A Profile in Courage

Courage -  the ability and willingness to confront fear, pain, danger, uncertainty, or intimidation. 

I was sitting with my son’s fourth grade teacher during a regularly scheduled conference.  She showed me his papers, how he was doing in math and language arts and areas we needed to work with him on.  Then she told me that he had asked to make a special announcement to his class.  

He got up  in front of the class holding a few papers and turned to them and said: “I know that many of you might have heard, but I wanted to tell you that it’s true – I’m gay.”  I let out an involuntary gasp, when she told me this, not because I didn’t know or was ashamed but because admitting something like that could cause problems for him at school and I didn’t want to see my son hurt.  But then she told me that he continued talking to the group.

“I’ve been bullied because people think I’m different and being bullied can really hurt people.”  Then taking his cue from a show we’d seen on Nickelodeon called Sticks, Stones and Cyberslams, he then took out a photo of a young boy named Carl Walker Hoover who was polite and well mannered but who got teased for being gay. The pressure and the teasing got to be too much and hung himself at age 11.  

He also had a photo of Phoebe Prince, a young girl who was bullied to death because she was different.    He told them that words can hurt and that no one should have to die because they feel life is unbearable because they can’t be who they really are.  He then he asked for a show of hands of the kids in the class who had been bullied – all the hands went up.  He then asked if any of the kids in the room had bullied other kids and a few hands went up.   His teacher seeing a definite teaching moment opening up asked the kids how they felt when they were picked on.   The class discussed what it felt like to not be accepted and how words could hurt.  They talked about how everyone was different and that could make them a target for bullies.   After about an hour, it was time for the kids to go to recess where no one got bullied.   

The teacher was afraid that she would hear from angry parents who had a problem with a discussion about homosexuality but she didn’t get a call or e-mail from a single parent.  Her guess was that the kids understood that my son was different in his own way like we all are and that’s what they took away – not that it was wrong to be gay but that it was wrong to make people feel bad about themselves. 

I sat back from that meeting happy that my son had the courage to speak his mind but honestly feeling a little ashamed that if he had told me in advance what he was planning – I would have probably tried to talk him out of it.   I would have been afraid for him to take that chance – that he could have been rejected by those children – that his effort would have failed and the bullying would have intensified. My protective instinct would have been a huge mistake because after he had that talk with his class, the bullying stopped.  My misguided effort to prevent failure would have taught him and his classmates nothing.  Instead, the powers that be allowed me to stay out of it and to let things unfold as they needed to.  This time it was in my child's favor. 

When you first hold your infant in your arms you wonder what sort of person your baby will grow into and project all those hopes and dreams into your child.   I remember when my daughter was born I was planning her wedding in my head when she was just a week old – seeing her as a future Disney Princess.  I’d dress her in pink overalls, a white hat with pink satin bow to match her pink cheeks.    She looked like a baby doll and for a certain time through her toddlerhood, she would wear frilly dresses like Cinderella.  She was my girly girl.  But as she got older, she rebelled against the onslaught of pink and frills.  In fact, I don’t even look at that side of the rack when I’m picking out clothes for her now, because I know that she won’t wear it.  I’ve had to change that expectation of my daughter because she is the awesome person she is -  just not one who is going to wear dresses, pearls, and a ton of ruffles to the school formal – that’s her- not me, and I’m really good with that.    

If I’ve learned anything as a parent, I’ve learned to release my expectations about who my kids are supposed to be.   But sometimes it’s hard to release the image of who you feel you’re supposed to be – the pretty blond girl - the middle daughter who always tries to keep the peace.  I wanted to be straight A student and I would pressurize myself to exhaustion try to get there.  I guess I thought it would make me happy.  I was an honor student and finished in the top 2% of my high school class with a 3.8 a grade average.   I should have been over the moon, but instead I felt like a clown that was hiding behind a mask that was supposed to make everyone happy but me.  This me at age 12.  I look like a deranged Jan Brady. 

How many people out there have felt like this – showing one mask to the outside of the world, but inside you feel like you’re just barely hanging on?  Whether you’re trying to get good grades, get that internship, get that job that is supposed to solve all your financial problems you have this façade that the world sees, but inside you know better.    I think it’s because we can’t release the image of who we think everyone wants us to be – and you end up you feeling like this.   Eventually, I figured out that I'm not wired like everyone else and  that I see the world differently which is good -  but it’s still a work in process and some days I still feel like the teenage girl in this picture - good God don't we all?  But at least I can project the image of what the world finds acceptable - but what if you're gay and tired of trying to be something you're not. 

When I realized that my son wanted to be different – wear make-up, nail polish, wigs, etc., I was concerned about how the world saw him and I knew that sometimes if you’re gay or transgender, it’s not safe to be yourself, especially in some parts of Georgia.  I tell him he is like Harry Potter and that home and church are Hogwarts – he can practice his “magic” with us and no one would make him feel bad about himself but around the muggles, he’d have to be careful.  He could wear his hair on a pony tail, but over the top make-up and bright nail polish was out.  After school and on the weekends, he can dress or be however he wants.  It’s the compromise we have for now but frankly we’re making it up as we go along.   

When we got to march in the Gay Pride Parade in the fall, he got to see that there were all kinds of people like him and we had a blast.  I was very grateful that our Unitarian church was part of that event and that both kids got to see people who were happy in their own skin, marching, hugging, singing and supporting each other.   It  felt like the happiest place on earth and really personified the word "gay."   Even the Westboro Baptist Church idiots could not diminish everyone's good time.  In fact, those folks had long scared my kids but when they saw them standing by the side of the road extolling their misguided philosophy that God hates gays, they walked over to them and told them it was not true.   The progressive Baptist church that was marching with us did the same and it made me smile because it helped my kids see that not every Baptist church felt the same way as these hate mongers did.  

In Georgia, the school year has started and he is more open this year about being transgender - his hair is longer, his ears are pierced and his wears a bit of face make-up but not eye make-up.  So far, so good - but when school begins - everyone is on their best behavior both the students and teachers.  So far, we've been lucky that his elementary school and middle school have had people in the administration who are gay and have his back.   I know that there are other places in the country where that is not the case and gay students are picked on and bullied unmercifully. They are made to feel like they are wrong and worthless for being gay, transgender or different.   Hopefully, they'll have the support of their family and church but I know that many kids do not have the support systems we do and I pray for them.

I pray for the gay people in Russia who are systematically being abused and oppressed because they are who they are.   I pray for all the kids who will be bullied this school year to have the courage to get through it because it will get better even if the idea of getting away from school and your tormentors is still years away.   It's interesting that polls can show that 93% of Americans support gay marriage but many gay kids in school wouldn't know it because the 7% who don't feel that way can still make your life a living hell.   I think the most courageous thing we can ask our children to do is not only be themselves but to stick up for those they see being bullied because you rob the bullies of their power.   The definition of courage is the ability and willingness to confront fear, pain, danger, uncertainty, or intimidation.  My son showed me that. He is one of the most courageous people I have ever known. 

A Mother's Pride

My church is very liberal - it's the Unitarian Universalist Congregation of Gwinnett County (UUCG).   I call it one of the little blue spots in the big red state of Georgia.   Our church believes in social justice, gay rights, and the right of everyone to explore their own belief system.  This is a huge contrast to my upbringing in the Catholic church were you didn't have a choice about what you believed you just had to believe in the teachings of the church.  There was not a lot of questioning about faith growing up although I will say that when Max and I got married, we did find St. Louis, a Catholic Church that was pretty open to a variety of ideas (ironically, the adjective catholic means universal).   So when it came time to get back into the habit of going to church for the sake of the religious upbringing of my kids, I tried going to Catholic churches here in Georgia.  I found them lacking compared to my beloved St. Louis.   I didn't see many alter girls at the churches we went to and while there were women helping to do readings during the service, I knew my little Amber would never see a woman priest leading the service and that made me sad.   I wanted to find a place where my kids could be who they were and the Catholic churches around where I lived at the time were just not giving us that.   I needed something more accessible. 

When Daniel was two years old, I found UUCG.  I remember taking Amber the first time I went.  Not knowing the dress code, I wore a skirt and six year old Amber wore a dress with a matching hat.   We were immediately welcomed to this small church that had maybe 100 families total.   With it being so small, you get to know folks and there are many people there that I'm very fond of and enjoy seeing.  It's a nice place to hang as long as you don't seek any deep spiritual conversations about God, Jesus, miracles, guardian angels or other Christian beliefs that might brand you a simpleton among the more enlightened unbelievers.  I've reconciled myself to knowing that I'm more there for the social and political aspects than finding my spiritual path there.  It's nice to not have to hide the fact that you're a liberal since Gwinnett County is very conservative.  My kids are very comfortable going there.   I will always have a place in my heart for the Catholic Church and its rituals even if it's not openly pro-gay rights.   I do enjoy going to mass from time to time just to keep me centered about my relationship with God, the power of prayer, the saints and the continuity of rituals that happen at the same time every year.   As far as prayer and my connection with God go, I can do that anywhere without going to a cathedral.  

With UUCG, it's sort of like Cheers - "you want to go where people know people are all the same, you want to go where everyone knows you’re name."  So you wouldn't pray at Cheers but you'd sure sit down at the bar and let Norm and Cliff know how you're week was.  They would be interested and you would feel like you belonged - that's UUCG but without Sam or Woody serving beers. 

At ages 11 and 16, my kids are huge advocates for gay rights because we raised them to believe that everyone deserves to be loved and respected.   Working in the theater, I have gay friends and have heard their stories growing up and how they were picked on and bullied.   When I worked at Actor's Express Theater Company, they produced The Laramie Project about the death of Matthew Shepherd, young gay man who was killed by a pair of vicious homophobes.  The story is about how his death affected the town of Laramie, Wyoming.  It echoed the struggles of the civic rights movement in the 1960's and how people who could have done something - could have stopped the prejudice sat by and did nothing.  Seeing that play and how people reacted to it - both the members of the gay and straight audiences was really touching - there was a feeling of loss and resolve to never let it happen again.   As many times as I saw that play as the Marketing Director there, it always got to me.  You could not help but feel sad when you thought about how tragically this young man had died at the hands of fear and ignorance.  

Amber and Daniel see the discrimination that comes with being gay in their schools and they want to work to end that prejudice.   Our hearts always break when we hear about a young person who has committed suicide because there were being bullied at school because they were gay. Daniel is also very aware of the Westboro Baptist Church and their demonstrations at the funerals of our servicemen to protest this country's perceived tolerance of homosexuals.   It outrages him every time he sees them in the news.  Picking on the grieving families of soldiers who died protecting our freedom is just wrong, and it's sure as hell not what Jesus would want.   I'm not really sure what they stand for but it's not on the side of God.  I tell Daniel and Amber that they are not really a church but just a bunch of stupid people who are out for attention.  They are not doing God's work because he loves all his children.  Daniel understands this but still gets very angry when Westboro appears in the news.   He's afraid of them as a group - because picking on people you don't agree with in the name of religion can eventually turn violent.

So this fall when we heard that the UUCG would be part of a contingent of Unitarian Churches that would march in the annual Gay Pride parade, the kids really wanted to be part of it.  The parade was on a Sunday in mid-October and would start at 1:00 p.m.  I had marched in the Pride Parade when Daniel was about a year old when I worked for Actor's Express which was named the "Gay Theater" back then and they were doing The Mystery of Irma Vep.  I even dressed up Daniel's stroller with show posters and streamers and he was a big hit back in 2002.  Now ten years later, I would have both my kids in the parade marching and it would be a family outing (no pun intended).   Max had to work that day but was there in spirit.  

We started our trek on Marta which is the public transit monorail that takes you into Atlanta.   It had been a while since Daniel and Amber had been on it.  It was an interesting combination of riders:  there were the church goers, those going to the Atlanta Falcon game and those either watching or marching in the Pride parade.   Each group seemed somewhat oblivious to the other but the Falcons fans were the loudest.  The kids were fascinated at iconic images of downtown Atlanta would flash by and I kept an eagle eye out for our stop.   Not being sure, I asked a group that seemed to be going to the parade where the right stop was - the bright wigs, sequins, make-up and spandex gave them away.   A young woman in the group said that she knew where to get off and to follow her.   So we got off at the Civic Center and were greeted by a slew of bright costumes, men in dresses, women in over the top costumes and just a sense of excitement and pure joy.   Literally, it was like a very gay Disney Parade but with lots of different types of queens instead of princesses.   It also felt like the happiest place on earth.   For the rest of the year, many of these people probably had to feel like they needed to not be who they were in order to navigate their real life in Georgia even if they lived in more tolerant cities like Atlanta or Decatur.  But today, they could be who there were and no one was going to judge them.   No one was going to tell them they were bad or evil.   Today, we were all there to celebrate the fact that they should have "pride" in who they are and no one was going to take that away from them. 

As we made our way to the Unitarian float, you could feel the excitement in the air.   Our float was lined up with some other more family friendly organizations which included the Humane Society and a very progressive Baptist Church that was there to show their support for the cause.  I was so glad to see that because I didn't want Daniel to think that all Baptist churches were like Westboro and that there were churches of all denominations that would accept gays.    We got in line right behind a group of men's volleyball players who ended up spiking and hitting volleyballs to each other through the entire parade route.   Before the parade started, Daniel asked me if he thought we would see any demonstrators like Westboro and frankly I doubted it because there seemed to be a ton of security and thousands of people down the parade route.   Daniel stayed on the float which was a flat bed trailer with bails of straw in it and a few signs being pulled by a van that looked like something out of a Scooby Doo movie.   We were walking down the parade route holding signs like "Unitarian Universalists Support You", "My Church Supports Gay Marriage," and "UU Churches Welcome You."   It was cool that when folks saw us and the float they started to cheer.   Amber, who usually gets really tired really fast kept on going, waving to the crowd with a big smile on her face.

Then about a third of the way into the parade, we saw them - the demonstrators - a few of which were from Westboro.   So here they were, these hate-mongers in our midst telling us that we were going to go to hell for what we believed.   Rather than getting rattled or upset by these misguided zealots, I saw Daniel on the float mouth the words, "Hell No!" as he grabbed a sign that said "My Church supports Gay marriage" and ran bravely towards them.   Amber saw the demonstrators and ran over as well.   I kept an eye on them - and their sense of righteousness to make sure nothing would get out of hand.  They were not scared and they were not going to back down.   Of course, there was safety in numbers.  There were people from our church around them along with about 10,000 parade goers on the side of gay rights, but in that moment it didn't matter - it was them against a group of bigoted hateful people and my kids were not going to be silenced.   When they saw Daniel's sign, they shouted that we needed to go to another church - Daniel walked proudly by unfazed.  I learned later that Amber flipped them off - perhaps not the most eloquent way of dealing with idiots but certainly in a language they understood.   One of the ladies in our group when over to the Westboros and said repeatedly "But we love you - please come and worship with us."   I liked her approach and vow to use it next year. 

My kids were now fully in front of the float, carrying their signs with me and being cheered by the crowd.   As we got to the home stretch, a man came towards me from the crowd and shook my hand.  He told me that his friend had been a member of a Unitarian Church in the area.  His friend was openly gay and felt very accepted and at home in the UU church.   But times got tough for his friend, he went through a really bad time and committed suicide.  The UU congregation opened the church to his grieving friends and they all felt very comforted and welcome in a way that most churches would not have under the same circumstances.   They were not judged, they were simply allowed to be.   The service was beautiful and he felt the need to tell me how much the church had meant to his friends and him.   I told him how sorry I was for his loss and hugged him.  

I had felt good all day about what we were doing, but that man's testimony helped me see what a resource my church was for those that felt so marginalized.   His friends were able to grieve openly and not be told by a minister that their friend was going to hell for taking his life or being gay or both.  There was a real spiritual connection that we shared in that moment.   I was glad that he told me his story because it affirmed for me that sometimes miracles can happen even in an Uniterian Church where many of the congregants will swear on a stack of bibles that they just don't believe.  For me, I knew that God does work in mysterious ways even for those that might not think they need the help.

We finished marching in the parade and I was glad that my kids had gotten a chance to face the Westboro folks who scared them and stood up to them (although as a mom I had mixed feelings about my daughter flipping someone off - even if they were fear-mongering miscreants).   I was proud of them and best of all, they were proud of what they accomplished.  They are part of a movement that will stand for justice for gays to be treated fairly and to have the freedom to marry who they want.  They beamed with excitement that night as they told their father what they had experienced.  It was a wonderful day full of love, lessons, the middle finger and at the end of it all, my children made their parents very proud - what more could a mother ask for?