FEATURES HIGH GEAR, MARCH, 1977 AND N.O.W........

Arlene Ross, who recently moved to Cleveland from Washington, D.C., has been appointed State Task Force Coordinator of the Ohio N.O.W. Sexuality Task Force. This is her story.

High Gear: Would you share with us the first sexual experience you can remember?

Arlene: It depends very much on how you term first sexual experience. Because it's my feeling that teenagers who are throwing pillows at each other or tickling each other are wanting to touch each other and that in itself is a sexual experience. The first time I can remember is when my mother went to the hospital to give birth to my brother and as a result I stayed with my grandmother and I remember at age four that I was pretending to be asleep as I slept in the bed with her so that I could toss and turn and accidentally touch her body as ! slept. I often think of this as my first sexual experience.

H.G. Do you recall any other experiences between that time and when you finally came out?

Arlene: When I was 11 years old I went to the roof of the building where I lived with my best friend. She was older, about 14, and we went up there to smoke cigarettes and remember that she took off her blouse and just held me. That's about all we experienced. I didn't question whether it was right or wrong or good or bad. I just knew that it felt warm and comfortable.

H.G. When did you first realize you were a lesbian?

Arlene: It was when I was about 16 years old, at the same time that every other adolescent

was reaching puberty and getting in touch with their sexuality. I realized I was much more attracted to women than I was to men, and I went to the library and looked up the word in the dictionary. I still didn't quite understand and with the help of my friendly neighborhood librarian. She was probably a dyke. She gave me Radcliffe Hall's The Well of Loneliness to read and I had a great deal of difficulty identifying with that, also coming from a working class background. But it did frighten me considerably and so I immediately lost my virginity to an extremely macho friend of mine who was the boyfriend of one of my best girlfriends. I did this as an effort to prove to myself that I wasn't a lesbian ... Then a lot of things happened from there. I went to the bars in an effort to come out. This was in the late fifties, early sixties to the bars in Greenwich village, and women at that time were very much into roles. There was the butch with her hair slicked back and the long-haired fem. And there I was with my bobby sox and saddle shoes and I didn't fit in, and I didn't have very many opportunities to meet anyone or have any experiences. At that time there were a lot of bar raids going on. There were two occasions when I was picked up. The first time I was held over night because I was only 17 years old. The second time I was much more clever and had false identification with me which got me in trouble anyway. Then I got involved with drugs, had a nervous breakdown, and I realized this wasn't for me, that because of the societal oppression there was nothing else for me to do

HERE'S ARLENE

but become "normal" and so I actively looked for a husband I went straight even though I had still not slept with a woman. I. got married when I was 21 and was married for ten years.

H.G. So when did you decide to come out a second time? Arlene: Ever heard of the seven year itch? I met a woman at work who introduced herself this way to me: 'My name is Karen Vogel. I prefer being called Wind, and I'm a lesbian and there's no reason to deny it.' She really shook me up, I was frightened. I wondered if other people in the office would make a point of comparison between. her and me. As I got to know her I realized I cared very much for her. The problem was that my husband realized this also and so he manipulated it so that she would have to work downstairs in his portion of the office. When that didn't work, he decided we'd go to Europe for 16 months in an effort to reconcile the marriage. From there I wrote her letters confessing my love and she in return sent me copies of Majority Report. When I got home I was ready to leave my husband and live with her happily ever after, but she apologized that I had read more into the lines that she intended and she just wanted us to be friends. Well, I immediately busied myself. I let all the hair under my arms grow in and on my legs. I read all the books on feminism. 1 got involved politically. In August of 1974 my husband and I separated. And I called Wind and said, please help, I'd like to put all of my energies into lesbianfemínísm. Where do I go? And she suggested that I go to the hootenanny at the Women's Center in New York. So I went and there was a women there from Canada who had come to get an abortion and needed housing. So I asked her to stay with me and she stayed. And she stayed. And she stayed. On September 9, 1974, 16 years after my first attempt to come out as a lesbian, I had my first lesbian sexual experience.

H.G. Given your experiences, what is your philosophy on relationships?

Arlene: Many people say that a radical lesbian feminist separatist should be really very much into non-monogamy and polygamy and not into things that tie us or bond us in the same way like women's sexual roles have been in the past. I think it's more a matter of choice. For me I find more emotional fulfillment by being into a one-to-one monogamous relationship.... That is one of the goals of the Sexuality Task force. That we as women should sit down and talk to each other and work together politically and socially, and we are going to be doing that with members of the task force who happen to be lesbian, those who happen to be heterosexual and those who happen to be bisexual.

H.G. Why are you a lesbianfeminist?

Arlene: O.K. It took me 16 years to come out. When I finally did make it out of the closet I came out in an extremely euphoric state. My head was up in the air and I had to get up on top of the rooftops and shout it out. And be free and be myself and realize this is 1977. As Wind put it, 'My name is Arlene Ross. I'm a lesbian and there's no reason to deny it.' So I came out at school and I was kicked out of school. I came out on my job and I was fired. I came out to my family and it was the only time I ever saw my father cry. My

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Photos by Al Morrill

Arlene: If they need either consciousness raising or therapy they can get in touch with Cleveland Women's Counseling at 321-8585. If they feel they need support groups, they can get in touch with Women In Growth at 371-1697. If they feel they would like to come and work with a large group of women interested in legislative changes, doing political work and also working for social and recreational alternatives, then they can come to the N.O.W. Lesbian Sexuality Task Force which meets the third Sunday of every month at 12184 Buckeye Road near E. 129th at 2 p.m. If

MY NAME IS ARLENE ROSS. I'M A LESBIAN AND THERE'S NO REASON TO DENY IT.

mother didn't comprehend what I said to her, and my brother who up to that time I had a very good relationship with is no longer speaking to me; but I would do it all again. And the reason I am politically active is to make things better for myself and two goals I have for myself is that I have to live to be there for other women because when I was coming out, there was little opportunity for me to have someone to go to and talk to who would understand and be supportive.

H.G.: What do you suggest other closeted area lesbians in the area do? Where do they go?

they have housing discrimination problems they can get in touch with Avery Friedman with H.U.D.

H.G.: We have heard that you are supposedly a separatist. Why did you agree to have a gay man interview you?

Arlene: feel that I'm a separatist in that I know what I want. I socialize only with women. I am woman identified. My love relationships are only with women. My lawyer, doctor and dentist are all women. Even the cats' veterinarian is a woman, but I've found from my two years of intense political activism that in order to reach my