When you’re rushing through an airport to fly to another destination, how many people do you pass that you glimpse for only an instant before they return to their life in some far away place?
When you’re standing by the seashore on one side of the world, you know there are other people doing the same thing on the other side of that very same body of water.
Have you ever wandered down a lone stretch of railroad track and thought about the other cities and towns it might pass through and what the lives lived there might be like?
I’ve always thought airports, oceans and train tracks shared a similar quality. Being by the sea, making a mad dash through an airport or walking on a railroad track makes me feel like I’m touching the rest of the world all at once.
For the past four years and some odd months, I’ve had the privilege of being able to connect with the lives of many others across both Carolinas through my work as editor here at Q-Notes.
In June, I decided that it was time for me to move on. I planned to work on a number of independent projects and spend more time with my family. When July rolled around my mom was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. There was no question — I would indeed be spending more time with family now. I just wasn’t expecting it to be under these circumstances.
It’s taken us a little while to find another individual to fill the position I’m vacating, so I’ve continued to work — mostly by laptop from the hospital or the family home — for the past two months.
As I lay here now, in the early morning hours in a bedroom a few doors down the hall from my mom’s, I can hear the sounds of cicadas and tree frogs echoing from the wooded area behind the house. She’s sleeping soundly, feeling well for the most part, and her outlook is good.
I’m running over again and again in my head what exactly it is I want to say in my final editor’s note. I could never began to express it all in such a limited space, but I’ll give it my best shot.
I’ve enjoyed the time spent here tremendously and my departure is not without a sense of melancholy. It is my sincerest desire that my work has had a positive impact on Q-Notes readers and the LGBT communities in both Carolinas.
When I returned to Charlotte to live five years ago I knew that I would continue to work in the media. I didn’t realize, however, that the job I was eventually to find would take me into direct contact with a multitude of LGBT communities in two states. I’ve enjoyed connecting with every one of you in so many different towns and cities: Asheville, Chapel Hill, Charleston, Charlotte, Columbia, Durham, Fayetteville, Greensboro, Greenville, Myrtle Beach, Raleigh and Wilmington, among others.
It’s made me feel like a member of a much larger community than just the city I live in.
I’ve also developed a greater sense of queer pride over so many of the efforts undertaken and achievements accomplished by numerous individuals and organizations: South Carolina’s gallant fight against the anti-family marriage amendment stands out in my mind as one of the most comprehensive movements ever put forth. Even though the outcome wasn’t what we had hoped for — you showed the rest of us what can be done when so many individuals selflessly pour themselves into a huge group effort. This isn’t the end of the fight for South Carolina’s LGBT residents — it’s just the beginning.
Other people, places and things of note I’d like to tip my hat to:
• N.C. Equality Project for their continued success in stymying a marriage amendment in North Carolina.
• Columbia Mayor Bob Coble for showing up at the HRC Carolinas Dinner when Charlotte Mayor Pat McCrory was hiding from Bill James.
• A determined group of individuals who came together two years ago with the Charlotte Lesbian & Gay Community Center to make a new Pride Charlotte Festival a hugely successful fundraiser for the non-profit organization.
• Efforts by MeckPAC, Parks Helms, Jennifer Roberts and all the Democrats on the Mecklenburg County Commission for making certain that employees of the county cannot be discriminated against for their sexual orientation.
• Bank of America, Wachovia and Food Lion for their continued support of the LGBT community despite threats of anti-gay boycotts.
When I look back over the past four years or so in terms of queer history, I realize that the world at large has changed greatly since I came onboard at Q-Notes in 2003.
Of course, the first such significant marker came on June 26, 2003, with the landmark Lawrence v. Texas case, that overturned sodomy laws throughout the United States, making private, consensual sex between two members of the same gender no longer a punishable offense.
Same-sex marriage in Massachusetts, domestic partnerships and civil unions in seven other states and a pending decision on gay marriage in Iowa along with a majority Democratic Congress curently debating hate crimes laws and the Employment Non-Discrimination Act all add up to one thing: LGBT discrimination is fading and will one day be a thing of the past.
I’m glad I was here with you to share this significant time in history.
Although I will no longer be onboard as Q-Notes’ editor, my work will continue to appear from time to time in these pages and in the pages of other publications, as well.
So it really isn’t goodbye. It’s just so long, for now.
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