I am pleased to welcome Bill Gordon back as our Senior Class guest blogger today. Born and raised in Kansas, Bill lived all over the country during his 45-year career in library and association management. When he retired in 2002, he was the Executive Director of The American Library Association (located here in Chicago) and has called Chicago home ever since.

Having just celebrated his 86th birthday, Bill says life so far has been “a great adventure.” Lucky for us, he enjoys remembering his adventurous life through his participation in the memoir-writing class I lead via Zoom on Thursday afternoons.

Salon, not Saloon

By Bill Gordon

Today’s guest blogger, Bill Gordon

Several years ago I enrolled in Beth Finke’s Memoir Writing class. As I grow older, writing about my life continues to intrigue me. Not for the consumption by others, but because I feel a gentle push to record my life’s experiences for myself – remembering, clarifying memories, creating a record, and finally trying to be honest with myself about who I am and what experiences I have had.

Beth’s approach to teaching memoir writing is to give a prompt and ask each of us to write a 500 word essay relating the prompt to a personal life experience. I have found that looking at my life in 500 word chunks is perfect for the type of record I want to create.

As years go by I find I have written many essays on many topics, always following the lead provided by the prompt. Throughout it all there has been one particular thing about me I’ve avoided writing about, and it’s a very important thing: my homosexuality. I just couldn’t be honest, always managing to skirt the subject no matter what the prompt was.

Until, that is, I found myself writing about the death of my partner. I read that essay in class back before COVID, when we were meeting in person. And guess what? The world did not come to an end. The sky did not fall. The other students did not get up and leave in disgust. In fact, they hugged me, and thanked me for my honesty.

I was 76 years old, and had, at last, “come out.”

And yet, the reticence I’d had towards my sexual orientation continued, making it difficult for me to write about this defining part of my life.

And then I changed classes, still with Beth Finke, but now via Zoom with an altogether new group of people. My new set of classmates make me feel incredibly comfortable, and I find myself writing more and more essays about my life as a gay man. The essays are well received by my classmates, encouraging me to tell more and more about my life in a true and authentic way.

As I became comfortable writing more essays about the intimate parts of my life, I began to feel an urge to share these stories with more people. I thought of the salons I’ve read about: authors, poets, even musicians getting together to share their creations with friends in a social setting for presentation and discussion.

Why couldn’t I do this?

No reason I couldn’t! I just didn’t want anyone to think of it as a personal conceit. Girding my loins for rejection, I invited ten people to my home for a “Reading and Discussion” and subtitled the event “A Slice of a Gay Man’s Life.” I let them know that light refreshments would be served, thinking this might be an inducement for the reluctant attendee.

Seven people came – six men and one woman. Of the other three invitees, one sent regrets. I didn’t hear from the other two.

I read ten carefully selected essays out loud. A lively discussion followed each essay, including comments on the essays, follow-up questions about some of the stories and comments about what gay life was like in mid-twentieth century America.

By any measure, the event was a success. I know this from the feedback and from the response of the attendees during the program. And worth noting: barely a scrap of the refreshments was left

Based on my experience with the “Reading,” I know I will do it again. The setting, as it turned out, was perfect. My living room, friends sitting in a semicircle, the rapt attention of those in attendance, and the comfort I felt telling tales of my life  -it could not have been better.

We all love stories – stories about ourselves and others – and with October being LGBTQ History Month, the timing was perfect. Creating a salon atmosphere, in the comfort of one’s home is an ideal setting for storytelling, reading essays, discussing issues. I am glad I overwhelmed my reluctance and strode confidently into exposing my writing to others.

When a loved one has the nerve to die, it’s a gut punch that knocks the wind out of me. Even if I knew it was coming. Then I get up, get back in the game, and work through the realization that they’re gone.

I know that they’re gone intellectually. But habit lives on. Fondness lives on. There’s still a presence. And so it’s been since our friend Brad died. He’s been gone a week and a half, but I find myself expecting to see him at our local watering hole, or walking to the Ace Hardware in the neighborhood. The Cleveland Guardians are doing well so far in the MLB playoffs, and, because he  was a longtime Cleveland fan (Brad has an autographed photo of Bob Feller,) I think about talking to him about their success.

I’ll read an article that I just know our friend Ulrich would’ve appreciated–and one that I’d like to talk with him about–and remember there is no Ulrich.

Hell, sometimes I want to talk to Janet—whom we lost in January—about the past several weeks which marked the end of Brad’s time. To this day I think about calling my mom and dad about some news, though they’ve been gone since 1992 and 1991, respectively.

It’s kind of random, I’m not sure what triggers these moments. It might be at a dinner at a place you used to go to with the departed; it might be on a beautiful spring day when you used to take a walk with your friend. A song. A smell. And it hits you: Absence.

The person’s walk, smile, voice—their tics, the way they made you nuts sometimes. Absence is a pure thing that allows you to recall everything you loved and that you didn’t love.

It used to unnerve me. But I’ve concluded that ultimately, absence is a presence, and for me, a comforting one.

Safe & Sound blog readers have been asking me lately if the memoir-writing classes I lead are starting up again now, and, if so, “Will you start publishing essays by your students on your blog again, too? I always like those.”

My answers? Yes, and yes!

Today is the first of October, I’ll be leading all three memoir-writing classes this week, and each class meets for six weeks. But wait–there’s more! I’m renewing our “Senior Class” feature today, too, with this essay Regan Burke (a writer in one of those classes) wrote about attending a presentation I did with Bindy Bitterman (a writer in another one of those classes) and Sharon Kramer (a writer from another class) three weeks ago.

The irrepressible Regan Burke, author of “In That Number.”

Mystery of the Matching Shoes

by Regan Burke

Chicago’s annual Printers Row Lit Fest is a red-meat feast of books. For two days bibliomaniacs don their Walgreen’s readers and shuffle from table to table in the two-block long chow-down of book delights. Lone readers never look up, never reply to vendors, never talk to authors. They’re intent on finding the books they need to satisfy an obsession that never ends — to be alone with their books.

Then there are the book lovers who hold vendors hostage, yakking about their favorite books and authors. And others with their dogs and friends, happy to be outside talking to neighbors, catching glimpses of book titles they may wander back to.

In 2021, my publisher asked me to stand behind the Tortoise Books display to promote my book, “In That Number.”

“Oh, you’re the author? What’s it about?” strangers asked.

“It’s a memoir about politics.” I answered.

The publisher interjected, “She was a hippie who worked for Bill Clinton. She met Putin.”

I had no idea how to initiate conversations about my book, never mind promote myself. I signed a few copies, but not many words passed between me and the buyers.

At the 2022 Lit Fest, memoir writing teacher, Beth Finke, organized and moderated a program called “Unlocking Memories and Uncovering Stories” with two of her students who had recently published children’s books.

I sat in the front row, soaking up the ethereal juice of a room of twenty-five or so people attracted to children’s literature.

The two presenters, Sharon Rosenblatt Kramer, and Bindy Bitterman, sat on either side of Beth Finke at a table covered by a floor-length black cloth. Beth, a published author herself, introduced her student-authors in her usual lighthearted manner, exuding pride in their accomplishments. She asked questions about how they got started and their publishing processes.

Look hard and you’ll see Luna’s paw pads as she snoozes.

Sharon Kramer’s book, “Time for Bubbe,” published by Golden Alley Press, blossomed from one of Beth’s memoir writing prompts, “Write about a grandparent.” It’s the story of her six-year-old grandson visiting his great-grandmother in her high-rise. He punches all the elevator buttons, and as the elevator car commences to stop at every single floor she responds, “Don’t worry boychik, we have all the time in the world.” Sharon is 83 years old, this is her first published book,and it comes complete with a glossary of Yiddish words at the end.

Bindy Bitterman’s Skiddly Diddly Skat is a self-published cat and mouse story written in limericks. Bindy is 90 years old, this is her first children’s book, and it comes accompanied with a QR audio code.

Halfway through the presentation, I noticed two sets of matching shoes sticking out from the tablecloth, under Sharon and Beth. Did Sharon and Beth coordinate their shoes? They looked like soft-souled, black canvas with round grey tips. The feet moved slightly every few minutes, always in unison. For a second I thought they might be mice.

I could not take my eyes off those shoes.

And then all at once the tablecloth ruffled! A black Labrador stuck her nose out from under the table, flopped her head back down and resumed her subservient posture at Beth’s feet. I’d forgotten that Luna, the Seeing Eye dog, uses those four black feet with grey pads to lead Beth around town.

Hmm. Would the mystery of the matching shoes make a good children’s story? I’m not sure, but one thing I did learn from Bindy and Sharon: it’s never too late to give children’s book writing a try.

An earlier version of this essay— appeared on Regan Burke’s Back Story Essays blog on September 24, 2022.

That’s Brad at a New Year’s celebration at Hackney’s in 2014. Rest in peace, dear friend.

Hello from Beth. Mike and I got some tough news yesterday — we learned our friend Stephen Bradley Gillaugh had died from lung cancer yesterday morning. We always referred to the Notorious SBG as Brad,” and I hope this posting of a blog Mike wrote about him ten years ago will give you a glimpse of why we loved –and will miss – Brad so much.

Me and Brad and Roy

by Michael Knezovich

Our favorite neighborhood watering hole and restaurant – Hackney’s Printers Row – draws us frequently (probably too frequently) because it also draws an eclectic, articulate, smart, accomplished and just-plain-nice group of folks from the neighborhood. Attorneys, artists, architects, research scientists, computer programmers, linguists, stock market mavens … you can learn a lot sipping a beer at Hack’s.

One of the Hackney’s denizens Beth and I have learned a great deal from is Stephen Bradley Gillaugh, who goes simply by “Brad.” Brad moved to Printers Row – from Los Angeles – to retire after a long, illustrious career in the art world. He worked for decades in NYC – at the Museum of Modern Art and at the famed Leo Castelli Gallery. Later, in LA, he managed a big corporate art collection (when corporations used to have such things). Brad doesn’t brag, but over time (and libations) Beth and I have gotten lots of inside chatter of his first-person encounters with the likes of Rauschenberg and Warhol and…even Truman Capote. (I’m not telling, so don’t even ask.)

We also learned that Brad has a fantastic art collection displayed right there in his own apartment. And get this: he has so much art that some of it has been left in boxes and shipping tubes. Why, you ask? Because there is no room in his apartment to display it.And so Brad, one day, decided to go through his forgotten works. He found prints and drawings by Roy Lichtenstein, Roger Brown, and other notables. But instead of framing them, he’s gone on a generous donation campaign, giving them outright to friends in the neighborhood.

Thanks to Brad’s generosity, this hangs in our living room.

Including us.

He had us over one evening to select from his overage. I took a fancy to the one he’d guessed I’d like — a print of a poster Lichtenstein did for the 1967 Aspen Winter Jazz Festival. It now hangs in our living room.

And I love it.

So much so that in 2012 it inspired me to visit the Art Institute of Chicago to take in the Lichtenstein Retrospective that runs through September 3. It turned out to be a terrific show—but it was all the better because I walked the gallery with Brad.

Along the way, I learned that Lichtenstein was a kind, even-tempered man, not the stereotypical high-maintenance hell-raising artist. He did drawings – studies – that became the basis of his paintings. He didn’t sell the drawings (many of which are in the retrospective), but “around the holidays,” Brad says, “he’d come into the gallery (Castelli) and give them to staff as gifts.” One of them – a study of entablatures – Lichtenstein gave directly to Brad, signed with a personal note.

I learned that Lichtenstein was easy to work with — as opposed to another prominent artist, who, Brad says “traveled with an entourage and would go through two bottles of Jack Daniels every time we set up a show.”

Two of my favorite people: Brad and, well, I think you recognize her.

I learned that Brad had actually handled one of the sculptures in the Lichtenstein exhibit ( it’s a big, metal art-deco-ish piece called “Modern Sculpture with Glass Wave” if you take in the show). Brad pointed at it and groaned, saying only that it was “god-awful heavy” to move around.

And for those of you who know Lichtenstein and may be thinking Brad…Brad…no our Brad is not THAT Brad. But I’m glad he’s our Brad, and I marvel at the people Beth and I are lucky enough to call our friends

That was the view from my hotel room.

Two weeks ago I was exploring Mexico City, acting the tourist after three days of work meetings. My phone tells me that on Monday, Sept. 12, I took more than 25,000 steps, covering 10+ miles. Every bit of it was worth it.

I work for a non-profit—and like other non-profits, our board of directors meets regularly to do things that boards do. But to shake things loose — to do some blue-sky thinking — the board invites some staff members to join them for the annual board retreat. The agenda is all about everything that isn’t business-as-usual – more of a “what if?” exercise.

This year, we held the retreat in Mexico City largely because one of our esteemed board members, Lourdes Melgar, lives there and served as a sort of unofficial host. It was an inspired choice of locations, because being in a grand, richly historic setting that was unfamiliar to most of us seemed to energize and set free our discussions.

About Lourdes — she’s got some energy chops. From her bio:

Lourdes Melgar, Ph.D., is a nonresident fellow at the Baker Institute Center for Energy. She is also a research affiliate at the Center for Collective Intelligence at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where she was the 2016-17 Robert E. Wilhelm Fellow.

From February 2014 to July 2016, Melgar served as Mexico’s deputy secretary of energy for hydrocarbons and was a member of Pemex’s board of directors. She was Mexico’s under-secretary for electricity from December 2012 to February 2014, during which she also served on the board of the Federal Electricity Commission. 

Paddleboats on the lagoon in Chapultepec Park.

Anyway, I’ll spare you more work details and say that Mexico City is as grand a city as any I’ve visited in the United States or Europe. I knew little about it save for childhood recollections from the 1968 summer Olympicgames that included what was then an unbelievable long jump record set by Bob Beamon and two African American medalists–John Carlos and Tommie Smith–flashing the Black Power symbol from the awards podium. It caused quite the stir.

Beyond that, I had the usual kind of chauvinistic American view of it and all things Mexico. I think to many Americans Mexico means either all-inclusive stays at beach resorts or drug cartels and crime and corruption. Or the place people flee to come to the United States.

Welp, not exactly.

I saw just a sliver of this giant metropolis, but it was enough to be awed by what a sophisticated city it is, and by the incredible history of Mexico that I learned about during my visit.

Mind you, it’s a big city, and like lots of big cities—including here in the United States—neighborhoods run from the opulent to the ragged and poverty-ridden.

But oh my. Here are a few touristy highlights:

The entrance to the museum.

• You’ll hear this from anyone who’s been to Mexico City but you must visit the national museum of anthropology and archaeology. It’s about the grandest of grand museums I’ve ever visited. The richness and complexity of the history of Mexico is mind-boggling. And the way cultures/societies supplanted and subsumed others, again and again, provides a nice sense of how on one hand, what we do is important, and on the other, it’s but a tiny data point.
• The museum is one of several set in Chapultepec Park, a lushly green and sprawling expanse that is twice the size of New York’s Central Park.
• Another park near our hotel was Lincoln Park. As in Abraham. There’s a statue of him — and he faces directly across from a statue of Martin Luther King.
• Speaking of lush, we stayed in the Polanco neighborhood, which is affluent and not necessarily typical. Flying in and then walking around on the ground, Mexico City is strikingly green. As in oodles of mature trees and vegetation and parks.
• Food. If you go, have lots of it. My highlights were street tacos al pastor, shaved off the spit in front of my eyes. Also barbacoa to die for. And…we had dinner at a great French restaurant.
• Drink lots of water. Mexico City sits at over 7,000 feet above sea level. The air is dry and thin, so take it easy for a couple days.
• The elevation makes for an extremely mild and pleasant climate. I experienced low 70s every single day for a week.

Adios!

In Lincoln Park, you can rent radio control boats.