gratitude – The New NormL

10 years out

Today, October 11, is National Coming Out day. In my lifetime, I have seen the concept of being “outed” change so much, it would be difficult to describe to someone who didn’t live through the events of the past 50 years that have changed our country, our world, so much. There is debate on many fronts – about the nature of what it is to be human; about what should be taught in schools; about what is “true” and what is “science”; even the nature of faith. Much of my life has been spent in recovery from lessons I would hope fewer children are taught now; but I know there will always be opportunities to give others encouragement to accept themselves, to stand up for others who need support, and to tell someone that they are loved.

Perhaps time doesn’t heal all wounds, but instead allows us to move beyond them and honor their lessons. I will probably spend the rest of my life continuing to learn and grow, and occasionally contribute to that in others; one of the reasons I write here is to try to share something with strangers out there who might be facing challenges that I faced, similar if different – and to say, hold on. Hold on to hope, to faith, to love – they are all real, they are eternal, and they surround you. But today the hours are winding down, and for the moment, I feel the best I can offer, now at least, is to share the letter I sent to friends and family on October 11, 2012 – like everything I write, it came from the heart. Since then – life has indeed changed. Life has truly become better – not easy, not carefree, not without challenges – but better. In that spirit – a look back at how my own path to becoming the best I can be took a big step towards growth, 10 years ago, today. The title to my email was –

A Voice in the wilderness no more

Family and Friends, far and wide, close and distant – Today is a day for sharing. I have exciting news to share – news I could not have imagined just a few years ago. Behind the headline is a larger story, one I wish I could convey in a more personal way but my hope is you will accept my offer to journey through with me. In it, perhaps, is something that will touch your life or the lives of those you love, and it is my gift and privilege to invite you to pause, listen, and perhaps see my life in a different light.

My news is that as of last month I am one of the newest members of the Gay Men’s Chorus of Los Angeles, or GMCLA. About 16 months ago I first attended one of their performances, and when they came out on stage – before even singing a note – I felt my heart welling up with tears. When I saw these men walking out in front of an audience, something about their openness and their pride spoke to my soul in a very deep way – because of the wounds that still lay deep within me. Later on, I heard a concert of spirituals that lifted my heart, and finally last June when I attended with a friend, he encouraged me to try out. When I auditioned, I knew that if I was selected, to stand with these men, to openly share not only my identity as a member of a chorus but as a representative of thousands, millions of voices that are not always heard – that I would take that privilege as a sign to fully share my story with you. It isn’t brief, but I hope you will take the time to find the meaning it offers.

It probably isn’t a surprise for me to tell you I am gay. It’s kind of funny for me to say that, still – when I was a kid, and I knew my feelings even then, gay was not a word in common use for that population. The words were uglier, and it was the 70’s, and at least in my sheltered world, there were no homosexuals – none that I knew of. They were solely characters whispered about in obscure movies and condemned in Old Testament stories. I remember my Mom complaining bitterly about how “they were stealing that beautiful word and making it ugly!” In any case, you may have assumed years ago that I am a fairy, a faggot, a queer, a homosexual (I don’t think many use the term sodomite anymore, but, whatever). But this isn’t about labels or names.

What is more important for me to tell you is how I came to the point of being able to finally embrace, willingly, and accept a part of me that I was taught, indoctrinated, even brainwashed to hate, reject, despise, and try to destroy. Because in that history is the core of whatever I have to share with you that really matters.

Many of you receiving this directly, today, “National Coming Out Day” 2012, have known something of my family life; some are family. But, unfortunately, my family life was a lot more destructive, in a well-intentioned way, than those of you who might have been a distant part of it could have known even then. It’s nothing too different from many children, but through whatever set of circumstances, disparate threads weaved together over time to form a rope, a net, and in some ways a noose that bound me more effectively than any prison. It’s not necessary to go into details; I know my parents loved me, but like all parents, they had their own brokenness and challenges. With my Dad out of the picture at a young age –probably for the best, for me – and my Mom impacted by disabilities and emotionally shattered – I was a child alone, and poorly prepared to face being different in addition to the rejection I already felt.

I don’t regret that I was brought up in a home where faith – or a form thereof – was a central facet of life. I was, as I see it, blessed with a gift of intelligence that allowed me to burrow away from the loneliness of rejection by my peers, and economic limitations, into a world of books and imagination. I could get “good grades” and be a “good boy”. But even though I am today thankful for all the good things that were a part of my growing up, and my family structure, I realized early on that a central fact about my being was the worst thing that anyone could be (in my insulated world) – I was attracted to other boys. I hated myself for it, and read books about it; I prayed for it to change, even as I left home for college; and my overall shame about not only that facet of my being, but an all-encompassing sense of alienation and worthlessness, kept me from stepping outside the safety of my pretend world, and my straight church boy alter ego, to even attempt to find my place in that other world. From what I saw in the porn I occasionally viewed, and then destroyed, I was not good enough to be attractive to other guys, and in any case, it was a sin worse than death. I also watched in the papers as news began to spread of a “gay plague” and the fear and condemnation that came from my world towards that group of “other people” was enough to keep me safely closeted.

When I finally, due to job requirements, left the safe but cold and lonely womb of my home, despite my Mom’s pleadings to remain, I started to cautiously but still shamefully and full of self-hatred step into the world I had only viewed from a distance. What happened at that point changed my destiny in a single night at age 26, when I was held at gunpoint, tied up, and my home ransacked and car stolen by a stranger I had brought home for what, in my twisted perception, passed for intimacy. I called the police, who ridiculed me behind my back and made no effective effort to find my car; more importantly, I called my Dad who came to bring me back home – to “safety”. There, after tearful confessions, I told my parents (separately) my horrible secret. My Dad was not overly reactive – he was not someone equipped with much in the way of caring skills – but my Mom prayed for my deliverance. And that is when the threads began to tighten around me.

For several years, I was in therapy, and eventually happily and hopefully participating in what was called “Ex gay deliverance” ministries, aka conversion therapy. I reached for the promise of being “healed” – of becoming straight, or like Pinocchio, a real boy. I attended groups where were prayed for God’s help in overcoming our “brokenness” and sin; I was prayed over for deliverance from demons; I confessed my temptations, I fasted, I read books. I even travelled to San Francisco for consideration in a yearlong residency at a home where young gay men could be taught how to become straight, through faith in God and the support of others. The only problem was … God wasn’t answering those prayers, and the support of the few believers that I turned to wasn’t enough to matter. The counseling failed to provide any consolation; and after several years, I just gave up – on living, on believing I could matter, or that there was any hope for love. Fortunately, for me, even though I made weak attempts at a typical straight life, I did not take it so far as to carry the deception into the life of another through a sham relationship and marriage. I poured myself into my work, my education, and artificial happiness. Alone. Always, alone.

When my Mom reached a point of decline that she needed to be moved from home in my 40’s, I literally returned to that original site of isolation and loneliness. Oddly, in working for literally years to clean my childhood home of my Mom’s hoarded treasures, I found in the stacks of old family photos, forgotten letters, journals and albums a message of hope. I saw that my life was a part of a chain of events, of other people – and I learned that their lives had tragedy and loss as well as the joy and happiness in the faded black and white snapshots. I learned that my family had lost members crossing the US to settle the west, that they had died in flu epidemics, and that they were separated by wars and fought many trials to stay alive. Out of that … I was born. My life was not some random occurrence; I was a part of a larger stream of life – and not only a leftover, or a mistake. For whatever reason, out of that I began to feel that my life had to have meaning beyond just taking care of others, beyond just working.

I had never abandoned my sense that my life was part of a larger whole, or a foundational belief that a Creator existed; but I had reached a place of desperation where I felt abandoned by a God who never responded to my pleas, and that must mean I did something wrong. I saw myself only as a failure who could not achieve what he was created to achieve – conformity with social expectations and gender roles, sexual roles, that were shouted all around me, along with that ongoing hatred of perversion shared by those who sat in the pews and sang the praise and worship songs, whether to an organ or a guitar with drum backups. The healing deliverance never came. There certainly was no one I could be honest with about what I felt; my prior counseling for years had produced only a sense of futility and hopelessness, and I clearly was not doing something right with all the ex-gay ministries. But as I delved into my family history, I reconnected with a member who had been scorned by my father, and effectively abandoned by the rest of the family – his gay cousin Bill.

Bill was an irresponsible man who took advantage of others while, at times, putting on airs of sophistication and living for the moment. He had come out during the 40’s as a teenager and lived as a hairdresser in Hollywood and Hawaii during a time of social change; I had only met him twice, briefly. When I visited Hawaii due to a business trip in the 80’s I was relieved that he and his partner were gone on a trip. When I went to visit him 20 years later in Palm Springs, and shortly thereafter his partner passed, I eventually became legally responsible for his care. I will never forget the Thanksgiving I asked my Dad if I could bring Bill to Corona for dinner, and he refused immediately. I visited him occasionally; he took me to a brunch one Sunday at a gay resort, and I remember feeling extremely uncomfortable and out of place. But Bill never asked me about my life; I made excuses for being single. Years later, I learned that he told his friends I would come to my senses one day, and he hoped they would help me.

Beginning in early 2006 with the loss of my stepmother, May of that year with my Mom’s passing, Bill’s death in October of that year and my Dad following in May of 2007, my world changed. Everything that had kept me in place was gone. I was in a new job; I had finished my second master’s and bought a beautiful home where I could at last display all the things I had spent time and money accumulating. I turned 50; I was utterly alone, I knew nothing about love, and I had to finally accept that unless I was ok with spending whatever time I had left isolated and uncared for, I had to find a way to accept that part of me that I had worked so hard to kill. I had to try to find a way to accept being gay, even though the teachings embedded in my brain and heart for 4 decades still shouted at me that they must be obeyed. The noose was beginning to unravel along with the lies that came from it.

It would not be true to say I had no friends in my life, but those that were did not know that part of me of which I was so ashamed – with one exception, Helen, a friend a fellow person of faith who did not condemn me. She didn’t pretend to have answers like most, but she knew enough to be sure that God did not hate me, or any of those who like me failed to meet that standard of purity and conformity. I made a friend in Alan, who taught me to ride horse back and who had himself followed a very different path, one of accepting himself early on and pursuing the life that I had denied. I started taking tentative steps and went to a gay bar for the first time in April of 2010; that summer was a time of confusion as I walked into a world very different from anything I had known. I made more friends, some of which lasted and some of which turned out to be ones that I needed to move on from. I began to come out to people I had spent my life lying to, out of desperation, because of the confusion I was experiencing as I tried to bridge my earlier perspective with the realities confronting me with each excursion beyond the prison of lies.

In time I found my way to the LA Gay and Lesbian Center, where for about six months in 2011 I spent time each week in a men’s group where others of all ages, races and backgrounds shared their process of accepting where they were, and finding that acceptance, sometimes, from others as well. I gradually shared my story with varying degrees of acceptance, some unsurprised, others shocked. I began with the people I felt I had lied to the most; the ones who I did not trust to accept me, and from whom I had hidden in shame. As I told one dear friend – I don’t have the answers; I don’t know why. But I know that God – and yes, I still believe in a creator that cares – loves me, and everyone like me, even though those who claim to be his representatives shout down any suggestion otherwise. I wanted her to know that anytime she heard someone share that lie, that she knew someone who loved her and who she loved, who had been a part of her life, who she knew to be a caring and decent man, was one of those being condemned and rejected –and that God wanted that to change.

I would be remiss if I failed to share the impact that another change has had on my life. Against any expectation on my own or from others, I find myself riding a beautiful, black, loud, shiny and at times unreliable beast I have named Prometheus – my 2001 centennial edition Indian Chief. It was brought into my life, of that I am sure. My courtship has been tentative, but I have not given up taming the beast. One of the proudest moments of my life was riding last December with the Satyrs Motorcycle club – my first group ride – the oldest continuously operating gay organization of any kind, in the world. And a few weeks ago, I rode into San Francisco – for the first time, as a man who accepts himself as he is, without shame, without lies. It has been transformative. In a way, it typifies my resolve to pursue what my heart desires against all the self-doubts and uncertainties – to take hold and not let go, regardless of what others think. The attached photo is from the Long Beach Pride parade I was able to ride in this past June.

In the past 30 months I have seen things and been on a journey to places that polite conversation would not welcome, and that’s as it should be. I don’t pretend that my experiences or desires are those common to all who walk the earth. But I have learned to not hate myself for it. And in that time, I have made many mistakes, blundered into situations for which my life of isolation did not prepare me, and frequently walked away feeling desperately out of place. And yet … for the first time in my life, I feel a sense of rightness. That instead of crushing my own heart, it breathes and beats the truth. When during the course of conversation an older gentleman proclaimed “Oh, so you are just coming out”, I responded that I feel it is more than coming out – it is, for me, comingtogether. Accepting pieces I tried to crush, to burn, to kill, to destroy – not knowing, not realizing that it was those very pieces which I needed to at last reach out and touch, and be touched, by others in the way that we all so deeply desire. At last I can say without doubt – what I feel is natural. It is normal. It is whole. And for me, for how I see the broader realities, it is blessed.

Beyond all these passages, I remain profoundly grateful. Grateful to be alive; grateful, at 54 in a world that values youth and in a life where I lost decades from living in a box, bound by fear shame and lies … to be able to stand. Able to choose. I never thought I had choices in life; it was all so very well defined. No thinking was necessary, or welcome; it was all set out for me, to follow the dotted lines. But I didn’t fit. I wasn’t created to fit. I now see we are all created ultimately to be true to ourselves and in that to honor the source of our life with that truth. And that only in accepting that truth – the whole of it, not just the pretty parts – can we fully realize, and then share, the most powerful resource our hearts can embrace –unconditional love. Not love that says “First you must” or “Only if you” … but love that comes from knowing we are ok JUST AS WE ARE.

For those of you out there reading this who want to respond with theological positions or scriptures … don’t know you I have spent my life on those questions? Don’t you realize I have cried in the darkness, alone, begging God to please change me? I have often wanted to stand in front of the bodies of believers who have been taught, thoughtlessly, to hate the different ones and ask – how much more did Jesus need to die, to bleed, for me to be forgiven and accepted? No … I am not straight. And don’t you believe that if God wanted me to become something I am not – he would or could zap me and make me conform to that? I reject those arguments. I will not participate in them. I will not waste one more moment hating myself or anyone else, or stand by while anyone shares lies and judgment, telling anyone that they are not good enough to stand up in the sunlight and be accepted and live as they choose, as they are, as they were created. We may not be able to choose who we are but we can damn well choose how we live. I stand today having to remind myself, just like any other man of character, that regardless of how others respond to me, regardless of how they view or accept or embrace or reject me – I must be true to what values and priorities that I want to define me.

This Saturday, I am so moved, so grateful, so blessed to be able to stand with nearly 50 other men and sing for an audience of 1500 teens, young adults and their parents who are hearing, freely, what I was never told – that it is ok to be gay. It’s ok to be lesbian. It’s ok to be unsure. It’s ok to not have answers – and that no one has the right to tell them to change. No one can tell them they are “wrong”. I hope that I won’t break down in tears. I hope that my smile will shine through as I stand before them, free to be myself, accept myself, and reach out with that hope for them.

I am not coming out to you today for you; I’m doing it for me and for anyone in your life that may need you to accept them as well. This isn’t about me seeking your acceptance or blessing; it’s about me at last, at last, having the strength to accept myself and step fully into the light without shame. I am so grateful to those who have stood with me in this passage; the trials are not over. So many who have led the way, so many who were braver than I, who fought and created the programs and the places and the freedoms so that I could take these steps. I want to thank them all. I especially want to thank the men who have listened, who have held me, who have encouraged me, who have accepted me. My promise is to live up to their hopes. My promise is to keep fighting. My promise, my choice, is to walk out of the shadows, and love.

I hope you will do the same. And I hope, wherever you are, whatever you believe, that if nothing else – you will go see a Gay men’s chorus. Listen. Open your heart. Let truth wipe away darkness. Let light dispel lies. Hear them sing. Hear me sing.

In love … Norm

With my husband in Dolores Park, San Francisco, October 2022.

Where gratitude leads us

**A lovely thought from a treasured vintage postcard, gifted by a good friend**

In a little less than a week, many in America, and others around the world, will celebrate by giving thanks. You probably have your traditions – perhaps they include special foods, or sports – perhaps online shopping, or a hike, far removed from the daily routine. As we approach that day, I have been thinking about the role of thanks not only in that upcoming day, but every day – and what I hope to gain by being a better practitioner of gratitude. Perhaps you, too, have reflected upon Thanksgiving a bit more this year, after all the hurdles of recent times. There have been years for me where I questioned what it was I was supposed to be thankful for; in recent days, the gatherings of my past seem to be offering a lesson for the future; I cannot quite make it out, but perhaps together we can find some meaning to share.

***The Norman Rockwell classic Thanksgiving dinner art – and a welcome reframing for today’s families***

I cannot tell you my first memory of Thanksgiving, as a family gathering. Some do have those “Norman Rockwell” images and memories; there were years that my family, in various configurations, tried to achieve that. Although the years of my parents being together were few, I am certain they tried to give my brother and I the “turkey and fixings and pumpkin pie” kind of meal. But, probably not with family, because in those years we were together, we lived far from any close relatives. I do, however, remember – and had to confirm with my older brother, whose recollections are a little clearer – after my parents separated, my father picking us up and driving us to his workplace for a dinner – at the Chino “Men’s rehabilitative state institute”, or, state prison, simply put. I remember driving through high, barbed wire topped automatic fences and eating in a large community room (with inmates and guards and families) – I think it was all he could afford, in those early years of separation and divorce. It wasn’t “pretty” or picture perfect – but he wanted to spend that meal with us, and that is what I choose to remember, now.

My Mom’s health issues were many, and she was not a cook (and neither am I!) But, when I was a little older, Dad remarried – a local elementary school teacher, single and older, who loved cooking (and was darn good at it!) – who prepared everything and more for Thanksgiving and just about any occasion. In time, their son was born – I was in junior high – and on occasion, a cousin or other family member might join as well. Years later, of course, both my brothers married, and had children, who joined the tradition now and then. My stepmother (who, confusingly at times, had the same first name as my Mom, creating two women with the same name in our not so large back then city) was always kind to prepare a plate for me to take home to my Mom. The other part of that tradition I remember – not so fondly – was the focus on hours and hours of football games. They seemed utterly boring and pointless to me.

In my college years, I would come home for Thanksgiving from the dorms; as I began my professional life, I often returned to those family gatherings, until a period of several years, after I moved away from my roots, when my own personal struggles led to more isolation and searching for understanding. I would sometimes spend the holidays alone, or going to see movies, or escaping for a “feast” to the “happiest place on earth” – Disneyland – where the music and energy would provide respite, briefly, from my inner uncertainties. I had long since stopped going to church – the gulf in my spirit between what I felt and what I had been taught was too wide to ignore. But, being raised as a “good church boy”, I often brought to mind the hymn that often had been sung in my childhood services – replaced later at more contemporary evangelical gatherings by “praise singers” – ever constant reminders that we “should” be thankful for our many blessings.

The song that I associate with giving thanks, with lyrics – sung now for 5 centuries, in various forms

As a history buff, I’ve come to realize, perhaps by coincidence, how the origins of the celebration crisscrossed my journeys. More than 30 years ago, on my solo and only drive through parts of American history on the east coast, I visited the location of what is now recognized as the first Thanksgiving by colonists – in the Jamestown settlement of Virginia. And nearly two decades later, I had the opportunity, courtesy of a friend, to visit Provincetown , Massachusetts – the first landing on what became American soil by the pilgrims, seeking refuge from religious oppression. Some now see these moments in human history primarily as infringement on indigenous peoples; certainly, their lives and world were forever altered by these events. The picture books I loved in my childhood and youth, and stories of heroes, are seen differently now by many. But as I reflect on the essence of what Thanksgiving means to me, if not to all – I remember those moments on my own journey to new life; recognizing that there were many sacrifices made for what we now enjoy. And realizing that I was fortunate, indeed, to never know true hunger.

The First Thanksgiving Took Place in Virginia, not Massachusetts

For all of us, the years of family gatherings can never last forever; my Mom spent her final 7 Thanksgivings in a care facility a short drive from our old home, where she would sit in her wheelchair sometimes outside in the sun, and the occasional visit from my brother’s family was a welcome distraction. It was during those years, cleaning her home through the paraphernalia accumulated over decades, I started my own discovery of family history through the letters, photos and mementos she had stored in forgotten drawers of her home of 40 years; my digging led to new connections, and renewed family sharing with many cousins. I remember another holiday during that period where I had asked my Dad if he was open to having me drive his cousin Bill, now a widowed gay retired hairdresser living in a trailer park in the desert, back to Corona for Thanksgiving. Dad was not open to that – after 30 or more years, he held on to his reasons for separation, and they were not to see one another again. For her final Thanksgiving in 2005, facing treatments for pancreatic cancer, my stepmother did not prepare her traditional feast; I drove her and my Dad to a Marie Callender’s for Thanksgiving buffet. She passed that winter; my Mom followed in spring 2006, and Cousin Bill in fall 2006. Dad outlived them all – he had his final Thanksgiving while living in a care facility near my younger brother, and while at a family gathering that day with both my brother’s families, he asked me to drive him back to the facility before we ate dinner together. That was the last time we were under one roof before his passing the following spring of 2007.

Those next few Thanksgivings felt very empty. It was a season – several seasons, cumulative, folding upon one another like a line of dominoes – of grief, and memory, and healing. In time, the process of working through the old, and accepting the new, opened doors in my own life to move ahead; the growth and understanding I came to embrace, through many lonely holidays, brought me to a very different – and better – place, in time. There have been many gatherings with family since then – at Thanksgiving, and more – and with friends, old and new, including one memorable Thanksgiving feast with something like 20 hungry gay men crammed into a small San Francisco home, wolfing down gourmet dishes. Like most of you reading this today, I spent Thanksgiving 2020 eating at home – happily no longer alone, but with my husband, something I never envisioned a decade before. This year, since neither of us fits the mold of being great cooks, we are looking forward to a sumptuous buffet at a restaurant, with masks suitably lowered but readily at hand.

***Hey, Thanksgiving is for everyone – even the Muppets and Charlie Brown!***

All of these prior Thanksgivings are swirling in my memory, and those who prepared the food, and who sat with us, although not present still are nevertheless still at our table, in my heart. I will be surrounded by memories as we go through our day – bravely enduring the Macy’s “parade” from the comfort of our den, with calls to and from family and friends, and Facebook posts, and a feast where our regrets begin probably before we put down the fork and put on our masks. I can assure you, however – NO FOOTBALL! But there is a deeper lesson to be learned and shared, even if we cannot – or choose not – to be “together” on that day; a lesson of what I am coming to think of as the destination we seek to reach on a road paved with gratitude. Where does our gratitude lead us?

I am coming to understand that the “injunctions” I heard from the church school of my childhood, and the pulpit of my later years, about giving thanks, and prayers, and acknowledging our blessings – whatever your own faith or views may be – have a greater end and purpose than just rote performance. When I reflect on the many graces and gifts that have come into my life from all sorts of people, not always in moments that traditionally might have been classified as “holy” or spiritual – I am humbled. I begin to see things differently – that the practice, consistently, of giving thanks opens my heart and my awareness to a greater peace and a living hope. Not born from my intellect, but from a connection outside my own being.

For me – giving thanks broadens my perspective in a way that I find difficult to describe, but feel deeply. Acknowledging that I have been given so many good things in life helps me to accept that I can never have all the answers, never control all the outcomes, and – at least on this earth – never understand the many “whys” that echo in my soul. It reminds me of my limits, certainly – but also helps me see the many miracles, dare I say, that have visited my life – and those of my family, now and in the past. That is one of the treasures of discovering ancestry – realizing the struggles and sacrifices, joys and daring choices that my forebears took to survive and build and create, which they gave me. Childless, I can only look on my family and friends and imagine the bond that they share with the next generations, and realize that legacy is priceless, and I try in my small way to add to it with love and encouragement. Our love is woven by unseen hands into something that lasts.

The practice, the habit, the discipline of giving thanks consciously leads to many outcomes, and the discovery and awareness of deeper truths than just what gifts I have received. It leads to humility and acceptance of my own limits, and others; to a peace and faith that the things I cannot know or see will be brought together for good, in time; and to an empathy and compassion for the lives I encounter once, or often along the way – wandering, as I do, on a path that none of us fully comprehend. Developing slowly, with effort, an “attitude of gratitude” opens my heart to knowing – I have been loved, I am loved, and those around me are loved and this moment, this day – whether filled with cooking meals or watching football or practicing music or sitting by the bedside of someone otherwise alone, and wondering what lies ahead – each moment is one that I can give love. Not answers – just love. A touch, a word, a smile, in between all the traffic jams and gas lines and news of conflict and ongoing threats that barrage our awareness and try to drown out the silent, patient hope.

***Every step we take, as we build our path moment by moment, matters.***

Whether your own life has brought you to a place where you believe there is a force out there, larger than us, who listens – or whether it is enough to realize that the power of community caring can lift us all to a better place, regardless – Thanksgiving is a day of hope, and realization, as much as celebration and remembrance. If you are with family – perhaps for the first time in a while – this could be a time for you to share and preserve your memories, histories, and lessons. They are worth celebrating, and sharing, for those who will walk past our days here. If you are alone, as I was for many years, this could be a chance to reach out to another and say, simply, I appreciate you, your caring for me, and I care about you too. What a joy it can be to find an opportunity to say that, in a brief moment, whether to a loved one or a stranger, and know it may mean the world to them, too.

My distant cousin, Susan Applegate, is an artist in rural Oregon, where our Applegate western pioneer roots were first established. Years ago, she did a painting of the “Old House” – indeed, the oldest house in original family hands, in Yoncalla – the home of my great great great grandfather, Charles and his wife Melinda. Her art showed multiple generations of family – dozens, over the many decades of life there – gathered around the fireplace, celebrating across the bonds of time. That thought – of our timeless connections, even among strangers – resonates with me as the nights start earlier and the leaves fall. Next week, I will be here in SF with Bob, feasting (and regretting) – but I will also be in that quiet now ancient home in Yoncalla, and in Denver with my grandparents I never knew, then in Corona with my parents, and also at that men’s prison in Chino, and smiling with my cousin Bill alone in Palm Springs; knowing again, somehow, all the moments of time, and life, and the echoes of their souls, laughter and love.

**My times of giving thanks are not quite this photogenic, but they feel like it sometimes!**

I invite you to join me on the path to gratitude and more; to give thanks tomorrow, and the day after – forgetting on occasion, I am sure, but returning again – in the morning quiet. Finding peace in accepting that as there have been joys and disappointments through every year of life, more lie ahead – but we will never be truly without hope, and without much for which to be grateful. And we will be reminded that those gifts have come, to know that greater love – from all the sources and all the hearts – is flowing not just to us in those moments of reflection, but through each of us, to others, like a timeless river of life.

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No thanks – but thanks – in 2020

Yes, it’s been nearly half a month since Thanksgiving, I know! Why am I so “late” in writing? Well, I prefer to think that I needed to get to the right place and time to express something worth offering to you – and, perhaps, to discover for myself. As I go through my reflective/creative process for sharing here, which (like me) is evolving, I often achieve some realizations, awareness, about the issues that are “troubling the waters” of my soul. There seems to be more troubling of the water, these days. Some of my friends might be surprised at how much I struggle, daily, and have for many years, with inner conflicts, doubts, depression and uncertainty. Whether online – here, Facebook – or in person (or zoom!), it’s not that the words I share, or the photos, are not from my heart – they are deeply sincere – but my day to day existence does not always match my aspirations.

But I have been thinking about thankfulness, gratitude, where it fits in my life – how easy it is to set aside or pretend and just go through the motions. In reality, choosing to be and express thankfulness is HARD WORK! But also, a very powerful, even life changing force. At last, for now, here are my own small reconsiderations, and reflections on that subject. Or, as an alternate title – “A heaping plate of regrets and a side of disappointment does not make for a pleasant dinner”.

*This is not the Thanksgiving you want to have … but it would be memorable!*

Even though I am sure anyone reading this has enough weighing on their hearts and is not seeking to focus on my challenges, I am convinced anything I have of value to share are the lessons for which I paid dearly, whether in blood, sweat or tears – that our mistakes offer more room for growth to lead to hopefully our triumphs. And I know others are like me – struggling to focus on having a positive attitude, expectations and hopes after so many months of, well, everything. But in that struggle, somehow, the beacon of grabbing onto gratitude in the midst of disappointment still calls out to me.

I wonder, in my early morning sleep deprived ruminations, what role does the giving of thanks play in our lives today? What meaning does it have? If we do not personally believe in what is generically termed a “higher power”, however we frame or conceptualize that – does giving thanks and prayer have any substantive value in our lives? Are we just begging for help out of desperation, hoping there is someone, something “out there” that will “deliver us from evil”, eliminate COVID, wipe out our political enemies who so clearly wrong about whatever we are what so clearly right on, and bring back everything we loved about our lives while somehow vanishing the problematic social, economic and other nasty realities we just want to exclude from our awareness? Or do we just want our “old lives” back – and in the case of far too many, the lives of our loved ones taken from us, struggling to reconcile our grief with our faith.

Oh, sure, I can put on the “attitude of gratitude” for a while, to fool myself, or maybe appear to for others. It is so very, very easy to mouth the platitudes that I was taught from an early age, whether they be prayers, or songs, or sayings – being thankful for family, food, shelter. I am very aware that in the larger reality of population I am among the most fortunate of humans, in terms of basic needs, care, and more. But just saying words is not enough – it is not from the heart. Perhaps anger and frustration from the heart are more powerful, more real than the practiced pleasant statements that we feel we are expected to include in our traditional gatherings. Soaking our hearts daily in anger and frustration is like a poison that seeps into every aspect of life. Our hearts began to be choked into silence by the thorns of despair.

*I have felt like this too much lately … but as I am discovering, there is another way.*

So if I was to describe my Thanksgiving – we (my husband and I, and our two cats) followed our local guidelines, and spent the day without in person contact with family or friends, with a low key meal (we are not the chefs that some of our friends exemplify), zooming instead, and enjoying some entertainment. In many ways, it was a lovely day. But underneath the traditions, I am dealing with the same frustrations, anger, fears and uncertainties that swirl around us all, daily. And in that, in the quiet moments when my heart puts all the chaos briefly on pause, somehow, the thought of gratitude keeps bubbling up, saying – “remember me”.

And I have been trying to do just that. To remember what it is like to be truly grateful; to think about what that means, when there is so much going on that seems to be coming from someone else’s nightmare, day after day after day. I try to turn off the news but find myself obsessively checking websites for the latest edict, the latest data, and the latest projections of doom and death. I juggle that with planning when to go to the store, when to manage our limited time outside the house, and, oh yes, Christmas! Because I am not going to lose Christmas, dammit! (Try to picture me saying that with a smile, at least in part!)

*2020 has been the year of unwanted presents – but also unexpected gifts*

Yet I sense that the way ahead – whether it is “through”, or “out of”, this current state of frustration is not changing the situation – not getting the reality I want – but accepting, embracing the reality I have. It’s sort of like reaching for something but you can’t because you are too burdened with what you are throttling, trying to choke the life out of, or dragging along with you – you haven’t released it. If this sounds similar to an entry a few months ago – you are probably right. I may be circling the same water because I never stopped to taste it.

I was raised in the traditional Christian church of the 60’s. I didn’t stay in it; I questioned what I was taught versus what I could see in people’s lives; I couldn’t conform to what I felt was expected of me. I don’t have a background in world religions, but I sense that whatever truths about human nature, the way we are built, the way we learn and grow, are central to many faiths. After all, in many ways, we are a single race, mixed in innumerous cultures and subcultures, families, neighborhoods, classes. But all of us, in some way, are trying to reach for something we sense but cannot name. The answers may be unknowable, for us, today. But the broader truth may be that we must embrace what we have now, make peace with it, yes, even love it and give thanks for it, to be free to move on.

It’s as though we are trapped in a room and cannot see the door because we are so desperately trying to break through the walls. Think of yourself as a battery – you have energy stored in you; it goes away; but it can also be replenished. That energy has a focus, where you are centralizing your attention. If it is on all the things you are frustrated with, it goes into that and produces – probably next to nothing, other than perhaps more frustration for you and those in your life. Acknowledging our inability to change something is not what my culture taught me.

Yet, however contradictory it may seem, I sense that it is in a deeper, daily acceptance of our current reality – through giving thanks, gratitude, whatever you want to call it (and to whomever or whatever you wish to express it) – which allows us to eventually be freed from the expectations, demands, fantasies and dreams that we cannot achieve. They have been so deeply woven into our focus, priorities and purpose that they become a cocoon, eve a prison perhaps. Focusing on our disappointment prevents us from seeing that the path we wanted to take is not the path before us. We have fixated on the walls of our cell that we want to escape so firmly that we are blind to the doorways which were there all along.

*If the way ahead is not apparent, we must be open to the unexpected and undiscovered*

To put it another way – Accepting, truly and completely making peace with the reality we would like to change (and our expectation that we cannot be otherwise whole) allows us to see choices we that were once invisible. We cannot fully see the possible while we cling to the wished for or expected. Creating an equilibrium of peace in our current state opens our eyes, and hearts, to new possibilities.

I am sure those familiar with the history of philosophy can identify the origins of just about any perspective we might take today – I don’t pretend to know those facts. I just am trying to listen to my heart, and to something outside of myself speaking to me there. Surely many are familiar with the 12 step programs, initially formalized with AA, and the Serenity prayer in all it’s iterations – “God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference”. I have learned that we do not always share the same challenges, or purpose, or destiny, or understanding – and we cannot let someone else tell us what ours must be. We have to find our own way, as individuals, and yet – together. But we are all facing a lot of what we cannot change today, and we all need serenity, equilibrium – stilling the waters of our souls.

If you google “gratitude quotes” you’ll find an endless listing of helpful websites. Two rang true with me today, as I work to bring these thoughts to a close. First, Charles Dickens, whose own life was far from problem free (here is an excellent profile ), but whose words still bring hope to readers around the globe in so many cultures –

And, author Melody Beattie, whose work is not familiar to me but who has written on addiction related issues and provided helpful insights to many – there is no “one size fits all”, of course –

Gratitude unlocks the fullness of life. It turns what we have into enough, and more. It turns denial into acceptance, chaos to order, confusion to clarity. It can turn a meal into a feast, a house into a home, a stranger into a friend. It turns problems into gifts, failures into successes, the unexpected into perfect timing, and mistakes into important events. It can turn an existence into a real life, and disconnected situations into important and beneficial lessons. Gratitude makes sense of our past, brings peace for today, and creates a vision for tomorrow.
Melody Beattie (follow this link for more) on gratitude

In the process of trying to understand what I cannot know … I discover, anew

Thanks for sitting with me for a while, and for reading my little thoughts. I hope something here may ring true for you – give you some “food for thought” as a post-Thanksgiving feast for the soul (well, maybe a snack, then). As challenging as times are, the process of focusing on gratitude gives me hope – and that’s something we all need to find, and share, everyday more than ever.

Until next time – be safe, and find hope – for yourself, and to share. It’s out there!

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Grandpa and Grandma Neighbor

It’s never too late to say thank you. Even when it might appear to be well overdue.

There are all kinds of ways to create families, to love others and to have a sense of belonging and connection. From a traditional perspective, I did not really have any kind of relationship with my natural grandparents; my fathers parents passed before I was 10, and although I have some pictures, they did not live nearby and we saw them rarely, especially after my parents separated. Today I know them probably better than anyone else alive – but through their letters, photos and diary, not my memories. My mother’s mother passed before I was born, and my mothers father remarried and live out of state; her economic and physical circumstances and own broken relation with him kept him farther away than the miles themselves.

With my paternal grandfather on the beach at their Oceanside home c. 1963

But looking back I can see that our neighbors in many ways filled the gap. Here, I do not share the names off the living, or their pictures – except in the case of myself, and occasionally my husband. In fact, sorting through my family records and the literally hundreds of photos from my parents, their parents and before, is going to be a very long term project. Still, when I ran across a portrait of our next door neighbors from my childhood, I feel that sharing their gifts to me might have meaning for you, distant readers. It’s my pleasure to introduce you to them, today.

We moved to our amazing all electric “Medallion home” in 1962 – there actually was a large gold emblem in the porch – it was one of the last sold. I was four, my brother 7, and my parents marriage would be over not long after. On one side, the Burchetts lived with two daughters, and across the street, the Millers with four children, three older than me – and these were not large homes. But next door, it was just the Milbrats. I had no idea of their age, of course – to me, they were just old. Even as I grew into my college years, I really didn’t know much about them, except that they had grown children – and that they were exceedingly kind. In some ways, they were angels in our lives.

Yes, that’s our then future president shilling Medallion Homes!

I remember, after my father left and we struggled financially, it was Mr. Milbrat rather than my Dad who taught me how to ride my bicycle, encouraging me. He lent us yard tools so that my older brother and I could try to keep up with all the work – they had a beautiful backyard, and a neatly trimmed lawn out front. But perhaps most importantly, they welcomed us into their home on very special occasions – to watch television. For most of my upbringing, due to broken TV tubes and limited funds, we did not have a functioning TV in our home, which definitely accentuated my sense of differentness from the families around us – no father, no car, no income really and – no TV!!! That was certainly a reason I rode to the library a lot.

This sure looks familiar … it took courage to climb aboard!

This was the era of Walt Disney’s Wonderful World of Color, preceded by Mutual of Omaha’s Wild Kingdom with your host, Marlin Perkins. The Milbrats welcomed us in every Sunday night to watch thrilling shows like Zorro and The Horse without a head, that I remember so clearly. And, at Christmas we would watch the specials – I particularly loved “The little drummer boy”, since we sang that song in my elementary district wide choir led by Mr. Farmer – that show, narrated by Greer Garson and animated by the famous Rankin Bass Studios, still moves me to this day. On New Years day, we would head over to watch the Rose Parade; and, historically, it was in front of the Milbrat’s tv that I saw the Apollo moon landing. Oh, but, we also had to endure neighbors gathering to watch slide shows of their travels, and weird documentaries like “If these walls could speak” hosted by Vincent Price, and of course – National Geographic specials featuring Jacques Cousteau, back when there were an astounding 7 channels on TV.

I still love watching this program, and hearing “One Star in the Night”

They were very involved in out local church as well, the Methodist church, where Mrs. Milbrat would donate her knitted goods and baked treats – always delicious! We would see them at the seasonal bazaaars, and annual Christmas nativity programs that we participated in, as well. Mrs. Milbrat was particularly sweet and kind – I remembers being fascinated by her stamp collection (yes, I was truly that nerdy) from I think her mother who had served as a postmistress decades before – I am sure it was quite valuable, even then. I think occasionally they would give us a lift to the doctor, but we mostly relied on taxis, or on my Dad’s weekly stopping by to pick me up to shop at the Alpha Beta not too far away – sending me in to the liquor store next door sometimes to pick up cigarettes or beer, as well.

I think after my father remarried that he and my stepmother, partly motivated to perhaps reduce the amount of time I watched tv at their home after junior high, which they lived nearby, and things like “Seymour presents” on Saturdays, gave me a small black and white portable TV. I would watch in my bedroom for hours, catching up on reruns of Get Smart and beginning my love of old movies – to escape the loneliness of the house, now holding only my mother and I. And I drifted away from youth group and choir at church, starting to attend the more modern “Cross roads” that was large, new, and had guitar music and a popular pastor who appeared with his family on “Family Feud” in my teens. The Milbrats were always there next door – my mother would talk with Mrs. Milbrat, and her other friends from bible study, on the phone for hours. But they slowly became less of a presence in my life.

Oh Skylark … Have you seen a valley green with spring?

And then an amazing thing happened, in 1979, the summer after my third year in college – my Mom presented me with my first car. She said she realized my father was never going to help me get behind a wheel – my brother had left to live with them in part so he would be able to drive once he was licensed in high school. Of course, my Mom had not worked in all the years since they first married, and her income was limited to a small alimony and disability payments from the state; but, the Milbrats daughter had decided she was finished with her 1965 Buick Skylark, and I think out of the kindness of their hearts, they sold it to my Mom for a mere $350. It was somewhat beat up, and my father immediately found many things that were wrong with it. But, it ran – and I finally had “wheels”, and no longer needed him to give me a weekly lift from Corona to my Cal Poly campus and dorms. A year later, after graduation, I remember distinctly a co worker at my first job, with a San Bernardino CPA firm, ridiculing it as the “Jupiter Two” from Lost in Space – but it was, nevertheless, a thing of beauty (in function if not form), to me.

There was one other “gift”, in a way, that came from the Milbrats, and remained in our lives, for a while. She made wonderful stuffed toys, dolls, and puppets – and when my younger brother was born in 1971, I bought her handmade “Raggedy Andy” doll as a gift for him. He had it for years, calling it “Baby Andy”. In time, my mother bought two more – one for my older brother and one for me, to give to our children. What happened to my older brother’s Andy is unknown to me – perhaps one of his kids, now grown, has it stored away – but I kept mine in a drawer with my own childhood mementos for many years. Because, of course, I knew – as did my Mom in time – that I would not be having any children to pass it on to. Five years ago, I had the joy of giving it to the daughter of a dear friend who was expecting her own first child, and sharing with them what it meant to me, and knowing it too would finally become a beloved companion. Another enduring gift of love.

Not Mrs. Milbrat’s Andy, but … a friendly face, even now.

Then, in May 1980, shortly before my college graduation, Mom called my dorm room to let me know Mrs. Milbrat had died; and, the family was asking me to be a pallbearer. At this point in my life, I had never even been to a funeral; well, probably to my fathers parents services, but not in my memory. I was shy and reluctant to be around so many strangers, but I remember driving to the chapel in Loma Linda and then to the cemetery, and returning to campus. I know that my presence meant something to Mr. Milbrat, but to the rest I probably seemed like an outsider – and, I guess in many ways, I was. After I began my job in San Bernardino, he moved away, and eventually word reached us a few years later that he had passed.

Presenting – my best neighbors ever … Oscar and Beatrice Milbrat

When I came across their picture in my endless sorting of faded documents and forgotten faces, I reflected on how much the simple kindnesses of these “chance” neighbors had touched my life, in ways that at the time I did not appreciate. Of course, as a child, I always thanked them – especially when they bought one of the many fund raisers I had to tramp through the neighborhood hawking, like seed packets, cans of nuts for cub scouts, or engraved Christmas cards for church youth group. But I was a child, and as I grew, I became too busy to appreciate all their kindnesses, busy with work, career, and trying to make my way through my own life with it’s challenges that I mostly bore alone.

So, this week, I delved into the amazing online resources available through services like Ancestry, Newspapers.com, and other resources that until now I had only explored for my own family of birth – realizing that in many ways, the Milbrats were my grandma and grandpa of the spirit. What I found was a bit surprising. Oscar, born in 1893 in Alabama, had been a grocer in Orange county – and had been married previously, in Yucatan Mexico in 1925. (It really is remarkable the information one can find on these services!) Apparently his first wife had unsuccessfully filed for divorce, according to a short newspaper article in Santa Ana that she had filed a police report for her husband being too noisy in repairing her roof! She passed in 1957, and two years later he married Beatrice – he was 66, she was 51, and the daughter I had thought was theirs, was only his. After he passed in 1985, he was laid to rest back in Orange County, beside his first wife, not Beatrice – and so, childless, she perhaps today is largely forgotten. But, not by me.

There are all kinds of angels in our lives, you know. Not like Clarence from “It’s a Wonderful Life”, necessarily – not even people whose names we know, perhaps. They may just pass through, but they give us moments of grace, love, encouragement and hope. Even better – we can be those sources for others – it doesn’t really cost us much, if anything, to take a moment to be kind, to listen, to smile. And I think, despite the fact that the tract home neighborhoods of the past don’t exist for us all anymore, we still have neighbors, just in a different way – online, social networks. Our need to connect still drives us deeply within, and there are days when I lie in bed thinking – did I touch someone today? Did I take a moment to show them care, to be as the best neighbor of all, Mr. Rogers, would – just be present with them?

To me, the Milbrats were like Mr. AND Mrs. Rogers, right next door

Is there someone who touched your life like my neighbors? Perhaps someone who in the past, or now, is making a difference in your life that you have never really acknowledged or expressed? Perhaps you’d like to take a moment to reach out and check on them, and say a heartfelt thanks. Or, if like the Milbrats, they have moved on – then the best way to thank and honor them is to share what they gave you, with someone who crosses your path soon. Yes, indeed – what the world needs now is love, sweet love – for and from each of us, especially this very moment.

I thank you, Mr. and Mrs. Milbrat – Oscar and Beatrice – Grandpa and Grandma neighbor – for your love. Your caring, acceptance, and giving spirits. I have to admit – I don’t measure up, by a long shot. But perhaps, sharing their lives with you today, will help us all remember – we have the power to touch lives, moment by moment in small ways – that echo through those lives in ways we will never know. We can reach out and together – rise. Let us do so, today.