Tag: Lewis

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Clothes by Lewis

[I would like to begin by looking back at what happened last week with the topic being “The Person I Fall in Love with Should Be…”. As we were leaving, I was feeling disheartened for two reasons: 1) I realized that the topic I had been responsible for was not inclusive of those in the group who are in a committed relationship. It essentially left them with almost nothing to say. I apologize for that and will not allow that to happen again. 2) One of our participants made it very clear that they were not at all happy with the word “should” and made quite a point of saying that “should” is a word that should never be used as part of a topic. I wonder if we want to engage in such disparagement of a topic, especially if, as was the case last week, the originator of that topic is present.

One more comment: We have been very clear that no one is required to write on the “topic of the week”. However, I think that it is conducive to the creative process to make those deviations the exception, rather than the rule. Hearing diverse perspectives on the same topic is what makes for a stimulating hour-and-a-half and also forces us to channel our creative forces in constructive ways. ‘Nuff said about process.]

Clothes are worn for many purposes: style, status, and modesty for three. I’m going to talk about a fourth: body image. People tend to model what they think is going to “surprise and delight” the casual observer or, perhaps, significant other. Popular opinion has a way of letting someone know when they have stepped over the line of decorum and/or vogue. As a repressed exhibitionist with an eroticized libido, I have been an avid follower of these taboos for most of my life. There exists in modern American society a very distinct double-standard when it comes to the line between dress that titillates and that which commits sensory trespass.

I would like to share with you a letter written to Annie’s Mailbox advice column that was published in the Denver Post on June 29, 2003, along with the response from the columnists, Kathy Mitchell and Marcy Sugar, —

[Read letter from photocopy.]

The key to understanding the present state of our society is in the first paragraph of the response:

“Most 14-year-old boys would not be willing to put up with the teasing that Jonah is getting from his peers. Stylish or not, they would stop wearing the swimsuits. Either Jonah has tremendous self-assurance or he is enjoying these bikinis on an entirely different level.”

I have to wonder–what level would that be? The same level upon which girls of that age might enjoy wearing a bikini? I don’t think that is what is meant at all. As the responders also write, “Bikinis and thongs usually indicate something more sensual. Exhibitionism and cross-dressing are possibilities but they aren’t the only ones.” What, exactly might the others be? Homosexuality? Pedophilia? Has anyone ever asked models for the Sports Illustrated swim suit issue if they are exhibitionists? And to even suggest that “Jonah” might be a cross-dresser is to imply that thongs and bikinis are the sole province of the female gender, which is begging the very question that I am asking: Isn’t what is good for the gander also good for the goose?

When I was about 10 years old, I took a swimming class at the Hutchinson, KS, YMCA. The rules were that swimming suits were not allowed in the pool, as they might carry germs. We had to shower before we got into the pool, as well as after. I was terrified but soon got comfortable with letting it all hang out. By the time my own children were about that age, boys did not even take their swimming suits off to shower after swimming. Why the vast difference? I would welcome any and all ideas on this.

In 1990, my wife, kids and I set out for Disney World in Orlando. Wanting to appear “with it”, I bought my first pair of “surfer-style” swim trunks just for the occasion. When we went to the water park, the first thing on the kids’ agenda was the huge, serpentine water slide. Not wanting to appear skittish or square, I enthusiastically joined them. Just one problem: about 6 feet down the slide, my ridiculously bulky “trunks” grabbed hold of the slide and held on for dear life. I had to “scoot” down the remaining three stories of slide while trying not to get “rear-ended” by an unsuspecting kiddie. I have worn nothing but trusty Speedos ever since. Yes, sometimes I do feel a little “over-exposed” but at least I don’t carry a gallon of water with me whenever I get out of the pool.

[As an illustration of the fact that America’s discomfort with the male form is not universal, I am passing around a copy of Down Under: To glorify the Australian lifesaver. I have flagged a few pertinent pages.]

© September 22, 2014

About the Author

I came to the beautiful state of Colorado out of my native Kansas by way of Michigan, the state where I married and I came to the beautiful state of Colorado out of my native Kansas by way of Michigan, the state where I married and had two children while working as an engineer for the Ford Motor Company. I was married to a wonderful woman for 26 happy years and suddenly realized that life was passing me by. I figured that I should make a change, as our offspring were basically on their own and I wasn’t getting any younger. Luckily, a very attractive and personable man just happened to be crossing my path at that time, so the change-over was both fortuitous and smooth. Soon after, I retired and we moved to Denver, my husband’s home town. He passed away after 13 blissful years together in October of 2012. I am left to find a new path to fulfillment. One possibility is through writing. Thank goodness, the SAGE Creative Writing Group was there to light the way.

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Being Gay Is by Lewis

For this well-ripened and battle-hardened gay man, being gay is–

seeing the beauty and sensuality in both the male and female body;

relishing the sensibilities of both male and female;

taking care of my own body because I think it’s beautiful and deserving;

knowing the difference between my political friends and enemies;

knowing the difference my involvement can make in electing my political friends into positions of power;

believing in my bones that the form of the human body that turns one on is not a matter of choice, no matter how much others may prefer to see it as a manifestation of depravity;

knowing the difference between lust and love and when each is “of the moment”;

knowing that, while judgment of others is part of our human nature, 50% of the time it is kinder to keep those judgments to myself;

having more than a single share of empathy, for I know that the only moccasins in which I have a walked a mile are my own, and, finally;

as a member of a not-so-long-ago reviled minority, knowing that it is not enough to just “be myself”. I must also be as loving and as kind and considerate a human being as I can, for I am not only me but a representative of my own maligned and precious kind.

© 29 September 27

About the Author

I came to the beautiful state of Colorado out of my native Kansas by way of Michigan, the state where I married and I came to the beautiful state of Colorado out of my native Kansas by way of Michigan, the state where I married and had two children while working as an engineer for the Ford Motor Company. I was married to a wonderful woman for 26 happy years and suddenly realized that life was passing me by. I figured that I should make a change, as our offspring were basically on their own and I wasn’t getting any younger. Luckily, a very attractive and personable man just happened to be crossing my path at that time, so the change-over was both fortuitous and smooth. Soon after, I retired and we moved to Denver, my husband’s home town. He passed away after 13 blissful years together in October of 2012. I am left to find a new path to fulfillment. One possibility is through writing. Thank goodness, the SAGE Creative Writing Group was there to light the way.

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Artistic by Lewis

[To my
audience:  Please be forewarned that what
you are about to hear may be infused with more than a soupcon (süp- sän) of “artistic
license”.]

When
I was about eleven and on the cusp of discovering that there was something
about me that was likely to relegate me to the margins of society, I began to
explore the ways in which American popular culture might open up avenues of
expression to me that would help me to wrap my arms around who I was and, more
importantly, how I might fit in. 
It
was 1957 and there were circles of American society wherein people leaving the
movie theater or concert hall might be heard to say things like, “You may
have noticed that [take your pick] Liberace/Sal
Mineo/Anthony Perkins/Montgomery Clift is a bit on the ‘artistic’ side.”
As
people who say such things often were prone to doing so in soft voices, I
mistakenly heard them to say that the actor at issue was “a bit autistic”.  I thought it appalling that a loving god
would see fit to bestow two such strikes upon a child from the moment of their
birth but I counted my blessings in that I seemed to have been passed over for
the autism part and moved on.
Knowing
little about autism and anxious to avoid drawing attention to my own proclivities
when it comes to members of the male gender, I, thenceforth, associated being “autistic”
with anyone exhibiting a combination of three or more of the characteristics of
the classical homosexual persona.  That
is–as Wikipedia describes Franklin
Pangborn, surely one of the most “artistic actors” in Hollywood
history–“fussy…, polite, elegant, and highly energetic, often
officious, fastidious, somewhat nervous, prone to becoming flustered but
essentially upbeat, and with an immediately recognizable high-speed patter-type
speech pattern.”
I
thought I had stumbled upon a fool-proof guide as to how to behave so as not to
elicit any suspicion whatsoever that I might be “queer”.  I set about to find the movie personality who
embodied every antithetical quality so I could emulate him.  He had to be stoic, insensitive, blunt,
laid-back, modest (even falsely so), unflappable but downbeat, slow-spoken and
have nerves of steel.  In a matter of seconds,
it came to me–Rock Hudson.  We all know
how that turned out.
© 8 September 2014 

About
the Author 
 I came to the beautiful
state of Colorado out of my native Kansas by way of Michigan, the state where I
married and I came to the beautiful state of Colorado out of my native Kansas
by way of Michigan, the state where I married and had two children while working
as an engineer for the Ford Motor Company. I was married to a wonderful woman
for 26 happy years and suddenly realized that life was passing me by. I figured
that I should make a change, as our offspring were basically on their own and I
wasn’t getting any younger. Luckily, a very attractive and personable man just
happened to be crossing my path at that time, so the change-over was both
fortuitous and smooth.
Soon after, I retired and we
moved to Denver, my husband’s home town. He passed away after 13 blissful years
together in October of 2012. I am left to find a new path to fulfillment. One
possibility is through writing. Thank goodness, the SAGE Creative Writing Group
was there to light the way.
Posted on

Clothes by Lewis

[I
would like to begin by looking back at what happened last week with the topic
being “The Person I Fall in Love with Should Be…”.  As we were leaving, I was feeling
disheartened for two reasons:  1) I
realized that the topic I had been responsible for was not inclusive of those
in the group who are in a committed relationship.  It essentially left them with almost nothing
to say.  I apologize for that and will
not allow that to happen again.  2) One
of our participants made it very clear that they were not at all happy with the
word “should” and made quite a point of saying that
“should” is a word that should never be used as part of a topic.  I wonder if we want to engage in such
disparagement of a topic, especially if, as was the case last week, the originator
of that topic is present.
One
more comment:  We have been very clear
that no one is required to write on the “topic of the week”.  However, I think that it is conducive to the
creative process to make those deviations the exception, rather than the rule.
Hearing diverse perspectives on the same topic is what makes for a stimulating
hour-and-a-half and also forces us to channel our creative forces in
constructive ways.  ‘Nuff said about
process.]
Clothes are worn for
many purposes:  style, status, and
modesty for three.  I’m going to talk
about a fourth:  body image.  People tend to model what they think is going
to “surprise and delight” the casual observer or, perhaps,
significant other.  Popular opinion has a
way of letting someone know when they have stepped over the line of decorum
and/or vogue.  As a repressed
exhibitionist with an eroticized libido, I have been an avid follower of these taboos
for most of my life.  There exists in
modern American society a very distinct double-standard when it comes to the
line between dress that titillates and that which commits sensory
trespass. 
I would like to share
with you a letter written to Annie’s
Mailbox advice column that was published in the Denver Post on June 29, 2003, along with the response from the
columnists, Kathy Mitchell and Marcy Sugar, 
[Read
letter from photocopy.]
The key to
understanding the present state of our society is in the first paragraph of the
response: 
“Most
14-year-old boys would not be willing to put up with the teasing that Jonah is
getting from his peers. Stylish or not, they would stop wearing the
swimsuits.  Either Jonah has
tremendous self-assurance or he is enjoying these bikinis on an entirely
different level.”
I have to wonder–what
level would that be?  The same level upon
which girls of that age might enjoy wearing a bikini?  I don’t think that is what is meant at all.  As the responders also write, “Bikinis and thongs usually indicate something more sensual.  Exhibitionism and cross-dressing are
possibilities but they aren’t the only ones.”  What, exactly might the others be?  Homosexuality?  Pedophilia? 
Has anyone ever asked models for the Sports
Illustrated swim suit issue if they are exhibitionists?  And to even suggest that “Jonah”
might be a cross-dresser is to imply that thongs and bikinis are the sole
province of the female gender, which is begging the very question that I am
asking:  Isn’t what is good for the
gander also good for the goose?
When I was about 10
years old, I took a swimming class at the Hutchinson, KS, YMCA.  The rules were that swimming suits were not
allowed in the pool, as they might carry germs. 
We had to shower before we got into the pool, as well as after.  I was terrified but soon got comfortable with
letting it all hang out.  By the time my
own children were about that age, boys did not even take their swimming suits
off to shower after swimming.  Why the
vast difference?  I would welcome any and
all ideas on this.
In 1990, my wife, kids
and I set out for Disney World in Orlando. 
Wanting to appear “with it”, I bought my first pair of “surfer-style”
swim trunks just for the occasion.  When
we went to the water park, the first thing on the kids’ agenda was the huge,
serpentine water slide.  Not wanting to
appear skittish or square, I enthusiastically joined them.  Just one problem:  about 6 feet down the slide, my ridiculously
bulky “trunks” grabbed hold of the slide and held on for dear
life.  I had to “scoot” down
the remaining three stories of slide while trying not to get “rear-ended”
by an unsuspecting kiddie.  I have worn
nothing but trusty Speedos ever since. 
Yes, sometimes I do feel a little “over-exposed” but at least
I don’t carry a gallon of water with me whenever I get out of the pool.
[As
an illustration of the fact that America’s discomfort with the male form is not
universal, I am passing around a copy of Down Under:  To glorify the Australian lifesaver.  I have flagged a few pertinent pages.]
© 22 September 2014 

About
the Author  
I came to the beautiful state of Colorado out of my native Kansas by way of Michigan, the state where I married and I came to the beautiful state of Colorado out of my native Kansas by way of Michigan, the state where I married and had two children while working as an engineer for the Ford Motor Company. I was married to a wonderful woman for 26 happy years and suddenly realized that life was passing me by. I figured that I should make a change, as our offspring were basically on their own and I wasn’t getting any younger. Luckily, a very attractive and personable man just happened to be crossing my path at that time, so the change-over was both fortuitous and smooth. Soon after, I retired and we moved to Denver, my husband’s home town. He passed away after 13 blissful years together in October of 2012. I am left to find a new path to fulfillment. One possibility is through writing. Thank goodness, the SAGE Creative Writing Group was there to light the way. 
Posted on

Angels, Santa Claus, and Fairies by Lewis

In 1897, Francis P.
Church, newspaper editor, wrote the following to an 8-year-old Virginia
O’Hanlon in response to her letter wanting to know if there really was a Santa
Claus.  It seems one or more of her
friends had told her no such “person” existed.  His words have become classic:
Virginia,
your little friends are wrong.  They have
been affected by the skepticism of a skeptical age.  They do not believe except what they see.
They think that nothing can be which is not comprehensible by their little
minds.  All minds, Virginia, whether they
be [adults] or children’s are little.
Yes,
Virginia, there is a Santa Claus.  He
exists as certainly as love and generosity and devotion exist, and you know that
they abound and give to your life its highest beauty and joy. Alas! how dreary
would be the world if there were no Santa Claus!  It would be as dreary as if there were no
Virginias.  There would be no childlike
faith then, no poetry, no romance to make tolerable this existence.  We
should have no enjoyment, except in sense and light.  The eternal light with which childhood fills
the world would be extinguished.
Not
believe in Santa Claus!  You might as
well not believe in fairies!…The most real things in the world are those that
neither children nor [adults] can see. 
Did you ever see fairies dancing on the lawn?  Of course not, but that’s no proof that they
are not there.
You
tear apart the baby’s rattle and see what makes the noise inside, but there is
a veil covering the unseen world which not the strongest [adult]…that ever
lived could tear apart.  Only faith,
fancy, poetry, love, romance, can push aside that curtain and view…the beauty
and glory beyond.  Is it all real?  Ah, Virginia, in all this world there is
nothing else so real and abiding.
No
Santa Claus!  Thank God, he lives and he
lives forever.  A thousand years from
now, Virginia, nay, ten times ten thousand years from now, he will continue to
make glad the heart of childhood.
I suspect that much of
Frank Church’s prose went right over young Virginia’s head.  It likely was written with an eye to
newspaper sales more than a child’s enlightenment.  But it apparently touched the hearts of many
parents of the late 19th Century–at least, those belonging to what we now call
“upper middle-class white America”. 
But there were a number
of Americas then, just as there are now. 
There were the wealthy Industrialists such as the Rockefellers and the
Mellons and the Carnegies.  It was the time
of robber barons, Reconstruction, and child labor.  For thousands, if not millions of children,
there were no newspapers in the household and they likely could not read them
if there were.  There also were almost
certainly no presents under the Christmas tree (if there were such a thing) in
their living rooms.  For them, Frank
Church’s promise was as illusory as the fairy on the front lawn or a front lawn
itself.
Essentially, I believe
that Santa Claus, angels, and fairies (the ethereal kind) are conjured up out
of a very human need for deliverance and salvation.  Santa Claus “delivers” in a
simplistic, materialistic way on Christmas Eve. 
He reminds us that we are worthy of love because we receive the material
things we hope for, things that will “gladden our heart”.
According to Wikipedia,
angels in the Abrahamic tradition “are often depicted as benevolent
celestial beings who act as intermediaries between heaven and earth or as
guardian spirits or a guiding influence”. 
I will take the liberty of casting them in the role of bringing “heavenly
gifts” to God’s children–a Santa Claus for the post-adolescent set. 
But what do they have
in their bag of treats?  Not material
things, of that I’m certain.  Perhaps a
soupcon of salvation, a lotion of love, a fountain of forgiveness?  Fyodor Dostoyevsky has said, “For a
[person], all resurrection, all salvation, from whatever perdition, lies in
love; in fact, it is [our] only way to it”.
Every gift under every
tree this Christmas is there as a representation of the love of one human being
for another.  They are the product of the
human hands which make them and others that wrap them and place them there,
given from one human being to another out of love.   Neither Santa Claus nor angels has a role to
play.  Each of us has the capacity both
to give and receive the fruits of love. 
This is a very liberating concept–one which does not depend upon
fantasy or hope alone. 
The only salvation that
matters is the one in this life and for that I have all the gifts that I need.  I have only to listen to Pavarotti sing
Puccini’s Nessun Dorma or Judy
Collins Someday Soon or Paul
McCartney It’s a Long and Winding Road
to hear the voice of Gabriel.  I have
only to feel a friends’ arm around me to brush against the Divine.  Standing at the foot of the Giant Redwoods
and glancing up at the sky, I know all of Nature is a Cathedral.  Gazing up at Michelangelo’s David, I see in my own humanity evolution’s
greatest gift.  What temptation could
Angel or Santa Claus possibly offer me now?
© 15 December 2014 
About
the Author 
I came to the beautiful
state of Colorado out of my native Kansas by way of Michigan, the state where I
married and I came to the beautiful state of Colorado out of my native Kansas
by way of Michigan, the state where I married and had two children while working
as an engineer for the Ford Motor Company. I was married to a wonderful woman
for 26 happy years and suddenly realized that life was passing me by. I figured
that I should make a change, as our offspring were basically on their own and I
wasn’t getting any younger. Luckily, a very attractive and personable man just
happened to be crossing my path at that time, so the change-over was both
fortuitous and smooth.
Soon after, I retired and we
moved to Denver, my husband’s home town. He passed away after 13 blissful years
together in October of 2012. I am left to find a new path to fulfillment. One
possibility is through writing. Thank goodness, the SAGE Creative Writing Group
was there to light the way.
Posted on

Anger by Lewis

I have related here
before the heightened levels of anger I experienced and acted out as a boy–my
killing of birds, shooting out of a streetlight, throwing a dandelion digger at
our cat. 
There are other
manifestations of my inner rage that I have not told.  For example, there is the time that I shut
off the electricity in our neighbor’s house when they were away on
vacation.  Or when I hit the hubcaps of a
passing car with a stone flung from my slingshot.  Then, there’s my all-time most daring feat of
disgruntlement when I wrote an anonymous, deprecating note to a bunch of older
boys and left it where they would be sure to find it.  They, to my shock, surmised the source and
came immediately to me expecting a confession. 
I, naturally, denied any knowledge of the blasphemy, whereupon they
demanded a sample of my handwriting.  I
compliantly agreed and, when handed a pen and paper, copied the words of the
note in my very best left-handed printing. 
The lack of resemblance left them dumb-founded and they turned away in
search of the real culprit.
I could easily blame my
parents for my anger.  My father was
gentle and kind but incapable of understanding me or my juvenile emotional or
psychological needs.  My mother lacked
empathy. 
I was isolated as an
only child and a withdrawn one at that. 
In addition, I was the bearer of a horrible secret about the most
shameful of subjects–my sexuality.  I
felt myself to be kind and loving, yet an unworthy aberration of God’s creation.  I had no role-models, for I did not fit the
“role” of any other human being I knew.  So, I compensated by seeking to act like–and
perhaps be–an apprentice of God while feeling like one of the
“unclean” on the inside.  It’s
no wonder that the tension found an outlet through acts of blatant hostility.
I recently attended my
50th high school reunion.  My high school
years, as I have said here before, were miserable.  I had few friends–in fact, had no idea how
to make any, other than by using my intellect to impress.  I had no interest in sports and was
intimidated by the very sight of a girl. 
If I had thought that I had any sex appeal at all, I would not have
known how to take advantage of it.  
Consequently, my lowest moment at the reunion was after taking the tour
of my high school, now having undergone a $30 million refurbishment.  What little of it I could recognize brought
back memories of a childhood lost or, at least, spent in a depression-induced
daze.  I have long suspected that the
same could be said of most of the folks who never show up for reunions. 
So, what is the state
of my anger today?  I suspect that it may
be out-of-sight but not out-of-mind, much like an old childhood scar, hidden
beneath my clothing.  I still curse a
blue-streak at the slightest frustration. 
Perhaps this is healthy, as I believe anger suppressed leads to
depression.  I suspect the neighbors in
my apartment building would complain were it not for the fact that I live in a
corner apartment with a laundry room next door. 
I think much of my
anger comes from shame.  Shame is a
condition much more difficult to express than anger.  Shame then builds, leading to more
anger.  Next thing I know, I’m feeling
ashamed of my anger, which is really depressing.  I think I’ll go shopping for a punching bag.
  
© 7 June 2014
About
the Author  
I came to the beautiful
state of Colorado out of my native Kansas by way of Michigan, the state where I
married and I came to the beautiful state of Colorado out of my native Kansas
by way of Michigan, the state where I married and had two children while working
as an engineer for the Ford Motor Company. I was married to a wonderful woman
for 26 happy years and suddenly realized that life was passing me by. I figured
that I should make a change, as our offspring were basically on their own and I
wasn’t getting any younger. Luckily, a very attractive and personable man just
happened to be crossing my path at that time, so the change-over was both
fortuitous and smooth.
Soon after, I retired and we
moved to Denver, my husband’s home town. He passed away after 13 blissful years
together in October of 2012. I am left to find a new path to fulfillment. One
possibility is through writing. Thank goodness, the SAGE Creative Writing Group
was there to light the way.
Posted on

Stories of GLBT Organizations by Lewis

My thirty-year career at Ford Motor Company reached its culmination at the end of the last century, coincident with the last of my 26 years of being in a straight marriage and the birth of the GLBT organization that has played the largest part in my personal journey toward wholeness. That organization is Ford GLOBE.

GLOBE is an acronym for Gay, Lesbian, Or Bisexual Employees. It was hatched in the minds of two Ford employees, a woman and a man, in Dearborn, MI, in July of 1994. By September, they had composed a letter to the Vice President of Employee Relations–with a copy to Ford CEO, Alex Trotman–expressing a desire to begin a dialogue with top management on workplace issues of concern to Ford’s gay, lesbian and bisexual employees. They were invited to meet with the VP of Employee Relations in November.

In 1995, the group, now flying in full view of corporate radar and growing, elected a five-member board, adopted its formal name of Ford GLOBE; designed their logo; adopted mission, vision, and objective statements; and adopted bylaws. The fresh-faced Board was invited to meet with the staff of the newly-created corporate Diversity Office. Soon after, “sexual orientation” was incorporated into Ford’s Global Diversity Initiative. Members of Ford GLOBE participated in the filming of two company videos on workplace diversity. Also that year, Ford was a sponsor of the world-premier on NBC of Serving in Silence, starring Glenn Close as Army Reserve Colonel Margarethe Cammermeyer. By September of 1996, Ford GLOBE chapters were forming in Great Britain and Germany.

In March of 1996, Ford GLOBE submitted to upper management the coming-out stories of 23 members in hope of putting a human face on what had been an invisible minority. Along with the stories came a formal request for Ford’s non-discrimination policy to be rewritten to include sexual orientation. At the time, only Ford of Britain had such a policy.

Ford GLOBE was beginning to network with similar interest groups at General Motors and Chrysler, including sharing a table at the 1996 Pridefest and walking together in the Michigan Pride Parade in Lansing. After two years of discussion between Ford GLOBE and top management, on November 14, 1996, Ford CEO, Alex Trotman, issued Revised Corporate Policy Letter # 2, adding “sexual orientation” to the company’s official non-discrimination policy. To this day, some of our largest and most profitable corporations, including Exxon Mobile, have refused to do the same.

My involvement with Ford GLOBE began sometime in 1997. For that reason and the fact that I have scrapped many of my records of this period, I have relied heavily on Ford GLOBE’s website for the dates and particulars of these events.

In February of 1998, I attended a “Gay Issues in the Workplace” Workshop, led by Brian McNaught, at Ford World Headquarters, jointed sponsored by GLOBE and the Ford Diversity Office. I remember a Ford Vice President taking the podium at that event. He was a white man of considerable social cachet and I assumed that the privilege that normally goes with that status would have shielded him from any brushes with discrimination. In fact, he told a story of riding a public transit bus with his mother at the height of World War II. His family was German. His mother had warned him sternly not to speak German while riding the bus. Thus, he, too, had known the fear of being outed because of who he was. The experience had made him into an unlikely ally of GLOBE members over 50 years later.

In 1999, Ford GLOBE amended its by-laws to make it their mission to include transgendered employees in Ford’s non-discrimination policy and gender identity in Ford’s diversity training. Ford Motor Company was the first and only U.S. automotive company listed on the 1999 Gay and Lesbian Values Index of top 100 companies working on gay issues, an achievement noted by Ford CEO Jac Nasser. It was about this time that retired Ford Vice Chairman and Chief Financial Officer Alan Gilmore came out as gay. The Advocate named Ford Motor Company to its list of 25 companies that provide good environments for gay employees in its Oct. 26 edition.

Having earlier written the contract bargaining teams for Ford Motor Company, United Auto Workers, and Canadian Auto Workers requesting specific changes in the upcoming union contracts, Ford GLOBE was pleased to see that the resulting Ford/CAW union contract included provision for same-sex domestic partners to be treated as common law spouses in Canada, for sexual orientation to be added to the nondiscrimination statement of the Ford/UAW contract, and that Ford and the UAW agreed to investigate implementation of same-sex domestic partner benefits during the current four-year union contract.

The year 2000 was not only the year that I became Board Chair of Ford GLOBE but also the year that marked a momentous event in automotive history as Ford, General Motors, and the Chrysler Division of DaimlerChrysler issued a joint press release with the United Auto Workers announcing same-sex health care benefits for the Big Three auto companies’ salaried and hourly employees in the U.S. As the first-ever industry-wide joint announcement of domestic partner benefits and largest ever workforce of 465,000 U.S. employees eligible in one stroke, the historic announcement made headlines across the nation. It was truly a proud moment for all of us in the Ford GLOBE organization.

On January 1 of 2001, my last year with the company, Ford expanded its benefits program for the spouses of gay employees to include financial planning, legal services, the personal protection plan, vehicle programs, and the vision plan.

Since my departure from the company, Ford and GLOBE have continued to advance the cause of GLBT equality and fairness both within the corporation and without. I am fortunate to have been supported in my own coming out process by my associates within the company, both gay and straight, and to Ford GLOBE in particular for the bonds of friendship honed in the common struggle toward a better and freer world.

About the Author

I came to the beautiful state of Colorado out of my native Kansas by way of Michigan, the state where I married and I came to the beautiful state of Colorado out of my native Kansas by way of Michigan, the state where I married and had two children while working as an engineer for the Ford Motor Company. I was married to a wonderful woman for 26 happy years and suddenly realized that life was passing me by. I figured that I should make a change, as our offspring were basically on their own and I wasn’t getting any younger. Luckily, a very attractive and personable man just happened to be crossing my path at that time, so the change-over was both fortuitous and smooth. Soon after, I retired and we moved to Denver, my husband’s home town. He passed away after 13 blissful years together in October of 2012. I am left to find a new path to fulfillment. One possibility is through writing. Thank goodness, the SAGE Creative Writing Group was there to light the way.

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Mushrooms by Lewis

I do not eat mushrooms. One of my pet peeves is that they are often very hard to pick out of foods that contain them. Fortunately, they have a rather mild flavor, so if I happen to eat part of one, I barely notice. I also find them interesting to look at in the wild. There’s something about them that is very sensual. When looked at in cross-section, the shape is highly suggestive of parts of both the male and female sexual anatomy.

Unfortunately, that is about the extent of my ability to write about the mushroom without resorting to Wikipedia. Having done so, I would like to augment this written exercise with a few more observations:

* Mushrooms are a fungus, like yeasts and molds. Of course, we know that yeast causes infections in women and mold can make a mess of your drywall.

* We also know that some mushrooms are toxic and others are psychoactive.

* Still others have medicinal properties or can be used to dye clothing.

In short, there are many reasons to be wary of mushrooms, at least, if you’re picking them yourself. You need to know what you’re doing. In my view, eating mushrooms is something like having unprotected sex, except not as pleasurable.

© June 2014

About the Author

I came to the beautiful state of Colorado out of my native Kansas by way of Michigan, the state where I married and I came to the beautiful state of Colorado out of my native Kansas by way of Michigan, the state where I married and had two children while working as an engineer for the Ford Motor Company. I was married to a wonderful woman for 26 happy years and suddenly realized that life was passing me by. I figured that I should make a change, as our offspring were basically on their own and I wasn’t getting any younger. Luckily, a very attractive and personable man just happened to be crossing my path at that time, so the change-over was both fortuitous and smooth. Soon after, I retired and we moved to Denver, my husband’s home town. He passed away after 13 blissful years together in October of 2012. I am left to find a new path to fulfillment. One possibility is through writing. Thank goodness, the SAGE Creative Writing Group was there to light the way.

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Mirror Image by Lewis

Mirror,
mirror on the wall
Who’s
the feyest of them all?
Surely
can’t be said of me
I
strive so hard to manly be.
Oft
my image makes me wince
Asymmetric
from birth hence;
Discolored
lips far from lush,
Eyes
that skew, no hair to brush.
Yet,
altogether not amiss
Or
with a trace of feminess,
I
pass as straight among the crowd
No
cry of “fag” is heard aloud.
I
wander any milieu,
Yielding
not a single clue
What
physique might catch my eyes
Or
give a hint I might like guys.
Perhaps
it shouldn’t matter
What
veggie I dip in batter
But
if something’s going to fry,
I’d
as soon it not be THIS guy.
©
22 June 2013

About the Author 

I came to the
beautiful state of Colorado out of my native Kansas by way of Michigan, the
state where I married and I came to the beautiful state of Colorado out of my
native Kansas by way of Michigan, the state where I married and had two
children while working as an engineer for the Ford Motor Company. I was married
to a wonderful woman for 26 happy years and suddenly realized that life was
passing me by. I figured that I should make a change, as our offspring were
basically on their own and I wasn’t getting any younger. Luckily, a very
attractive and personable man just happened to be crossing my path at that
time, so the change-over was both fortuitous and smooth.
Soon after, I retired
and we moved to Denver, my husband’s home town. He passed away after 13
blissful years together in October of 2012. I am left to find a new path to
fulfillment. One possibility is through writing. Thank goodness, the SAGE
Creative Writing Group was there to light the way.
Posted on

One Summer Afternoon by Lewis

When I was a child, my parents didn’t take a “family vacation” some summers. Instead, they sent me off to summer camp, which was enough vacation for them, I guess. On one such occasion, they sent me off for an interminable ten days to a YMCA camp called “Camp Wood”. I was about nine years old and an only child. I was introverted and a non-swimmer. For me, swimming was, to quote Bill Cosby, “staying alive in the water”. I had allergies and my sinuses were constantly inflamed. If chlorinated water got up my nose, it felt like someone had set my snot on fire. Therefore, if I was in water more than four feet deep, out came my nose plugs. It was swimming that kept me from getting beyond a “Star” rank in Boy Scouts.

When I got to Camp Wood, I soon discovered that it was organized a little like a country club. The lake had two beaches–the shallow one with the kiddy swings for the non-swimmers and the cool beach with the deeper water and the water slide for the swimmers. I was a few years older than almost all the kids on the kiddy beach and was going to make myself absolutely miserable unless I could graduate to the older boys’ beach. To do that meant that I would have to swim from the edge of the kiddy beach out to a floating dock about 50 yards out into the lake. From where I stood on the edge of the water at the kiddy beach, the dock looked to me to be only one or two strokes closer than hell itself. Not only that, but there would be kids and adults nearby watching me. Who knows if they were rooting for me to make it or were hoping to see something their parents would be most interested hearing about?

There was a lifeguard standing on the dock. He looked to me to be a young man of about 17. I’m not very good at judging these things, as I never had an older brother or even a male relative under 21. I suspect that it was only the prospect of that young man coming to my rescue that gave me the courage needed to attempt to swim toward the raft.

I would give anything to see a home movie of my valiant effort to look graceful while flailing all four skinny limbs in a desperate attempt to keep from consuming too much of the lake. By the time I reached the dock, I was totally exhausted, a fact that I’m sure was obvious to the young man looking worriedly down at me. Nevertheless, one got no credit for merely reaching the dock. No. One had to swim back to the shore from whence I had come.

I’m sure the lifeguard offered me his hand. But I was too embarrassed and determined to pass the test, so I turned back toward shore hoping against hope that I would find the strength somehow to make it all the way. Well, I only made it a few yards before I started to flounder. The lifeguard was on me in a couple of seconds, lifting me up and putting me under his arm to sweep me back to the safety of the dock.

“This must be what it feels like to be Sleeping Beauty”, I thought. No, not really. But it did feel pretty sweet, though humiliating.

None of the other campers ever mentioned my fiasco, nor did I ever tell my parents about it. Camp ended on a much higher note, when I placed first in the broad jump in the track meet on the last morning of camp. Somehow, solid ground just seems to suit me better.

17 June 2013

About
the Author  


I came to the beautiful state of Colorado out of my native Kansas by way of Michigan, the state where I married and I came to the beautiful state of Colorado out of my native Kansas by way of Michigan, the state where I married and had two children while working as an engineer for the Ford Motor Company. I was married to a wonderful woman for 26 happy years and suddenly realized that life was passing me by. I figured that I should make a change, as our offspring were basically on their own and I wasn’t getting any younger. Luckily, a very attractive and personable man just happened to be crossing my path at that time, so the change-over was both fortuitous and smooth. Soon after, I retired and we moved to Denver, my husband’s home town. He passed away after 13 blissful years together in October of 2012. I am left to find a new path to fulfillment. One possibility is through writing. Thank goodness, the SAGE Creative Writing Group was there to light the way.