Dad's birthday was this week, he would have been 75. He's a Virgo, which equates to a whole slew of positive things in my book -- an outgoing life of the party, a connector, and organizer. He also happened to be a gay man from a time where it made him an outcast and placed [...]
Figuring out how I fit in became a question when I was three years old, left living with Dad, and began living with Mom…first with her parents in Davenport, Iowa. As my parents finalized their divorce when I was two it hadn’t occurred to me that I needed to fit. It was living with grandparents I [...]
When I was a little girl I didn’t know our family was off or different, things just were the way they were. Yes, I felt the ups and downs of first living with Dad, then with Mom…really with Grandparents shortly before Mom found a house for us. The important thing is I was unassuming, resilient [...]
It was the quiet spaces that were the killer. The fact that I saw things about Dad we didn’t talk about. The quirky way he and Jim would look at one another after having drinks after 5, after being separated all day, then joining back together with us kids for the evening. It was the [...]
Beginning when I was old enough to fly to see Dad on my own, each and every time I visited him he’d guide me to the room I was staying in. On the bed I would find one of his thick velour robes, laid out for me to wear in the morning hours. Each [...]
At 17, I already felt a large tear in my life, in my heart. Dad had been so dear to me, so animated, so gregarious, so loving. Now, in the forefront of my mind he was gay. He was what my friends would label: homo, fag, queer – all negative labels, words used to make [...]
I think of Dad as I freeze jars of pesto made from my garden to be pulled later for a special holiday dinner. Some of my fondest memories are cooking with Dad in the many kitchens he had over the years. As I go through the ritual of blending fall ready ingredients I think about [...]
