Fried & Convicted, page 18
She and Muriel joined up with Barbara Grier and her partner, Donna McBride, and in 1973 the courageous quartet founded Naiad Press. It was launched in 1974 with the publication of that first Sarah Aldridge novel, The Latecomer. The book was a slight, sweet, very old-fashioned romance, but entirely cutting edge as it was the first published lesbian romance with a happy ending. Before that, one lover in any lesbian story had to be thrown under the bus or killed off in some disgusting way. Morality had to triumph.
While the simple Sarah Aldridge tales have been eclipsed today by amazing contemporary stories and diverse storytelling, the early Sarah Aldridge books gave so many lesbians their very first look at themselves on the printed page. They’d lived in a world where they had never read a story featuring the feelings they felt, the impulses they recognized. It was historic.
We are so lucky today, to have all of you in this room, writing and reading about lesbian relationships. But imagine opening a brown paper wrapper on a book that, for the first time ever, reflected your own feelings. What was your first book like that?
But back then, Naiad Press had a tough time. Printers refused to print such so-called filth. A printer would agree, then back out. Imagine the courage it took to hand over that lesbian love story to an ink-covered print shop owner and wait for the disgusted rejection. Sometimes it was just a “no.” Sometimes it was a barrage of hatred, sometimes it was a threat to call the police. It took them a year to find a print shop that would print their first book, and even then it had to be secretive. The printer’s largest client was a Baptist church. It was a freaky combination.
But through the courage and perseverance of the publishers of Naiad, plus the growing network of gay newspapers and feminist bookstores, the press became, in its day, the most successful lesbian publishing house in the country, perhaps the world.
After Anyda’s eleventh novel, she and Muriel withdrew from Naiad and started A&M Books of Rehoboth.
Anyda’s fourteenth and final novel was published in 2003 when the novelist was ninety-two years old. She was as giddy with glee as a teenager when her new book arrived from the printer.
When Anyda and Muriel first moved to Rehoboth Beach in the 1950s, they were deeply closeted and silent about their relationship. They stayed that way even as they were publishing those scandalous lesbian books with Naiad.
In fact, Muriel couldn’t even say the word lesbian so she coined a new one. When they would see a female couple walking down the street Muriel would say “Shhhh . . .” Eventually, they began to call their own kind Shushes.
In 1948, the year I was born, Anyda became one of the first female attorneys at a prestigious D.C. law firm. She met Muriel there. She told me she looked at Muriel one day, and thought “That’s it.” Although she didn’t have any words for what it was. Think about it. 1948—before any public respect for, or even acknowledgement of same-sex relationships. Theirs was a bold, courageous and willful choice.
They became feminists almost before the term came into use.
Anyda and Muriel hosted Delaware’s first-ever National Organization for Women meeting. Anyda described the women having to sneak out of their homes because their husbands were angry about their going to a feminist event. Some of those husbands actually lurked in the street outside, behind trees, to see which Rehoboth women had the nerve to defy them. Anyda phoned the newspaper to get photos of the men hiding in the bushes.
By the turn of the millennium the ladies were aging, although Anyda was still bossy and imperious and Muriel mischievously liked to kiss the young lesbians who came to call—you know, young lesbians, those of us in our 50s and 60s. Once in a while, she’d lean forward in her recliner and pat Bonnie on the behind as she passed by, then look at me, put a finger up to her lips, and giggle.
At one point I was directing a local production of The Vagina Monologues. Anyda and Muriel wanted to attend, but a night out at the theatre was too much for them.
So we brought a dress rehearsal to their living room.
Everything was going along fine until one of the actresses came to those famous lines, “Cunt. There I said it. Cunt. Cunt. Cunt.”
The actress looked at the elderly audience of two and sputtered “Cu . . . Cuuu . . .” She couldn’t do it. Forget the entire point of Eve Ensler’s groundbreaking work, these women might have been her grandmothers and she just couldn’t.
At which point Anyda leaned forward and said, “Really my dear, you can say it. Naiad Press once published The Cunt Coloring Book. We’re really rather well aware of the word.”
By 2005, the ladies were frail and elderly. But still hosting cocktail salons on their porch. They were Rehoboth’s Gertrude Stein and Alice B. Toklas.
By Christmas 2005, Anyda was home, having been diagnosed with a fast-growing cancer and refusing treatment. “I’m almost 95,” she said. “There will be no treatment!”
From a hospital bed in the living room she insisted that the frame of the bed be tilted at the perfect angle so she could see Muriel in her chair in the sunroom and call, “Yoohoo, Sweetie” and wave.
Although she was absolutely furious at her deteriorating condition, she continued to rule the roost, giving orders to hospice staff, requesting not just tea, but Prince of Wales tea, discussing newspaper headlines, and demanding her 5 p.m. glass of Dewar’s.
The parade of visitors spoke to Anyda and Muriel’s vast circle of loving friends. Until almost the last, Anyda would remind me not to make Muriel’s drink too strong. And Muriel would hold the glass up to the light and complain that the liquid looked awfully pale.
As Anyda rested one day I read her a letter from a woman named Carol Seajay—former editor of the Feminist Bookstore News and an important part of our lesbian publishing culture.
In part, the letter read:“Anyda, it was your vision of a possible world in your first lesbian novel and your vision that we could have such books, and your vision and skills that launched our first, grand lesbian publishing house—and published books that have gone out all over the world, changed countless women’s lives, giving hope and opening doors. Yours was an awesome body of work and I hope you are fiercely proud of it all.”
Oh, she was.
One day, very near the end, as Anyda napped, Muriel, Bonnie, and I sat discussing the merits of Dewar’s vs. Johnny Walker Scotch. Although she had already been quite removed from any conversation around her for a day or two, as we continued the comparison, Anyda sat bolt upright, looked at us with authority, and announced, “The virtue of Johnny Walker is that it can be found all over the globe.”
As it turned out, those were her last words. Kind of appropriate.
And as I carried on the work of A&M Books, I have tried, as best I could, to live up to Anyda and Muriel’s example . . . in both publishing and cocktails.
But frankly my biggest and most iconic inspirations in this world of lesbian literature and culture are all of you. And you don’t have it easy, either. While the proliferation of lesbian publishing houses and authors has been astounding and wonderful, the publishing world we now inhabit is nuts.
You have to have the hide of an elephant to look yourself up on Amazon. There, a herd of entrepreneurs are reselling our books. There are used copies selling at fire sale for $1.96, or else a colossal $27.99 as signed collectibles. Just put me on a shelf with the Hummels and Lladros.
Between book piracy, Amazon’s price wars, the death of our bookstores, and disappearing LGBT publications, you are all my heroes.
And a sense of humor is mandatory.
Which brings me back to the traditional gay sensibility and our rich history of lesbian books and culture.
Are we up for the challenge of passing it along? Of course we are!
I’m convinced that more than most people, gay people have a wonderful and enduring spirit of adventure, well past senior-hood and into old age, just like Barbara Gittings and Anyda Marchant.
My wife celebrated her 60th birthday on a zip line, and in three weeks we’re headed to Iceland to drive around the entire country in an RV. I recently tried riding a Segway and I heard a flapping sound. I think it was my three chins. I kayak with alligators, and I made my stage debut after I got my Medicare card.
And from all the stories I’ve already heard at this conference, we’re all in shape to do the hard work of passing along our culture.
Come with me on the adventure; let’s commit ourselves to what I call “EduGAYtion.” Take a baby dyke to lunch. Join a PFLAG chapter and tell your stories. Host a movie night for younger lesbians so they can enjoy Desert Hearts. Give gifts of used books to kids who will love them!
Invite your elders to dinner and ask about the outlaw days. Make an intergenerational connection in a group like a gay chorus or book club.
If your knees won’t let you play softball or pickleball, be a scorekeeper or manage a team. And, of course, keep writing and reading like mad women. Shout it out. Read, read, read gay history, gay historical fiction, gay mysteries, romance and the lot.
And revel in Pride. Don’t say we don’t need parades anymore; we need them more than ever and we should take part. Wear the rainbow, fly the flag, be brave, be visible, celebrate Pride, call out prejudice, and keep nurturing our culture. We owe it to those who follow.
And I leave you with the following advice that has become my motto:
May you all live so fully that the Westboro Baptist Church pickets your funerals.
Thanks for listening! (rim shot)
July 2016
HAVE THINGS CHANGED
IN THE SQUAD ROOM?
Pretty much everybody has written just about everything there is to say about the 2016 Democratic Convention. From Hillary’s amazing speech to her bold choice of a white pantsuit, from awesome Sarah McBride, the first transgender speaker at a national political convention, to the hammering home of the “Stronger Together” theme.
For LGBTQ (I’m starting to add Q now, but enough, please) people, and our wonderful allies, the Democratic Convention was a history-making, glass-ceiling shattering, spectacularly inclusive affair.
But for me, there was one teeny-weeny special moment, probably thirty seconds or less, that saw me burst into tears. It could have happened as I heard any number of truly moving stories, pleas to end gun violence, warnings about demagogues, and appeals for kindness and caring. Those moments touched me, moved me, made me cheer. Perhaps a tear or two welled up.
But, no, the only moment when I completely lost it was seeing Tyne Daly and Sharon Gless, TV’s Cagney and Lacey, reunited and singing “What the World Needs Now” with a host of other performers. Bizarre? I thought so.
But then I realized that the seven-year duration of the well-written, groundbreaking female cop buddy show mirrored the most formative time in my life. It premiered on March 25, 1982, just two nights before I met my wife Bonnie.
And yes, I know, Meg Foster was the original Christine Cagney, with Gless picking up in Season Two. But for me, Gless and Daly epitomized strong, independent women with careers, decisions to make, and mostly real-life problems to navigate. In contrast to the married Mary Beth Lacey, Christine Cagney was single and facing many of the issues I faced as an unmarried woman, on my own, learning to deal with a job, a secret, and often discrimination.
Of course, Cagney was not a lesbian in the show. She couldn’t have been in 1982, even if the writers wanted her to be, which they didn’t. But we could somehow see ourselves in her swagger and her struggles.
It was the closest we’d get for years, unless you count Cher’s character in 1983’s Silkwood, reading Katherine Forrest’s Curious Wine (also 1983), or the premiere of Desert Hearts in 1985. And face it, Sharon Gless was easy on the eyes. And somehow we got a vibe that she was an ally—played out years later by her taking a role as the PFLAG Mom in Queer as Folk, and making the sweet 2009 film Hannah Free.
Cagney and Lacey enchanted me so much I dabbled in fanfic before I ever knew such a writing genre existed. But I didn’t just write my own Cagney and Lacey story in honor of the show. I actually worked on a teleplay—a script—and submitted it to the producers. I’d never written a script before, and I really didn’t know what I was doing but I threw myself into the breach as only an enthusiastic young person would.
My script saw a policewoman injured on the job and detailed how the show’s characters, from the two principals to the other squad members, Lacey’s husband, and others, reacted to the surprising news that the next of kin they had to contact was another woman. It wrapped up, mostly happily, and there were rocky moments in the squad room, as it reflected our lives in the mid-1980s.
One night, several months after I forwarded the script to Hollywood, I got a phone call. It came in at 10:30 at night Eastern Standard Time from a young-sounding guy working production on the show. After establishing I was the writer, he made sure to let me know, emphatically, that he had not read the script, as “we’re not allowed to read it until it’s been through legal.”
He told me my script was in the wrong format, and he was going to send me a sample copy of a script so I could redo it correctly.
“And then we can read it,” he said, “because it has to go through the lawyers first,” we said in unison.
By the following week I received a large packet from the studio with two sample scripts, writing guidelines, paperwork to fill out for their lawyers, and a whole bunch of other stuff. Yes, Bonnie and I concluded it was a lot of trouble to go to for a script nobody had read.
Well here’s the upshot: I took my mess of a script, redid it to format, and mailed it off to the infamous lawyers. That same young man and I talked a couple of times after that, and our last call determined that the script would be put on the schedule for the following season of Cagney and Lacey. Woo-hoo!
Then the show got cancelled. Major bummer.
But I assure you, my bursting into tears at seeing those icons of mine almost thirty years later at the Democratic Convention had nothing to do with the loss of a writing credit or paycheck (although that would have been nice!) It had everything to do with the many years I traveled vicariously with those women and their TV family as I came out, grew up, and settled down.
By 1988 when the show ended, I was forty. Bonnie and I were suburban homeowners, and we had been living in unmarried bliss for six years and counting. Frankly, by that point I was more like the married Mary Beth Lacey than the single and loving it Christine Cagney.
We had to wait until our 30th anniversary to get married legally, but we finally made it. And now, as retirees and Medicare recipients, we look back so fondly on those Cagney and Lacey days. That old script is still in the desk drawer. A lot has changed in 30 years and it would need a hell of a lot of re-writing to reflect changes in attitudes . . . or would it? Maybe I can rework it for NCIS New Orleans. As for Ms. Cagney and Mrs. Lacey, I loved seeing “them” standing up for our values.
July 2016
AGING BY THE NUMBERS
I never thought I’d have to buy another bright orange string trimmer. I was wrong.
This led me to realize I can calculate my life stages by the kinds of items I have purchased, over and over, through the years.
In our current community of manufactured homes, management mows our lawn, but not, alas, along the fence or inside the postage-stamp yard. We felt sure we could edge the fence and manage the small plot of interior grass with a trimmer, but the machine gagged on the task and died.
I gagged at the thought of buying yet another string trimmer, not to mention a small electric lawn mower. I had sworn those days were behind me. But no, it was déjà vu, as 35 years ago I purchased an electric mower. That was in the “Getting to Know You” stage, when my mate and I were setting up housekeeping.
And the townhouse yard was almost as tiny as the current splotch of green stuff. It turned out to be just a matter of time before my spouse ran over the electric cord with the mower blades, committing Mowercide.
Cordless battery mowers wouldn’t be invented for another quarter century so we got a gas mower. Readystart buttons hadn’t been invented yet either so we both have residual rotator cuff issues from years of yanking the ornery pull cord.
Joining that expensive gas mower was our first hot tub. It was a splendid wooden barrel tub, a do-it-yourself kit, which seated eight people sitting upright with their legs dangling into the deep foot-well. We hosted lots of backyard parties, which, in turn, led to the purchase of our first charcoal barbecue grill.
Then, entering our 40s, came the Nesting Stage. We upgraded our residence to a single-family home, but still relied on friends to help us move—so we let the hideously heavy hot tub convey with the townhouse, but took the mower and grill along. Within weeks we were worn out from shoving that mower across the much larger lawn. And we didn’t even have a hot tub to soothe our weary bones. So in addition to upgrading to a self-propelled mower, we went hot tub hunting.
The safari took us to a fairgrounds hot tub expo, where we fell victim to, I mean invested in, a massive six-person acrylic square, with a dozen air jets and room to host an orca. But not until we had six adults in the thing did we realize we’d all have to be nearly prone with our dozen legs intertwined just to stay submerged. So it became a hot tub for two, three if it was family.
And lo and behold, charcoal was passé so we traded up for a gas grill. In those days they did not come assembled. We bought it at nine in the morning and by 8 p.m. we were still squatting on the deck (the second deck to be built by us, by the way) amid more remaining screws and bolts than you’d need to build the Batmobile. We ordered pizza delivery and froze the ribs.
A word about grill covers: Missing. Every time we had a windstorm our grill cover of the moment would fly into orbit. Had we attached our names, I’m sure one of those black shrouds will eventually be discovered on Mars.
