Author: jnelson

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My Favorite Gay Role Model, by Ricky

This should be an interesting topic
for our story group.  I can imagine that
there will be several gay role models written about; perhaps, one for each of
the group members.  But, I can also
imagine there will be some members who, like me, have no gay role models.  In which case, it will be interesting to see
how those group members respond to this topic.
        As far back in
time as I can remember, I only met one gay man (Jim Nabors) that might have
become a role model but, was not.  The
problem was two-fold.  First, I did not
know he was gay until decades later and second, I did not know (or admit to
myself) I was gay until decades later.
        In my pre-teen
years, I did get to watch Liberace, if he was a featured guest on someone’s TV
show.  I did notice his flamboyant costume and signature candelabra sitting on top of his grand piano and thought it was
strange when compared to other pianists I had seen in movies or on TV.  However, no adult ever mentioned that he was
probably a homosexual in my presence.  It
would have been strange if they had brought up a sexual topic to me at that
age.  If fact, the only people who did
speak about sex were my peers when we finally reached puberty and began to
share forbidden information, magazines, and photos taken from our fathers’
“hidden stashes”.
        In high school,
I did not know any gay males.  In
college, while I did mentally lust after a few males in my dorm, I did not act on the
feelings because I was afraid of being labeled “queer” and, at that time, I was
terribly shy and did not know how to make friends, straight or otherwise.  After I married, there was very little
incentive to even mentally lust after males. 
So, it was easy to consider myself “normal” and not homosexual.  Besides, I really did want a family.
        Like many gay
men of my generation, marriage was expected by society and it became a place to
hide one’s orientation and consciously or unconsciously suppress the
desires.  Thus, during the marriage
period for me there was no opportunity to develop a relationship with a gay
person, so no role model appeared.
        At my current
age, I am fairly set in my ways and I have yet to find or (in my opinion) to
need a gay role model.  I obtained role
models when I was young.  Not human role
models, but philosophical role models. 
·      
If
you can’t say something nice, don’t say anything.  (I don’t follow this one all the time, in
fact never did follow it exclusively.)
·      
Do
unto others as you want them to do unto you.
And then came the philosophical role models that still
dominate my life:
·      
The
Boy Scout Oath and the Scout Law. These two underpinnings were cemented in
place by my joining the LDS Church.
This is why I am the nice-guy I am.
        The Boy Scout
program stopped me from becoming a juvenile delinquent.  I was already on the path to become one
because I had no parental supervision and lots of time for my idle hands to
find the “Devil’s workshop.”  I could say
that my scoutmasters were my role models at the time I needed a role
model.  It was a pity that they did not
know I was sexually confused and they were not gay.  Who knows what or who I may have become if
they had un-confused me at that age.
©
23 February 2015 
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 
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Hunting, by Ray S

Here is my
pathetic hunting story. I have told you all several stories before of my states
of extreme self pity. I was so very sure I must have been an unwanted adopted
child. This attitude became most evident when members of the family realized
that their social or vacation plans became complicated by the need to figure
out what to do with the Boy Child.
Everyone’s
Saturday night plans were such that the low man on the totem pole turned out to
be the Big Brother who had plans to spend the evening with a lady friend,
evidently deemed of great romantic potential. Could anything dampen one’s plans
better than having to take the Little Brother along on the date of a maybe
lifetime? But the parents had plans for that night too, and they took seniority
precedence.
After
arriving at the home of Brother’s amore, they settled the child in with
necessary coloring books (this story predates TV) and the funny papers, and
warned him to stay put while they stepped out for a brief journey to a local
ice cream parlor, or so they said.
As I
previously described to you the glorious degree of ‘poor me’ took command.
After obediently wearing out the box of Crayolas and memorizing the Tribune’s
comics, a decision was arrived at by His Nibs: “I will show them. I’ll run away
and they will find me never, never, never!” In this instance the open road
consisted of several neighborhood blocks dimly lit by an occasional street
lamp.
Eventually
the spirit of revolt lost some of its motivation and maybe it was time to
return to the frenzied desperate arms of the would-be guardians. Only then did
the forsaken one realize that after searching and hunting for Young Lady’s
house, His Nibs was lost.
Sitting on
the street curb, two fists rubbing away the tears from two sad and maybe
repentant eyes, he looked up to his side at a tall blue-uniformed man. The man
reached down for a little arm and softly said, “Come with me, I’ll take you
home.”
© 26 September 2016  
About the Author 
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Birthdays, by Phillip Hoyle

My
fifteenth birthday was a day of celebration but not so much over me as it was
over our family’s move from Junction City to Clay Center. Don’t mistake this by
thinking we were excited to be leaving an army town to go to some idyllic place
in the countryside. Actually we kids were horrified to think we were moving to
a town with only one four-way stop light. We were going out to the sticks in
our minds. Still, the move was a celebration.
Probably
this birthday was the first one I had that didn’t feature a cake with candles,
wishes, and the suspense of wondering if I would get all of the candles blown
out in one breath. The night before we family members went to several
neighboring houses to sleep since all our goods had been packed the day before
into a moving van. Tippy, my beagle, stayed in our garage, the cats on the back
porch of the house. We came back for them in the morning. When we were ready to
leave, we kids went to get the three of them for the trip. I put Tippy on the
leash, Lynn got a good hold on Kissy—her Persian ’fraidy cat—and Holly picked
up Mascot—a reprobate tomcat that one rainy afternoon had come home with our
youngest sister. I said I’d get the car door. Tippy insisted on sniffing
something and then we took off in a run around the west side of the house. The
girls and their cats came around the east side of the house just as Tippy and I
burst by. Kissy clawed Lynn in a desperate and successful attempt to escape. We
got Mascot and Tippy into the car and went searching for Kissy who was nowhere
to be found and, if she heard us calling “Kitty, Kitty, Kitty,” didn’t care. We
had to leave her and go meet the truck some forty miles away.
During the
drive to Clay Center, Tippy hung her head out the open window, Mascot got sick
in his litter, and Lynn cried over the loss of her pet. Finally we got to the
new town and opened the house to receive our furniture, appliances, and
personal effects. I don’t recall a cake or any such celebration, but I do know
I began to move into my room, one with a large closet, plenty of wall space for
my artwork, and a carpeted floor. The junior decorator in me was a bit
over-excited for already Mom had ordered drapes and such, and we were setting
out to re-do the whole house.
Later that
day, after the van had pulled away and things were settling down, I went
outdoors to set up Tippy’s new home in the garage and eventually to assess the
lawn. The new power mower was due to arrive the next day; I wanted to be ready.
Since the big old house sat on three corner lots, I was trying to figure out
how to organize my attack on grass and weeds. I heard a ruckus in the north
yard and went to investigate. There I found Mascot stealthily marking his new
territory and blue jays in great screaming protest attacking him like protective
dive bombers. Such drama!
We were all
moving in and making our best ways into the future. I would have new
responsibilities, a new school, new teachers, new church, and new friends. I
hoped nothing would dive bomb my attempts to make my way. And fortunately I
found a strong music program, many activities with kids at church, and a new
job. Actually it was the same job—carrying out groceries—but in a new store,
this one managed by my uncle who paid me twice as much as my dad had in our
other store. I felt like I was growing out of boyhood in a rapid approach to
adult life, and I felt ready for it all. While the day’s activities were
exhausting and probably there was not a birthday cake, the whole package was a
celebration of life and of a new future for me as I began the sixteenth year of
my life.
© 14 Nov 2016  
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
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My Happiest Day/Leaving, by Pat Gourley

From
the Pali Canon:

The Buddha was speaking to a
group of monks. He said, “Monks, suppose that this great earth were totally
covered with water and a man were to toss a yoke with a single hole into the
water. A wind from the West would push it East; a wind from the East would push
it West; a wind from the North would push it South; a wind from the South would
push it North. And suppose a blind sea turtle were there. It would come to the
surface only once every 100 years. Now what do you suppose the chances would be
that a blind turtle, coming once to the surface every 100 years, would stick
his neck into the yoke with a single hole?”


And the monks answered, “It
would be very unusual, Sir, that a blind turtle coming to the surface once
every hundred years would stick his neck into the yoke.”


And the Buddha replied, “And
just so, it is very, very rare that one attains the human state.”

My happiest day was
January 12th, 1949. This was the day of my birth and it took place
in La Porte Indiana.  Based on the
Buddha’s thoughts above I was one lucky fella. Putting blind turtles aside and
relying instead on actual current knowledge of the development from a
fertilized egg to viable fetus your chances are probably less than 20% of
making the grade. A very significant majority of embryos never make it beyond
the first couple days or weeks following conception.
If according to the most
extreme “right-to-lifers” human life begins at conception then heaven is
overwhelmingly populated with embryos. Or do embryos have fully actualized
souls with developed human personalities? Sorry but that is a bit beyond my
comprehension. And if you do believe in God having a direct hand in inflicting
his will on all sentient life on the planet then that would make him by far the
world’s leading abortionist. There really are a lot of holes in this whole “God
thing” when you start to critically ponder it, which of course is why the whole
business of “faith” was cooked up. To quote Dana Carvey’s SNL character the Church
Lady; “how convenient”!
 And the gauntlet doesn’t end with a live birth
but the odds of making it to at least the age of reason, which the Catholic
Church tells us is age seven, is certainly much better than in ages gone by.
If, however, you are born in many of the poorer countries of the world your
chances of dying in infancy are still considerable.
So I must say that the
happiest day of my life came with the added bonuses of being born a white male
in the United States. This could only have been better if I had been born white
in a western European democracy, post 1945 of course.
I suppose I could also say
the happiest day of my life, the one with the greatest long-term daily benefit,
was the day I came out. Only problem there is pinning down the exact date. My
coming out was certainly a process with at times fitful starts and stops, a
gradual evolution lasting from about age ten until my mid-twenties. I was
certainly much happier at the end of this process than at the beginning. There
was though no particular day filled with bolts of lightening from on high and a
choir of angels singing to usher me to the promised queer land.
I therefore must return
to my day of birth as my happiest since this provided the opportunity for all
that was to follow. I am very happy that I was not one of the millions of
embryos that inadvertently wind up getting flushed down a toilet or expelled
into an open sewer. I truly am one lucky son-of-a-bitch.
I am now left to often
ponder what it will be like to take my final leave. Let’s face it all the other
leaving one engages in life is really small potatoes compared to the final
exit. It is often the paralyzing and at times incomprehensible fear of our vaporizing
into nothingness after we take our final breath that has spawned the very many
human creations of an afterlife and higher power. If only we aren’t really
leaving but rather transitioning to something better and eternal, the ultimate
bit of delusional thinking. The idea that I am so great that the Universe can’t
possibly go on without me is now in my mind simply deluded human hubris.
Though I am convinced
that the human dance on this planet is a going to be limited and very short in
the grand scheme of things that does not in any way diminish how fucking
amazing it will have been. In growing into the label of humanist, or atheist if
I am in a particularly ornery mood, I want to be able to say that when I do
take my final leave I will have left things a bit more conducive to other
sentient beings able to experience and enjoy the wonder of being one of those
lucky blind turtles.
© 29 Oct 2017 
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.
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Another Plug for Metropolitan Community Churches, by Louis Brown

Romans 6:23, King James
Version (KJV)

23 For the wages of sin is death; but the gift of God is
eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.
“Consequence”
is a term of logic, that reminds me of the inevitability of death for sinners
as stated in the above-cited Biblical quotation. This often repeated phrase
always bothered me. It was used as an excuse to persecute heretics and gay
people. It reminds me further of the so-called “clobber passages” often cited
from the Bible. Homophobes use this phrase not only to persecute gay people and
other non-conformists, they use it to justify their internalized irrational
hatred of all non-conformists and people who are different.
Most gay
people accept the basic premise of the homophobic version of Christianity and
become atheists or agnostics or adopt earth-oriented spiritualties. Personally,
I side with Lesbian and gay male positive interpreters of Christianity. In
refuting the homophobic version of this Biblical citation, I would remind the
homophobe that God did not ordain that majorities get the moral right to define
“sin”. Well, MCCR is doing a good job in refuting homophobic prejudice in Bible
studies.
My parents
were non-conformists and had a negative view of Christian churchdom.
Presbyterians (our ancestral denomination) consisted, according to them, of
hypocrites who go to church and worship the almighty dollar and call it God.
The Catholic Church has a history of sympathizing with Hitler and Mussolini and
then makes the dubious claim of being the ultimate moral authority for their
believers and for everyone. What a joke!
Personally,
I would not go as far as my parents. But we should be on guard for hypocrisy in
the Church and for intolerance for non-conformists, but give gay and Lesbian
Christians the opportunity to construct a more tolerant, a more enlightened
version of Christianity.
© 11 Oct 2016 

About the Author 

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

Nostalgia Regained, Gillian

I
have always thought myself blessed; I can live the time and place where my
nostalgia takes me any time I want. There are countless books, and especially
movies, about Britain during World War Two – the time and place of my early
years. There are not as many of the later 1940’s, or the ’50’s and ’60’s, but
there are enough. If I want to return to my childhood amongst remote farms, I
can watch and re-watch the old PBS/BBC series, All Creatures Great and Small,
which feels to me to be an almost exact replica of my childhood environment.
If
I want to feel that stirring patriotism of the war years, emotions which I
think I recall but in fact was probably too young, I can watch the old
black-and-white movies of the time, many of which are cloyingly sentimental, such
as, In Which We Serve, The First of the Few, or the unabashed
propaganda of Mrs. Miniver.
In the ’50’s and ’60’s
came an era of more realistic movies dealing with the many issues remaining
after the war: Saturday Night and Sunday Morning, Billy Liar, and
Georgy Girl.

 
Or
those films whose only purpose was to make us laugh, like the wonderful
selection starring Alec Guinness.  
And
then, along came The Beatles with It’s a Hard Day’s Night, which
appeared in 1964, a year after I graduated from college. A nostalgic ride if
ever there was one. 
In the year of my birth
alone, 1942, Britain produced over 50 movies set in Britain. Yes, it is easy
for me to take that trip down memory lane any time I feel so inclined; which I
did quite frequently over the  years. Opportunities
for nostalgic trips via the movies are even more plentiful, of course for
Americans. But most other first-generation immigrants like me are not offered
this escape; at least it is not immediately available from the local library,
and probably not even these days from Netflix and the like. How many movies are
there that would have you jump aboard and be immediately transported back in
time to 1940’s Latvia or 1950’s Guatemala?
But in later years
something seemed to go wrong. I no longer delighted in this armchair
time-travel the way I used to. In fact, rather the opposite. Movies, either
fiction or documentaries, depicting my time and place of nostalgia, whether
made back then or current depictions of it, tended rather to depress and anger
me. They make me cry. They are sexist, classist, xenophobic, homophobic; all
the ists and ics you can think of. They are bigoted, 100% white and 100%
heterosexual. They are all about the unthinking, unquestioning, superiority of
men and equally unquestioningly subservient women. They made me question not
only my memory but my very sanity. This is the piece of history upon which I
gaze with such affection? It has been said that nostalgia is a longing for a
time and place which never existed. I fear that must be what I suffered from
for much of my life. Sadly, I began to see it more clearly for what really did
exist, and did not particularly like it.
I rather blamed my
efforts, over the last few years, to become a more spiritual person. This has,
as indeed it is part of it’s purpose, raised my consciousness; allowed me to
see things more clearly, as they are, rather than as a blurred concoction of my
own designing. But I hated that I was robbed of my nostalgia; my place of
escape on a bad day.
More recently I have
turned yet another corner. I can still take that magic carpet ride. I can still
enjoy depictions of my past. It is simply that I have lost those tinted lenses
through which I once gazed with love and longing.
I wouldn’t go back there
if you paid me!
In 1952, when Alan Turin
was arrested for his homosexuality, I was an English schoolgirl of 12. What
hope was there for me to deal with, or even acknowledge, my own homosexuality?
Not that anyone knew anything of Turin at the time, all he had done for the Allied
war effort was kept under the secure wraps of the Official Secrets Act for
decades, but his terrible story is emblematic of the attitudes of the times.
So now I again enjoy
movies and books portraying that life I once lived. They no longer make me angry.
They simply offer pictures of a past which, thankfully, no longer exists. They
remind me of the many ways in which we have moved forward, for all that at
times it seems that we have not. I can recognize that past of which I was a
part, with at least a modicum of objectivity. I neither hate it nor love it. It
once was, and now it’s gone. Those spiritual teachers/guides would be proud of
me. I am truly, at least in this one instance, living in THE NOW!
© May 2016 
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 been with
my wonderful partner Betsy for thirty-years. We have been married since 2013.
Posted on

Covered Wagon, by Cecil Bethea

Dear Sirs,
You all should know that Mary’s Bar
actually did exist here in Denver, but years ago it was urban renewed into a
parking lot.  About five years past the
parking lot became the site of the building housing the offices of the two newspapers.  An actual takeover of the bar took place
during World War II, but I know none of the details.  The result is that my account is fiction in
all details except for the name of the establishment.
Having had nothing published, I have
been told to include something about my life. 
A biography would be slight, I’m from Alabama but have lived in Denver
for over fifty years.  My life was
certainly not exciting and no doubt of little interest to almost any one.
Then on August 25th of
last year during the Democratic Convention, everything changed.  While coming home after doing some research
on the Battle of Lepanto at the public library, I became enmeshed in a
demonstration by the anarchists that bloomed into a full-fledged conflict with
the police.  Because the eldest of the protestors
could not have been thirty, my white hair made me stand out like the Statue of
Liberty.  The police in their contorted
wisdom decided to take me into custody. During their manhandling of me, a
photographer for the Rocky Mountain NEWS took a splendid photograph of me being
wrestled by two 225 pound policemen.
After the publication of the photograph and an explanatory
article in the NEWS, fame came suddenly and fleetingly.  However, I do understand that my name is
embedded somewhere on the Internet.
Since then I have testified in seven
trials of the protestors.  Also the
A.C.L.U. is working toward a lawsuit for me. 
Not the sort of suit that stirs up visions of orgies in Las Vegas with
the payoff.  The lawyer has warned me not
to splurge at MacDonald’s.
The best!
© 23 Feb 2009 
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 18th, 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 memory 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.
Posted on

Clubs, by Betsy

In 1950 when I was 15 years old our family moved from New
Jersey to Louisiana.
I have often said a comparable change would be moving from
Earth to the moon.
In this case, however, the moon would have been populated
with humanoids who had their own culture and language–very much different from
anything I had ever encountered in my young life. However, I was young and I
had much to learn and experience. 
The first difference that I noticed in my new home was the
blatant discrimination and racist practices carried out against people of
color. I’m not so sure the same thing was not going on in New Jersey. I suspect
I just didn’t see it. It was hidden. In the deep South, it couldn’t be hidden
because of the large population of African Americans.  Almost every household in my new hometown had
at least one black person working for them. These family servants had to have
their own toilet facilities usually outside or in the garage, their own private
glass from which to get a drink of water (never would a white person want to
drink from the same glass!) We all know about the public drinking fountains.
Of course, the schools were segregated as was everything
else. I left the South to attend college in New York State in 1953 never to
return except for visits with my parents.
After federal legislation made segregation illegal in the
1960’s nothing changed much in Louisiana. These southern people are slow moving
indeed.  It was not until the late 1970’s
that they finally were forced to allow black people to use public facilities
such as restaurants. On one occasion when I returned to Hammond for a visit, my
high school friend suggested we go out to dinner. She assured me they had
solved the problem of integration by making the city restaurants into private
clubs. Most whites belonged to all the clubs and there were many of them. We
would have to take our own liquor since it was no longer a public place. The
private clubs could or would not get licenses to sell liquor. 
White folks continued for decades to claim that the culture
of segregation is justified because everyone is happy with the status quo
including blacks. That’s how we want it and that’s how they want it, was the
claim.  People want to stay in their
place and keep to themselves. Keep to themselves, maybe, but stay in their
current place–please!
The last time I visited Hammond, Louisiana was in 2003 when I
attended my fiftieth high school reunion. I had no family there except in the
cemetery in the church yard.
I was happy to see that the public places that had had a
brief existence as private clubs–they had all become public places again,
businesses now open to all people. The college in Hammond–a branch of
Louisiana State University–included many black students, and many higher
paying positions previously unavailable to people of color were now occupied by
African Americans. Change comes slowly but change for the better had indeed
come to Hammond Louisiana albeit at the expense of the lives of many good
people and many hard-fought battles lasting for decades.
It saddens me more than I can say to watch the evening news
and see that racism is alive and well today in the United States of
America–land of the free and home of the brave—and not just in the South.  At the same time, I am happy to see that
public places are not changing into private clubs in order to avoid the law of
the land. The law of the land has made segregation in public places illegal as
it should be. In spite of this institutional racism is prevalent. A young law
abiding African American or Latino male in some locations is suspect simply
because of who he is. Racial profiling is common practice in some areas. Our
prisons are filled with men and women of color in numbers disproportionate to
the population. In recent years, we have witnessed the passage of laws in some
states designed to make it almost impossible for certain people to vote. Those
laws, in my opinion, target low income people of color. 
While being white, I have not had to experience the horrors
of decades of discrimination I have described here. I have, however,
experienced on a very few brief occasions the hatred felt toward a person who
is perceived as being different and a threat to the power structure. We have
seen that progress against discrimination and hatred can come quickly when our
leaders pass laws making discrimination illegal.
I want to believe there is a basic innate goodness in all
human beings on this planet–our leaders, law enforcement officials, even the
wrong-doers and criminals.
Let us step back and consider our place in the universe–so
small, so isolated, so seemingly vulnerable. 
At the same time, we must consider that we are creatures who have the
capacity to love each other and to love this tiny speck of rock we live
on.  Love is the means to peace on Earth,
I believe.  Let us look beyond our egos
and other constructs of the mind. It is our egos that drive us to create clubs
so we can segregate ourselves from each other. Let us all look inside beyond
our egos and awaken to our very core, our being, which is love. I do believe
love is the answer for us humans.


 © 23 Mar 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), and the GLBT Community Center. She has been
retired from the human services field for 20 years. Since her retirement, her major
activities have included tennis, camping, traveling, teaching skiing as a
volunteer instructor with the National Sports Center for the Disabled, reading,
writing, and learning. Betsy came out as a lesbian after 25 years of marriage.
She has a close relationship with her three children and four grandchildren.
Betsy says her greatest and most meaningful enjoyment comes from sharing her
life with her partner of 30 years, Gillian Edwards.
Posted on

Culture Shock, by Will Stanton

The day was sunny and fairly warm for
November, so I took a stroll through the park, occasionally having a seat on
one of the many benches to soak up the sunshine and to watch the hundreds of
geese on the lake.  The benches came in
handy, considering that it has been a very long time since I was able to take
twenty-mile, mountain hikes.  My hips
were speaking to me, so I sought out another bench to rest.
The only bench close by me at that
moment already was occupied by one older woman. 
I correctly guessed that she was babushka,
a grandmother from Russia.  She appeared
to be friendly, so I asked if could join her. 
She seemed glad to have the company and someone to talk to.  With her heavy Russian accent, the
conversation was more “talk to” than “talk with,” for she did the majority of
the talking.  That was OK with me because
everything she had to say was quite interesting.
It turns out that she is seventy-six,
although she could pass for fifty.  She
lived most of her life in Yekaterinburg, the fourth largest city in Russia with
quite a history.   Situated in the Urals
on the border of Europe and Asia, it perhaps is best known as the location
where, tragically, Czar Nicolas II, his wife, and all his children were
murdered and then buried in the forests nearby.
Yekaterinburg also is known to be a
highly cultural city with ample opportunities to engage in the arts.  In addition to all of its educational
facilities, it has more than thirty museums, plus several theaters, concert
halls, and opera houses.  Several
world-famous operas singers got their start in Yekaterinburg. 
This loquacious babushka explained that society there just assumes that good
culture should be part of everyone’s life. 
Consequently, children are brought up to appreciate and to participate
in music and the arts and to be familiar with great literature.  As it turns out, these pursuits are not just
simple hobbies; the families take them seriously.  Before she acquired a degree in architectural
engineering, she first acquired a degree in classical piano performance.  Now that is dedication! 
She went on to talk about her family:
her husband, her daughters, and her grown granddaughters.  Yes, her daughters also acquired degrees in
music before pursuing degrees in their chosen professions.  Now her granddaughters just have completed
their music degrees in Boulder.
Babushka says
that she very much misses her home and all the cultural opportunities left
behind, but she came to America because of her family.  Her husband was offered a good
job-opportunity as an environmental planner here in America.  He accepted it and moved here by
himself.  His wife chose to remain behind
at home.  Eventually, their daughters
joined their father in America, and Babushka
was left alone.  Family is most important
to her, so finally she joined the family here.
There are many things that she likes
about America; however, she has noticed a major difference in culture
here.  There are some of the same
cultural advantages here as in her homeland, but at a very reduced scale and
with fewer and fewer people who truly are interested.  There appears not to be the same society-wide
appreciation of the arts among the population or understanding that incorporating
arts and music into one’s life not only enriches human life but also, as proved
by several psychological / educational research-studies, enhances the ability
to learn other disciplines, a concept apparently lost upon school districts
that eliminate the arts first from their school programs as “non-essential.”
I understood what she was talking
about.  Since my childhood, the vast
majority of classical music radio stations in America have been disbanded
because of rapidly dwindling listenership and advertising income.  Throughout America over the last generation,
the country has lost dozens of symphonies, theaters, opera companies, ballets
companies, and school arts and music programs.
A few years ago, the Denver Symphony
could not afford to keep going and was disbanded.  Apparently, Denverites will pay hundreds or
even thousands of dollars to go to football games and rock concerts, but many
far-less pricey symphony tickets were left half-unsold.  World-famous musicians would arrive on stage
to the embarrassing view of oceans of empty seats.  The failed symphony finally was replaced with
the Colorado Symphony.  Then just last
year, most of the board left out of frustration, and the symphony again came
close to closing.  It is keeping barely
alive by cutting the number of concerts, minimizing salaries, and traveling to
other venues with small groups of musicians to perform for a handful of
listeners. 
Other societies have a far different
view from America.  For example, Germany
funds their national arts programs at a rate of dozens of times higher per
capita in contrast to America.  They give
government funding to symphonies at a rate of 25 times that of America and
opera companies at 28 times.  In
contrast, Mit Romney (when running for President) said that he would eliminate
all government support for the arts in this country, and he’s not the only one
to say that.  Like many politicians the
past thirty years, he believes in so-called “small government” – – except of
course in the cases of increasing military spending, intruding into people’s
private lives, dictating women’s health choices, pushing religious beliefs into
school science programs, gutting the workers’ unions, and suppressing the right
to vote.  Within the total military
expenditures for each year, a tiny fraction of goes to supporting military
marching bands; yet that amount of money is so huge in contrast to what is
provided currently to the National Endowment for the Arts that this sum could
resurrect and support twenty full-time symphony orchestras at $20 million apiece
plus give 80,000 musicians, artists, and sculptors an annual salary of
$50,000.  But, the “cut-the-budget”
power-brokers in Congress never would do that. 
During World War II, Britain’s
finance minister recommended to Winston Churchill that they cut arts funding to
better fund the war effort.  Churchill’s
response was, “Then what are we fighting for?” 
There are numerous sociological and psychological articles written and
available for reading about the essential need for the arts to develop and
maintain a civilized nation with civilized people.
Another example of how culture has
declined in America can be seen in what recordings the majority of Americans
choose to buy.  Just ten years ago, the
local Barnes and Noble on Colorado Boulevard carried, in a large percentage of
the media room, hundreds of classical recordings on CDs and DVDs; and their
staff were graduate students from the Denver University Graduate School of
Music.  That large display-area
continually shrank until only one small area by the back wall contained
classical music, and the only clerk was a high-school graduate who admitted
that she had no background in music at all. 
With the recent renovation of the store and the reduction of the media
area to a minor space off to the far side, the stock has been minimized to
virtually nothing. 
Then I recently stopped in Target
just to check out their DVDs.  They had
only about a half-dozen of real quality and interest to me, five of which I
already had, and absolutely no classical CD section at all among the rap,
heavy-metal, hip-hop, country-western, pop, rock, and TV soundtracks.  That is what sells in America with
recordings, live concerts, radio, and TV, and even the music chosen for
background noise even in so-called good restaurants. 
Many fine grand-piano stores,
including the two major ones in my area, have gone bankrupt and closed because
so few people now are interested in classical music and learning how to play
the piano.  An article in the New York
Times described how many pianos now are taken to the dump because they often cannot
even be given away.  The correspondent
spoke about watching as a bulldozer ran over and crushed a Knabe baby-brand
piano.
Quite obviously, our country has
developed different priorities and values from that of many other advanced
nations.  I recently finished watching
the BBC production of John Carré’s “Tinker, Taylor…”  One particular quotation caught my attention.  In questioning one of the characters in his
story as to why he was so unhappy with America, the man replied, “Do you know
what the problem is…?  Greed, and
constipation…morally, politically, aesthetically.”  If that statement seems extreme, the sad fact
is that many people hold the same feelings. 
Unfortunately, since the book was written around forty years ago, a
similar view of America has persisted among many foreign nations in
particular.  This cultural difference
between the grandmother’s home and what America has become has not been lost
upon her, either.
So, the grandmother, obviously proud
of her family and all their accomplishments, laments the culture shock that she
has experienced.  She appreciates her
chance to come to America and to be reunited with her family.  Yet at the same time, she speaks with
fondness and nostalgia of her once having lived in an environment of great
cultural opportunity. 
Bosendorfer Grand Piano
I was sure that she had much more to
talk about,  and I would have been glad to have heard more; however, the sun was
going down, and the air quickly was becoming chilly.  Even my personal, extra insulation was not
enough to stave off the growing cold. 
So, I thanked her for her conversation, bid her farewell, and headed
home, all the time weighing the possible social and personal implications of
her reported culture shock.
© 28 Sep 2016 
About the Author 
 I have had a life-long fascination with
people and their life stories.  I also
realize that, although my own life has not brought me particular fame or
fortune, I too have had some noteworthy experiences and, at times, unusual
ones.  Since I joined this Story Time
group, I have derived pleasure and satisfaction participating in the group.  I do put some thought and effort into my
stories, and I hope that you find them interesting.
Posted on

When Things Don’t Work, by Ricky

I suppose I should begin with When I Don’t
Work.  As a boy and teen, I was in a
perpetual state of work avoidance.  It
didn’t matter if it was chores at home or homework for school, I did not want
to do it.  When Mom asked me to do the
vacuuming and dishes, I would do the vacuuming but would delay doing the dishes
until it was very late and I had to go to bed before school the next day.  As for the homework, I did do that, but
procrastinated as long as possible.
The skill of procrastination did not serve me
well when I attended Sacramento State College right out of high school in
1966.  My English 101 class introduced me
to adult fantasy novels.  The professor
told us that his professional colleagues thought he was crazy to teach his
selected book of ‟trash” as English Literature. 
Our professor told us that we would be reading and discussing the story because
it was the up-and-coming genre of literature. 
He was so very correct as the book we studied is Tolkien’s Lord of
the Rings.  I got so involved in the
story that I neglected most of my studies for two weeks and got so far behind I
was demoralized and so went on academic probation at the end of the
semester.  I then did not even try the
next semester so I flunked out of my first year of college.  I was still very immature.
After losing my academic deferment, I managed to
join the Air Force to avoid being drafted into the Army or Marine Corps.  I worried about the draft for nothing.  While I was attending Air Force basic
training, I received my draft notice—for the Navy.
The Air Force was good for me.  It gave me a safe place to finish growing up
and also taught me team work, skill with administrative work, a bit of
self-discipline, kept me out of Vietnam, and even paid me to learn.  Who could have asked for more?  After three years with my assigned unit, I
was selected to set up a newly organized squadron’s administrative section for
the squadron commander and first sergeant. 
It turned out that I really must have been a good worker as I was given
two medals for the work I did throughout my enlisted time.
I continued to work until a couple of years
following my wife’s passing.  Then my
depression was so bad I reverted back to my youth and avoided work whenever
possible.  Then after ten-years of
self-pity, I began to come alive again and sought out things to do that were
not work but mostly recreation.  I do
have modest financial stability through the VA, Civil Service retirement, and
Social Security but I needed to supplement my income a little bit, so after a
two-year search, I finally landed a position as a cashier in an adult video
store where I worked from 1 August 2012 through June 2016.
Now when things other than me don’t work, I react
totally different.  My behavior divides
according to specific scenarios.  The
first is, if the not-working thing is my property and can be fixed.  If I can fix it, I will try and do so.  If I cannot fix it, I send it to or call in a
repairman.  If that is not possible, I
will replace it or do without.
Second scenario is where the not-working thing is
a large project, if it is to be fixed, such as replacing the floor and wall
tile in a bathroom.  When I was in my
20’s, Deborah and I did just that.  I
know exactly how much work it was.  At my
age now, I am totally against do-it-yourself projects.  If it isn’t broken, don’t fix it.  If it is broken, call in an expert repair
person and pay the price.
The third scenario consists of not-working things
that I have no direct control over.  The
prime example of this is Republican obstructionism in Congress for the past
six-plus years, known to me as the Bonner Do Nothing Republican Congress.  The only thing I can do about that is vote
and write letters.  Another example is
potholes in city or county roads.  I can
notify the authorities where the potholes are but nothing is done.  Then there are the roads which are repaved
and repainted and 3 to 6-months later, dug up to replace water or sewer
lines.  The powers that be don’t
coordinate getting the underground work done before the repaving, so streets
are often disrupted longer than necessary.
My number one pet peeve I believe falls into the
category of things that don’t work. The movie and theater industry repeatedly
miscast actors in their productions. 
Specifically, beginning with Maude Adams, productions of Peter Pan
have featured women in the title role. 
Barrie’s manuscripts clearly indicate that Peter was small and still had
all his baby teeth.  He was not an adult
woman or a teen-age boy.  At least Walt
Disney used a 12-year old Bobby Driscoe as the model for the Disney animators;
he just used the wrong aged model.  This
past week there was another made for TV broadcast production, Peter Pan
Live, staring yet another adult female as Peter.  I am sure it was a good performance, although
I did not watch it.  Not to take anything
away from the actress and other cast members, the performance was still a
travesty.  The casting system is broken
and does not work with regards to Peter Pan and I am powerless to do
anything but complain.  Very frustrating
for me as Peter Pan is my all-time
favorite prepubescent story from childhood.
Anyone who has seen the musical Oliver,
knows there are many talented youngsters who can sing and dance.  If you search YouTube, you can find videos of
the search for and training of the actors who ended up playing Billy Elliott in
the American version stage play.  It is
nearly unbelievable the amount of talent children have.  There is absolutely no reason to keep casting
adult women as Peter.
Fortunately, someone has finally come along to
end my frustration.  While in a movie
theater this past week, I saw a preview of a new Peter Pan movie to be released
in the summer of 2015 titled, Pan. 
The role of Pan finally has been assigned to a young boy, one more
closely age appropriate and accurate to the original story.  The story itself is another prequel, but I
don’t care about that.  I just want to
see a more realistic Peter Pan.  So for
me, I can see that someone in the movie industry is actually trying to make
literary accurate movies whose cast actually resembles the characters in the
novels.
Just because some things don’t work, doesn’t mean
that someone cannot begin to fix them. 
Maybe there is hope for Congress too.
© 7 December 2014 / revised 3 Feb 2017
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