2024-07-13 Elderberries Salon

MacPhee Centre thank you card
MacPhee Centre thank you card

July 13, 2024 Storytelling Salon

The Salon produced by the ElderBerries and MacPheeCentre.

There were approximately 20 audience members in and out of the room during the afternoon.

Audio Recording

HistoryProjectTodoList: someone needs to listen to this and create a table of contents similar to this one.

Table of Contents

Session 1: My first great same sex love (mp3, 33 min)

00:01:10
DrBobFredrickson -- First experience, late bloomer; Liberace; Princeton all male school, later co-ed; [00:04:00] med school; 1960s activism; bearded hippies & acid; [00:05:57] relationship with another med student; living in a commune with med students & the travelling Broadway cast of Hair.
00:09:18
StephanieBrown?: I was straight; I got a divorce; eyelash mascara cracked the door for me; I spent a long time as a cross dresser. [00:10:15] While dating a girl from a traditional cultural background came out as a cross dresser; she said “So what?”, which blew me away. She totally accepted me for who I was. [00:12:00] Took me a very long time to accept that people would accept me. [00:13:05] The work here is to build up the confidence that you are normal. It's a long journey, it's a hard journey, there are a lot of questions to be asked.
00:13:57
JennNearing?: I'm a trans woman. I'll tell my story backwards: Pre-internet days, at Dal, in a five-storey library I found only TWO books where trans folk were mentioned, but were described in the most horrifying terms. [00:15:22] Many years later I was in a relationship - and I felt I needed to tell my partner something, but I had no information. I outed myself to them. The result "We will find a place for Jenn in our relationship." [00:17:05] I've been living this way for almost a quarter century. As time went by, things became “too real, too fast” for partner. [00:18:54] Moved from Cape Breton to PEI, “from the fat to the fire,” politician said there were “no gay people on PEI;” then moved back to Halifax. [00:19:43] Trans convention in Atlanta brought clarity; ended relationship shortly after. [00:21:20] At this point no trans community in Halifax, tried to create trans support group online, but it went nowhere [00:22:00] Difficult initially to find support for transition.Transition as second puberty physically and emotionally. [00:24:06] Presentation at Safe Harbour, met partner, married.
00:26:41
LynnMurphy: My first romance was a long time ago. She was the janitor of a rooming house, and got an apartment in the basement for free and also ran a crepe truck; some people used to sign in to The Turret as Minnie Mouse, but we used our middle names; chanting with the Buddhists; National Conference in Halifax which was a big deal. She broke up with me the night before the march [the first gay march in Halifax] - so there I was, tears running down my face as we marched down the street.

Session 2: The bad old days and the good old days: (mp3, 39 min)

00:00:28
DanielMacKay: WayvesMagazine: we can see the bad old days in the advertisers in the old Wayves; thinking about the brave early advertisers: one hairdresser; could be fired for being gay in 1970s, 80s; Realtor EdieHancock?, 1983+; RosiePorter; there are now 15 out-of-closet real estate agents in Halifax, but that first advertiser was incredibly brave [00:04:17] Good old days: putting together Wayves was an amazing experience with other incredibly intelligent, connected, brave activists.
00:05:55
JennNearing?: good old days within the bad days; “sliver of light” was online resource from Atlanta, GA during early internet days; online spaces were fairly safe because they were closed [00:09:33] bad old days now; more assholes online; [00:10:50] relative safety of transition on job was helped by unionized environment; [00:11:59] grievance over use of female bathroom dismissed; [00:12:40] being outed by colleagues at work; among first to transition in Halifax meant “flying without a net;” [00:15:00] loan for cost of surgery in defiance of bank rules; good experiences with women employees; IDs gender changed; [00:17:00] for 20 years after transition, received two electors cards, one in new and one in dead name. Things are changing but hopefully we’ll make up ground we’ve lost. We’re here. The work of transitioning many years ago; helpers along the way.
00:19:05
BarendKamperman: We knew nothing about sex when we were in school; progressive parents but no concept of “gay;” Liberace again; didn’t like him; we had no models really. Falling in love with my phys ed teacher. It “woke me the frig up.” Mental health issues, concerned about hell [00:24:25] The horrors of AIDS; the terror of maybe having it. If you really love somebody sometimes you just have to walk away.[00:26:40] Trip to Japan, reflection, peace; God made me this way. Moved to Vancouver, first pride parade; Gay chuirch with gay pastor; We may seem tough and hard... but we'd be dead if we weren't. We may have some hard hard battles ahead of us. Gotta toughen up in this political environment. Stand up for yourself and others.
00:29:24
LynnMurphy: I have a little story - with no political implications. [Note : Don't know why I said that - of course it had political implications.] I like demonstrations. I sign up for them. Before the things I talked about in the first session, I identified as bisexual. Many gay people used to go to the Jury Room. Management told the staff there to not serve the Q customers. So there was a protest - a picket - outside the Jury Room one weekend. My boyfriend said, "What would you like to do this evening? Restaurant? Movie?" I said, "Well, the gay people are having a demonstration outside the Jury Room, I'd like to go to that!" And he went - he was taking a risk as a young prof without tenure; I was a librarian, and I was not so much. We marched around for an hour or two right outside the Chronicle Herald Building - but next day the newspaper never said anything about the protest - there was no coverage there. Then, we finished the picket... and someone from GAE invited everyone to The Turret [Note: bar owned by the Gay Alliance for Equality] on Barrington Street right upstairs from Dr Bob Fredrickson's office. We walked in - and a close friend was already there! Like many young people then, he used to smoke a little weed [Note : which was then illegal]. There had been a play [Note : actually, a movie] in Halifax, Fortune And Men's Eyes and when I first became involved with the gay movement, I was thinking about this friend, and how he might have to go to prison some day, where gay men were beaten and raped like in the play. Going back to my boyfriend, he took a chance to go on that protest in the bad old days, when you could get fired, you could get kicked out of your apartment, you could be outed in the newspaper, and for some people that was a sentence of exile. But it was the good old days too: People were protesting, people had opened a club, some straight people were ready to help us. And it was the beginning of the change.

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