Image provided by: University of Oregon Libraries; Eugene, OR
About Just out. (Portland, OR) 1983-2013 | View Entire Issue (Jan. 1, 1993)
just out T January 1, 1993 T 13 Thalia Zepatos A driving force behind the twelfth-hour success of the No on 9 campaign and a first-time author by Marilyn Davis ▼ T halia Zepatos, travel writer and politi In talking with women I found it wasn’t that they cal organizer, reached the satisfying really needed any more information. They needed end of two difficult journeys in No someone to say, ‘You can do it. You’ll be OK. vember. On Nov. 3, her work with the You can go.’” No on 9 campaign was rewarded when At first Zepatos tried to balance working part- Oregon voters defeated Ballot Measure time 9, and for Governor Roberts with writing A Jour three weeks later her first book, A Journey o f ney o f One’s Own, an effort she describes as a One's Own: Uncommon Advice fo r the Indepen “terrible failure. The writing just never happened.” dent Woman Traveler, was published by Eighth Then a group of friends organized a fund-raiser Mountain Press. Now, a month after the election, and collected several thousand dollars to support she rests at home with a cup of tea, reflecting on her while she wrote full-time. She had signed a the No on 9 campaign, eager to talk about her new contract with her publisher and was writing to book. meet a deadline as the No on 9 campaign heated up last summer. Zepatos, a self-described “straightperson from a large Greek-American family,” has spent her Zepatos had left political work to be a writer, whole working life in politics, at first with con but the commitment was hard to justify in the face sumer rights, then with state and national of the OCA and Ballot Measure 9. She had spent abortion-rights organizations. As an organizer for six years in the pro-choice movement, fighting the National Abortion Rights Action League she the OCA. “I saw how they started in just a couple traveled around the country teaching local of states, going for parental notification or limit women’s groups how to set up pro-choice organi ing access to abortions for poor women. If it zations and run election campaigns. She worked worked in one state they would go to others. They with the Rainbow Coalition and helped direct were testing in Oregon and Colorado the same Barbara Roberts’s successful cam paign for way. I felt so strongly that we’ve got to stop them governor. now or it would spread like a cancer across the For years Zepatos alternated periods of in whole country.” Sull she resisted the impulse to tense work on political campaigns with adventur join the No on 9 campaign. “I had a pretty distant ous travel to all parts of the world. The idea of a role compared to what my heart was saying. I was book for “the independent woman traveler” be very tom. I went around and around and also saw gan after one very long trip. “I came back and the level of fear among some of my closest friends. started doing workshops for woman travelers The ante was going up and up and up.” because I got so many phone calls from women Then the day after A Journey o f One's Own who wanted to have a cup of coffee and talk. They went to press, Scot Nakagawa called from the No had heard I had made this trip and they had long on 9 office to ask Zepatos to help set up the door- dreamed of doing something similar. Almost ev to-door canvassing and telephoning phase of the eryone has a dream or a fantasy of a journey, and campaign, and she agreed. “I spent some sleep women especially need a little more encourage less nights and finally I couldn’t live with myself ment to make those dreams come true.” anymore. I thought this is not just another cam A Journey o f One’s Own combines realistic, paign. It’s not whether we have self-service gas or triple-trailers. These are our lives, and all of us are practical advice with anecdotes from Zepatos’s affected.” own travel journals and stories she has collected from other woman travelers. “I found from doing Eventually Zepatos and her publisher, Ruth the workshops that it was the stories that capture Gundle, agreed to delay publication of the book women’s imaginations. A woman reads ‘The until after the election, and Zepatos went to work Ladies Compartment’ and thinks, ‘I could have for the campaign. “This was my book, and I ’d been working on it forever. I thought, how can I been on that train in India. I could have taken care of myself. I could have told that guy where to go! ’ put it off? But, on the other hand, how could I not? WHEEL ALIGNMENTS & TIRES It came down to being at a certain moment in history. Whether you like it or not, you’re there, and you’ve got to give your all. So Ruth and I pushed back the publication date o f the book. We thought it was that important." In September, Zepatos went to work full time for No on 9, lending her years of political organiz ing experience to another fight against the OCA. She describes the campaign as “being in a row boat with a tidal wave coming. The whole world came to look at Oregon and Measure 9. We had to ride, to surf the wave, and not get caught rolling under it. Once you get caught in the breakers, you can never get out. “There’s a huge job in a campaign of interfac ing with the outside world, constructing a mes sage and presenting it. There’s another huge job of managing and training and supervising all the people who work on the staff and all the volun teers and activists all over the state. It’s a virtually undoable task for one person. I was hired to help split that work and get it done more effectively. I felt that the skills and experience I had were very much needed there, and that’s why I did it. “And for me, as a straight person, it was an opportunity to feel what it meant to be part of a group of people that is reviled by society. I never once wore that ‘Straight But Not Narrow’ button, because I don't really like it personally, although I understood why some people wanted to wear it. W hat’s the difference if I’m straight or not? Here I am on this side. I learned a lot. What frightened me more than anything else was the hatred and overt discrimination that was promulgated by Measure 9. It pulled the veneer from our state and allowed some ugly things to happen.” Her worst moment, she says, came after St. Matthew’s Catho lic Church in Hillsboro had been defaced and a fire set. “I went in the church and saw painted in red blood, ‘Kill Queers, Jews and Spies.' I broke down sobbing. This is what we’ve come to? It was horrible." At the same time Zepatos knows the campaign also changed people’s lives for the better. It gen erated fear, but it also inspired courage. She tells the story of a Catholic church where a member of the congregation came out during a discussion of Ballot Measure 9. “ People broke down and cried. When they were talking about gay men and lesbi ans it was some other people, until one o f their own stood up and said, ‘This is me you’re talking about.’ Many acts of bravery like that happened during the campaign.” She remembers the first big No on 9 rally in Pioneer Courthouse Square, when 10,000 people gathered to fight the OCA. “ For people to feel that level o f support was important. We were all in it together, and w e’ve got to be.” Today, as she thinks about the campaign and looks forward to a West Coast tour to promote her book, Zepatos feels good about putting off publi cation of A Journey o f One's Own so she could work against Ballot Measure 9. “ Everything that every person did around the state was necessary for us to win. I feel that 1 made a difference. I don’t know how much that difference was, but I ’m very glad I was there.” A Journey o f One's Own: Uncommon Advice fo r the Independent Woman Traveler is available at most local bookstores. NO ONE MEASURES UP TO M in ib lin d WE'RE NOT JUST MINIBLINDS ANYMORE. VERTI CALS • WOODS • DUETTES • TOPPERS «USCH’ • LEVOIOR- • HUNTED DOUGLAS* • lOllVEDODAPE- • N S !- • DEL HAD- P R O B LE M : Consumers lose $1 billion a year mismeasuring S O L U T IO N : M r Miniblind s Best Price Promise1’ Measured and Installed on name brand blinds. Product for product, service for service, we won’t be beat. MarkHuckms- The Original Ur Mmiblind S T R A T E G Y : National buying power Owner operated Mobile franchises dedicated to customer service across the U S A making name brands affordable for everyone! M O T T O : Were not afraid to work for your business C O M P E T IT IO N : No one ? ) ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ N A T I O N A L 292-6464 636-6588 Portland/Beaverton Wash. Co Lake Oswego/West Linn/ Clack. CoiTualatin