 Welcome to our interview show in which we interview LGBTQ guests who are important contributors to our community. We want to acknowledge that All Things LGBTQ is produced at Orca Media in Montpelier, Vermont, which is unceded Indigenous land. Enjoy the show. Hello. I'm John Kalaki and I am here celebrating the fourth anniversary of All Things LGBTQ. I love this cable show. It is so important to me. It's so important. It's like a Vermont treasure and these three people, Ann Charles, Keith Goslin, and Linda Quindlin, are my heroes. And instead of them interviewing, I said, no, no, no. It's your anniversary. It's your birthday. It's four years you've been doing this. I want to interview the three of you. So today, we've kind of moved things around. I'm going to be interviewing them individually and then at the end of the hour, we're going to bring all back together. And we're going to share stories about the history, how this happened. But we're taping this on National Coming Out Day. So I'm actually going to be asking them the Coming Out stories as well, because that's probably very important as we do our queer activism. And these three are leading queer activists in Vermont. So, Linda, hello, my friend. Hi, John. How are you? Oh, I'm great. I'm so happy to be here. I just, you know, it's a thrill for me. I've been on your show a couple times over the years and I always enjoy your show. And I am so appreciative of what you've all done. Well, thank you. We enjoy having you on the show, John. Well, thank you. Thank you. And remember, when I say who was your favorite guest, you talk about me later on in the show, okay? It's just a prompt. You can pick other people, too, if you want. But at least for now. So as we talk about Coming Out stories, I think you told me that you came out when you were 34. Correct. In midlife. And you had two kids. Yes. That was a while ago. So what was it like coming out with two kids? You know, it was really, it was very interesting. I left my ex and moved to California with my two sons, who were then at the time, six and 10. And I went with the intention of coming out at that point. Although I didn't really come out to my ex-husband until I found a girlfriend. But you know, the move to San Francisco, I think, was my way of leaving the marriage, but also to finally be able to come out. I knew that I was at least bisexual in high school, before high school, grammar school. I met a woman I really loved when I was in Aspen, Colorado. But I was too frightened to come out then. So I did come out. I was married for 10 years. And the kids were how old when you came out? Six and 10. And they were fine. Yeah. I tried to be real natural about it. But they'd always kind of lived a sort of hippie alternative life where they were around a lot of gay people, people of color, you know, different religions. So they were kind of used to it. And so when I came out, they said, oh, okay. And then we just moved on. So I was pretty lucky that way. I think we were in San Francisco around the same time. Because if I had this right with our chronologies, you were there when Harvey Milk was assassinated. I came two weeks after Harvey Milk was assassinated. Two weeks. Yeah. And Jonestown just happened. Yes. It was just crazy. I was there. I left. You arrived. I had just left. I thought, this is not, it's just too crazy here for me. So I got it ready for you, I guess. But then you went from San Francisco. Then did you go to Madison? Or how did? No, I went to Boston where I met him. Then we went to Madison when I went to graduate school. So, you know. And how did you two meet in Boston? We met in the basement of the Unitarian Church in Cambridge. They were advertising for people to volunteer to work on the magazine, Second Wave. And they were looking for older people. I know this is really strange at our age, but I would have been the oldest one that was interviewed. I think they were like 32 when I was 36. I know. And we met and I thought, wow, that's a really interesting, smart, cute woman. And I thought, well, so I asked her out. She tried to avoid me. I wouldn't let her. I worked for movie theaters. And so the one good thing I had was I cleaned movie theaters and I had free tickets to the movies. And Anne loved the movies. So I wooed her by inviting her to free movies all over Cambridge. So. Okay, now I'm going to ask her the same question and see if she has the same version of this story. It was always lovely to see longtime partners like this tell their stories. And then you went off to Madison, I think. We did. We took the kids and we went to Madison. As I get to know you, I cherish you more and more. And it seems to me that I've seen you create community wherever you are. And I loved when you told me that in Madison, you were part of a painting crew, but it was an all queer painting crew. So you found community that way in your work. It was an all women's crew. Yeah. And that was pretty early on. And there really wasn't many painting crews. And I will tell you the reason I started my own crew was when I was living in Boston. I was working on a woman's crew. I think she was probably the first person in the country to start a women's lesbian painting crew. I took my cue from her. But as I was looking for jobs, I couldn't find any jobs. None of the men would hire me. One guy hired me in Boston. And he said, well, I'd rather have you than a and he said the N word. And I thought, okay, you know, because he had to be diverse. So I said, you know, okay, I'm just going to do my own business. And that really pushed me to really hire women, train them and do all the things that I felt would be supportive of women in trades. And it was a lot of fun. Well, you know, I, I'm going to fast forward for when you're when you moved to Montpelier decades later. But there you had a lesbian mother's group. I think our grandmother's group you started, I think, didn't you? Yeah. So let's be a mother's group. Yes. And then the rainbow umbrella, I think you and Anne were pretty instrumental in that. Yes. So I just, you know, I just appreciate all of that that you've done for all of us. You know, because it's amazing to see you're, you're the generation that opened things up for for monitors. And it's you've laid the foundation and that's essential to honor the three of you. And that's, you know, what I want to do today. I, as you know, I am a huge fan of your poetry. Thank you, John. I just, I just love it. And I just want to read something I wrote about your latest book where it was crystalline prose illuminates rough human desolate lives interspersed with the tender fragilities of friendship and escape. Now, getting to know you, I told me as a child, you were very dyslexic. And yes, you actually dropped out of high school at ninth grade. But I'm, and then you eventually went back to school and, and I think Boston was, yes, you missed, but I want to understand how someone who's dyslexic becomes such a fine, poet. It's a really interesting journey for me because it's words and your words are so cracked. Well, I fell in love with poetry actually the year that I quit and stopped going to school. I had a teacher who, who loves poetry and I just fell in love with it, John. I, you know, I don't know how the, how the words are, you know, how it comes to me the way it does. I know that I was really interested in, in working class poetry, in poetry that brought people to a different place than one might, you know, very urban, very hard edge, and I hope very honest. And so I don't know. I think, you know, because being of having reading disabilities and also being ADD, it just formed in this way for me that I just felt like was, was magic. I, I don't know. I, I can't explain, but it just, it came to me in the way it does. It's sort of like when you go in a dark room, when you have a blank piece of paper, and then all of a sudden you have a vision. So that's kind of how it feels to me. Well, I think what's incredible is that your kind of insights into working class lives is, is so beautifully rendered. Would you read us a poem? I'd be delighted. Great. And I thought I'd read a poem actually, you know, because it describes my family, where I grew up, and how hard it can be sometimes, and how conflicted families are. So this is called Chelsea Mass, which is also, which is part of the title of the book, which is Chelsea Creek. I grew up in Chelsea, Massachusetts. Then as her February birth, my Aunt Evie swayed with every half tone, the spontaneous steps of a child living outside Newfoundland, the fishing village of her family's past. This wasn't New Orleans, where she might have had a chance, where anger and creativity collide. This was Chelsea, a city of bad daughters and warlike sons, where nothing grew but immigrants and hunger. Her father's madness beckoned him to an ocean death, but instead he crawled into dementia, soaked in beer and sadness, the smell of urine, even when he slept. My Aunt married one summer a man back from the war in Europe. His pale, violent swelling out of every room made her a ghost. She danced at home over the kitchen tile that curled in the corners. She danced in circles while her daughter slept, until her husband took their child away, punishing her dance, commanded a beach from the suburbs, and snapped his fingers again and again and again, until even her suicide seemed clumsy. Wow, that's a beautiful piece. Thank you. And to bring us into that experience, so it's, you know, it's kind of wonderful to think about people's challenges, how it actually is their gift. Sometimes, yes, it is. And, you know, and she was a very special person to me, my Aunt. I loved her. We, as I, the story I tell about is that I used to run numbers for her, from the bar to the bookie joint, and I was a very wealthy teenager because of that. Well, my father was a bookie, so he was doing an innovation. We didn't have to run. My Irish, my Irish brought up rigging that. So I could relate to your poems in lots of ways. Quite beautiful. You know, throughout your life, queer activism has been part of, but what kind of, was there a moment that tips you into activism? I mean, was it the women's collective in Boston, or was it earlier in your life, or was it? It was kind of, began in Vietnam, you know, the anti-war movement. In the, you know, I was living in Boston at the time. I was living on Beacon Hill. And I got involved in the women's, in the anti-war movement, and then the women's movement, and then of course, the gay movement later. And so it was kind of a progression from the war, which was important. But when feminism came, it was kind of like, I don't know, a star fell from the sky or something and said, this is for you. This is yours. And I felt that, and so I really felt it was important. And I also, you know, and of course, the gay movement. So it was kind of a progression. I've always been politically active, but it was a progression. So there. Okay. Well, we're going to go over to Ann now, and we're going to hear her version of the Boston meeting and then talk to her about her wonderful experiences too. So don't go far, Linda. We're coming back in a few minutes with you. Okay? Okay, Ann. Hello. How are you? I'm fine. I'm quite well. Thank you. Great. Well, listen, we're sharing coming out stories as well. But first, I want to talk to you about that meeting in Boston, in that basement. It was a, where you met Linda. Tell us your version of that story. Okay. I had been involved in the collective for about a year. And we met and discussed things and processed and we hadn't published a magazine through the entire year. And we had, one of our collective members had used her own money to publish the last issue. So we were struggling to pay her back and having these fundraisers that nobody came to so we, and then it became clear that the collector was very young. They were on their 20s. I was the oldest person and I was 32. And in fact, a woman wrote sort of an expose of the women's movement in Boston called Look Me in the Eye about how they're no older women in any of these feminist collectives. And they cited me, they cited the second wave and the oldest member being 32. And she's 32 being an elder. Exactly. So we advertised and Linda came in and it was really striking because you advertised for older guys, but just the older guys welcome. How did you advertise? Well, what happened was people would come, they go for a year, they get burned out because they'd be frustrated because nothing ever happened except these dances that nobody went to. So they would quit and we'd constantly have to replenish our dysfunctional group. And it was also an arena of eroticism because every, you know, who was interested in whom, who was whose ex, who was, you know, so that was going on. But I was involved in my own personal drama. I turned, when I turned 30, I quit smoking and I had smoked three packs a day. So I gained 65 pounds. So I was full of my own drama and my own addictions. And, you know, I kind of had a tumultuous early 30s for that reason. But anyway, so in comes Linda to be interviewed by the collective. And what was striking about her was she looked at all of us right in the eye. She was very composed, gave an interview in which she revealed Linnie's that were even a little leftward for our collective. So when she left, we discussed her. And the first thing we said was we like her because she's older. She's older. But now she says you weren't too interested in her in the beginning. Well, for one thing, you know, she called me at nine in the morning to ask me out. And I had no mornings. And I was like, what's going on? And I was looking, I don't know if you have lived in Boston, but one September first comes, you really have to, I had given notice at my apartment then I had to find a new apartment. So that was my also my current drama. I was all caught up in that. So I turned her down when she asked again. And then we had a collective meeting and she didn't meet my eyes. And I thought, Oh, my gosh, she was hurt by this. I never meant to hurt her. And the rest is history. The rest is history. Well, let's go back. You were a Barnard woman. You graduated from Barnard. And then you went off to Purdue, I think in 1974, 75, maybe. And it was your first teaching gig as a professor. And you decided to come out during that time. So that must have been an interesting moment at Purdue to be out. Well, and let me clarify my low rank. I was a professor. I was a teaching assistant. Okay, MA. It was my first teaching year. But I had been trying to come out in New York, but I had been too frightened by the prospect. I'd gone to a very homophobic all girls Catholic high school. And that set me back, set my coming out back, I think by a few years. So I spent time in New York. After I graduated from Barnard, I lived there for two years and kept trying. I had a job on Wall Street, oddly enough. And I kept trying to go to women's bars after work and hoping someone would talk to me or which no one ever did. So by the time I got to Purdue, I really, I was identifying as bisexual, I thought. I was seeing a man. And I went to a gay literature talk. And heads turned, it was a very small community. And a woman who was, as I say is like Stephen Gordon, the main character of the well of loneliness, a stereotype almost pursued me. And I had much more in common with the man. But when she and I had our first experience, I thought, aha, something, something is here. So I sat on my dorm room bed and said, I am a lesbian. So time continued. Because it was like, you had said at that time that what was important that there was a small women's community there, but what was more important for you is that they were now gay and lesbian conferences, academic conferences, and that opened up your world. Was that during this time? Well, I went to my first and it wasn't really an academic conference. I went to my first gay and lesbian conference in Bloomington, Indiana, a few months after I came out. And the speakers were Elaine Noble and Leonard Matlowicz. And I was so energized by that. And I remember Elaine Noble, and this may speak to you. Well, times have changed. But she was a legislator and she said, I want to sit right up in front. So when they say things about me, they'll have to look at me. And I was so inspired by that. And Leonard Matlowicz, of course, is legendary. So that was my first conference. And at that point, I had been an active feminist. It was the heyday of lesbian feminism. The Michigan Women's Music Festival was just starting around then. I had a partner, a woman partner after I came out who, you know, went religiously to that. Olivia Records was in its heyday, all that stuff was going on. But I wasn't, because it was my first year teaching and I was new also at coming out. I was out to my friends, but I didn't come out to my classes or to the department. And that's why I moved to Boston to be an open lesbian. I had discovered I was diabetic. So I wanted to have a nine to five job to test that out. And so I moved to Boston without any friends or any job or anything, joined a lesbian book group and then joined the second wave. And that church, that church basement thing happened, which is a good thing. It occurred. But did you ever publish anything with this second wave collective? No, they never published the whole time I was there. And then after about six months after we left, they folded and it was fine. They had Austria is passed, but it was time. And then you and I think Linda, you moved to Madison, right? Because you wanted to continue your academic career. And that's where Linda was on the paint crew, the women's paint crew. How was Madison for you? Regress, ruling, intense. I should add, Linda also was on a women's painter crew in Boston. And she got me on because I worked in fuel assistance, which was a seasonal job. And so she entered, she was a very experienced painter. And so she interceded and got me on the crew. And I was, I didn't know how to open a paint can. And these women were like, I may a sconce and I, why did you bring her on? Your girlfriend's not very good at this. So then they developed a little hierarchy and Linda was an expert in they hired, they had little apprentices and I was an apprentice. And another Smith grad was an apprentice. And we, you know, we had the wet sand to do the grueling. And it was so shoestring that the head brought gloves for us who were wet, skinny in our hands, turn blue. I mean, it was very state of the art, but Linda was the, you know, superior and she was going around doing trim. She's sort of the boss of all things LGBTQ as well, it seems to me. But, but you got your PhD in Madison, right? I did. And what was your PhD in? And I wrote my dissertation on sapphic modernism and the novels of June of arms. So it's interesting, like your queer activism really was around kind of feminist literary theory. Yes and no, because during the Boston period before I met Linda, I mean, I moved to Boston as an ardent lesbian feminist and was able to go to a lot of conferences and talks in the Boston area before I went to grad school, the second time for the PhD. So I was primed. And then when I moved to Madison, that was my intent to be a lesbian scholar. But I got my start earlier. And politically, I'd gotten my start of Barnard with Marxism and the anti-war movement and etc. And then you went to New Orleans for 17 years when you taught. And is this right to taught the first lesbian course in the state of Louisiana? Yes, in the early 90s. And what was that course? What was it called? 20th century lesbian literature. And who took the class? Were kids interested in this? Well, yes. And what was striking, John, was that about a third of the students were heterosexual men, which at first I thought I was going to be, you know, that my car was going to be vandalized. I was going to be harassed and so forth. But nothing happened. And these men signed up because they had a mother who was a lesbian or a sister who was a lesbian. I mean, it was really interesting mix. And then of course, was a lot of lesbians were in the class too. It was around the time, I don't know if you recall, and I should look this up to get the exact date. But one of the first novels I taught was Stone Butch Blues. Remember when that came out? Oh my God, yes. And that novel was after my own heart because it takes place in Buffalo and I'm from Buffalo. Yeah. And she recently died. Didn't less the punch. Yeah. I think last year. And incredible, incredible novel, incredible leader for all of us. She really showed us gender was non binary. All those years ago. And then I was able to it kind of took in the department. I mean, I was at a low level again on the academic hierarchy, but then a tenured colleague of mine took it up. I taught an upper level course called, you know, and then I taught queer modernism and it became integrated into the mainstream of the university with this gay male colleague too. Incredible, incredible. And then so long time down there and then you retired from there. But then you were, I'm an adjunct at Champlain right now. And you were for four or five years also teaching at Champlain College here in Vermont, right? Well, what happened was Katrina hit and I was in the middle. It was two weeks into the semester. And so we all had to leave. I taught online. I evacuated to my mother's house. I taught online. And I was just starting a wonderful course about women writers from around the world. But it all we were gone teaching online. And then when I returned, I taught two semesters and decided to join Linda who was living in Vermont at that point. Now, when we talked a few weeks ago, just to catch up, you said to me that in your academic career, scholarship was your activism. But once you retired, grassroots became your activism. So what does that mean? How did that manifest for you? Well, Linda, as you may know, has wonderful creative ideas all the time. And as she and two other lesbians and I founded Rainbow Umbrella. And in the initial stages of that, Linda said, well, why don't we have a solidarity march in Montpelier? And people joined again, you know, build it and they will comment. The idea took off. Keith joined us. And we all staged a solidarity march. This was three years ago, I think in Montpelier. And the aim of it was to be political rather than corporate. As part of Rainbow Umbrella of Central Vermont, I started a discussion group that became a women's discussion group. And we've been meeting bi-weekly for five years and talking about exciting things. And I've been recording all of our meetings. I have 70 pages now of information about what we talked about, what we read, and so forth. And of course, the show that we're on is another brand of activism that we like to pursue. Incredible. That's why we're here celebrating four years. Do you know how many episodes you've done in these four years? No, I don't. Maybe Keith can figure it out. Okay. Well, we're going to check with Keith first. And I can't have him ask if he met you too in the basement in Boston, but we'll get how he knows you as well. Okay. All right. So Keith, come on in now. Oh, here I am. All right. Nice to see you, buddy. Thank you. It's just great to have you here. It's nice seeing you again. And thank you for your interview on our show. You have become one of our favorite guests. Well, that's the right answer. Thank you. You're welcome. You know what? You have a lot of favorite guests because it's a great show. And you know, I love being interviewed by Keith because you do research and you really like whenever you really in depth. And so I get a little nervous here. Like now I get to interview you, but I don't know if I can do this much research about your life. But actually, there's quite a bit that I've learned, which is incredible. Now, when you were growing up, you said you were like a queen without a country. Absolutely. What does that mean? I grew up in Plain Tels, which people watching this show will be very familiar with. And when I was growing up, the population was maybe a little over 1,500 people. So anyone stood out. Both of my parents had grown up in Plainfield. I have three brothers who grew up with me in Plainfield. All of my grandparents lived in Plainfield. And as I have told people in public lectures, in my youth, I had even more demonstrative traditionally feminine characteristics and mannerisms than I do now. And isn't that frightening to my parents' credit? And it was a conversation I had with my mother. Probably when I was around 16 or 17 years old, she shared with me that she and my father both recognized that I was a queen without a country. But they also recognized that they really didn't know that much about it. And they made a decision and a commitment that they really didn't want to do something harmful to me. They didn't want to do something wrong. So they decided they would allow me to find my own mentors, to find those people who could help me on my personal journey. And again, anyone who knows Plainfield, I had gathered college over my shoulder. And even though my parents were what were called the townies, and it was definitely a split between those people associated with Goddard and the townies, they let me spend time on campus. I got to audit classes. I got to participate in the Goddard College dance company. I got to spend time with people who otherwise in Vermont, you wouldn't have had access to that thought, that theory, that activism. And they supported me in all of that. You know, Keith, we share such a parallel story. When I was in school, the school went to the Albany Lee Dance Company. And I grew up, there's five kids in my family. My father sold cattle at the Chicago Stockyards and was a bookie in the basement. So we didn't have a lot of culture in our house. But that night at dinner with the five kids and my mom and dad, I announced that because I had seen the Albany Lee Dance Company, I'm going to be a modern dancer. I was like, what's a modern dancer? He said, I saw it on stage today. I'm going to be that. And like your mother, my mother's credit, she opened up the yellow pages, found modern dance classes, and drove me downtown Chicago to take a modern dance class. And I began my career as an artist. So, you know, moms, thank you for supporting your career, little kids. Absolutely. And we gave them some great fashion tips along the way. Well, I didn't do so well with that. I think you're more far more fashionable than I am. So you've worked at the Vermont State Hospital for 47 years, I think. Incredible time with admissions. It's a very profound place, profoundly sad in some ways. You worked in admissions, and you did an incredible job there. During that time, I think you also, in your activist side, you began to work with the police. And I love some of the things you told me about working with the police department for them to understand their own homophobia. Yes. It was a very interesting process. The administration of the Vermont State Hospital, when I started becoming involved in public politics and became someone who was then in the media, rather than telling me that I had to be quiet, they actually encouraged my activism. Which was an amazing process. As a part of that, when I was working in the admissions department, routinely, the Sheriff's Department would be the individuals who were transporting people to the Vermont State Hospital on an involuntary basis. And what stands out for me was that in 1988, then the, he was a Chintanjee County Sheriff, worked for the UVM Police Department, and was helping to coordinate the training at the Police Academy. His name was Paul Mead. He approached me saying, can I talk to you? Which immediately sort of made me think, yes, but... What did I do? Exactly. But what he said to me was that the LGBTQ plus and then we were just the gay community. We were the new kids on the block. And law enforcement had no clue what they were doing right, what they were doing wrong. He basically admitted, we don't know what we don't know. Would you please come talk to me? So myself and Josie Yuhas, who is one of the people who was also involved when we founded outright Vermont several years later, went with me to just meet with new recruits, basic patrol procedures, and introduction to Vermont's gay community. And after several sessions, Josie said, I can't do this anymore. That I can't be in the room with law enforcement. It just makes me too unedged. So I continued doing it on my own. And it was basically a conversation with them saying, okay, I got all of the same messages that you did. What did you get from messages? What importance do they have in your life when you heard them? Who told you that? If they have changed, what's helped them change? Or what has supported that change? And then we talk about language. And one of the stories that I've shared with you before, one of the things that happened is, and I did this for 20 years, I kept being invited back and doing diversity and then ultimately bias and hate motivated crime training. But at one point, the person coordinating training was Bill Aware from the Burlington Police Department. And he shared a story with the recruits about our first Friday in 1983, where we were really concerned about how is the city of Burlington going to respond to us. Well, apparently the Burlington Police Department had the same concerns. So they had people stationed around the parade route. They had people in the second floors of buildings. But they also had plain clothes police officers marching in the parade with us. And Bill shared a story with them that here he was walking down the street looking around sort of what's happening. And he looks up and here was the WCAX camera in front of him. And he said for that moment, he just froze. And it's, I know why I'm here. My wife knows why I'm here. My mother doesn't know why I'm here. My neighbors don't know why I'm here. Anyone seeing this broadcast, will they know why I'm here? And he said for that moment, he got it about the fear which we lived and the risk of coming out of the closet. Well, you know, you like Lyndon and have done many things. You created queer communities in so many ways. I'm also deeply appreciative of your openness about sexual assault, something that we don't talk about in the queer community. And I know I read a piece and it's a while now, but you were open about it as a child. And that must have been very hard to be publicly bothered. Well, it was something that I held as a secret 30 years and never told anybody. And you know, I would have relationships that would be challenged and would fall apart. And I would wake up in the middle of the night with incredible nightmares and flashbacks at times. And there were times that it made it very difficult to engage in an intimate relationship because of this sense of fear. And my personal story was, essentially, it was a hate crime. I was 18 years old. It was sort of this classic pattern. It was five young men, late teens, early 20s, they were out drinking. And there I was. And everybody knew that I was the town queer. And I became the evening's entertainment. And what I had said in public forums is, for me, it's something I deal with on a daily basis. There were times that I wake up and think that one of my perpetrators is hovering over. But I know for them, it's probably something they haven't thought about since that day, because if you think about the messages that we all got about queers, we were less than we didn't count. This was something they were entitled to do, which when you talk with women survivors of sexual violence, it's that same kind of story. You have the power, you're entitled to do this. And then you can just walk away without consequence. Well, thank you. It makes it easier for all of us when people are sharing these stories. You've done also an amazing thing. You, as a number of folks, started outright from on. Yes. When was that? Because it's incredible now. But in the beginnings, when did you start that? Oh, my goodness. It was, we just had the 30th anniversary. Wow. And it was a group of us, there was a group of us who lovingly said, you know, we didn't know, we couldn't. So we just kept doing things much like that Linda Quinlan, who if she ever comes up to you and says, I have an idea, you should run from the room. There was a small core group of us in, and it was basically based in Chittenden County, Terry Anderson, Deborah Kotzko, David Landers, Bill Lippert, Howdy Russell, myself, Peggy Lures, Josie Youhas, you know, people from within the women's community. We founded Vermont Cares, dealing with HIV and AIDS, outright Vermont, the Vermont Coalition for Lesbian and Gay Rights. Outright came out of really Howdy and Bill Lippert and listening to a colleague whose daughter was coming out and what she was encountering and saying, we can do better. Why are we not supporting our youth and making a commitment to creating a safe place for them? You were at the state house last year and over 90 kids from around the state with outright Vermont came to the state house and the out legislators in the center of the house spoke to them. And there were so many kids that they took all the seats on the floor of the house and I said, you are going to be a legislator someday. But to think that you made this possible, you and this great group of people, again, you can now see the fruit of that work when you see that all these kids feel like they have community, that they can be whoever they want to be. That's really essential that as we're all finding our identities here, like, okay, gay, straight, is there a binary function there? So it's amazing in our lifetime. What you've done and what Linda has done and has done. And so let me bring you all back together now. If that would be fun to have you all back. Okay, everybody take their mics off. Put them on. I mean, put your Linda. So Linda, Steve tells me that this show is all your fault. No, how's that? Why does he blame you for the glory of this show? You know, I watched Andy and Andy and I thought, well, and you know, they do the show in New York. And I thought, well, I'll think I'll do a radio show because I'd like to do something in Vermont that talks about Vermont politics, but also national and international. And so I tried radio, it was too difficult. It required too much work. And I thought, well, let's do TV. So I walked over to Orca and they said, I'd like to start a show and they said, well, what would you like to call it? And I told them and they said, great. So the woman I had originally was going to do radio with dropped out. So there was just me. So I dragged in kicking and screaming. And wait a minute, Anne, were you kicking and screaming or like, did you knock Linda out of the way to get to it? I was hesitant. You were hesitant. Why were you hesitant? Because people said, this is too much work. Don't do it. But I trusted Linda and the rest. Okay. And then a friend of ours said, oh, Keith would be perfect for this. He would be perfect as a third for you all. That's our friend, Rachel, who was our first interview on all things LGBTQ and was one of the other ring leaders are bringing together rainbow umbrella. Correct. Who was a neighbor of mine in Plainfield? Yeah. Thank you people. You're kind of queer down there. Okay. It's just saying. Okay. Well, let's shift the keys for a second here now. And Keith, you know, usually at the times I've been on the show, you're the person who interviews me and I'm so impressed with the research you do. And you are such a policy walk in the state house. So you're always asking me questions. I have to like, I had to really put my thoughts together before I interviewed by you. But how did you three, how do you curate your show? Like, who does what parts of the show? How does that come together? Well, we met for months. You know, we haunted restaurants around central Vermont. The firehouse in Barry may never be the same again. And talking about what it would look like in our individual interests and Anne loves international events and international politics. So for her, that was a pre-existing passion. Linda, Linda said that she likes the national but what Linda really liked was the entertainment and the gossip. So, and because I had been involved in, you know, Vermont activism since 1985, you know, it sort of made sense that I would look at what was happening locally and sort of New England based, but I also really wanted to do interviews. You know, one of, one of the driving forces behind bringing outright together was our youth coming up after us need to have an appreciation of how we arrived at this point in time. What did you take and how do you protect it? So, interviewing those people who were leaders within our community seemed really critical. You know, I don't know if you three know, I was a radio show host of Fresh Fruit, is called in Minneapolis. It was a weekly show and at the time I was working at the Walker Art Center and one of the board members said to me, what do you talk about for an hour every Sunday night? And she had a gay son. Like, well, just listen sometime and you'll kind of know, but I loved interviewing people and, you know, giving a wider voice and so that people like Minnesota is urban and rural and the rural kids, I wanted to make sure they were hearing role models because the three of us didn't have a lot of role models as we were growing up. And so we found them and we were mentored by some incredible men and women, thankfully, but, you know, your show's done that. Now, Ann, I want to know, it was usually in the studio in Montpelier, so COVID happened and I love how you've all adapted, but talk about that process of going from the studio now into Zoompelier. Sure, and I have a couple of things to add. I did the math and we've done 100 news shows, more or less. But more or less, I know I want the exact number, okay? Come on, more or less. I didn't bring my phone out or it could have been more exact, but the other thing, I bet, is not counting the interview shows and I'm glad you mentioned that because COVID happened, everything shut down, as you know, and we began to feel like we could continue. So we got a Zoom account and then we began to think, since, you know, one of the reasons we taped every other week is that Linda and I like to travel and, of course, we weren't traveling, so we came up with the idea of an interview show to supplement our new show. So every other week we do an interview show now, which has been very gratifying, and now we have a national scope. So we can, like I interviewed somebody yesterday from LA and we can, each of us interviews one person, which keeps the pace going and in the past, we tried to incorporate interviews in our new show, but this gives us much more freedom geographically and in terms of time because we can dedicate an hour entirely to the news and then talk with people for another hour, which is, it gives us a chance to pursue our individual interests too. Linda interviews poets. I try to interview some of the old, you know, some of our national pioneers and other artistic figures that are doing things. Keith's the same. We think Keith is turning into our nature reporter because he's a beaker and a farmer, you know, he's doing a real week. I think he just likes to run naked in the woods or something. I don't know about nature reporter. I think also in addition to that, and I just wanted to add that we had the All Things LGBTQ Youth Edition, which was on for a year and it's still on YouTube. So it was kind of like we were trying to reach both. They did the show for a year and they did it on whatever they wanted to do it on and it is fascinating and incredible to watch. So we were trying to cover the young and the old and I think- And the middle age. Yeah. And you know, that kind of, you know, it was important to cover all those angles, I think. And so in doing youth show and interviews, you know, we covered a lot of ground there, I think. So So what's going to now post COVID, God willing, right? We will return to normal. Will you then continue doing this weekly show and will you do it virtually or do you want to go back in the studio? What are your thoughts about what it's going to look like a year from now? I think we'll do interviews in the theater. I mean, we'll do our show in the studio. I think we'll do some interviews for people who are local in the studio, but I do believe that we will continue with interviewing people from all over the country and hopefully all over the world via this format of Zoom because it's really worked and it's really given us a wider range of what we could do. All right. Two questions for each of you. We'll start- I'll tell you the two and then we'll go your favorite person you interviewed, other than me, of course. So don't say who else in your fantasy would you love to interview on your show? So let's start. Ann, who's your favorite? Are you our favorites? You don't have to pick one person. Well, I, John Kalecki, top of the list. Yeah. Taylor Small has been on more than anybody else. Ann, I like interviewing artists and writers. And one of our first Zoom interviews was with young person, a young writer, Juliano Delgado Lopera, whose book came out right in the beginning of the pandemic. So they had all their author events were canceled. And we had read the book in our lesbian group, book group. And that, you know, one of our goals is to try to promote people who are, who need a boost, who need some attention. And that was a very rewarding interview in the beginning. We did it in the beginning. So that was, you know, and photographers, dynamic Adams, people who can give us a photographic history of our queer past. I love those interviews. I like them all really. The theater critic, Ben Bradley from the New York Times is retiring. And he's doing an upcoming column. Donna told me about signature pieces in his career. And he's asked on Ann McAdams for a photograph of Karen Finley. That was one of his really important pieces that he saw. So Donna will be back in the New York Times, which is, That's fabulous. We'll have to give her back on the show to celebrate. Great. And Linda, how about you? Some of your favorites? Well, John, of course you. That's getting tired, but I like it. You're on so often because we really admire and adore you. So, you know, know that. Taylor Small is always, she's always been, she's also been on the show quite a few times in various ways, you know, as a politician, as doing the queer story hour, you know, working for the Pride Center. So she's been very important. I liked interviewing poets. We did Judith Chambers and James Cruz, which are both local poets. Oh, I love Judy's poetry. She's so good. Oh, my God, it's exclusive. Judith Chalmer. Judith Chalmer. Yeah, yeah. Judy Chalmer. Incredible poet. I want her to be the poet laureate of Vermont. Yes, that would be great. Yeah. And, you know, so we interviewed her and I really enjoyed that. So I really like, you know, doing the poets and writers and so those have been some of my favorites. Great. We're starting to interview the filmmakers, too. Oh, beautiful. All right, Keith, how about you? Well, one of our favorites has always been that John Kalaki because it's just so delightful spending time with him. Yeah. But aside from John... Other than that. Yeah, other than that. The interview that really stands out for me was my first interview with Debbie Ingram, Shedding County Senator, where halfway through the interview, as I'm asking her, so how does this lesbian from the South, who spent time in Hollywood producing the one two years then doing documentary films in Bangladesh end up in Vermont. And she said, well, in 2000, she and her partner came from Bangladesh to Vermont to get a single civil union. And as I'm looking at her, I said, by any chance was your civil union on the shores of Lake Champlain? No. And we both simultaneously said, I officiated for her. So that and you can go back in our archives and actually see that. So we looked at each other and went, how have you been? And the interview I'm most looking forward to coming up is going to be right after the session reconvenes and being able to be the first person to interview the Vermont Senate's first woman and out lesbian president from 10. Oh, and that would be? That would be Becca Ballant. Yes, it would. Incredible. I love her. Okay, let's see. Linda, who do you want to interview in your dreams? Oh, it's dreams. Oh, boy. Oh, God, there's so many. You know, that's kind of like when they asked you in the New York Times, you know, when they interview them, what books are on yours to hit? Who would you invite to dinner? I can never, let me see. Let's move on to in first because I can't have anything at the moment. Barbara Smith, top of my list. I want to read her. I've read almost everything she's written, but I have her new collection or her most recent collection from 2014. Barbara Smith. I didn't hear who you're. Oh, yeah. Okay. Incredible. Smith. You know who you should interview? Eileen Miles. Yes. Totally, I would love to do that. I'm going to have to figure her up and find her. That's what's so exciting about doing this show. There's such a long list that and each is more fresh and exciting than the last. Well, listen, I love you three. I salute you for four years of doing this for our entire community. And I wish you at least another five years doing this. And I know it's going to crimp into your traveling styles, but we need you to do this. And for the next generation, you've made such a difference. And I honor the three of you. And thank you very much on behalf of all of us here in Vermont. Thank you, John. All right. I love you three. Thank you for joining us. We'll see you in two weeks. But in the meantime, resist.