GAY PEOPLE'S CHRONICLE October 1, 2004

'Tell the stories'

They beckon readers to the edge, to grow and find truth

Interrupted by God

by Tracey Lind

Pilgrim, $24 hardcover

by Eric Resnick

"I feel homeless right now. It's like I I am not wanted here. It's so profound,” said the Very Reverend Tracey Lind upon hearing that the legal challenges had been given up earlier that day and that the anti-marriage Ohio constitutional amendment would be on the ballot.

In retrospect, giving her that news before sitting down to discuss her life and her book Interrupted by God provided the perfect opportunity to process firsthand what the book, and Lind, are all about.

The book's subtitle is Glimpses from the Edge-the place where she believes truth and

Interrupted by phonpara

Good

holiness are found. At that moment, we had just journeyed to the edge together. There tears.

were

The collective lives of all LGBT Ohioans and those

who love them were just interrupted by something that cannot be ignored because it is powerful enough to change the course of one's life, and in this case it is scary and vexing.

Not shrinking from that interruption, the openly lesbian dean of Cleveland's Trinity Cathedral said, "Tell them we held hands."

The meaning of that very empowering statement is found on page 144 of the book: "Perhaps one of the most poignant examples of the power of song during fateful times was the final message of Etty Hillesum. Scribbled

on a scrap of paper and thrown from a boxcar as she and her family departed for Auschwitz, this young woman wrote, 'We left the camp singing.'

"I love holding Emily Ingalls' hand," said Lind of her partner. "And we hold hands a lot. And when we walk around our Cleveland Heights neighborhood past a church that will remain nameless, we make sure we're holding hands, and we make sure they know we're holding hands."

"We will be accepted and our relationships validated when we tell our stories," she said. "All we can do is tell our stories even when they don't want to hear them."

Storytelling is what Lind does in Interrupted by God. These are her stories and the stories of people in her life who have meant something to her, and who have taken her to the "edge" with little interruptions that made big differences.

There are 29 of the stories. Some are written like sermons. A few are embellished a bit, with disclosure. Some are funny. But all the characters are real and compelling.

The photographs in the book are compelling, too. Though modest about it, Lind is an accomplished photographer. The book is meritorious on the photos alone.

"The art of photography does not come naturally to me," writes Lind, "I must work at it. But I have discerned that photography is the work of my soul, not my ego, and I have Tracey Lind

learned the hard way that whenever my ego gets involved, it distorts the picture."

Some of the photos in the book are displayed in her office at Trinity. They are guarded by a concrete goose at the door which sports her clerical collar when she's not wearing it.

Lind's story is compelling in itself. She describes herself as "belonging to the edge, to the fringe, to the people who are never certain if, when, or where they fit into the great scheme of things."

An openly lesbian Episcopal priest with a Jewish father and Christian mother, she grew up with a Reform Jewish education, even though the more conservative branches of Judaism would not allow her to be Jewish without a Jewish mother.

Lind was born May

17, 1954, the day the U.S. Supreme Court handed down its landmark Brown v. Board of Education decision. On her 50th birthday, the state

of Massachusetts issued its first marriage licenses to same-sex couples.

Rev. Lind describes the event that she says has influenced every life decision she has made, which occurred when she was 15. After a movie about the Holocaust at her religious school, a young rabbi asked Lind what she would have done, since she could have passed as a non-Jew.

"I don't know," she responded.

Continued on facing page

Curbside

ATOM

ROBERT KIRBY 2003

THE TWINS, MIKE'N IKE, LIVED IN

THIS OLD APARTMENT WITH A MOTHER. WHO WAS NEVER AROUND, AND THAT'S WHERE THE GANG KEPT BUSY WHEN THE WEATHER TURNED CRUDDY. I'LL RAISE

YOUR

ASS.

And

MAN

THERE MORE BEER?

ONE DAY I WAS CHILLING OUT THERE WITH JUST MIKE'N IKE, WHEN OUTTA THE GWE, ATOM SHOWED UP.

ATOM

HEY.

by Robert Kirby

NOW THAT HE WAS STANDING RIGHT IN FRONT OF ME, I COULD SEE HOW HE ENDED UP THE LEADER OF THE GANG. HE WAS SOMEONE YOU WOULDN'T WANT TO MESS WITH.

Sa YOU'RE

NATHAN, HUM

YEAHE

I KNOW ALL ABOUT

You.

CLINK

I WAS A LITTLE FREAKED, EXPECT ING TROUBLE, BUT HE WAS BEING ALL NICE TO ME.

WHAT'S GOIN' ON, MAN? ABOUT TIME, HUH?

UH,

SURE?

AFTER I ACTUALLY BEAT HIM AT

WE TALKED ABOUT EVERYTHING AND ANYTHING EXCEPT FOR CAL, ARM WRESTLING 3 OUTTA SI

WHICH IS WHY I FIGURED WE WERE ABLE TO PRETEND TO BE FRIENDLY TO EACH OTHER.

WAS OFFICIALLY A MEMBER OF THE GANG, THE OLDEST GODDAMNED GANG MEMBER I'D EVER. HEARD OF

YOU'RE NEXT, IKE. grunt 3,

I'M MIKE. AND NAH, THAT'S AIGHT.....

GEORGE BUSH says:

"Today I call upon Congress to pass ... an amendment to our Constitution defining and protecting marriage as a union of a man and a woman.

JOHN KERRY says:

"The courage to do what's right means standing up for civil rights ... and ending discrimination against gay men and lesbians.

Paid for by the Cleveland Stonewall Democrats, Patrick Shepherd, President, 12931 Shaker Blvd., Cleveland, 44120

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