The Gift of Queer

Facing one another, we sat on the living room couch. My middle school daughter had just returned from a week-long camp for adolescent girls. Themes of growing into womanhood were woven through art, dream work, ritual, nature meditation, fireside conversation. She had found the solitary forest meditation and the chats with the other girls particularly enriching. Now she was sharing one of those discussions with her mother. “I believe I'm a Lesbian, Mom. Another friend says she is Bisexual.” I wasn't shocked, but I was stunned. Can a person know who she is when she is only fourteen? I absorbed my daughter's message, and intuited she was right. I gave her a tremendous hug and shared one of my visions: “Before you were born, I thought that if you were to be a Lesbian you would have chosen the best possible family.” She smiled and indulged her mother who years ago told her about the awake dreamlike, pre-birth, little girl image I had of her.

There was no question about my total love for my daughter the day of her “coming out.” But as I listened in awe to her maturity, thoughts and questions swirled around inside my brain: What discrimination, limitations, even hate, would she face? Would getting married and raising a family be an option? How could her father and I support who she is and fight if necessary for her rights? Little did I understand then that this journey of my daughter's self-discovery would be my journey to a completer knowledge of what it means to be an authentic, courageous human being. Now, over eight years later, I can definitely say, my daughter's “Queerness” has been and is an incredible gift.

Getting up from the couch, I felt lost, not certain what being Gay might mean. During college I slowly became involved with women's issues and women's consciousness raising groups. Sheltered throughout my childhood and young adulthood, it was my eventual move to Oregon in the late seventies that opened my eyes to Lesbian women. I met and became good friends with a woman who happened to be a Lesbian and together we ended up leading a “Lesbian/Non-Lesbian” group. Our aim was to try and bring Gay/Separatist/Straight women together, despite our differences. During our difficult, often heated meetings, I grew up tenfold.

As part of my graduate school curriculum, I chose to study Women's Literature. The university even had a Queer Studies department, but back then I shied away from the Queer word and from delving into understanding the Queer world. My daughter's coming out that day made everything more personal and more relevant. For me the personal absolutely did turn into the political. I spontaneously met a thirty-years-together Lesbian couple who led me to a local chapter of PFLAG (Parents and Friends of Lesbians, Gays, Transgender, Bisexual, Intersex and Queer). Through PFLAG I found a weekly Youth Group for Queer and Questioning Youth, which my daughter eagerly and regularly attended. Through PFLAG, I became my daughter's staunchest ally and LGBITQQ supporter/activist. But this story isn't about my parenting, but about a daughter who became her mother's teacher and opened up my naïve, narrow definitions of gender, sexuality and truth.

As a middle school student, my daughter dressed completely in black. She once mentioned she wanted to be invisible, to fade into the background. But I never really connected this statement then with her increasing awareness of her difference. I knew she hung out with the boys rather than the catty girls but I didn't realize how many put-downs she heard between classes, or how isolated she felt by being who she was.

But she had been attending the LGBTQQ Youth Group for years and I credit this group and its adult facilitator for giving my daughter the strength, the bravery and the survival skills for embodying and voicing her truth. She spoke out at PFLAG fundraising dinners about her school experiences and became acquainted with the PFLAG President, Elise. With Elise, she went back to her middle school and spoke to several classes about her growing up experiences as a young Queer student. This daughter didn't blame or shame, but simply wanted to convey the need for tolerance and acceptance so that future Queer middle schoolers wouldn't have to hear the hateful, hallway whisperings.

In high school, she never sought attention around her Queerness, and yet she never wanted to hide herself either. She and her then-senior girlfriend were the only non-heterosexual couple to attend her girl friend's prom. Her girlfriend was of a more activist bent, and organized Day of Silence/Pride rallies. When the girlfriend was asked to be interviewed for the local paper about young adolescents coming out, my daughter went with her and the two were photographed for a city section article, “New Generation, Out and Out Loud.” Through this visible statement, a friend of my daughter's later shared with her that it gave him the courage to come out to his family.

Near the end of her high school years, my daughter became the school newspaper's Commentary Editor. She wrote several thoughtful essays about being an “out” LGBTQQ teenager and supporting others who chose to do so. Though earlier a member and semi-leader of the school's Gay/Straight Alliance, it was during her senior year that she created what she called “The Pride Club.” Once a week this group would hang out after school in a favorite teacher's classroom and simply talk about everything and anything. The teacher later confided how joyous it made her to be sponsoring this gathering.

Tears readily surface whenever I write about my incredible daughter. She was a humble, unintentional adolescent activist for equality. I understand completely the courage it took to be her authentic self during the teenage years when no one wants to be different or stand out in any way. She worked through her “black period,” her initial social withdrawal/possible depression and stepped forward into the light. As David Kato, the slain Ugandan Gay Rights Activist stated before he was killed: “If we keep on hiding, they will say we are not here.”

And this is my Queer daughter's treasured gift: She has known who she is all along. She has known that not everyone is born heterosexual, that we are born on a long continuum encompassing degrees of Gayness and Straightness. I would never have had these countless enriching experiences if it were not for my Queer daughter and my joining PFLAG. Befriending a transitioning Transgender woman taught me even more about the expanding definition of gender. The qualities we readily assign to male and female are like the yin and yang of humanity. Each human is not totally male or totally female. We have both the feminine and the masculine available to us. The presence of Queer allows each of us to become more completely and authentically ourselves.

I want so desperately to shout to other mothers who would discriminate against who my daughter is that homosexuals are born, not made and are here for a definitive purpose. They are our gifts to a wider world of loving and living. Diversity is richness; differences are celebrations. I am in deepest debt to my out loud, Queer daughter for an ever expanding circle of “coming out” friends and family, who enrich my existence. I agree with the Native American writer, Sherman Alexie, when he states, “..Years ago, homosexuals were given special status within the tribe. They had powerful medicine. I think it's even more today, even though our tribe has assimilated into homophobia. I mean, a person has to have magic to assert their identity without regard to all the bullshit, right?”

© 2012

From My Journal: Beyond Control

January 18, 2012: We're back to a wind whipping deluge of traditional Oregon rain. This time of year when I get up in the morning I tend to feel like Frodo: I could easily fall into and be swallowed by the lake of the hallow faced dead. But then the phone rings and I hear Dan's voice on the other end, wishing me good morning and asking me when I need the car. And it's as if I am pulled back from the frigid, gloomy waters to enter the cherished presence of my precious living. Dan is and has always been my life line. A smile crosses my face as I end our conversation and begin my day. I am so lucky to have this man, to have our house, to have the abundance and the quiet, meditative time I do have.

So I shower and wash my hair, hurry to dry off, get dressed and get warm. Warmth is usually my main goal in winter and once I'm warm I'm content. As I do the dishes I stare out the kitchen window and see a man riding his bicycle with a huge blanket strapped onto the back. Once again I'm reminded about the survival hardships humans endure. Why is he out there biking and possibly homeless and why am I inside, surrounded by comfort with my two cats asleep on the kitchen table? Are our lives ruled more by choice or chance? I figure it is a little of both.

I almost forgot about Wayne's Birthday tomorrow, so I quickly wrote him a card, apologizing for its lateness and sent it off. Wayne, my half brother, a Utah Mormon who if he knew about Aspen would...would he really be against a Gay family member? I can't believe this would be true. But I know I love him and I believe we have a connection even if he hasn't sent Christmas or Birthday cards these last few years. I am imaging he and Carol are taking care of each other and with Wayne's brain injury this is probably all they can do. I don't want to give up. I want to keep sending my thoughts and to say no matter what there will always be love and remembrance. I am tired of the false divisions we have erected in this country. For our existences to not only be confirmed but to continue, we need to see how we are alike rather than different.

I scan the New York Times and see an essay about Bi-Polar disorder. It is written by the Bi-Polar brother of a sister who is the writer on the new HBO series, “Homeland” with Claire Danes. Danes plays a CIA detective who doesn't realize she is Bi-Polar. Apparently the sister based her writing of Danes's character on her brother. Her brother's response to this series is emotional and positive with hopes this will start a national conversation about this common disorder. As he notes it is better to reveal secrets rather than to keep them hidden.

I am certain my father was an undiagnosed Bi-Polar. His manic/depressive episodes took my childhood on several wild roller-coaster rides. He did have involuntary electroshock treatments which the essay's author says has been proven helpful to this disorder. But I believe it was these uncaringly administered shock treatments which made my father worse. I also have several long distance friends who have been diagnosed with Bi-Polar. Both were receiving medications the last time I had contact with either of them, but my dearest childhood friend has been non-communicative these past few years. Neilani's mother was a depressed, eccentric, alcoholic hermit, and I fear Neilani, who lives in her mother's run down house, has become one too... minus the alcohol. Like with my brother Wayne, I keep sending birthday and holiday cards, wishing for the best.

So much of our lives is beyond control whether we acknowledge this loss of control or not. Or perhaps more accurately, I can never enter another person's mind or body to completely understand where they are or where they have been. I may think I know someone else...my husband or my daughter or a friend... but really I have only touched their surface. Soul sharing with others is possible but can I ever truly know my own core being? My mind flies all over the place and I am left to wonder at both its superficiality and its depth of knowledge. Why do I get pulled in by Hollywood gossip or soap opera dramas or random Internet surfing? Why do I relish stimulating university seminar conversations, novels, classical music and even opera? What's the difference? Which brain cells are used with each attraction? Does the dark, cold, rainy weather give me more reasons for serious contemplation? Is this why Russian novelists often write tragic, depressed works? Does the mind eventually rule over matter and the weather?

© 2012

Google Earth

At times I consider myself a technophobe, steering clear of Internet surfing, tweeting, LOL cat videos and overly humorous or dramatic tragic stories. This is not to say I don't fall for the occasional sentimental heart tugger or sarcastic political commentary sent to me by husband, friends or daughter. My daughter admires her father for finding the most amazing factoids on the Net and being ahead of her with his pop cultural knowledge. This bond is not my bond, though I admit I envy their weird, nerdy communication. How grateful I am to have my family bale me out of my frequent blogging, e-mail, research and writing faux pas.

All of the above is not to say I am not fascinated with the possibilities the Internet presents. One day my husband, who loves geography and maps, was fooling around with“Google Earth. ” This is a site whose goal is to literally picture on the Net every residence in the United States. If we type in our address we can see our street, our block, our neighborhood, our city as if from up in the sky and we can then zoom in and observe our actual house and driveway with parked car, garden and avenue. My mouth dropped open as I asked Dan if he would zoom in on an old friend's house in another state. Soon there was her home with a dirt garden and several tarps covering her roof. This is a dear childhood friend whom I worry about, who, years ago, returned to living in her mother's 40s bungalow in the same small town we grew up in. She has no phone, and no longer replies to my letters. Like her mother, she has become an eccentric hermit.

The wonders of this Google Earth technology got me to thinking about its symbology. I have felt lately as if the whole of my past never even happened. Like Google Earth, when I zoom in on my childhood home, I wonder if I ever lived and grew up there. For the first eighteen years of my existence I resided on that corner, played in the neighborhood, walked ten blocks to the elementary school, attended the one and only junior high school and high school in my town. Currently in my sixties, my faded memories of these times give me the belief that another person had that childhood. It is as if I am looking through a telescope at the girl and the young adolescent I once was.

As a young woman I had dreams; I had ambitions that allowed me to be the first in my family to graduate from college, and took me several times to Europe to live, study and teach. But this era of my twenties seems also like zooming out with the browser from my childhood home to these other lands. I am the observer, standing faraway. Did I really study and live in Germany? Did I really return to teach English in a Mittelschule? I keep zooming skyward above the years of romance and marriage and birth, raising a child to adulthood and teaching, writing, slowly coming to the present.

Where am I and who am I in this moment of time? Where are my dreams and ambitions? Is this distant zoom-out effect a natural part of aging? I used to love creating photo albums, keeping souvenirs, ruminating over cherished crafted items from my beloved daughter. I've grieved more for the empty nest phase of my life than for any other stage. This grieving has taught me how the past can cause pain at its remembrance because whatever we have experienced cannot be revisited. Like Google Earth, I can zoom in on and away from the past, but I cannot hold this past in my present hands. With what Internet speed can we view all the way from the smallest flower to the wide expanse of the Milky Way; and similarly, I continue to marvel at how quickly I have reached the sixth decade of my living.

I never at the time thought I was in any particular phase or a stage: I was an adolescent or a young single adult woman forever. I was a teacher, a wife and a mother forever. But now it's as if these eras were filed and forgotten, and here I am. This part of my life, however, seems different. For like the zooming of Google Earth, I see all the other parts of my life behind me and as never before I know there will be an end. I have no idea about the number of earth years I'll be given. Will I be able to create a 60s segment with new dreams and ambitions I can look back on in my 70s and a 70s segment I can look back upon in my 80s?

Death played little part in my early and middle history. Now it rides on my shoulder wherever I go. And I continue to struggle with being just as daring and just as adventurous now as I was in my past. There are creaks and chinks in the armor, but my vibrant energy and spirit remain. I don't want to set myself aside from the societal mainstream because I have attained a certain amount of years. I want to create and give what and where I can. And so I shall... to the finite reaches of my personal outer space!

© 2012

The Dilemma of Belief

Often as people age, their faith becomes stronger. I, however, find that I keep undergoing what I term “the dilemma of belief.” I question the reality of a spiritual realm; I toy with my practical doubts that there can be anything beyond this earth-based existence. Yet...and this is a huge yet...my heart is drawn to nature's magic and sings loudly when encountering unexplainable phenomenon, craving the intangible. Thus, I am caught between two worlds. My feet walk the literal, wet, mulched pathways, while my vision soars above, scanning for unseen miracles.

It is not easy to have faith in a world so enmeshed with the material. I understand my desire to feel soft fabrics next to my vulnerable skin, to wrap my tired feet in plush slippers, to dig and plant something in the soil in order to witness new life. I understand wanting warmth and comfort in winter, blue skies and cool breezes in summer. I understand wanting speed and fast communications between one destination and another. But when I start to get lost in what I or my house is to wear or how overfull my life can become with comings and goings, I have to stop and question. I hope there is more than this.

I have found the “more,” the “richness,” cannot be sought. It comes on tiny, silent paws and catches the seeker unawares. Then it is as if an explosion of belief, an “ah ha moment” occurs. I was sitting in the audience at Tsunami Bookstore, listening to a Celtic Winter Concert. There were only two performers: a female violinist/guitarist and a male flutist, both with deep, resonant, pure voices. The concert was ending and they chose to sing an original, ancient Scottish version of “Auld Lang Syne.” Their blended voices were beyond lovely. It was as if they reached inside, cradling and caressing my heart gently in their hands. As I sat there, a visionary, ethereal scene, fanned itself out before me. There was my Scottish, Campbell-plaid-dressed grandmother liltingly dancing the highland fling. Next to her were my mother in a flowing skirt and her handsome brother twirling and waltzing. My Irish great grandmother smiled broadly and beckoned from the side. Tears formed at the corner of my seeing. Was I caught up in my own imaginings? Perhaps. But music is not always of this plane, and why should I not be lifted up there too?

Watching my ancestors' joy brought back my amazement at suddenly seeing an unexpected enormous flock of gulls rise straight up off a white sandy water's edge. Through the foggy twilight mist these birds and their miracle of being had been completely hidden as I walked along a wooden railing overlooking the Pacific Ocean. Although this moment was over half a lifetime ago, I have never forgotten the spiritual infusion this scene provided.

Whenever I start to poke holes in my faith, I return to the evening of my daughter's birth. My two-day labor had been intense. I was nearing ten centimeters and the doctor was nervous about the rhythm of my daughter's heart. I just couldn't seem to open sufficiently to have the natural birth I wanted. But before my imminent C-section, I looked down and saw a bright, flowing light. I knew this was my daughter's spirit and it only mattered that she be brought into this world without further delay.

The spirit world is never as mysterious or faraway as I believe it to be. It is with me, physically and emotionally, if my ears, eyes and mind are open to everyday occurrences. I remember waking in the middle of the night, hearing the notes of my teenage daughter's cello drifting down from her attic bedroom. As I listened more intently, I felt a wetness streaking my cheeks. The lush bass, reverberating chords hit a place within I had forgotten existed: a place which realized how fleeting our life spans, how precious our love and earth bound connections, how wondrous the given glimpses beyond questions of doubt and belief. Where the heart is led is where is heart is home.

© 2012