Fay and Me

Only once did I talk to Grandpa Fay about being gay. I was at Michigan State in East Lansing in the late 70s and had rarely visited with him even though he was just a few miles down the road. I was in my senior year, playing a big shot at the campus newspaper, living in a house with a bunch of friends including my tall, handsome boyfriend.

 

Me (on the left) with some college friends

On a drunken evening, one of the many that had become my habit in those days, I was hanging out with one of my roommates and telling her about my gay grandfather. I was more attracted to her than my handsome boyfriend and I suspect that’s why my grandfather’s story came to mind. I told her that he had lived in Lansing for decades and she, who was delightfully impulsive, said  let’s go see him. So we did.

Fay in his 70s

With a half empty bottle of cheap wine in my hand, we showed up at his apartment door. It was late and he was alone. He was as gracious as always and let us right in. Fay was a night owl, so we might have shown up before he was going out. He didn't bat an eye at the open bottle of wine.

I regret that I remember little of the evening, but I think we were there for quite some time. My friend was entranced with Fay, as he told her family stories, I think. At some point in the night, I started to ask him about bars in Lansing, mentioning every gay bar I had been told about by another friend who covered the minorities beat at the newspaper. Yes, he said, I have been to Covello’s and Trammpps. Yes, he knew they were gay bars.

Trammpps Disco on East Michigan Avenue, Lansing

He offered no further information, but I know he would have if I had only asked. I didn’t. I’m still not sure why.

17 Dec 1944, Belgium - American prisoners captured during the Battle of the Bulge march under guard by German soldiers

The only other time I remember talking to him about his life was a night when we went out to dinner during those college years. I don't remember why or how we got together, but I had always enjoyed his company so it was a fun evening. I asked him about his war years because those were the most vivid stories I had been told about him and he told me about being a prisoner of war and having been forced marched through Germany as the war was ending. It seemed like he had a regular rap about those days, but it was the first time I heard about the war from him.

And then many years passed. I came out as a lesbian a year after my drunken evening at Fay’s apartment. I had known for a long time that I preferred women to men, but it wasn’t until I found the guise of radical feminist that I had the courage to announce myself. I didn’t give Fay as a gay man much of a second thought as I blundered into adulthood, moved to Boston and found a life I loved.

My wife Donna and I in the early years

But Fay’s story was a part of my childhood DNA. When we were growing up, we used to pour over the scrapbooks my mother stored in her closet that documented Fay’s POW saga. As next of kin, my mother was the one notified when he disappeared and the local newspaper treated them both like dramatic heroes as it wrote story after story about his war experience. My mother’s nursing school graduation picture, where she is so beautiful, was used in every story. It all felt so big and important when we were kids.

Some of the many artifacts from my mother's scrapbooks 

As a true reporter and a lover of history, I asked my mother a lot of questions over the years about the war and Fay’s POW drama. Those stories led to other stories about her own childhood and what it had meant to have Fay for a father. Her stories were filled with contradictions. He was the best time anyone could ever have, filled with laughter and adventure. At the same time he was irresponsible and selfish, someone who had disappointed her more times than she could count.

Fay and my mother

Some of the facts she stated didn’t add up or seemed more like family lore than anything that could have happened. But, in the end, she wove a tale that has become this story, a family story that may or may not be entirely true, as is true of all family stories.

So this is Fay’s story, a quintessential 20th Century tale about a gay man. And it is also my mother’s story because she’s the one who told it to us.

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