A picture of downtown Watsonville, Ca. three years after I was born and six years before my father made  a Commie speech in the park that bordered on  Main Street. I loved Watsonville when I was a kid.  Louie and Jackie( my older brothers) and I had a ball  robbing  the FIVE AND TEN.  My older brothers would raise a ruckus in the back of the store while I stuffed THREE MUSKETEERS candy bars and Hershey KISSES into my pockets.  Since Daddy was always somewhere carousing and drinking we learned how to steal pork and beans from the corner grocery so we wouldn’t go  hungry.  We got hot, fresh baked bread from the bakery because the fat lady who owned it would only come downstairs from her apartment when the front door ding-a-linged.  I was always the one who rushed in–grabbed a loaf and was out the door in a flash. For entertainment we stole empty gallon jugs from garages and we’d sell them to the junk man for five cents.  The  Pajaro movie house (a half a block from the left side of this photo) only charged a dime Sometimes we would pay to get in but other times we managed to sneak in and hide behind the velvet curtains in the balcony until the movie started.

Louie and Jackie protected me from the school bullies when we weren’t playing hookey.They also taught me how to use my fists.

My baby sister Easter will turn 81 on March 20th. Don, her ardent lover is 89 years old. This photo was taken—uh–I think in 1990–when she was in her seventies–something like that.

My CHERRY RED  SCOOTER WITH THE QUEER FLAG  is a few months away from being two years old.  However, it can qualify for my OLD-OLD AGE BULLETIN:  A doctor just gave it a new heart—ooops!  I mean a month ago it needed a new battery. It goes chug-chug-chug and sometimes I have to turn the ignition key three–maybe four times before it will start.  Also, it scared the shit out of me when it stopped while I was driving it–I’ve felt unsafe ever since.  The good news is that HEATHER, who works at the V.A. is getting a brand new one..  The bad news is that it won’t be CHERRY RED–it will be burgundy.The title of my biography is THE CHERRY RED SCOOTER WITH THE QUEER FLAG. How does this sound—THE BURGUNDY RED  SCOOTER WITH THE QUEER FLAG?  Not so hot?  Any suggestions, dear reader? gbirimisa@sbcglobal.net   CHERRY

DEMOCRACY NOW–DEMOCRACY NOW!!!!!

This is a sideways view of my play MR. JELLO–1968

DAVID KOPAY, the former running back  played 10 seasons of professional football in the National Football League. He shook up the sports world i 1975 when he publicly announced to a national newspaper that he was gay. “When I came out as a gay man, I was confronting bigotry, the silence, and the hatred directed towards gay men and women,” Kopay said in a 2009 speech.  “Gay men have always been considered weak, silly and equated with women as being something less.  Sure, hatred still exists, but there is a huge difference now. Hatred, dominance and brutality are no longer considered fashionable, celebrated or tolerated. Hopefully. more people will continue to embrace change and diversity.”

KOPAY  enrolled at the  U. of Washington and in 1964 he was named ALL-AMERICAN as well as Rose Bowl co-captain.  He was signed by the SF 49ers and he eventually played for the legendary VINCE LOMBARDI. After he retired from football, he wanted to coach professionally but believed his sexual orientation stood in the way. Since he retired only two former NFL players have come out of the closet.  ROY SIMMONS IN 1992 and Esera Tuaolo in 2002.

HE IS ONE OF MY HEROES!

ONE OF MY MANY, MANY HATS!

ED GALLAGHER, an offensive lineman for the University of Pittsburgh from 1977-79, tried to commit suicide by jumping from a damn 12 days after his first sexual encounter with another man. He survived but was left a paraplegic.  Gallagher said that before his suicide attempt  he had become unable to reconcile his image of himself as an athlete with gay urges.  He later admitted that the incident forced him to come to grips with his sexuality. “I WAS MORE EMOTIONALLY PARALYZED THEN, THAN I AM PHYSICALLY NOW.”

PAUL SAGAN told me there was more to the WOODY GUTHRIE quote:  “I fully aim to get my soul known again/As the maniac, the saint, the sinner, the drinker, the thinker,the queer/ I am the works, the whole works/ And it’s not ’till you have called me all of those things/ That I feel satisfied, I feel satisfied.”

These angelic little boys grew up to be rich and to be landlords. They were the sons of Mateo Lettunich, my great Uncle,who owned most of the apple orchards in Watsonville and also the local bank on Main Street. He hated my father because he was a free spirit–didn’t do what he wanted him to do. Daddy got even with him by joining the Communist Party. However, Lettunich did put a down payment on a house on Main Street when Mom was in ‘the family way’ with Violet, my older sister.   Rumor has it that Uncle Mateo had the fire department turn on the hoses when Daddy was giving a Red speech in the park. Daddy caught pneumonia and went to the charity ward of the County hospital  in Santa Cruz.  A few days before he died Uncle Mateo took him out of the charity ward and placed him in private hospital in Watsonville where he died. It seems that Uncle Mateo did not want a relative of his  to die in a charity ward.  Then he  foreclosed on our bungalow. Finally he took me and my two brothers out of  St. Francis School, where we were wards of the County of Santa Cruz ,and bought us suits so we would look like little gentlemen like his sons who are pictured in the photo.