Now the turn, now we are following,
a roadside stand. Tomatoes. Melon. Wine.
I'm going to Texas. My father's brother died
in Dallas, almost twenty years ago,
before I'd met him, long before I knew
that all diseases aren't the same, that some
are old, and some are new and families
are terrified of some, and can't believe
their sons and brothers, just like on the news,
could die, like that, in hospices, alone
and young and smart and scared; and even seeing,
some still cannot believe, and do not come.
We cross a bridge, a train below us howls,
the wide alfalfa fields accept the sound,
the whistle saying, "Tired," the fields, "Keep on,
you are needed." If his energy
remains, I'll say, The family has grown,
perhaps they understand you better now.
My dad asked me to read this poem as a part of this Father's Day celebration, because it is about the relationship between fathers and daughters, and the relationships between generations. I actually had to try several times over the course of an entire year before I was able to write this poem, to find the write words to express how the death of my uncle Mike -- whom I never met -- of AIDS in the early 1980s, when I was just a little girl, would have a profound impact on the relationship I, as an adult, would have with my father. I was in the first or second grade, I understood next to nothing about what was going on; I knew my dad was flying to Texas because his brother was very sick. I remember waiting up to see him when he came home. I remember he brought back a set of gray coffee mugs that said "Dallas" on them. Some years later, when I was in junior high, I learned that my uncle had been gay, and I was asked by my parents not to tell anyone. I learned that he had had AIDS in a time when most people didn't really know what AIDS was. People were calling it an epidemic, a brand new disease that no one survived, a disease you caught by being a junkie or a homosexual. AIDS was terrifying in the early '80s. People simply did not know what they were facing -- only that if you caught it, you died. All this fear engendered a lot of anti-gay sentiment, a lot of hatred and prejudice. My father was suddenly pulled into the center of that fear, and his first personal impressions of gay people and gay lifestyles were very negative. Homosexuality became equated for him with pain and death.
Our parents' stories are prologues to our own. About three years ago I came out to my father as a lesbian. I knew that he had a lot of very negative feelings about homosexuality, stemming from the frightening experiences surrounding his brother's death, but I was leaving for Spain for a year and I wanted to get that out in the open before I went. We talked in the car as he was driving me to church -- I was singing in a Catholic church choir at the time -- and I told him I was a lesbian. It wasn't an easy conversation. There were a lot of long, cautious pauses while we searched for the right words. At the end he said it was very hard for him to accept or understand, but he loved me and wanted me to be happy in my life, and that was the most important thing, the weight lifted from my heart. It has been a struggle for both of us, stepping away from those older prejudices, but we have come a long way.
Our lives entwine with one another in strange ways -- who would have foreseen the connections? But this is a Father's Day celebration, and we are talking about pain we've had in our lives with our fathers but mostly about the joy we've had. Seeing my father overcome his anger towards the gay community, loving and fully accepting me as his gay daughter, but mostly just his daughter, has been an amazing, wonderful thing. I felt elated, giddy, after that first conversation, knowing he supported me no matter what, and embraced who I was. My father's acceptance -- the acceptance of both my parents -- freed me, filled me with joy and love, and helped to develop in me a confidence that lets me do things like get up in front of people and talk about these things, helps me deal with prejudice in the rest of the world. I am a different, better person because of my parents' support. Their love lifts me up. SOme old pain has been transformed into beauty. One generation's suffering becomes a deep source of strength for the next. And this is what I got up here to say: to thank my father for his gifts of acceptance -- even when it was very hard for him -- and unconditional love. To honor the bonds among families. So Happy Father's Day!
The UUA Welcoming Congregation Program is the Unitarian Universalist Association's groundbreaking effort to fight homophobia and embrace gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender people as valuable and beloved members of the Unitarian Universalist community.
The Unitarian Universalist Fellowship of Ligonier Valley, now in its new home in its very own building, is where I was introduced to Unitarian Universalism, and that community has had an important influence in my own spiritual development; I bless and thank them all.
