by Dave Isay
I always remember your eyes when you were waiting for me in the airport. The sun was shining in your eyes, and Nadia was hiding behind you. She was trying to see who the guy was.
Hilda: We went to Bahia Gigante, and the three of us sat there looking at the sea and the sunshine. You started telling me these weird things, like how grad students didn’t earn much in the U.S., but they could live well. And you told me about the school system. “Hmm, that’s good.” I didn’t know where this conversation was heading.
All of a sudden you said, “Well, I don’t make much money, but if you want, we could get married, and I think the three of us could live with some dignity until I finish school.” And I just thought to myself, This man is either totally crazy or has the biggest cojones on earth, because after all that I said about marriage, here he is asking me to marry him? I was shocked, and honestly, I had never thought about marrying again. But I just thought, If I let him go I will never forgive myself, because I’ve never felt this connection with anyone before in my life. And I said, “Yes.”
I remember everybody being terrified, because I was marrying a guy that I had met ten days before and taking my daughter out of the country. I pretty much left everything behind to follow you.
I remember that the second day in Costa Rica, you and Nadia sat to watch a TV show. She started asking you all these questions, and little by little she started leaning on you. Then, I remember, she sat on your lap, and she put her hand over your shoulder. And I thought to myself, This is one of the nicest images I’ll ever save in my mind. The two of you were laughing about that TV show, so happy. And that’s how I picture the two of you today. You have this laughing relationship, so close and funny. Even if you stop loving me tomorrow, I could never pay you back for all the love and affection you have given my baby.
Pedro: When I met Nadia, I said, I’m going to present myself as I am and see if she likes me. And fortunately, things turned out well. I’m a really proud stepfather.
Hilda: People say, Everyday things kill love. I probably used to say that twenty-five years ago, before I met you. But the things that we do on a daily basis, simple things like going to get the fruit at the market or paying the bills, or just cleaning the house, they aren’t chores or responsibilities but fun things when we do them together.
I told you when I met you that I don’t like husbands. Boyfriends invite you to the movies or to dance and bring you flowers, but husbands just take you for granted, right?
Pedro: So says tradition.
Hilda: But you’re not a traditional husband. I have this strange sensation with you—part of me feels like we met yesterday, but there’s another part of me that feels like I’ve been with you forever.
Pedro: And it feels good to feel young with you, and at the same time to grow old with you. And it’s all those things together at the same moment.
Hilda: Love you, Papito.
Pedro: Yo también.
Recorded in New York, New York, on April 23, 2010.
REGINA PEARLMUTTER, 81, talks to her niece, MURIEL SINGER, 57
Regina Pearlmutter: I didn’t have a steady boyfriend until Irv came into the picture. I must have been fifteen or sixteen, because I invited him to take me to the junior prom at the high school. He was my first romance, and he asked me to marry him.
But when I was in my sophomore year in college, I went with my parents to the Catskills. We got there and there was a young man in the lobby. He said to his cousin, “Get me introduced, because that’s the girl I’m going to marry.”
So that night, when there was a dance, his cousin came and introduced herself to my parents and said that the young man wanted to meet me. We sat up until about four in the morning at the bar. My father came down in his pajamas looking for me, and said, “Oh, you’re with him? Okay.” Then he turned around and walked back up the steps. [Laughs.]
Muriel Singer: So they liked Morris.
Regina: My father did, but not my mother; she didn’t like him. Even though he was a young doctor, they just never got along.
Muriel: So did you have that same feeling, This is the man that I’m going to marry?
Regina: I thought he was wonderful that night. He was so bright and so knowledgeable. He was all of the things that I always wanted.
He swept me off my feet. We were married a few months later; I was nineteen years old. I don’t think we had had more than a dozen dates, which isn’t enough. I think I was too young to be married, but wartime speeded everything up.
My marriage lasted thirty and a half years. We had had our thirtieth anniversary party, and about six months later it broke up. I blossomed, I think, after that.
Muriel: So how did Irv come back into your life?
Regina: At the same time I met Morris, Irv was transferred to New York to train as a spy to be parachuted into Germany. On July Fourth weekend, I said, “I’ve met somebody else.” It was a terrible thing to do. I was wearing his mother’s ring, and I gave it back to him. I’m crying and he’s crying. It was an awful evening. But that was it. The next weekend, when Morris saw that I didn’t have the ring on anymore, he asked me to marry him, and I said yes. So that was that.
I was working at Macy’s after school, and Irv’s mother came in. On her knees this woman begged me to not give up her son. I always kept that to myself, because it was so embarrassing, and I felt so awful. I didn’t know what to say. What do you say? Irv wouldn’t get married for another six or seven years, but he did have a very happy marriage.
Forty-something years later my cousin Seymour called me saying he had just seen an obituary in one of the Long Island papers that Irv’s wife had died. So I thought, Oh . . . I didn’t know where he lived, but I thought that he maybe worked in New York, and I knew he was going to be an accountant. I looked in the phone book, and sure enough, the Manhattan book had his name and his New York office. So I wrote him a letter of condolence. I told him that I hoped he had a family that would be there for him, but if he wanted to cry on anybody’s shoulder, mine was available. [Laughs.] I gave him my address and my phone number.
He said when the letter came, he recognized my handwriting. He opened it up and called me that second: “When can I see you?” I said, “Well, I don’t know.” I got flustered about it. Then he said he had to go and have some surgery. If it turned out all right, he would call me again. If it didn’t, he wouldn’t call.
So a month went by. He called and he asked if we could meet. I said, “I work, but tomorrow I get off at 3:00; I can be ready by 3:30.” He said, “I’ll be there at 3:31.” And he was, with flowers.
I talked the entire four hours; he could hardly get a word in. I was very nervous. He said that he knew the minute he saw me that this was it. He was staying forever.
Soon after that he got sick. The cancer that they thought they had taken out was coming back. After that, he moved into my apartment.
He lasted about four and a half years. He worked almost until the day he died—he kept right on going. And we did have a wonderful time together. He was a wonderful, wonderful companion, and he treated me beautifully. He loved my daughters, and I got very close to his family and still am.
When Irv came back into my life forty years later, what I found so wonderful was that I was able to do for him. I always felt guilty that I had given him up the way I did. But we had a good five years together. So you see me smiling.
Recorded in New York, New York, on July 21, 2005.
MURIEL SINGER (left) AND REGINA PEARLMUTTER
ASHANTHI GAJAWEERA, 38, talks with her mother, HEMAMALA “MALA” FERNANDO, 63
Ashanthi Gajaweera: Mom, you met my father in 1965, when you were growing up in Sri Lanka.
Mala Fernando: It was my final year in school, and my aunt told me that this man was coming to see me the next day. I was a little annoyed at her, and
I told her, “What is this all about?” She said, “He’s a doctor, and he might even go abroad.” So I told her, “You get married to him, and you can go abroad with him!” [Laughs.]
I was up all night, thinking, How can I stop this? The next morning I woke up and bathed early. Around ten o’clock in the morning I bathed again—and again at twelve o’clock and four o’clock. I stayed in wet clothes all day, thinking I would get sick. I expected to get pneumonia by evening, but nothing happened.
So now I was in my room, and I heard a car coming into our garden. My mother came and knocked on the door; I did not answer. Then my sisters-in-law knocked, but I did not answer. Finally my father came and knocked on my door and said, “Darling, please come out. These guests have already waited for forty-five minutes. Please come out and meet them, for my behalf.” I would never embarrass my father; I adored him. So I came out and saw this young man. He smiled at me, and I was nervous—my goodness! I could hear my heart pounding—like it’s pounding now.
Finally, the moment came that they were ready to leave, and my mother comes in with a gold coin on a tray for the young man. If he liked me, he could take it. And he took it. I remember standing against the wall in the back of the living room when he took the coin. He looked at my face and smiled. For the first time, I felt something.
He was intelligent, animated, intellectual; I liked him. But I don’t think it was love. I had no chance to meet any boys other than my own brothers, so this was a novelty for me.
I married him about a year and a half later.
Ashanthi: And did you ever fall in love with Daddy?
Mala: The thing is, I married your father on the day of my twenty-second birthday, and I had your sister just nine months later. I was very immature, and I was very reluctant to go abroad. But my father always told me, “Once you get married, you’re a wife. You belong to him, and you have to go along with his future.” I was away from home and I missed my family, but I never told your daddy how unhappy I was—I knew this was the partner my parents had chosen. This was the way it should be.
Then, when I was thirty-four, your youngest sister, Nalika, was born. It was a new beginning for us, and we were like a young couple, just married. I was more in love—and more mature.
Daddy used to treat me like another little girl before Nalika came. He would sometimes call me his daughter. After Nalika was born, I told him, “I’m not your daughter. I’m your wife. Treat me like a wife.”
Ashanthi: And then Daddy died after just fourteen years of marriage.
Mala: Within that year I grew up so fast. I mean, that’s the total changing moment in my life.
Ashanthi: Because you didn’t even know how to write a check before that, right?
Mala: I found myself as a person for the first time. I was no more Daddy’s little girl—I was a grown-up woman.
Then, when you were thirteen years old, one day you suddenly said, “Mom, you’re now thirty-nine years old. It’s time that you get married.” So then I asked you, “How are you going to find a man for me?” [Laughs.] So you looked into the marriage proposals section of this newspaper we had. You circled all these marriage proposals and told me the next morning, “Mom, this is a good one.”
He was a widower; I was a widow. He had two boys. So we met.
Ashanthi: It was kind of weird. [Laughs.] I was a teenager, and I saw you fall head over heels in love with your current husband, my stepfather.
Mala: That was the first time I really felt, This is how you fall in love. It was not a proposed marriage. We did it on our own, and you were the little matchmaker.
Ashanthi: I think Daddy would be very proud of you.
Mala: I think so. I have brought up my own three daughters and my second husband’s two sons. I think I have accomplished a lot in my life.
Ashanthi: It’ll be twenty-seven years since Daddy died, and gosh, you have changed. I mean, nobody would ever call you a little girl anymore. You’re really a very independent, strong—incredibly strong—woman. You’re my hero.
Recorded in Rochester, New York, on July 11, 2009.
DAVID WILSON, 66
David Wilson: I was born in Boston, Massachusetts. My parents were both domestics for white families. From a very early age, I remember my mother saying, “This is not something I want for you. Hopefully you will go to college and you will work for a corporation or work for the U.S. government, but not work for another family.” I was an only child. My mother and father were pretty much there guiding me every step of the way.
I met my high school sweetheart at sixteen. We dated for two years of high school and then through college, and we decided to get married. We had three children—great, great kids. My life was very structured: I worked in management for a Fortune 500 company. Everybody came to work between 7:00 and 8:00 in the morning, and we all worked until 5:00 or 6:00 in the evening. I really never pushed the envelope in any way.
I was thirty-seven years old when I came to terms with being a gay man. I had been in therapy for almost two years, and during one of the sessions, all of a sudden, a lightbulb went on for me: I realized that my wife was more like my best friend. So I sat down with her, and we spent pretty much an entire weekend trying to work through all the details. Later, we sat down with our three children, and I said, “Mom needs to move on with her life, and I need to move on with my own.” That was a very rough patch for our family, but we all got through it.
Then I met Ron. We moved fairly quickly into an apartment and then we finally bought a house. Over a period of thirteen years, it was about as good as it gets: I had an ex-wife who remained my best friend, I had three adult children, and I had a partner.
One day in November, I came home from work and I pulled into the driveway. Ron had been raking. He was lying across a pile of leaves, and he wasn’t moving. I didn’t know quite what was going on. The EMTs put Ron into an emergency vehicle, and when I got to our local hospital he was dead on arrival.
My whole world kind of fell apart. Where do I go from here? I felt pretty broken at that point.
After six weeks I went back to work. I had seventeen people who reported to me, and I had to gather them together in the conference room and tell them that I had lost my partner. The questions were, Partner? I know you’re divorced and you have three kids, but what do you mean “partner?” So a lot of that was about explaining, “I’m gay, but I didn’t feel I could be gay at work. But here we are.” I was the only senior manager in the entire organization who was openly gay. This was 1995.
I started going to meetings with other gay fathers. One meeting, in walked a man who had been fired from his job in Michigan. He stood up and told his story at the meeting. His name was Rob Compton. Then I stood up and told my story. We both continued to talk about the experiences we’d had and we decided to go out on a date. After about a year, Rob moved into the home that I had lived in with Ron. We had a commitment ceremony three years later. After that we were asked to be plaintiffs in a major lawsuit against the State of Massachusetts over the right to get married.
My kids and my ex-wife were fully supportive. My dad wasn’t sure. He was eighty-five years old, and all of a sudden his only son was going to become this prominent, out, gay, black man. So I talked with Dad about some of the issues. A couple hours later, Dad said, “You’re doing the right thing and you’ve got my support.” When we got the decision from the Supreme Judicial Court, I drove to my dad’s and said, “Dad, we won!” He was so excited. “Now, when are we going to have a wedding? A legal wedding?” Dad had been discriminated against his whole life, so for him this victory was not just for gay people. It was a victory he could be a part of, and he could not have been more proud.
We had our wedding on May 17, 2004, one of the first gay weddings in Massachusetts. I said, “Dad, I’m sending a limo to pick you up.” Dad had never been in a limo; he w
as eighty-nine at that point. He was in the front row, and when we walked down the aisle, both his arms were in the air.
Recorded in New York, New York, on June 17, 2010.
GWENDOLYN DIAZ talks with her husband, HENRY FLORES
Gwendolyn Diaz: We were both professors at St. Mary’s University in San Antonio, Texas. I was sitting in my office with the door open, and I noticed this man walking by . . .
Henry Flores: For me it was just a normal afternoon. I was one of the original computer nerds, when we used to work off the mainframe. I was walking down the hallway, and I noticed that the last office in the hallway’s door was open. I looked inside to see who was in there, and I saw a flash of ankle, and I saw these beautiful green eyes, and I saw this blond hair, and I went, Wow! And then I went smack dab into the wall. I literally crashed. It was really embarrassing, so I scurried off into the computer room and closed the door. When I came out you were gone.
The very next day, at about the same time, I was walking down the hallway again, and I saw the same door open. I looked inside, saw that beautiful face, and I went, Wow! And I walked into the wall again, in the same, identical place. This time I went running back to my office, closed the door, and said to myself, You idiot! You idiot! What are you doing?
All of a sudden I heard this knock on my door. I opened the door, and it was you. You just kind of stared at me and said, “Do you have a cigarette?” We used to smoke in those days, but we’ve long since quit. I gave you a cigarette, and you kind of looked at me and turned around and walked away, and you didn’t say a thing. I closed the door and said to myself, Wow. She wants to talk to me. This is crazy. So I looked around my office, and I thought, An ashtray. If she bummed a cigarette, she needs an ashtray. I cleaned all of the ashtrays in my office, and I tried to make myself somewhat presentable. Then I went and knocked on your door. I said, “You need an ashtray? You can have your pick—any one you want.”