where African Americans, or any people of color for that matter, were as rare as hen’s teeth. FYI, hens have no teeth. I did though have the opportunity to be informed and sensitized to the amazing reality of racial inequality in America in the late 1960’s by my high school government/civics teacher. This teacher was a Holy Cross nun whose enlightenment on these issues put her truly in a league of her own in northern Illinois in 1967. An amazingly dynamic woman named Sister Alberta Marie (SAM) showed me the harsh realties of racial injustice in America and the horrible folly and crime that was the war in Vietnam.

SAM was herself very involved in peace activist work primarily, though not exclusively, aimed at opposing the war in Vietnam. She brought the great Jesuit activist Father Daniel Barrigan to our high school my senior year, an effort I always thought instrumental in getting her booted out of the Order a short time later. Important for me personally she arranged to send a small group of her students, myself included, to rural Mississippi to observe the activities of literacy teachers working primarily with poor black farm workers. This trip to Mississippi coincided closely with my own first male sexual encounters with a wonderful mentor several decades older than myself. My senior year was quite busy and many of my activities had lifelong and very positive implications.

The harsh realities of life for the black folks I ran into in Mississippi were almost incomprehensible for a little middle class white kid. I was though aware of Martin Luther King Jr. and viewed him as the leader of the Civil Rights movement but it was this trip that started to bring it all home in a very real and substantive fashion. I knew about the 1963 march on Washington and the “I Have a Dream Speech.” Someone I was not aware of, though I may have at least heard his name, was Bayard Rustin. As it turns out this very openly gay man was not only a mentor for Dr. King, he was the main architect for the 1963 March on Washington and the person most responsible for bringing the potent concept of nonviolent action to the Civil Rights movement.

Remarkably Bayard was boldly open about his sexuality in the 1940’s and 1950’s. It was an arrest and conviction on “morals charges” in California in 1953 that was to haunt him and in many respects diminish the credit he richly deserves for his role in the Civil Rights movement. The “crime” he was convicted of was sex with a couple other men in the back seat of a car; it did not even involve being busted in a public cruising area—the most common form of institutional terror inflicted on gay men at the time. He was throughout his life a frequent target of FBI surveillance and, I suspect, mischief meant to discredit his powerful organizing capabilities that in many respects made him such a potent target of the racist forces opposed to civil liberties for African Americans in the early 1960’s. Strom Thurmond in an attempt to derail the 1963 March made a point of publically stating that a “pervert” was largely organizing the whole affair.

Bayard was though a very active proponent of civil rights long before the 1960’s and was pushing to sit in the front of the bus long before Rosa Parks. He was a Quaker and had been involved and active in a group called the Fellowship of Reconciliation. His involvement with this group also was curtailed by the public humiliation that came along with his arrest and conviction for the “crime” of loving another man. He was also a strong advocate of workers rights and a strong supporter of the Trade Unions. He was of course, as were most activists worth their salt back in the 1930’s and 1940’s, involved with the Communist Party. He did significant prison time in the 1940’s for resisting the draft. This activist pedigree when looked at in its totality including in part being a felon, a draft dodger, a pervert, a nonviolent disciple of Gandhi, an African American and a communist is quite impressive and really has no equal when compared with LGBT leaders of today.

One of his most profound insights and something he stressed through sixty years of activism is that we are all in this together. Certain Buddhists refer to this as the concept of One Taste. Bayard Rustin truly grasped the essence of One Taste in the following statement: “We are all one and if we don’t know it we will learn it the hard way”. So on this MLK day in 2013 I would encourage all my LGBT brothers and sisters to remember these words from our dear comrade Bayard and be willing to expand our work and activism beyond our own, albeit legitimate, concerns of marriage and military service. What a great gift from our community if we could produce more Bayard Rustin’s fighting for income equality, world peace, repeal of the Second Amendment and a Manhattan project to address climate change.

If you are more interested in the life of this great gay man who played such an integral role in the life and activism of Martin Luther King, Jr. I highly suggest the award-winning documentary film Brother Outsider: The Life of Bayard Rustin (2003), available on Netflix. Also the very extensive biography, The Lost Prophet (2003) available on Kindle by John D’Emilio, is well worth the read.

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 am currently on an extended sabbatical in San
Francisco, California.

January 18, 2013February 26, 2019

Breaking into Gay Culture by Donny Kaye

My new home is only a couple blocks down the street and along the park from the coffee shop where my most recent introduction to gay culture started, some ten years ago. To understand the significance of my new home’s location I must go back in time to my earliest introduction to gay culture.

After I graduated from college and before I was married I hung out with several colleagues who were friends of mine. The selection of hangout spots was always determined by a couple of the gals within the group. Their choice was either a country and western themed dance club or a gay bar on the outskirts of the city limits. We partied weekly as we danced and drank together unwinding from the challenges of work.

On those nights when we would decide to go beyond the city limits and visit the bar heading up the hillside to the west of town, I paid close attention to the men who flirted with one another in the darkened recesses of the bar, typically men with men seeming very much at ease as they maintained close physical proximity with one another. Once in a while I would observe knees touching, hands caressing one another and even an occasional extended kiss. My heart would quicken and my mind engage. A few different nights I went back to that bar alone to not only watch but to be.

On each of those occasions, feelings of excitement stirred deep within me. I got what I was looking for in terms of physical connection that would lead to the parking lot just outside and on one occasion; I actually went home with someone, caressing each other as I excitedly drove down the darkened roadway. My excitement was accelerated by desire and the experience of allowing what I then tried to repress and consciously deny.

Within moments after the exchange I would be filled with guilt and shame as the awareness that within months I was to be married returned to my consciousness. It seemed so right and yet at the same time not allowable within my understandings of relationship, sexuality and my naïveté regarding models I had experienced for “doing” life, as defined by religion. There seemed to be no other choices. Being like I wanted to be seemed to also include the diagnosis of me having a psychiatric disorder! I just liked guys, why did it have to be so complex?

Ten years ago I was helping my good friend with the opening of her hair salon, immediately next door to one of the area’s leading gay coffee shops. On each of those days after my early morning work at her shop, I always enjoyed sauntering into the coffee shop ordering my coffee, watching, wondering, and considering the possibilities. I felt very much at home there and I recognized in that setting my secret wasn’t of significance.

In the interim between those early days and the coffee shop on ninth Avenue there were experiences, especially when work-related travel removed me from the confines of suburban life as a married man. I frequented various theaters, on occasion a gay bar, porn stores and occasionally an extended eye contact followed by a wink, a touch and caress. My experience of gay culture was reduced to a rich fantasy life and the expression of short stories in my creative mind as I ran miles at a time, trying to control my interests in men.

The coffee shop became a weekly haunt, long after the work at the hair salon was completed. I began to relate to other gay men whom I met through a close friend who is gay. The longing to be in gay culture, at least as I had always known it to be, had started to shift from that of cruising, sexual connection and guilt, to something much different.

My desire increasingly has included wanting honest relationships with men and women who understood me; who accept my desire, passion, and longing as a man of a certain sexual persuasion. I want to be around those who seemingly understood me and who have an allowance for me being the me that I have always wanted to be AND who are like me in that they are more diverse in their sexual orientation.

The gift of my life now is the opportunity to integrate a culture rich in sexual diversity with the aspects of my former life, especially my children and grand children.

Living within the hood allows me to interact in a much more complete and authentic way than I ever considered possible. The culture is no longer someplace I visit in secret in the dark of night and the anonymity of a setting where I’m just passing through. It is no longer restricted to Thursday mornings when I would linger at the coffee shop for hours on end, dreading the return to life as I had crafted it to be.

My experience of my culture now allows not only for the expression of my natural sexual orientation, but allows for you my dearest of friends. It allows for this space, this time this opportunity to just be me.

I live just up the block and through the park. I look from my balcony onto the streets and across the space of my neighborhood, which allows the experience of my culture. No longer separate or someplace I’m passing through. It’s where I flourish, the place I call home. My culture. My family. The place I rest in for this moment in time.