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About Just out. (Portland, OR) 1983-2013 | View Entire Issue (Sept. 1, 1985)
Tale of a tourist b y Lee L y n ch O n e of m y cats died last night, after I’d returned from a glorious day at Crater Lake. M y old friend Carol, here briefly from C o n necticut, w as with m e for both the death and the trip. E d iso n , the cat, w as thirteen. He’d lost his m other at an early age and been adopted by a dyke w ho m oved in with m y ex-lover and m e in C onne cticut W hen the dyke took off for Florida, E d iso n becam e ours, and when I broke with the lover, E d iso n becam e mine. He w as overw eight and overbearing, a nested som ew here around infancy where food and r 1 .. T H E AMAZON TRAIL ' affection were concerned, craving abnorm al am oun ts o f both. B ut he w as a handsom e c a t form al in h is constant tuxedo, and loving. T he official greeter in m y household, I co u ld n ’t keep him off a guest’s lap, wanted oonot > B u t he’d had cystitis for years. A n opera tion helped tem porarily, m edication helped to a point, tom ato juice, with its crystal- d isso lvin g powers, kept him go in g a while longer. I buried him this m orning, under a crooked tree, the first occupant of a pet cem etery m y lover and I Envisioon. W e’re p lanning an E d iso n M em orial Seat under the crooked tree. Sh e baked an E d iso n M em orial Cake. A n d I’m left trying to m ake sense of the im perm anence of life. How we seem to just p a ss through it, like tourists in a park. W hy just yesterday, I’d think, tears w elling up, E dd y w as running after m ice in the back field. O r last tim e I Looked, there he was, sleeping in h is regal black and white robes on m y bed. Then there’s Carol, m y old friend. Last night sh e w as still here too, and we sat sharing the nearly w ordless sign a ls of twenty years of friendship. W e m et in college, she a fresh m an, I a sophom ore, both from New York City. W e later becam e lovers, then broke up, joined living collectives, settled separately in New Haven, met often for C hinese dinners and prolonged gigglin g fits. Keeping our connection gave u s both a feeling of con tinuity, of perm anence. C arol talked about another college friend, from w hom she seem s to have grow n away. A bou t how relationships, friends, change. A bou t how people, pete, p ass through, som e tim es out of our lives, and we through theirs. S h e com forted m e with talk of Gordie, her diabetic cat, w ho finally died after years of insulin shots and four “Last Birthday” parties. At each of these celebrations sh e 'd ply him with lox and sm oked whitefish. I w as there for each party. T h is year, I w ould not have been, but we celebrated C arol’s birthday the night before E d iso n ’s death. A nd I served the cats canned shrim p. Fu nny little rituals of lesbian life. T he w ays we m ake family, to keep, and let g o of, one another. S o yesterday, one specific yesterday in twenty years of them, Carol and I toured C ra ter Lake Park, talking of Gordie, old friends, college, New York, our new lives and lovers, of how it is to be queer in the world, of how queer it is to be in the world. T he park w as riotous with bold life. Even before we reached it we stopped to behold a gorge, its water, in otherw ise dry Southern O regon, bursting along a path through the rocks, hurrying, shouting, a s sure a s w e 'd been twenty years before. W e tried to capture that q uick life with cam eras. W e drove through a forest of m am m oth p in es teem ing with every living thing indige n o u s to these parts. W e rounded the rim of Crater Lake to behold that first breathtaking w ond rous view. The lake, so m any thousand feet below, w as a piercing blue, m ellow ed by lu sh green coves. Boatloads of people were like toys in a bathtub. Large birds wheeled above, defying the frightening heights. We, too, clim bed a s far a s we could and tim or o u sly peered over edges. M osse s, flowers, pines, m adrones, insects, m ore birds. N othing, despite the holy silence, w as still W e were tiny transient lives am ongst m any, cling ing, like the hardy white pines, to our ow n rocky prom ontories. Building, like the birds, nest after n e st N o u rish in g ourselves, like the deer, on the greenery of ou r lives: friendships, loves — hearty food s both. T iny chipm unks darted up and dow n the cliffs. The cliffs; the m ountains; longer lasting, m ore significant than a thousand chipm unks, trees. C ard, me, Edison. T hen E d iso n w ho’d died, all warm and soft and furry, in m y arm s. I walked around today stunned, weeping, know ing full well his death had to com e. B ut after a day like that? In the face of all that life? After Crater Lake, after his m orning exploits with the m ice? A s if to em phasize the p assin g of all things, C arol left today, to return to her/m y old life back e a st I called a new friend. S h e ’s eighty and wise with com m on sense. “How,” I asked her, “can I reconcile these th in g s? Life and lo ss? Death and unstoppable, boisterous b e in g?” “You know," she said, not even pausing to think, “Crater Lake is the result of a kind of death. It w as created by a volcano that caused incredible destruction. A nd we’re left with a beautiful, beautiful lake we w ouldn't have had w ithout that death.” W e all p ass through our Crater Lakes. Son's discovery of dad's gayness leads to problems D e ar Dr. Ray, I’m furious. I’m alm ost thirty years old and it is only in the last couple of years that I learned to accept m y gayness. Being gay has alw ays been real traum atic for me. W hen I w as thirteen m y parents discovered m e fooling around with m y cousin, w ho is a couple o f years older than me. There w as a b ig scene w hich resulted in m y being sent to m ilitary school for two years to be ‘Straight ened o u t’ Before I finished high school I had Dear Dr. Ray, tried twice to kill m yself. In college I went through ‘aversion therapy’ w here I looked at slid e s of attractive m en and then had to sniff som e awful stuff out of a , bottle. It w orked for a while. But so o n I felt m ore attracted than ever to guys. I have al w ays felt inferior. I finally started go in g out to a gay support group. W ith the help o f m y friends and som e se ssio n s with a therapist I m anaged to put m yself back together. Now I see that it is ok to have these feelings and that it is redly society that is screw ed up. Last week I went hom e to visit m y M om , w ho is divorced from Dad. Sh e told m e that sh e recently found som e letters from m y D ad to another m an. It turns out that m y D ad is ga y too! I can harldy believe it The m an is a prom i nent physician and very active in h is com m unity. N ow I think he is a slim y hypocrite. Instead of standing by while m y fam ily p u nishe d m e for being gay, he should have helped m e o u t It w ould have been so m uch easier to accept being gay if I had know n that m y dad w as gay too. Instead I felt like a freak. I w ent through hell and it’s h is fault N ow m y D ad has asked m e to stay with him for the holidays. (He d oe sn’t know that I know .) B u t I’m so angry that I m ight just slu g him if I see him again. W hat shou ld I d o ? A Furious So n D e a r Furious, You have every right to feel anger and d is appointm ent with your dad. W e all expect our parents to be honest with u s and to protect us, and that d id n't happen with your dad. Your first step should be to allow yourself som e tim e to cool off. W hen we react out of ange r we often say or d o things that we regret later. You m ay feel like dum ping your dad at this point but chances are that you still have a lot of attachm ent that you’ll feel m ore strongly a s tim e heeds this w ound. (If you d idn’t care at all for your dad, you probably w ouldn’t feel all this anger.) It is not a goo d idea for you to spend this holiday with your dad if you are still feeling explosive anger. You shou ld write or call your dad and tell him everything you know. E x plain that you want to d isc u ss this issue with him , but that you need som e tim e to sort th in g s o u t If you want to m aintain a relationship with yo u r father you are go in g to have to confront him at som e p o in t It is perfectly ok to tell him how angry and disappointed you feel. Re m em ber, you have a right to your feelings: they are perfectly legitimate. T h is is the tough p art You are a lso go in g to have to be w illing to hear h is view. It is im portant for you to rem em ber that your father grew up in a different era. A s a closeted hom osexual with a fam ily and a com m unity reputation, your father m ay have believed that he w ould lose everything (including you) If h is hom osexuality were revealed. He m ay have felt unable to help at the time. It m ay help to keep in m ind that you both suffered from society’s prejudice about hom osexuality. Ultim ately you will have to decide whether yo u want to continue your relationship with yo u r father. If you do, yo u ’ll have to put your ange r aside at som e p o in t Dr. R a ym o n d M. Berger, a Portland p sych o therapist, is author o f G ay and Gray: The O ld er H om osexual Alan published b y the U niversity o f Illinois P r ess. To schedule an appointm ent with Dr. Berger call 503-246-1563. Have a problem ? Need advice? W rite to “Dr. Ray” in care of J u st O ut, P.O. B ox 15117, Portland, O re gon 97215. You will receive a personal reply. CELEBRATES LESBIAN & GAY PRIDE E V E R Y MONTH SA N D R A K. PINCHES C LIN IC A L P SY C H O L O G IST Counseling and Psychotherapy clignee J A iu jra in ^ i. ed C O U N S E L IN G F O R W O M E N A N D F R IE N D S O F W O M E N 777-6653 i903 S E ANKENY PORTLAND. OR 97214 U Individuals, Couples, and Families Adolescents, Adults Gay, Lesbian and Couples Individuals Relationship Problems Depression Stress Partners of Alcoholics 1809 N.W. JO H N SO N , SU ITE 7 PO RTLAND, OR 97209 (503) 227-7558 Adults and Children Families and Couples PATRICIA I. CHANCE, MSW THERAPIST Depression • Relationship Issues Personal Transitions • Incest Survivors Coming Out Concerns • Sliding Fee Scale (503) 2204210 It Just Out. September. 198Í