Growing up I never even KNEW anyone who travelled far beyond the valley I grew up in. The Wyoming Valley, in Pennsylvania--
The Valley With a Heart they called it after hurricane Agnes wiped it out in 1972? yes, 72 I was 10. I remember standing on our back porch and watching the creek waters overflow and being astonished at how fast the waterline moved that night; almost flooding but not quite.
The Valley Without a Brain we called it, some of us returning, still young, from other places, to be a presence for the good. A small community in the 80s-90s of positive thinkers, UUs, Wiccans, Queers, Transpeople, IV drug users with HIV (when did it get to be named that?)...queer men with HIV...lesbians helping their brothers die in comfort...we had to unify. There weren't enough of us to form divisions.
In Wilkes Barre, meeting a woman from San Francisco was amazing simply because she was from there. Now I live in a place people flock to and I understand. Almost everyone is from someplace else.
But no one moves TO Wilkes Barre. If you're in Wilkes Barre at all it's because you're from there. Or you were sent there.
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I found these people through a personal ad. It's how we connected before the innerwebz. I don't remember the ad exactly, only that I was looking for other gay or bi friendly people to meet. There weren't any gay clubs in Wilkes Barre that I knew of...some were informally gay-friendly on certain nights. One club had 2-stepping on Thursdays, I believe...I learned to 2-step with some amazing gay men teachers. Fantastic lead dancers. Dance like butter on a hot skillet. Smooth. As lesbians must, I learned to follow ... And to lead. Fun times.
One person I met was a young lesbian professor at the Wilkes-Barre campus of Penn State. Coming from Philadelphia to teach at the small extension campus, she'd hoped to join the gay community there. She didn't realize there was none.
A courageous lady--I remember her saying at some point she realized if she wanted a gay community on the Penn State Campus in Wilkes-Barre in the 90s, she'd have to create one. OMG I remember her well now. Even her name may come to me at some point.
Anyway this professor was a Philadelphia windstorm come to a backwater valley without a brain. She organized a trip to Washington DC for the 1993 March on Washington. Several of her students signed up. Plus 4 or 5 of us locals. We were all supposed to kick in.
She rented a large van to drive us all comfortably to DC (a 3 hour trip 4?) It was going to be fun, a rolling caravan of assorted 'queers': gay, bi, lesbian---all in a bunch. All excited to be going to the March. We left on the day of the march, and stayed overnight in a suite in DC.
On the day of departure, none of her students showed up.
None. Not one.
I was too young and callow to understand the devastation of this professor. She'd worked so hard to organize these young adults, to get them to a place where they could stand proud and show who and what they were. They had all signed up. But their parents made them stay home.
It wasn't because they were against LBGT rights, oh no. They were PFlag members.
It was that they feared for their children's safety. They'd heard there'd be violence. Bombs dropped on marchers maybe. Gun shots. Fist fights at least. Nope. Too dangerous. They made their kids stay home.
For a moment, I was scared. I was older then, and out of college for many years. I was a grown-up. Early 30s. Yet I was scared.
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A friend born in the Valley who'd moved to San Francisco and lived there many years with a girlfriend then came back to the Valley after they broke up...omg Wendy? It's coming back to me. Her parents totally accepted her. They astonished me. They were gentle and loving and let Wendy move back to the log home they'd built themselves on many acres in Dallas Pennsylvania, a lovely rural area outside Wilkes-Barre. The place had horses. Wendy played with one horse like it was a dog. I was astonished. I had a crush on Wendy. And on her brother. I was confused back then.
Wendy was tiny but could throw bales of hay around like they were filled with marshmallow. I tried to lift one. She laughed. I couldn't budge it. That was when I was young and as strong as I would ever be. Wendy climbed trees like a bear cub. She had straight light brown hair in a boyish bowl cut except for a single long braid she kept as a remembrance of a past love. No, as a symbol she would be okay. here's the story:
She told me her SF girlfriend used to braid her long hair and after they broke up she didn't think she could braid it herself. She needed a change (we do that). We change our hair. So she got a short cut and moved on but not before she discovered, that by flipping the braid over, she could braid it very well. All. by. herself. She could make that braid that lovely braid that trailed down her back.
At night it was so dark the sky was astonishing. I'd never seen a sky without light pollution. Never.
Astonishing. The stars. My gods it's full of stars LOL.
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Wendy was my courage.
She'd lived in the big city. She'd smile--I can see that smile--her blue eyes crinkling at the corners... and assure me it would be fine. I believed her.
People exaggerate danger to manipulate you into staying home.
That was a lesson.
So we went. There was no violence. It was loving and peaceful and wonderful. The AIDS Quilt was on display. I can still hear people cheering on the Metro..."We're here. We're Queer. Get used to it" or "We're here. We're Queer. Let's have a Beer"...before there were memes. Real humans shouting for joy at being out at last...free at last...
On the way home the professor was angry. Very angry.
I recall an agonizing lurch from gas station to gas station on the way home in the middle of the night (before GPS or cell phones) and gas tank on Empty--her searching for gas a few cents cheaper. Fat chance on the Turnpike. We kicked in what we could but she lost money for sure on that trip.
I think I understand her anger better now. It wasn't the money.
She thought she could make a difference in a little backwater place--wrench a few people kicking and screaming free from the morass. Into the light. Into freedom. Many tried back then. It was a different world. No social media, No place to validate that who and what you were was mostly OK.
But she did make a difference. She did change things, for me, at least. It was a life-changing event.
I still can't remember her name but with the magic and serendipity of the innerwebs she might someday read this story and remember and laugh...and feel better about the whole thing I hope.
And Wendy...I hope she's fine and settled on that farm she loved so much. She found a girlfriend. OMG another story... a young lesbian dropped into Scranton Pennsylvania following a love who soon deserted her...in SCRANTON PENNSYLVANIA...the horror...the poor girl was shattered. absolutely shattered. til she found Wendy and began to heal. Her name starts with a D I'm sure... maybe...no, not Wendy and Lisa LOL [OMG they have a FB page and everything. Where have I been? Sure they were lesbians! They had to hide it then. A different world. ASTONISHING]
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anyway...shoot...she danced with us on Thursdays in Downtown Wilkes Barre...gay night...2-stepping. she and Wendy were a thing. A love. A couple. They lit each other up. Way before gay marriage.
Oooo I was crushed...my Wendy...LOL
that's for another blog. I don't know if they're still together but I hope they're still happy.
Wilkes-Barre I hear has declined for other reasons. Much of my family still lives in the Valley. I can't speak for Wilkes-Barre today but from what I read it's a sad and now violent place. It's pretty. It has potential. I hope it gets better there.
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Years before I moved back to Wilkes Barre (No one moves TO Wilkes-Barre but some of us move back) I remember working in a pizza place in another valley...the Happy Valley... (after my meltdown from Cornell Law school and spin-out into sobriety...a lot of stories LOL OMG)--content enough to have a job that paid the rent--content just to be sober...just to be sane... outside State College Pennsylvania (an oddball place--very rural but very much a university town, not unlike Ithaca come to think of it).
Anyway I was ringing this guy up as his pizza was baking and recognized a tune he was whistling. "Music of the Night" I mentioned I was dying to see that show on broadway. He was astonished I'd heard of it. "We do have some culture here in the boonies," I laughed. He actually gave me his and his new wife's address in NYC and said I could stay with them whenever I finally got to NYC to see the show.
I never contacted him again but I remember that little bit of light...a small connection...in a place I felt both cozy and alone. A place of healing that I took to but not for long enough... but that story will come out in time.
By the way I did get to see Phantom on Broadway. A couple times. A whole nother life with my future spouse, a male to female transsexual OB/GYN and Vietnam Paratrooper who landed in Wilkes-Barre (she was one sent there) from Philadelphia OMG the stories LOL --Montreal, Provincetown, the South China Sea and Key West. Finally. Key West.
If I'd had FB as an adolescent...how different my life might be. I have a few FB friends who are young and weird and vulnerable just like I was. Unique just like me. I try to be kind. I try to be the adult friend I wish I'd had growing up alone in the Valley without a Heart. Another story.
Kitty slow blinks
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