Archive for the ‘Features’ Category

TWENTYNINE PALMS – When 54-year-old Empress Lonnie (Gamache), once the reigning monarch of the Imperial Court of Los Angeles, moved to the Hi Desert in 1990 he thought he had retired from gay philanthropy.

“I gave everything away, my crowns, my gowns and my eyelashes,” said Gamache.  “It’s not cheap being an empress.”

Nowadays he works for a non-profit as a Licensed Psychiatric Technician, and recently he became active again with the Imperial Court as an advisor for the Czarina’s Ball, an elite fund raiser held at the Riviera Palm Springs Resort. The nation’s oldest gay philanthropic organization, last year the Imperial Courts handed over more than $100,000 to the Matthew Shepard Foundation.

“I thought the plan was to slow down, but now I don’t know. I enjoy helping our community and other people, “ he said, shrugging his shoulders.

“When people know you everywhere you go, it says something about what you’ve done with your life.”

This year Lonnie received the Queen s Mother’s Double Edged Award for his years of service which began in LA in the early 1970s.

“That was a long time ago,” he said. “Now I’m here to stay. My whole family lives in the Hi Desert now.”

JOSHUA TREE, CA — Top entertainers and notable speakers are expected to draw crowds for the family-friendly JOSHUA TREE GAY PRIDE Saturday, June 26 at the Art Queen next to Joshua Tree Saloon. The theme is In The Name of Equality.

Live music will abound. Headlining is Rabbit & Rutherford of Gram Rabbit, the popular indie space-rock players born out of the Mojave. US House of Representatives candidate Pat Meagher, and State Assembly candidate Carl Wood will both be at JOSHUA TREE GAY PRIDE in the Name of Equality.

Saturday’s program begins with the summer JOSHUA TREE GALLERY CRAWL. The following galleries will remain open until 8 pm: The Red Arrow Gallery, True World Gallery, JTAG, Windwalkers, Woods in the Desert Art Gallery & Mt. Fuji General Store.

The ‘equality’ theme will be played out along the way with works relating to the freedoms denied lesbian,gay, bisexual & transgender people.

About 6 pm activities move a few blocks east to the Art Queen, 61855 Hwy. 62, in Joshua Tree. Refreshments, crafts vendors, area social and non-profits will be at the outdoor venue. Plus lots more live music including Quinn & Hood, Shari Elf & The Kittens, My Bear Hands, and Santina Giordano. DJ Darin Rich spins his brand of sophisticated house, samba and space disco between live sets.

JOSHUA TREE GAY PRIDE is organized by Courage Campaign’s Team Morongo Basin, a non-profit, grass roots,advocacy organization.

The event is funded by individual pledges plus A Design Marketing, Desert Daily Guide, Hi-Desert LGBT News, Crossroads Café , No Limits, Strata Tattoo Lab, Hi-Desert Acupuncture Center, Windwalkers and Zono Art, but more individual pledges remain critical to the success of the the effort.

If you can’t give money, please volunteer some time. Go to JoshuaTreeGayPride.com or call Hi-Desert LGBT News at 760-449-4048.

MORONGO BASIN—Queer communities mostly agree that transgender folk don’t often look like gay men or lesbians, don’t often socialize with us, and, hell, great numbers of transgenders don’t even consider themselves homosexual. So why should LGBs include the struggles of the Ts in on our agenda? A lot of reasons …

• The struggle for justice and equality, by definition, can’t discriminate;
• our enemies lump us together anyway;
• because of the similarities of our experiences, no other groups are more naturally suited for unification;
• it’s the right thing to do and we’re on the side of right;
• as leaders in the struggle for equality, we are obliged to demand it for all.

Understanding that, are we obliged to represent transgenders here when it seems none are even up here?

Morongo Basin’s Most Brave

Meet the Basin’s bravest: Leslie Mariah Andrews, a 35-year-old transgender who lives in Morongo Valley, and Lexi Jayden, a 21-year-old Yucca Valley native. They’re among a handful of brave locals unable and unwilling to deny who they are meant to be in order to conform to social expectations.

"Wherever I go, I find those who accept me and those who do not," says Leslie Andrews.

Leslie Andrews: A Journalist’s Story

For Leslie Andrews, an awareness that she was different began at an early age. It’s a sentiment most gays and lesbians can identify with. During her early school years she responded with increasing denial to a growing consciousness she was indeed different.

As an adolescent male, she turned to hard line Christianity and regretfully recalls bullying young schoolmates perceived as gay. No amount of hope or denial would allow the young teen to avoid the awareness and reality puberty would stimulate, and in her late teens, Leslie began to confront who she was. By age 21, she was finding it impossible to masquerade as a male while her brain told her she was female. Leslie began living as a female part-time for the next few years.

Juggling dual personas was difficult to manage. “In 2001 I decided to unify,” says Leslie. “I felt like I was a whole person for the first time in my life. No more duality!”

Today Leslie Andrews is a journalist and author. She works full-time for Desert Local News, a weekly news magazine headquartered in Desert Hot Springs. Her beat includes the Morongo Basin; she’s a familiar face at city council and planning meetings from Yucca Valley to 29 Palms.

The author of two novels under the pen name Mariah Andrews, her first work, Awakening From Broken Dreams (2004) is a semi-autobiographical, dramatic, yet humorous story of a young transsexual living a life so easily misunderstood. Andrews’ most recent work, Love Cradle, is a suspense thriller. She dedicated Love Cradle to the late DHS city councilman, Gary Bosworth, who was a long-time teacher and mentor to Andrews. Revenue from her book sales go toward Leslie’s much anticipated sex reassignment surgery. Costs for the procedure begin at around $10,000.

Lexi Jayden: A Hometown Story

"My experience at Copper Mountain was really good," says Lexi Jayden, who moved to West Covina to be with boyfriend Andy.“I grew up in Yucca Valley, but I never considered it my hometown,” says Lexi Jayden. “Home is where you feel loved and accepted and I never felt that there.”

The 21-year-old began living as a female full-time about two years ago, but the effort was not new. Lexi began making the transition in high school.

“My family was very conservative,” she says. “I started school at Joshua Springs where the brainwashing starts at a very early age.” Every queer knows that no amount of brainwashing or wishful thinking can change one straight. It is the same for transgenders. As much as one might want to be like everyone else, it isn’t possible.

“When I was 14 I told my dad I thought it would be great if I could be a woman just for one day,” said Lexi. “He shot out to never say something like that again, and I knew then he’d have a big problem with it.” Her father committed suicide some time after that.

At 15, Lexi came out as gay and later came out again as transgender. A victim of unchecked harassment at Yucca Valley High School, Lexi transferred to Monument High in 29 Palms where she was treated much better, even dressing female for her graduation there.

Jayden’s most affirming experience was at Copper Mountain College where she was able to pursue her education free from harassment. She was even able to work with administrators to clear the way for her to use the ladies rooms, typically a tricky issue for TGs who are made to feel unwelcome using any public restroom.

Late last year, while celebrating her 21st birthday in LA, Lexi met Andy. They began dating immediately. Andy initially had no idea Lexi was TG; and his feelings for her did not change once she came out to him. Lexi did not enroll this semester and instead relocated to West Covina to be with Andy. They are working and saving for Lexi’s sex reassignment surgery.

Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere

- MLK, Jr.

What Leslie and Lexi and every Hi-Desert T wants is what we all want: the freedom to lead honest lives, protected under the law, with equal access to education, employment, housing and healthcare. Transgender people have a rightful place in the queer community. Failure to include Ts from the struggle for equality would be to fall victim to the same misguided reasoning that afflicts our persecutors.

Transgender is a general term that applies to a variety of individuals, behaviors, and groups involving tendencies to deviate from generally accepted gender roles. Transgender is the state of one’s “gender identity” (self-identification as male, female, neither or both) when it does not match their “assigned sex” (identification by others as male or female based on physical/genetic sex).

Transgender does not imply a sexual orientation. Transgenders may identify as gay, straight, bi, pansexual or asexual; or may view these labels inadequate or inapplicable to them. A universally accepted definition of transgender remains in flux, but includes:

• Designating, or relating to, someone whose self identity does not clearly conform to conventional notions of male or female roles, but combines or moves between them.
• People who feel the sex assigned them at birth, based on their genitals, is an inaccurate or incomplete description of themselves.
• Non-identification with the sex (and assumed gender) assigned at birth.
• A transgender person may have characteristics normally associated with one gender, but identify as the other.

Transsexual people identify as, or desire to live and be accepted as, a member of the sex opposite that assigned at birth. Many trans people undergo gender transition. Those who have transitioned may no longer identify as transgender or transsexual, but may identify as simply a man or a woman.

WONDER VALLEY—In 2002, her quest for spiritual rebirth and enlightenment brought Diane Mitchell to a remote corner of Morongo Basin.  As part of that quest, Diane labored the better part of nine months to create a 45’ labyrinth of wood and stone.
A few weeks ago, Diane invited me out to chat and walk the labyrinth.
Diane, 66, comes off as gentle, but not at all delicate. Her voice is soulful and knowing. She mixes views on life with facts on the labyrinth—it’s circuitous path a metaphor for a journey to one’s center and back out into the world with a broader understanding.
The quest for enlightenment continues to drive Diane. But her ambition now is to broaden society’s understanding of LGBT people. She dreams of a day when society recognizes our rightful place in it.

“Attitudes will change if we can demonstrate what brilliant, gifted people we are,” she predicts. “We need to show the world our talents.”
Diane and I spent the better part of the afternoon talking about our community’s queer past and future. Returning to the Basin’s west end, I noted the many gay-owned businesses and households. Nearing the remarkable labyrinth at Starland, some 50 miles from Diane’s labyrinth, I imagined them bookending the Basin.

Diane’s dream is coming true. The contributions of our community demonstrate our rightful place here. Attitudes are changing as the understanding of who we are broadens.
If you’d like to broaden your own understanding, phone Diane at 760-361-7417 to arrange a visit to her Wonder Valley labyrinth.