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Mother Goose and Granny – Revisited by Ricky

            It has been over twenty years since I have given any
thought to Granny or Mother Goose products or nursery rhymes, as that was when
my youngest child stopped wanting me to read to her.  Now I just have to wait until my granddaughter
is around so I can read that stuff again.
          I first encountered Granny Goose in the 1960’s when actor
Philip Carey played a macho James Bond type of character, named Granny Goose,
in potato chip commercials.  My favorite
commercial was the one where Mexican banditos ride up to Granny and one says,
“What’s in the bag, Goose?” 
Phillip Carey (1951-2008)
See Phillip Carey as Granny Goose

          Those commercials usually ended with Granny asking, “Now the only question is, are you grown up enough for Granny Goose.” I can assure you that the old cliché, “Idle minds are the Devil’s playground” is quite true. I was in high school in the ‘60’s and it did not take me long to convert Granny’s closing question into “Now the only question is, are you grown up enough to goose Granny?”

          Naturally, I first learned of Mother Goose when I was very young. My parents did read it to me sometimes, when I would sit still so they could. After I began to read, I would read them myself if it was raining and I was bored. I is rather interesting how many of the rhymes people can remember when they become senior citizens of advanced seniority.

          While on-line researching the term “Mother Goose,” I discovered that there are many books published on the topic containing many of the nursery rhymes. As it turns out, I have a copy of one of them in my library.

My Book’s Cover

          It is not the rarest one but apparently the most popular (if not famous). In perusing the contents, I managed to read many of the rhymes I remembered and discovered that several were longer or worded different.

          One of the oddest I found was one that completely solves the mystery of the cause of sexual orientation.

A Week of Birthdays

Monday’s
child is fair of face,
Tuesday’s
child is full of grace,
Wednesday’s
child is full of woe,
Thursday’s
child has far to go,
Friday’s
child is loving and giving,
Saturday’s
child works hard for its living,
But the
child that’s born on the Sabbath day
Is bonny
and blithe, and good and gay.

           Since there is one Sabbath Day per week and 52-weeks in a year, according to the above rhyme it follows that 14.285% of the population is gay, not the 3 through 10-percent figures often thrown about.  Mystery — SOLVED.  (Note:  These figures do not include the “Sabbath” days of other religions so the actual percentage would be even higher.)

           Many of the nursery rhymes are supposed to be short lessons on proper or unacceptable behaviors or even warnings. For example, consider:
 

Little Miss Muffet

Little
Miss Muffet
Sat on a
tuffet,
Eating
of curds and whey;
There
came a big spider,
And sat
down beside her,
And
frightened Miss Muffet away.
Moral #1: Eating curds and whey attracts big spiders. 
Moral #2: Girls are afraid of spiders. (So am I for that matter but, I don’t run; I attack using deadly force.)

          Also, consider the case of: 


Tom, Tom, the Piper’s Son

Tom,
Tom, the Piper’s son,
Stole a
pig, and away he run,
The pig
was eat,
And Tom
was beat,
And Tom
ran crying down the street.
Moral:  Getting beat is worth a good meal.
         If you recall I titled this essay “Mother Goose and Granny – Revisited.” What comes next is the revisited part. These rhymes come from my K-8 elementary school days.
Little Miss Muffet

Little
Miss Muffet,
Sat on
a tuffet,
Eating
curds and whey,
Along
came a spider,
And sat
down beside her,
And she
beat the hell out of it with her spoon.
Little Miss Muffet

Little
Miss Muffet,
Sat on
a tuffet,
Eating
curds and whey,
Along
came a spider,
And sat
down beside her,
And she
ate that too.
The above nursery rhymes in
the blue font are from the book The Real Mother Goose, the 67th printing in 1977 – Rand
McNally & Company.  © 1944
© 20 May 2012

About the Author

Emerald Bay, Lake Tahoe, CA

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



When united with his mother and new stepfather, he lived 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, 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.  “I find writing these memories to be very therapeutic.”

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

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Mother Goose by Colin Dale

Train whistle blowing, makes a sleepy
noise,
Underneath their blankets go all the girls and boys.
Heading from the station, out along the bay,
All bound for Morningtown, many miles away.
You may recognize those
lyrics, from the ‘50’s folksong Morningtown
Ride.  What does Morningtown Ride have to do with Mother Goose?  Well, I had a rough time with this week’s
prompt.  I had to really reach.   Mother Goose had nothing to do with my
childhood.  She was just not a presence
in my earliest years.  When I talk about
“earliest years,” I’m talking about really
earliest years: one, two, and three.  As
best I can remember—and who can really remember those years?—there was no
Mother Goose, no nursery rhymes, no bedtime stories.  I’m not saying my parents were remote or
ungiving, like “Let the kid lie in his crib and stare at the
ceiling.”  Not at all.  It’s just that storytelling wasn’t my
parents’ “thing.”
Early childhood memories are
notoriously uncertain.  I’ve tried many
times to reach back and remember my earliest true, verifiable, trustworthy
memory, not looking for Mother Goose but for the first flicker of
self-awareness, like a movie screen coming to life.  We’ve all done this.  It’s tough.
The best I’ve been able to
do is light up a day when I was four.  My
fourth birthday, as best I can tell.  I remember
a gift, and it seems it was a birthday gift: a toy truck, yellow and blue plastic,
and I remember playing with this truck on the living room carpet of our
second-floor apartment in the East Bronx.  I remember the room being filled with
sunlight.  Mine happens to be a February
birthday, so I’m guessing if this is a true memory, and it was my fourth
birthday, and if I had I looked out the window I’d have seen The Bronx in deep snow–the
way winters were back then.
I’m reasonably sure there
were no bedtime stories around the time of this fourth birthday.  There was certainly no Mother Goose.  But what about the years before: Years One,
Two, and Three?  Might my parents have
slipped in a little Baa, Baa, Black Sheep or I’m a Little Teapot during those
earliest veiled years?  Who’s to say?  Those years are forever irretrievable, unknowable.  Annus
incognita, the old maps would have said. 
  
The best I can do is
introduce circumstantial evidence.  My
parents were not big readers.   It’s
highly unlikely they would have been storytellers.  Anecdotes and jokes among adults, yes, but
bedtime storytelling?  Highly
unlikely.  My father went straight to the
back pages of the New York Daily News to see how he might best place a few
bucks on horses at Aqueduct and Belmont. 
My mother read the supermarket magazine, Woman’s Day.  Throw in a once-over of the Sunday church
bulletin.  That was it around my house.  More circumstantial evidence?  When I was old enough to be prowling about
and looking for stuff to read, I found no Golden Books of children’s literature,
no Beatrix Potter, no Brothers Grimm.
Slipping the time machine
into Forward gear, let’s hop ahead ten years, to when I’m fourteen, to when Morningtown Ride is just about to enter
the picture . . .
In spite of not having been
read to, I filled those ten years with books. 
I was a self-made reader.  Where
the inclination came from, I have no idea. 
Ours was a family of four.  My
father and mother, as I’ve already said, were limited readers.  My brother, fourteen years older than me, was
an athlete, and his athleticism was all consuming.  He was even less of a reader than my parents.
Me, the reader, was also me,
the shut-away loner.  My kingdom was my
bedroom.  How it came to be that I
dreaded being made to play outdoors with the boys in the street, I don’t know.  But that’s how it was.  That’s how I was.  I’d come home from P.S. 71 and shut my
door.  Weekends, too, except for meals,
I’d stay in my room.  I had a beat-up
Smith Corona typewriter I was using to pound out my first great novel–although
I never made much headway: I kept typing Page 1 over and over.  I did have a treasure in travel books
(wrangled from a favorite uncle, but that’s another story): Richard
Haliburton’s Complete Book of Marvels,
Beryl Markham’s West with the Night, Heinrich
Harrer’s Seven Years in Tibet, Charles
Doughty’s Travels In Arabia Desert and
so on.  I was happy in my room.  My second-floor cave.  Through double-pane windows I would hear the
shouts of the boys in the street, but I didn’t care.  I was safe. 
Apart.  Unthreatened.
But–and this is the odd
part–I was also unhappy.  Although I
kept my unhappiness a secret, I had arrived at the point where I didn’t want this
loner existence to be the sum total of my life–the be all and end all.
Cue: Morningtown Ride . . . 
Slipping in to join the
books and the Smith Corona–thanks to a favorite aunt, wife of the favorite
uncle–came a Phonola High Fidelity Record Player, breadbox-size, portable, tan
& cream, a second speaker in the detachable lid; on the face of it the only
three knobs you would ever really need: base, treble, and loudness.
Along with the Phonola came
an assortment of records, mostly singles, 45 rpm.  One of the singles happened to be by a
singer/songwriter Malvina Reynolds: Morningtown
Ride.  I listened to it.  It was definitely juvenile stuff.  I listened to it again.  And again. 
And again, until it took up (I later realized) permanent residence in my
brain.
Train whistle blowing, makes a sleepy
noise,
Underneath their blankets go all the girls and boys.
Heading from the station, out along the bay,
All bound for Morningtown, many miles away.
Sarah’s at the engine, Tony rings the
bell,
John swings the lantern to show that all is well.
Rocking, rolling, riding, out along the bay,
All bound for Morningtown, many miles away.
Maybe it is raining where our train will
ride,
But all the little travelers are snug and warm inside.
Somewhere there is sunshine, somewhere there is day,
Somewhere there is Morningtown, many miles away.
Years later I heard Malvina
Reynolds on the radio, when Morningtown
Ride recorded by the Australian group The Seekers had become a surprise
hit.  Reynolds said, “I know youngsters
hate to go to bed at night because it seems like, as far as they’re concerned,
it is the end of the world. Going to sleep means you are going to be cut off
from everything, and I wanted to help them understand that they were heading
somewhere, when they got into bed, that they were heading for morning.”
At fourteen, naturally, I didn’t
think going to bed meant the end of the world. 
I wanted to travel, to get out of my room, and not to be “cut off
from everything.”  I didn’t want the
alternative to be having to join the boys in the street.  I wanted an alternative that was right for me,
something that was me, something that told me I was “heading
somewhere.”  Until it appeared, I’d hang
on to my apartness, to remain “snug and warm inside.”
   
So, this silly little song,
perhaps in the shock of my being exposed for the first time to the innocence–and
wisdom–of a nursery rhyme, assured me . . .
. . . somewhere there is sunshine,
somewhere there is day . . .
A silly little song that
was–and remains–my foster Mother Goose.

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.
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Down by the River by Ray S

     Sometime during the latter half of the
19th century the designer of New York’s Central Park took on the project to
plan a bucolic suburban community west of the city of Chicago.  Riverside was appropriately named due to the
proximity of the Des Plaines River.
     It is a quaint town replete with streets
that meander like the river—so much so that visitors always lost their way in
this would be enchanted forest.
     Civic buildings patterned in the
Medieval/Gothic revival mode.  Added to
the mix was the requisite Alpine chalet and Victorian gingerbread styles.  All in all quite a charming big city get away
for a weekend in the country (with apologies to what’s his name).
     Growing up in this never never land in the
1930’s was in retrospect a  fabulous
experience, but at age 10 I took it all for granted and always managed to find
the trail of bread crumbs home after school.
    I recall a winter’s late afternoon with the
gas street lamps casting a golden glow on the snow.  I trudged home but pausing to make a snow angel,
in hopes some unsuspecting good Samaritan would find me and offer to save me
from a death of frost bite.
     At a bend of the river there is a great
depression and sledding hill called the Swan Pond where everyone gathered when
the snow was good to go coasting down the hills. And when it was good and cold
so the river froze there was ice skating.
     Ultimately the little town grew to be a
full blown bedroom community for office workers and professionals commuting
daily to the Loop on the CB&Q.
     Along with Chicago’s Century of Progress,
there lacked sufficient progress to prevent that city’s use of the Des Plaines
as a waste disposal.  Often barely a
trickle, and source of malodorous bouquet, sometimes when we ventured to the
river’s edge we found many curiosities to wonder about.  Why were there always those white balloons
washed up on the shore?
     Under the railroad trestle there was a
colony of men camping. These were the flotsam and jetsam of the depression
called hobos.  We stood at a distance and
stared and they didn’t object to our quiet intrusions.  The only time you might have occasion to
converse with one of these men is when they came around to the back door to
collect some food the housewives would leave on the steps.  Remember, this was the NRA.
     Mother either didn’t know or trusted all
was safe as her progeny dawdled about the shores of the river, the Hobo camp, and
scampered across the railroad bridge if a train wasn’t imminent.
     So goes the remembrance of Down By The
River.

About the Author

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The Interview by Michael King

For
several years I’ve been going to the GLBT Center for a program called
“Telling Your Story”. Each week we have a topic which runs the gamut
from “Weather” to “Queer, Just How Queer?” to “Mud”
to “Drama Queen” and so on. When I first started going to “Story
time,” the other name we call it, I would choke up and remember
experiences that I had so suppressed that I hadn’t thought about them for 60 or
so years. It seemed that once acknowledging the pain and denials of these old
happenings, I was relieved and another piece of my baggage seemed to have been
dealt with. The experience I’m writing about this time is a little different as
I am consciously telling about something for the purpose of sharing and also for
reflecting on or getting in touch with not only my feelings but also to share
these experiences with others that might want to know about the events of the
last few days.
The topic for July 16, 2012
is “The Interview.”
I
looked up the word “interview” in my little pocket dictionary and was
surprised that my concept of the word differed some from Merriam Webster’s: 1:
a formal consultation; 2: a meeting at which a writer or reporter obtains information
from a person; also the written account of such a meeting.
My
thoughts on the topic were more along the lines of a job interview or a TV
program technique, and I guess that does also apply within the dictionary’s
definition. If that’s the case then the
meeting Merlyn and I had on Thursday would or could be called an interview,
though at the time I didn’t know I would be writing an account of the
experience.
On
Wednesday I stopped by the office to pick up the rent receipts. Mable asked if
I had been to my apartment yet. I said “no” and she said that someone
from the victim assistance unit had been there and had left a note under my
door. I thought that someone had reported the injuries to my face and knee from
having had a bad fall after tripping on the raised sidewalk some 9 days
earlier. Perhaps they thought it was a gay bashing or mugging.
Entering
my apartment, I picked up the form that had been shoved under my door.
“City
and County of Denver, Department of Safety. July 11, 2012. 1:30PM I am very
sorry to have to bring you this news. There has been an emergency and I was
unable to contact you in person. Therefore, you have been requested to contact (then
written on a blank line) Lindsay–Boulder coroner’s office–at (the number) who
has more information concerning this situation.” It went on to state that
they would give me assistance and who to contact in their office.
I
immediately knew what had happened. I was sure that a homeless man I had known
years before had died. His name was Michael and has been one of the people I
most love. It was near impossible to relate to Michael, but the place in my
heart though full of love also has had a very big hole.
I
called Lindsey, got a recording to call another number and finally got her on
the phone. I gave her my name and she confirmed that it was Michael who had
died and that I was the only name on his emergency contact from some paperwork
the police had access to. Lindsay is Kayla Wallace’s assistant. Kayla is the
lead investigating officer.
Michael
had died in his sleep at The Boulder Shelter for the Homeless. I called there
and left a message (standard operating 
procedure) I also found out that the case manager for Michael at the
shelter was Karyn. I called her and she said that the body had been found that
morning in his bunk when he didn’t wake up.
Merlyn,
my companion and I talked a lot about Michael and my experiences with him years
earlier. A few weeks ago Merlyn had helped me do a search for Michael thru an
agency we found on the internet. It gave his previous addresses. I recognized
some of them from years and years ago. One was in Boulder and we planned to
check it out sometime even though I thought that it too was an old address.
I
have thought much about Michael over the years and wondered what he was doing
and how he was. I have gone over and over in my mind what I could do or could
have done. Long ago I realized that he preferred the homeless lifestyle, but I
could never grasp why that would be his choice. He knew how to work the system, and he had been very good at it when I knew him. But the last time either
anyone in his family or I had seen him was 15 or so years ago. He liked Boulder
and I assumed that that was where he probably was. His brother-in-law had seen
him a couple of times, but there was never a further contact.
Merlyn
suggested we go to see the shelter and maybe find out if anyone knew him and
could fill us in on his life since I last saw him. Thursday morning I called
Karyn and made arrangements to meet her and see the bunk where Michael died.
By
this time I was already fatigued.  I had
spent most of Wednesday afternoon and evening talking to Michael’s sisters and brother-in-law, and finally his brother called me from Albuquerque while Merlyn
and I were at Taco Bell. Merlyn had wanted to take me out to dinner and even
though I wasn’t very hungry I needed to take a walk. My knee was stiff and
sore. I was spacey from the pain pills and exhausted from all the phone calls
as well as the emotions of the day. I don’t hear well, so when I got a call on
Merlyn’s cell phone I didn’t have any idea who I was talking to. I had only
known that Michael’s brother had been named Jonathan so I didn’t connect when
the caller said it was Jon. Finally he explained that he was Michael’s brother.
I had now talked to two of Michael’s sisters and his brother-in-law several
times and now his brother.  Michael’s
mother is in the hospital with a brain tumor which causes her to be erratic and
hallucinative.
Jon
certainly has his hands full. He seems to be a really nice person. He asked if
I would send him some of Michael’s ashes. He will wait until his mother can
accept the news. Surgery is scheduled for the 25th and one of the sisters is
planning to be there also.
So
Merlyn drove me to Boulder and we met with Karyn. This is what I will call the
interview; finding out what the life and last days of a homeless man was like.
What has happened in the last 15 years?
I
think it was a UPS guy at the door with Karyn when we arrived. He left and she
warmly greeted us and took us to her office. Even though she had only been
Michael’s case manager for a few months she had know him for some time. She had
been fond of him. Her description was of a quiet, but friendly and quite
independent, pleasant loaner. His history was a pattern of using the shelter,
getting into a housing program, breaking the rules by letting others crash at
his place, then losing his housing and repeating the cycle. He maintained close
contact with mental health and between all the agencies he successfully had
food, clothing, shelter and money for cigarettes. He knew and was known by his
community of choice. Karyn said he was very dark. I think probably from the sun
as he was fair and had been a blond when he was younger. She was surprised to
find out that he was only 47; apparently he looked much older. I would have
thought his hair would have been gray, but she said there was very little gray.
She figured he was part Native American from his looks and mentioned that it
was as if he was a hippy from the 60s. Michael had told people that he was in
fact a Native American, a veteran who had suffered injuries in the war and
numerous other scenarios that weren’t true.
Tim,
another case worker, knocked on the door. After introductions, explained that
he had known Mike, as they all called him, for 12 years.  The interview confirmed that Michael was for
the last 15 or so years duplicating the patterns that had been my experience
years before when I helped him find housing, get food and checked regularly to
see how he was doing.
Karyn
showed us the bunk Michael was sleeping in when he died.
There
were so many things for me to process. I think that was true for Merlyn as
well. My worst fears over the years had been dispelled. He wasn’t found in some
dark alley. He hadn’t been mugged or beaten. He apparently wasn’t on drugs,
other than prescription drugs. He wasn’t in a filthy, rundown shelter. Quite
the opposite. He had spent a total of 1100 nights over the last 10 years at the
shelter, almost a third of the time. It is a newish, modern and spacious
building, very clean and well appointed. The group areas are warm and
comfortable and the outdoor recreation and sitting space is very nice; quite
comfortable. The shelter opens in the evening and is empty during the day. The
men and women have a bus that takes them downtown, but it is only one way. Many
can be seen on the streets. They are checked for alcohol when returning. The
rules are strict, but humane and they are treated with dignity and respect.
Karyn
shared that Michael had a sense of humor, that several days ago she had
observed Michael sitting outside in the recreation area as another homeless man
was shooting baskets all by himself. When finished, the basketball guy was
heading back to the building and as he passed Michael, Michael asked him ”
Who won?”
Now
for my observations and reflections. Michael was in a very nice shelter,
perhaps nicer than the best youth hostel that I ever stayed in. It reminded me
of the one in Amsterdam. He was in the Transition Unit, which means that by the
end of August he would have been in permanent housing. He was on an up cycle.
Both
his older sister and Merlyn have encouraged me to write about why Michael may
have chosen being homeless as a lifestyle. He didn’t have to be alone. There
were other people around and he could relate to them as he chose or he could be
by himself. He didn’t have to clean up his living space, a kitchen, bathroom,
bedroom, do the laundry or maintain and protect possessions. When he needed
clean clothing, there were places to pick up what he needed. There are places
to get food and places to shower and sleep. No one expected him to “make
something of himself”. He didn’t have to work or compete for position,
take orders, follow a schedule, maintain equipment or appliances, be indebted
to banks, credit card companies, or make payments on a car, a mortgage, a
student loan or be responsible for hospital and doctor bills. He could observe
the world go by and feel free, detached and could participate in conversation
and some activities with others as he wanted to. He was not responsible for
children, a wife, girlfriend, lover or anyone except himself, and then only to
be in some program or another that provided his needs when and as he wanted. I
think that once he was in permanent housing he would soon get lonesome, miss
the street companions and before long be living in filth and squalor, let
others crash there and loose that privilege again as has happened in the past.
The shelters for the homeless and living on the streets gave him the
fulfillment of his physical and emotional needs, companionship and a security
without responsibility.
Since
his snoring was very loud and erratic he may have had sleep asthenia, quit
breathing. The autopsy will take 6 to 8 weeks.
The
body was transferred to Crist Mortuary and sometime, probably this week, will
be cremated.
My
interview concerned a 47 year old man that I had known in the past and that
lived most of his life in and out of homeless shelters. It seems he had a good
soul. Though his family wasn’t capable of sharing their lives with him and vise
versa. He was loved. Though interactions had been difficult, he was always
loving.
I
feel that I can report to his brother and 3 sisters that he lived a life that
he chose and did it on his own terms. He had the respect of those who live that
lifestyle and those who provide services. He was apparently well liked. He
achieved his goals. He had mastered the skills necessary for life on the
streets.
I
have a sense of closure and feel privileged to have known and loved Michael. My
deep love comes in part from the fact that I was his father.

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.
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Till Death Us Do Part by Nicholas

Jamie and I never thought we would get
married. Through all the debate over gay marriage, we never felt really drawn
to it. We never thought about going to Massachusetts or to Canada as friends of
ours had to get hitched. We didn’t jump onto an airplane in February 2004 and
head to San Francisco when Mayor Gavin Newsum started issuing marriage licenses
and Jamie’s mom inquired as to whether or not we would—as I’m sure she deeply
wished. Long active in the struggle for gay marriage, she had flung herself
into that fray by driving up to the city from Menlo Park to volunteer as a
witness for couples who showed up at San Francisco City Hall. Her fondest hope
was to see her gay son married someday.
Jamie and I always said that, yes, we would
like to marry but only when it became immediately and practically real where we
live—in Colorado—and that did not look too likely in our lifetimes. We knew who
we were and we were confident about our love for and commitment to one another
so until legal realities caught up with our reality, we stayed home.
We did take care to put in place any legal
arrangements available to protect our relationship. We had our last wills and
testaments, legal powers of attorney, medical directives, medical powers of
attorney, house ownership agreement, and even, our official certificate of
domestic partnership from the City and County of Denver. We even carry these
documents with us in our cars should we ever need them in an emergency without
time to go home and retrieve them. We were set.
Of course, it all depended on the whim of whomever
might challenge us as to whether any of our documents and legal constructions
would work. Because, of course, we weren’t married.
Married couples don’t ever have to produce legal documents to justify
themselves.
Then May 15, 2008 happened. The California
Supreme Court ruled that the State of California had no justification to
prohibit the marriage of two people of the same gender. It amounted to
discrimination. California was liberated.
When I heard the news flash on the radio, my
instant response was: Let’s go home to California, where we used to live and
still had family and friends, and get married.
That day, Jamie was with his mom in Minnesota
visiting friends and relatives and my big worry was that she, with her activism
for marriage equality, would start lobbying for her son and prospective
son-in-law to do the wedding march ASAP. That, I feared, would only spark
Jamie’s resistance—we had so often said that marriage was not for us until some
unspecifiable time in the future, i.e., probably never. And there’s nothing
like a nagging mother to produce a quick “No.”

I hastily phoned him on his cell hoping to
short circuit what I imagined to be my mother-in-law’s certain campaign. Yes,
he and mom had heard the news and talked about it, he said. But, no, she hadn’t
been urging him/us to wed. She must really want this to happen, I thought;
she’s laying low. The motherly artillery was for now quiet.
I had my opening. I asked Jamie if he wanted
to go to California and get married, the closest to a proposal I’d ever make.
And he replied, to my surprise, that, yea, he would, the closest to a yes, I’d
ever hear.
I can’t explain this sudden turn about in
feelings toward getting married. We still would gain nothing in the state where
we lived. In fact, marriage was still as legally empty for us as it ever was.
Nothing would change. Maybe because we met and lived together in San Francisco
before moving to Denver and still had family and friends there and are always
going there that California is still was kind of home. It just felt like the
right thing for us to do. And that’s how we entered the dazzling world of
wedding planning. We were going all the way—a church wedding and catered
reception. Mom was paying.
From indifferent to ardent believers in 30
seconds. I’ve heard all the jokes—and told them—about marriage being a
wonderful institution but who wants to live in an institution. I guess we just
gave into the romance of the idea. Isn’t that why people get married
everywhere? It’s the romance, never mind the legal goodies, which, after all,
we now qualified for in at least 6 states and the District of Columbia. Of
course, we were also entering a legal Alice in Wonderland as to which rights we
had depending on which geographical location we were in. We could get bigger
and then we could get smaller.
We’ve never regretted our marriage. In fact,
we were both kind of surprised that it did seem to make a difference. We began
to think of ourselves in different terms as more than a couple, but a
recognized and sanctioned couple. It isn’t just straight people who have to
adjust their idea of marriage to include gay and lesbian couples. Now that we
have something we never in our wildest imaginations thought we would ever have,
we too wonder what this means. Are we changing the definition of marriage, like
the gay-haters say? Well, I hope so.
What, for example, do we call ourselves?
Spouses? Husbands? I don’t like the term “husband”—it implies there’s a “wife”
somewhere—but it does spell it all out in just one word and we’ve come to use
it. We love each other, we’re committed to each other, we share property, we
can make decisions for each other, and we have sex. No explanations are needed
as to who my “friend” is.



There’s a catch, though, Here’s the catch. We can’t get divorced. Anyone can go to California and get married. Only legal residents of California can use divorce court. We’re not residents. So, we are stuck. Stuck with each other for life. But that’s just where we want to be.

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.
Posted on

MY Did It Rain by Betsy

“This has got to be the worst weather yet,
don’t you think,” asked Carole.  “And I’m
getting really cold.”
No wonder. 
We had been pedaling our bikes since day break in the pouring rain.  We were completely saturated and it was
barely mid-morning. 
“Let’s stop for coffee if we ever come to a
shop.”  We had seen nothing but flooded
farmers’ fields for the last 10 miles.  
“We’re going toward the river road. 
The next town should be coming up soon,” said Cathy hopefully.
Another five miles and we did reach the river
road.  No sign of the town or our support
vehicle known as Bo Peep–so named because she was always losing us–her
sheep.  Nor had there been a sign of tour
company’s van and the trailer hauling our luggage and traveling kitchen. 
“It’s getting so dark, “yelled Cathy. 
“The weather just keeps getting worse.  Let’s just hope we don’t get serious thunder
and lightning.  We’ll have to hole-up for
awhile if that happens.  Meantime, I
would like to get to a coffee shop as soon as possible,” I said. Privately I
was thinking, “I MUST get to a coffee shop soon.”
This was Mississippi in late April.  We had completed 2/3 of our cycling trip from
the Pacific Ocean to the Atlantic.  Up to
now–from California to Louisiana– the weather had been pretty good.  Not perfect, but mostly dry and benign.   It had obviously been raining here for quite
some time.  The fields in this rural area
of southern Mississippi were badly flooded and the rivers were very high.
Just when the rain did let up a bit we came upon
a low-lying section of road about 1/4 mile long.  The water was completely covering the road;
so deep, we could not actually be sure we were on the pavement.  We had no choice but to carry our bicycles
through the two feet of water to the place beyond where the road became visible
again.  Not only was the road covered,
but also there was a rather formidable current running across it coming out of
a nearby swamp.
          As
we were emerging from this quagmire almost home free, we heard a vehicle
droning along behind us.  It was our tour
van and trailer.  The van was doing well
to get through the flooded road.  The
attached trailer on the other hand, was literally floating atop the water, its
wheels having most definitely left the ground, moving at an angle in the
current while at the same time holding on for dear life to it’s life support,
the van, which we all prayed would not stall in the flood.  We stood gaping in horror at this sight each
of us going over in our heads the condition our belongings would be in by the
time they reached dry ground. 
“My computer is in there, cried Carole.  Mine, too,” screamed Cathy.
Talking about the events of the day at our
group gathering that evening Cathy, Carole and I learned that we were fortunate
to be one of the first groups to finish that ride that day.  We were indeed glad of this when one woman
said “ Walking our bikes through the water wouldn’t have been so bad if someone
hadn’t told us beforehand to watch out for the snakes and alligators!”  The three of us agreed we were much better
off not knowing about those hazards. And we were relieved
to learn that the van trailer kept our belongings dry and secure.
“Of course,” I thought.  “It was floating.  It must be water-tight.”  A good thing! 
We had stew for dinner that night.  Claudia, our cook and heroic van driver, had
purchased everything for tonight’s dinner early that morning before the watery
event.  It was all safe and sound in the
trailer kitchen she assured us.  But I’m
not so sure.  I could have sworn that
stew meat had a gamey, reptilian taste to it.

About the Author

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

Life in the Big City by the Bay by Pat Gourley

So
having now been a San Francisco resident for several months there have been a
few observations I have made that make me realize I am no longer in Denver. This
is a town I have visited many times over the last nearly 35 years but being
here for a prolonged period brings into sharper focus some of its
uniqueness.  Though I had gotten to know
the City pretty well over several decades of visiting I was still here as a
tourist really.

I
am going to list just some of the striking images and elements I have come in
contact with in my new home. These are not things I think are necessarily
better than in Denver but definitely different. Stuff that seems to have at
least temporarily left an impression:

1)  
Shortly
after arriving I had to go downtown to the Apple store for some gadget or the
other and on entering the store I was greeted and assisted by a sweet young
Bear in a kilt and very neatly pressed blue hanky in his left pocket!

2)  
I
did participate in the LGBT Pride parade here in late June. It was in most
respects similar to the event in Denver especially the commercialization and
corporate sponsorship that has taken over these Stonewall Riot commemorations.
What was different though was that I was able to march the entire length of the
parade with a modest but very vocal contingent of 25-30 folks in support of
Bradley Manning. Manning of course is the young gay hero currently imprisoned
by the military for supposedly leaking classified documents detailing among
other things potential war crimes committed in Iraq to Julian Assange and
Wikileaks.

3)  
Real
Farmer’s Markets!! The one I go to most often, though they can be found
everyday somewhere in the City, is at Civic Center now three days a week. By real
I mean there is stand after stand of fresh fruits and vegetables and most
vendors focus on one or just a few items: nuts, mushrooms, or eggs with other vendors
selling only organic greens of all sorts, many new to me, and then the melon
and stone fruit dealers and their many free samples. Most markets have very
limited or no non-edible items for sale and no prepared foods. The idea is to
take it home to eat and cook if needed.

4)  
Somewhat
related are the fading green grocers. There are still quite a few corner
markets (no 7-Elevens to be seen) most of which do have fresh produce but there
are still a few that really are green grocers. My favorite being across from the
Safeway on Church Street.

5)  
On
a less esthetic note the recent announcements that the escalators at the BART
stations at Civic Center and 16th & Mission had been closed
having broken down because of excessive fecal contamination in the works! Still
not sure why anyone would take a shit on an escalator? I mean what does one do
if your pants get caught in the works?

6)  
Public
transportation that really functions quite well most of the time goes almost
everywhere and costs less than RTD in Denver. MUNI fare is $2.00 and in a year
and half once I hit 65 it will only cost 75 cents!

7)  
Rats.
The City has lots and a long and checkered history with the varmints.  I brought my two cats out with me and they
are particularly fond of nighttime garden forays and I have no doubt this is
part rat patrol! Though I think they would be clueless if they ran into one up
close. I have just finished a great non-fiction read called The Barbary
Plague by Marilyn Chase. The fascinating tale of the bubonic plague in San
Francisco in the early 1900’s and the amazing efforts of the city’s politicians
and merchants to deny it and when acknowledging it at all to blame it on the
Chinese. Racism that was shocking in its openly, blatant and crass extent.

8)   Mark Twains
frequently quoted observation: The
coldest winter I ever saw was the summer I spent in San Francisco”. He
wasn’t kidding. Perhaps it’s my Irish roots but I have really enjoyed the
frequently cool, misty, foggy mornings walking to my gym. Most often the fog
dissipates by early afternoon to be replaced by a brisk ocean breezes being
sucked inland by the torrid temperatures just a few miles to the east.

9)   I have joined a gym I
enjoy very much but now find my work out compatriots to be mostly older
Japanese men rather than older white guys. I am a member of a club up near
Japantown and there are plenty of gay folks of all ages and stripes too. I
avoided the gym facilities on Market and SOMA that cater to the sculpted queer
boys.

10)              
 The sight of naked
people, most often male but not always, walking down the street on most sunny
days is still a bit jarring. The locals though hardly ever seem to notice. I am
not well versed in the law but understand that public nudity is not a crime in
San Francisco. The idea supposedly is a celebration of the naked human form but
I wonder if pure nudist philosophy doesn’t cross over to voyeurism for some
when there is a cock-ring involved?

11)              
 I have met very
few confirmed and practicing Buddhists, though I do live across the street
almost from the San Francisco Zen Center. I must say there are more statues of
Buddha in this town in private homes and in various businesses than you can
shake a stick at. Countless different depictions of the Enlightened One everywhere certainly can’t hurt I suppose. There is also
currently a large red inflatable lotus in the public square to the east of City
Hall.

12)              
There are many bicycles on the streets and though I think
this is wonderful and would probably support a total private automobile ban in
the city the reality is you are more likely to get hit by a scofflaw bicyclist
than a motorist. I prefer to walk with both eyes wide open!

13)              
The fog! Oh my I find it, so far at least, to be amazing
in its many forms and permutations and love especially when it races and snakes
into town pushed along by a cool wind. Have I already mentioned my Irish
heritage?

I
expect this partial list of San Francisco life impressions will continue to
grow and be updated and added to from time to time.

Hugs
and kisses from the City by the Bay.

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.

Posted on

Secrets by Donny Kaye

My
nine year old granddaughter told me yesterday that secrets can be good or
bad.  She went on to say that a secret
was good if you have just gotten a new puppy and want to surprise someone with
it.  When I asked her about when secrets
are bad she said, “Papa, you just feel bad inside with some secrets”.  As Lauren answered me, I recognized once
again, how early in life we are introduced to secrets and how they typically register
at the earliest of ages as “making you feel badly inside” and fill one with confusion,
disconnection and wonder about the truth.
Last
Saturday, the lay organist searched out the melodious tune of Amazing Grace on
the transportable electric keyboard organ in the gathering area at the small
town funeral home.  I was intrigued to
watch members of my extended family solemnly entering the memorial service in
remembrance of their recently deceased loved one, my aunt.    As I
witnessed their somber entrance, I was filled with fleeting remembrances of my
own of the stories that are part of my heritage in the Irish Catholic family I
grew up in.  Most of the stories I was
recalling have been figured out in time, realizing that secrets flourish in my
family’s history.
          My
cousin Mary spoke so eloquently at her mother’s funeral the other morning.  There is still confusion in the family about
her children and husband.  It seems that
after she was first married and had a child, she left her husband and child for
the man next door and his children.  No
one has ever breathed a word about this episode.  It’s treated more like she got confused one
night and entered the wrong house when she came home and no one ever had
courage enough to correct her error. 
There
is the secret about Cousin Bill who one day just disappeared from the family.  As a child I watched the eye brows raise in
the hush of the conversation about Bill. He was older and really cool and one
of my cousins who I enjoyed the most. 
Where did he go?  What could he have
done that resulted in such secrecy? Years later I learned that he was gay and
just disappeared because it seemed easier than to try and find acceptance
within the family.  
Or
Cousin Diane, whose children just disappeared one day, leaving all of the
others of us kids wondering if the same could happen to us, and nothing would
be said. 
To
add to the confusion and deceit there was Cousin Rogene, who after an extended
stay in California, returned home with triplets.  I was only ten and couldn’t understand how
that happened.  Only at her funeral some fifty
years later did I learn that the triplet’s father had secretly continued to
visit his lover, my cousin, on weekends when he could travel to Denver, leaving
behind his other wife and children in California.  It would have been nice to know that she
really hadn’t gone through life totally alone as a single mom. 
And
Amazing Grace played on.
As I
was overcome by emotions sitting in the memorial service as a result of the,
“bad feelings inside”, to quote my granddaughter Lauren, I found it difficult
to breath knowing my own story of secrecy related to my homosexuality and I
wondered how my deceit  would ever find a
place of acceptance and understanding within my family? No wonder my Cousin
Bill just disappeared one day.
On
Friday night before the funeral, I was visiting with my niece, who is my age
mate and who grew up with me more as my sister who lived next door. We were
recalling humorously, our learning in high school that one of our family had
been suspended from school because of the “m” word.  The only “m” word that she understood at that
point in her life was menstruation.   Did
this mean boys menstruated too?  This
secret confused her for a number of years; thinking that she didn’t want to get
caught having her period at school, for fear that she would get suspended like
our cousin.  She was in her late twenties
when she realized our Cousin William had been suspended for
getting caught masturbating at school.  Oh,
that
“M” word!  Needless to say, not only do
secrets make you feel bad inside, they can create situations of immense
confusion and major misunderstanding.
         It seems that sexual secrets
abound in our family.  My sister, who was
sixteen years my senior, recalled for me long after I was married that our
mother had bitterly handed her a brown paper bag as she prepared to leave her
wedding reception.  In the bag was a jar
of Vaseline and a douche bag.  Our
mother’s words to her on this significant occasion were, “Here, you will need
these!”  These were the only words ever
spoken to my sister about sex.  This
exchange of the brown paper bag constituted her sex education it seemed.   
In
the hours since this weekend’s family gathering, I’ve not only been aware of
“feeling badly” about the secrets I have created and allowed in my life, I’m
also aware of anger and sadness that comes up for me.  I know that there has been no spaciousness
within my life experience for fifty some years, regarding my sexuality. As I
realize this, I also recognize that I have been the one agreeing to and
perpetuating the secret concerning my sexuality.  As my granddaughter said to me yesterday,
some secrets are good, some bad.  Out of
fear and a sense of inadequacy within me to language my sexuality, I created
the secret in my life related to who I am. 
         Secrets, despite them
creating bad feelings and a sense of disconnection, isolation and separateness,
you’ve got to laugh.  Secrets revealed or
not can be quite humorous.
What
I recognize now is that living the secret is far more energy consuming than
living the truth.  Others do figure it
out, eventually.  The real price of
having a secret comes at the expense of the one living the secret.  After all, only my closest friends realized
the enjoyment I had shopping for my aunt’s funeral  for the perfect muted pattern scarf in purple,
pink and red to wear with my European cut pink shirt and skinny jeans.

About the Author

Posted on

Hallowe’en by Ricky

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The symbol of “Candy Day”

My earliest memories of Hallowe’en involve two years of costumes and large shopping bags of goodies. I only remember one of my costumes, Superman. (I even had a cape.) Mother made it for me. During both years, I remember  mother and father walked with me and several neighborhood parents with kids around to a lot of houses.

This is NOT me.
In those days homemade and store bought goodies were about equally distributed. My favorite was the chocolate candies as one might expect. Somehow the overstuffed very large shopping bags (we went out again when the first bag was full) I lugged about were mysteriously emptied long before I could have eaten even a tenth of my haul. Don’t you just love parents who “wisely” protect you from all that candy? Of course, these were the days before apples with inserted razor blades created a Hallowe’en panic among parents.

While living with my grandparents on their farm, there was no Hallowe’en trick or treating. The neighbors were too far away. So, I had to be content with the in school Hallowe’en “parties”. In replacement, we did celebrate “May Day” in the farming communities on May first each year. Basically, we would deliver a basket of goodies to a neighbor’s farm house, knock on the door and yell “May Day”, then run and hide in a large scale game of Hide-and-Seek.

Grandparent’s farm house in Minnesota.

Once back with my mother, I went by myself trick or treating until my little brother and sister were old enough to go, and then I took them. One year (the last I ever went) my friend, Jimmy and I did pull a couple of “tricks” on two houses. We used ski wax to write four letter words on two-car’s windows. Ski wax is hard to get off.

On the path to delinquency.

I was not always a nice kid.

It is said that, “A mind is a terrible thing to waste.” (referring to not educating a mind), and that is certainly true. However, when a person has a good, sound, healthy, and well educated mind, but doesn’t use the knowledge stored therein, I submit it is a greater tragedy and even a bigger waste. Unfortunately, I once fell into this category (at least I hope it was only once). 

Back-in-the-day, whatever day that was, I was married and living in Marana, AZ. It was in late October when I arrived home for lunch and discovered that my wife had just finished “cooking down” a pumpkin in preparation to making pumpkin pie. I rushed over to taste it and she warned me that it was hot. So, not being stupid (or so I thought then), I obtained a spoon from the silverware drawer and dipped it into the golden elixir, started to blow upon it to cool it down to enjoyable tasting temperature, then she also warned me that there was no “spice” in it yet. So, not being stupid (or so I thought then), I replied, “So what? It’s pumpkin!”. I then proceeded to put the spoon in my mouth to enjoy the near ambrosia delicacy. I removed the spoon, swirled the contents about my mouth, and promptly spit it out into the sink. This wasn’t pumpkin, it was squash!! I have hated squash ever since I was 4.

I did learn several things from this event:  

1. Pumpkins are squashes; 

2. I hate the flavor of squash not the texture; 


3. What good is knowledge if you don’t use it?; 


4. When someone warns you about something, if there is time, ask “What are you warning me about?”; 

5. Unpleasant things can be made pleasurable, if disguised properly; 

6. I’m not stupid, but I don’t know everything; 

7. I should have put more trust in my wife, because she remembered that I didn’t like squash and warned me; and 

8. My wife made an outstanding pumpkin pie.

This one is MINE! Go get your own.

About the Author



Emerald Bay – Lake Tahoe

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

When united with his mother and new stepfather, he lived at Emerald Bay and then at South Lake Tahoe, California, graduating from South Tahoe High School in 1966.  After two 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.  “I find writing these memories to be very therapeutic.”

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

Posted on

Queer, Just How Queer by Phillip Hoyle

      I love to use the word queer, the term brought into gay prominence in political and academic queering movements of the 1960s through the 90s. I also like it for the memories it raises of my grandma Pink, who in old fashion used the word for anything odd. I like it for its political symbolism and for making positive a word too long used as a pejorative. I like it for its strength. I like it for its inclusive quality covering the bases of LGBTandQ concerns. I like it for its exclusive quality, as in not too many people I run into want to be called by this moniker. I especially like the discomfort its use raises among some of my gay friends! It’s a word of wide potential and great humor. So just how queer am I? It’s a fair question. I’ll try to answer it once and for all.

     This morning I looked through the photographs on my digital camera that included those I took last summer at Pridefest Denver 2012. I was surprised to find there quite a few more images, ones I thought had been erased when I uploaded them into my computer. I flipped through frame after frame and saw so much of my life there, even photos from Pridefest Denver 2011. First I saw a photo of my partner’s 90-year-old mother, sitting at the kitchen table drinking her morning coffee. I often kid her about all her gay sons although only one of her offspring turned out to be gay. Her multiplicity of gay sons is made up of all of Jim’s and my gay friends. I call them her growing family of gay kids. She smiles for me and takes delight in these others who bring her presents of chocolate, humor, and unaffected affection. She represents in this picture a nine-year connection I have with her son and the growing numbers of her other gay sons. The photo reveals layer after layer of queer experience and relationship, but it’s just the beginning. I did mention two sets of photos taken at Pridefest, but I haven’t yet told of the hundreds of photos of the family of plastic pink flamingos that live in our yard shown standing alone and together among a variety of ferns. I took these and many more in the past couple of years, the queer obsession of a queer artist! I also haven’t mentioned many photos of flowers, of my artwork, of self-portraits, of extreme Christmas decorations at a local gay bar, of the bunch of men I run with at parties, in restaurants, and on the street. I haven’t told you of pictures of an art display, of drag queens, of small, large, and supersized lesbians, of gay architects and engineers, of employees of Chipotle restaurants, of young people polling for the Obama campaign, of great arches of rainbow colored balloons, of a guy wearing fairy wings, of a barely-clad muscle man standing by a muscle car, of the model in a platinum blond wig and red bikini sitting in a red convertible advertising At the Beach, of a parade on-looker smoking a huge stogie, of people dancing, of a young drag queen posing sexily for me, of a young man in shorts sitting on the curb with his little dog watching the parade, of political signs urging the election of sane officials, of leather studs, of a drum and bagpipe band in their smart kilts, of religiously motivated anti-gay protesters, of two young guys in interestingly revealing slacks, of Senior Citizens doing a dance routine with their walkers, of youngsters calling attention to Rainbow Alley, of the prominent landmark The Center makes along the route, of the partiers on its roof sometimes watching the parade passing by below, of the poignant reminder of the ongoing presence of AIDS among us, of wild hairdos, of the Imperial Court, or of the leathery Uncle Sam who stopped to ask me, “Where’s the free beer?” I haven’t said a word of many other pictures of musicians, dancers, activists, on and on. These photos are my people whom I celebrate with my little digital camera as passionately as Walt Whitman in the nineteenth century celebrated the democracy of America, the endless variety of life, the human body, his own body, and his sturdy comrades with whom he liked to lie in Leaves of Grass. 

     So just how queer am I? Really, really queer. I’ve been trying to tell you just how queer in my stories! In summary of all I’ve said to you in the past, hear this: 

* I’m as queer as the little boy who wanted to wear both cowboy and Indian costumes in public.
* I’m as queer as the boy who donned his great aunt’s wig and sister’s skirt and went to the family grocery store to show himself to his dad.
* I’m as queer as the teen who used to lie in bed next to his dad, not only to read alongside him but also to smell him.
* I’m as queer as the teen who bragged to another boy about marking his friend with hickies.
* I’m as queer as any teen boy singing in the school choir and more than most of them.
* I’m as queer as the high schooler who looked forward to each issue of House Beautiful.
* I’m as queer as the boy who ordered prints from a NYC art print company and treasured the company’s catalogue with its variety of homoerotic images.
* I’m as queer as the young man who discovered the striking 
International Male ads and catalogue.
* I’m as queer as the young man whose first male friend in adulthood was homosexual.
* I’m as queer as the young man who read all the homosexual-theme books in the public library.
* I’m as queer as the young man with wife and children who at age thirty fell in love with another man.
* I’m as queer as the young man who reveled in the idea he was bisexual.
* I’m as queer as the young man who discovered that his homosexual proclivities lay at the center of his sexuality.
* I’m as queer as the middle-age man who had sexual affairs with other men.
* I’m as queer as the writer who when he was asked to include cultural diversity in an adult religious education resource anthology quoted gay writers and HIV-related themes alongside many other cultural writings.
* I’m as queer as the middle-age man who left his wife to live as a gay man in a large city.
* I’m as queer as the old man who snapped photos at Pridfest knowing he was as queer as anyone there and loved the notion and the reality of it.

     I am the old man who says all these things proudly and with love, deep love for all my companions:
* Male and female
* Educated and uneducated
* Professional and worker
* Wealthy and dirt-poor
* Crazy and sane
* Chic and tasteless
* Laughing and crying
* Hale and exhausted
* Living it up and overwhelmed
     
     So, how queer am I? Pretty darn queer and happy as a lark about it.
     And now, if you’ll pose, I’ll take even more pictures with my camera, snapshots of the folk who add so richly to the queerness of my existence and the joy of my gay life. 

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.”