The STUFF Sisters

Sweet Liberty

Our family has always been partial to holidays. Birthdays, too. We celebrate, but not over-the-top crazy celebrations. Simple seems to rule the days. Have a Happy 4th.

Our family has always been partial to holidays. Birthdays, too. We celebrate, but not over-the-top crazy celebrations. Simple seems to rule the days.

July 4th is a good case in point. When we were growing up, the 4th was a day to swim and barbeque. When our parents owned a boat, we swam in a lake. When we had a pool in the back yard, we cooled off in chlorine. The meals themselves were from our grill but are forgettable in their simplicity. But the dessert was always something that included whipped cream, blueberries and strawberries. In a pattern – possibly a flag – or jumbled together in a trifle. Cake was part of it. Or home made ice cream. Red, white and blue.

This photo of our mother shows her on a 4th of July probably 20+ years ago. Our parents had separated, and she decided to take us all down to the deck on the back of her office near 25th and Holmes so we could watch the fireworks that would burst over Union Station. It was a wonderful night, and we all remember it. Not only was she dressed for the occasion with suitable head attire, she was dressed in white with red toenails and blue sandals. Red, white and blue. But the dessert that night, served after take out from Gates Bar-B-Q, was a three layer cake. When you sliced it, it revealed the flag. Not to scale, but to perfection.

Throughout the years she has been known to quote the Constitution while holding a jumbo sparkler in the darkening gloam of night. She has decorated our childhood homes with all forms of US flags. “Don’t Tread on Me” was always a favorite, and a reproduction of an early flag by Betsy Ross was good for feminist conversation.

Mothers give us much. This one, however, gave us never-ending lessons in freedom and justice. She didn’t so much wrap it in the flag as hand it to us gently and tell us to be careful.

Have a Happy 4th, and enjoy your red, white and blue.

Sisters Are The Best

We did not have the easiest of days yesterday, my sister and me. Mondays seldom feel like Mondays, but today was one. HR issues, packed meeting schedule, serious reminders that retail is a bear of a business, too many incoming phone calls. It was not the funnest day on record.

But it was a day where the sun shined and we were healthy. We didn’t smile much, and Monday will roll into Tuesday a little bit, but we are good. Fine. OK.

After the day was over and the store was closed, we went to a kick-off event for a charity we both adore. She left work in her car, and I left work in mine. She ran her child to an engagement, and I went a picked mine up. We met up again at the event and never stopped smiling and laughing.

We were smiling and laughing because she pulled a stunt only she could. She fingered the sale rack and came up with this wicking doozy.

And we all rolled with laughter. And we’ll roll right through the week, and I know that, when I do not feel like smiling, I will look at this picture and know all is well with the world.

Work is work and play is play. We blend it all the time, but that doesn’t mean every day is easy.

My Walk with AIDS

On a Friday night over a week ago, I stood under a tent in a large urban park at a memorial service for no one in particular and for every one on this planet. I held the microphone in my hand and began. Began again. To tell my story of AIDS.

Friday night was a small candlelight ceremony for those who have been lost to HIV/AIDS in our community, and they were celebrated that evening by those under the tent. But I have lost no one. No one I can hold up a photo for. No one I can memorialize on a T-shirt, flag or banner.

I held that microphone as tightly as I hold my son. That was who I was fighting for, I said. Sixteen years ago, I held a newborn boy in my arms as I volunteered for the first time along the route of the AIDS Walk. Months before he was born, a friend had asked me to help. Standing in the grass on a spring morning sounded magical to me in my eighth month of pregnancy. When the day arrived, it was dreamlike. Me, my husband, my new son – all sporting little red ribbons and helping a band entertain walkers and enthusiastic runners in the sun.

Every year since, I have worked on the Walk and moved up through the volunteer ranks. Route helper, volunteer coordinator, project coordinator, special event committee person, steering committee member, Walk co-chair. Every year since that first one, I’ve had a little hand in mine or a little head in my eyesight on Walk day. My son has never missed a Walk and now joins me as a full-fledged committee member on one event. Walk day is a family reunion for all of us.

My story is short and simple. I desire deeply a world without AIDS for my son. For all sons and daughters and mothers and fathers. Sisters. Brothers. A world free of stigma and hate. Pointed fingers and whispered admonishments will be behind us. Every year I renew my commitment to making that world come to be.

This year I stood in the light rain as my son walked by me carrying a dated memorial flag representing the 25 years of the AIDS Walk. Three long blocks later, I looked up, and there was my niece sporting a flag of her own. This one held the name of someone who no longer walks. She carried it to its final place with the others in a circle of flags that every one of the 2,000+ walkers walked by. My tears were easily covered by Mother Nature’s water show.

They are my future and my chance to live in an AIDS free world. They’ve never known one.

I believe that they will.

Springtime Hello

My husband and I owned a home before the one we live in now. But to my father’s father, this is our first home. The other one was “nothing but air, really.” When we purchased the house we live in now, my grandfather practically rejoiced.

My husband and I owned a home before the one we live in now. But to my father’s father, this is our first home. The other one was “nothing but air, really.”

It was a condo in a converted warehouse downtown. The first such condos in Kansas City. We were practically pioneers! But to the midwestern farmer, a large space without bedroom walls four stories in the air isn’t something you own, is it? I called all of my grandparents when we closed on the condo because I was so proud. I owned something, and this, I felt, was something they could embrace with me.

Three of them did. One, not so much. He would call it “my apartment” while he and my Grandma Ginny made themselves comfortable on our sofa. I would smile and begin to tell him all about condo rules and association dues, beautification committees and other details. He looked at me with incredible blue eyes like I was speaking in tongues.

I moved on.

My grandmother loved the loft. She loved everything about her grandchildren, whether it involved property ownership or not. She clearly got the idea of how a loft was less work and less maintenance – snow removal, house painting, etc. – and I think it excited her a little. They had worked hard all of their lives on their home and properties. Our loft was a new concept, not only to them but to many Americans, and she sparkled while asking all about it and what we planned to do.

When we purchased the house we live in now – the one with the yard work, the roof repairs, the exterior paint jobs – my grandfather practically rejoiced. This he could understand. We owned the actual dirt our house stood on. It was built of wood and stone and brick and it was solid. The neighbors weren’t on top of us or below us. They were a secure distance away.

My grandmother couldn’t wait to see the house. She waited until all our “pretties” were in place – which means she gave us about two weeks to get settled – and then they arrived. I was so terribly excited because they had agreed to spend the night – something they had never done at the loft, although my grandmother had wanted to. The lack of interior walls threw my grandpa for a loop.

In the back of the pick-up truck, under a cotton sheet and inside an old pickle bucket, was a collection of sticks with small green leaves on them stuck in crumbly mud. It was fall when they arrived, so these sticks were moving towards being done with the growing season. They looked sad and a wee bit pathetic. Until earlier that day, it had been part of a larger bush near their home in mid-Missouri.

My grandfather hauled them out and walked with me around “the property” to find a place to plant “this bush”. I was intrigued because what I saw in the bucket looked like what we had spent most of a week tearing out of our plot. Junk. Detritus. Weeds.

It wasn’t any of that. It was what my grandmother called a “bridal wreath bush. You’ll see what I mean next spring.”

I trusted them both in their ability to grow things. They were farmers, for goodness’ sake. So, I let my grandfather pick a spot in the far end of the back yard up in a raised bed. It made him happy. A little bit of run-off and a good spot not to “gather up too much late afternoon sun.”

And it has stayed there for almost twenty years, only getting bigger and needing no maintenance. My grandparents are gone now, but every spring I go out and tell them hello. This year, like every spring in the past, they were delighted to see me, and they put on quite a show.

Embracing Simplicity

Parades are funny things. Not just because of clowns and puppets and dogs. Not because of men in tutus and babies in top hats. Parades are funny because they bring out the best in America.

Parades are funny things. Not just because of clowns and puppets and dogs. Not because of men in tutus and babies in top hats.

Parades are funny because they bring out the best in America. The slowing down of time, the sitting still and watching the world go by, the embracing of simplicity.

Last month’s Brookside St. Pat’s parade was the 11th time we have marched as a unit for STUFF. Every year we start thinking about it the minute the calendar clicks over to the new year. And every year we don’t start working on it until March starts. Lots of time in there between the thinking and the working, which is not like us.

We’ve learned to slow down and not rush into decisions. We’ve learned to let the magic of an idea sink in and then rise to the surface. This year we simplified and let the people who walk with us – the customers, the dogs, the children – tell our story.

We are about people, not product. We are about hand-crafting, not production. For one short parade route a year, we are about the color green and candy and laughter and shouting and smiling.

It’s that simple.

Voices in My Head

I attended a charity luncheon last week, and the main speaker – a graduate of the program we were there to raise money for – spoke of her life, her troubles and her achievements.

I attended a charity luncheon last week, and the main speaker – a graduate of the program we were there to raise money for – spoke of her life, her troubles and her achievements. A clear voice she remembers from her past, a grandmother, told her when she was young that she would never amount to anything. Ever.

I was breathless. I carry voices in my head from the women in my life. One grandmother, when life was too good or edging towards bad, would tell me, “It’s a rich full life.” Another grandmother, “Let’s get this done.” I can’t imagine my life without my family standing behind me. Perched there waiting to step in with help or preparing to step back in pride.

Less than a day after the luncheon, I was sitting at a breakfast to celebrate the leaps and bounds a local university has taken in accepting and embracing people in the LGBTQIA community. At this celebration, three young people told their stories of coming out to their families and their greater world.

Much like the woman from the day before, they stood there proud of their accomplishments but wracked with the pain of the voices they carry in their heads – of family and friends who have not been accepting of their life. An institution – and members of its staff – was clearly stepping in to fill a painful void. A void that four small years of learning or a five week empowerment program can’t completely fill.

These young people stood there alone at their microphones – placed arms’ lengths away from each other – and shared openly. It took every fiber in my body to stay in my seat half an auditorium away as they each reached a crescendo in the stories that left them speechless and upset. I wanted to be near them – right behind them and much closer than an arm’s length – to remind them silently that it is a rich, full life. That the norm is not for those you trust most to leave you or let you down.

I stayed in my seat, was joyously a part of the raucous standing ovation, and left the room wondering. Wondering if I was correct in my assessment of what the norm is for family behavior.

I will never know the answer to that. You are given one life full of challenges, loss, gifts, celebrations, pain and love. I doubt normal ever dips its foot into these waters.

p.s. My week ended at an amazing fundraising party for the KC CARE Clinic. The women in these photos are many of the voices that live in my head – from just that one night. I treasure every single one of them.

Living With History

I love driving. I like to be in control. I enjoy it. Last week I took a road trip with my husband and son during the younger one’s spring break. Our small family truly loves road trips.