Sentimental Ramblings…

The next letter is from my Great-Grandmother to my Grandmother- it appears my Gram met my Granddaddy’s folks without him even there. I can’t even imagine how strange and awkward that might have been for her. My grandfather had only one sister, Martha, and it is not clear to me whether she approved of my grandmother of not. It was kind of a big deal that my Grandfather was marrying outside of the Quaker religion. I know, so scandalous. I am actually not sure what that side of the family makes of me and my “lifestyle choices”. No one talked about it. I never truly “came out”to my grandmother. It was this unspoken thing, that I had women who would come and spend time with the family, without a title and occasionally I would live with them. The first thing my father said to me when he found out I was a lesbian was not to tell my grandmother. But, she’s not dumb. She started asking questions like, how many bedrooms are in your house? Do you two share a bed? And then I had a wedding and she was invited to it. It turned out she didn’t care at all that I married a woman; she actually couldn’t understand why anyone felt the need to legislate my love. But all of my family is extremely religious and I’m sure they all had their own internal struggles about who I am and how I live my life. I’m lucky that no one really shared their struggles with me. I don’t even know where I’m going with this rambling post except to say- we never know the journey or process someone is going through in their own heads from tolerance to acceptance. I try to give everyone the grace to work it out for themselves. My father told me the biggest act of protest I could do was to live my life openly without shame. That people would see that I was a normal person who happened to be gay. It’s attraction, not promotion. So far it has worked for me. But I know I have a lot of privileges that not everyone has.

Anyways…may you all live your lives openly without shame and just keep doing the best you can do. And I hope you know what it feels like to love and to be loved.