Oral History with Giannani Callejas-Torres and Anna Marie Smith, Part 2

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

Good morning. Today's date is October 23rd. Today I'm interviewing Anna-Marie and Gigi. And this is our second session of interviews we've done. Both of you reside in Asheville, North Carolina. Let's see, Anna, how long have you been living here? All your life?

Anna-Marie:

I've been in Asheville all my life for 31 years.

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

Gigi, you've been living here how long?

Giannina Callejas:

Three years. Three and a half now. Almost three and a half.

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

Okay. Practically a local. And my name is Rachel Muir and I'm an interviewer for the oral history project, which is sponsored by the Blue Ridge Pride, the YMCA of Western North Carolina and the University of North Carolina, Asheville and 00:01:00professor Amanda Ray. So in our last interview, we basically gave you a chance to talk about your story and your experience here in Asheville and your experience with the LGBTQ community and the community at large. Today there's a series of questions that are part of the standard information we go through with our interviews. And if it's okay with you, I'd like to address those.

Giannina Callejas:

Okay.

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

So if you look at the categories of questions, the first one is about community supports and services. So here's the first question, which LGBTQ organizations or other kinds of organizations and groups have you worked with, benefited from, or considered an asset in your community? Any events in Western, North Carolina 00:02:00that have played a formative role in your life?

Anna-Marie:

For me, honestly, if I was being really candid, which I am, the first thing that comes up is the social scene, the club. It was a club long before attending any rallies or intentional spaces where queer people were being centered. That was the club first for me personally.

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

Hairspray?

Anna-Marie:

Hairspray. Club Hairspray. So, that was my first kind of... that hits this question and where was that kind of space or environment that you encountered LGBTQ people the most often, was that same space. And so I think I came out around 16 or 17. And as soon as I turned 18, I was able to go to a club. And so 00:03:00before then I hadn't had much interaction or involvement with other queer people at all. And if so, maybe it was kind of covertly and people not really comfortable with being out. I didn't have a huge social scene growing up and organization wise, it wasn't until really my mid 20s and my late 20s that I started being kind of engaged with organizations... knowing Michael Harney and the work that he would do around town, and so, I think that was maybe even the first openly gay man that I crossed paths with professionally and personally.

Anna-Marie:

And so Michael's work with WNCAP here in Asheville, the Western North Carolina AIDS Project, was the first organization I think that I encountered and it centered not just all people, but specifically a lot of LGBTQ people. And that must've been around like 22 or so. And then here recently I joined a leadership development cohort called SONG, southerners on New Ground, and SONG really opened me up to my LGBTQ community. I don't think that I had ever had a close enough engagement with a transperson up until maybe a year and a half ago.

Anna-Marie:

So at 28 or 29 is around the time that I had first gone to a gathering that 00:05:00centered. I was part of this group called the Lorde's Werq. And so SONG had this leadership development cohort called the Lorde's Werq. The Lorde as in Audre Lorde and werq was spelled W-E-R-Q or something. And so the purpose of that convening or that cohort was to kind of just get you more comfortable with being around other LGBTQ people, but specifically of color. So all my Latinx LGBTQ people, all my black LGBTQ people are part of this cohort, and it must be 35 of us who we go down to Atlanta and we get together and we just start getting to know each other. And that's where I was kind of like, my mind was blown. It shattered at how diverse those letters really are, the LGBTQ. I had never been 00:06:00in a room with all of the letters. And so recently I experienced that and it was really cool.

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

So when was that? Just this past year or the year before?

Anna-Marie:

It was a little bit last year and it was a year and a half of a leadership development cohort.

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

Okay. And how did you discover that?

Anna-Marie:

I was referred to it. Just being in close networks here around town, a lot of associates and friends are currently working with SONG. And so when the Lorde's Werq opened up it's specifically for black and brown people. And so I guess the pool kind of gets a little small, if you weren't already working for SONG here in Western North Carolina, then you might have easily been sought out to participate in this black and brown leadership development cohort.

Giannina Callejas:

I think it was just black people. I think it was just black.

Anna-Marie:

Was it just all black?

Giannina Callejas:

Yeah, just black.

Anna-Marie:

I guess some of the SONG's staff were Latinx and that's where... so actually we were all black.

Giannina Callejas:

Just black, gay, queer. Yap, it was just black, gay, queer.

Anna-Marie:

Thanks for reminding me.

Giannina Callejas:

I'm like, "Mm-mm (negative) Latinx people weren't a part of it." I think staff-

Anna-Marie:

I think I'm mixing up SONG staff. And then that leadership development was explicitly black.

Giannina Callejas:

And then, Gaycation, you may also be thinking about Gaycation.

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

Stepping back for a minute, if you started to go to Hairspray at 18, what year would that have been?

Anna-Marie:

I'm 31-

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

About.

Anna-Marie:

Oh, 2009. I graduated school in 2008.

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

[crosstalk] before you were 18?

Anna-Marie:

Well, no. Did I go in before 18? No.

Giannina Callejas:

Is this a trick question?

Anna-Marie:

No, me, I never cut school. I cut school one time and it was on cut day and I was like, "Man."

Giannina Callejas:

Did you have permission from your mom?

Anna-Marie:

Everybody gets permission on cut day. But no, I didn't try to sneak in prematurely or anything like that. You just go to a house party for that. I had seven siblings and so everything was a house party to us. You get into a-

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

A house was always full.

Anna-Marie:

Right. It's always a party.

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

How about you, Gigi, were there organizations or events that you've benefit from, and not just here, but in the past that were LGBTQ or open to LGBTQ folks, that were an influence or a support?

Giannina Callejas:

Yeah, I think I mentioned this in our first meeting, about the organization that 00:09:00I think most molded me in a very severe way. It's called the Fresh Air fund and is based in New York city. And its mission... well, it does several things, but it started in the 1800s where it wanted to take the city kids and take them out of the city to go to more to the camp, to go to more rural spaces. And so I remember being a part of camp and I used to go to camp since I was eight. So I had been at camp for a while. And the directors... everybody was just free. You just were able to be who you wanted to be at the Fresh Air Fund.

Giannina Callejas:

The Fresh Air Fund, molded you and asked questions and allowed you to be just 00:10:00who you are. And it's summer camp, so you kind of get to be who you wanted to be if there were no rules. And what I mean by that is, of course there were rules, but I personally wouldn't act on being curious, being so young at eight years old, with my mom or at least I wouldn't do that. And I was a part of the Fresh Air Fund all the way until I was at least 21, 22.

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

Wow.

Giannina Callejas:

So from eight to 22, they have pictures of me when I was a little girl and then as I grew up.

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

Were you a counselor as you got older?

Giannina Callejas:

Oh, I went through all of their phases. I was a camper. I was a leader in training. I was a counselor in training. I was a junior counselor and then I was a counselor. And I was a part of their career awareness program. So they helped 00:11:00me get a mentor to apply to college in my community... my mom only speaks Spanish, so applying to college, getting scholarships, all of that was up to me. And so the Fresh Air Farm provided mentors and I still speak to them to this day. I just talked to them a week ago, Marine.

Anna-Marie:

Were there a lot of gay people at the camp?

Giannina Callejas:

Yeah. The director at that time, she's not the director of all of it, her name is Alicia Guevara, she is the most amazing woman ever, but she's one of the first gay woman to get married in New York when marriage was legal, when it became legal. And she got married at the Fresh Air Fund. [crosstalk] Little 00:12:00trickling effect of new people getting married there. So everybody was either gay or kind of gay or curious. This is where definitely, in psychology, they mentioned that we're all gay. That we are all bisexual or that we're all pansexual, right? That there is no... but that society molds us to go more into one direction or that we preference one thing. That's definitely where everybody...

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

Could I ask a favor? Would you mind turning off that overhead light because it kind of... can't always see your face.

Giannina Callejas:

I think we should go over here, babe. Is that better?

Anna-Marie:

We can see you now.

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

Yes. I can see you better. Thanks. When you became a counselor, what was your interaction with the campers there? Do you think you encouraged that same kind 00:13:00of openness with the young people you worked with?

Giannina Callejas:

Absolutely. The Fresh Air Fund was definitely a brave and what we used to call a safe space. So it's just fun. Some of the kids still have contact or communication with their social media. But yeah, absolutely. And I don't want to say this is a gay camp because this is not that. Is just a place where we were able to leave the city and kind of be free from the expectations that society and our families and our school puts on us. And it was just a space where we're able to imagine where we can go run in the meadow and where we have no phones, where you go hiking. At the Fresh Air Fund is where I had one of the most 00:14:00magical experiences in my life. Where I hiked the Appalachian trail for four days.

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

Wow.

Giannina Callejas:

With a group of teammates. And it's the most memorable experience that I've ever had. One of the most memorable.

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

Where was that? What part of the trail?

Giannina Callejas:

By Bear Mountain up in New York, that's where we ended. And then where we started, we started about... the Fresh Air Fund is in Fishkill, New York. So it's about an hour and a half from the city, and then we ended in Bear Mountain. And I remember when we ended, it was so funny, we were like four days stinky, hungry, but happy, right, because we're having such a great experience. And we had to hike through the pool of one of the cabin and kind of lodging areas at Bear Mountain, because Bear Mountain is one of those touristy places. And here we were with huge bags, tired, walking, and all you see to the left of you is a pool that you really just want to dive into.

Anna-Marie:

Did you?

Giannina Callejas:

No, we couldn't.

Anna-Marie:

So I would say the Fresh Air Fund is one of the most influential. It's what also gave me so much love towards women and learning more, I ended up getting my bachelor's in women and gender studies. It's what, definitely, had me working in nonprofits. Needless to say that the Fresh Air Fund had one of the most impacts in my life.

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

Has there been an organization here that you've been active in or has been an 00:16:0000:15:00influence or a support?

Giannina Callejas:

Very specifically with me being a gay woman?

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

No, not really.

Giannina Callejas:

[crosstalk] gay woman. No, but maybe [inaudible] organization that I work with, but it's not specifically me being a gay woman. There is none for me.

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

I know there's some organizations that historically have worked just with gay women or lesbians. But I think their members and their appeal is largely for older women. So I was interested if you've heard of them or had any interaction with them.

Giannina Callejas:

No, Anna and I, we're going to go to one of the Gaycations from Southerners on New Ground. But to say that, that organization had an influence on me being a 00:17:00gay woman, not in Asheville.

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

Being part of a LGBTQ scene here in Asheville and Western North Carolina, has it brought you in contact with people at different class and race backgrounds and how did that impact your circumstances or outlook? You mentioned that, well may be at that SONG meeting, you met people of all kinds of different letters you said?

Anna-Marie:

Well, growing up here, I wrote a paper recently that was like me trying to figure out what's my experience been like in Asheville for 31 years. And like I 00:18:00said, it wasn't really until mid 20s that I started kind of just noticing who I am, what other kind of people are transplanted into this community. Otherwise, we kind of get familiar with who's who around town, you just see the same old faces and it's always been kind of I grew up in black communities and then I see white people in professional settings or grocery stores or stuff like that. But it seemed 50-50 up until my mid 20s. And that's where all of this kind of imbalance became privy to me where I'm like, "Oh, I didn't know there were so few black people in the town. I thought it was 50-50."

Anna-Marie:

And so I just kind of got this awareness. And then when you peel back another layer of past race, me identifying as a gay woman, all the gay women that I knew 00:19:00growing up or were familiar with were kind of down low. And my gym teacher was not an open gay woman for a really long time, although, everybody knew she was gay and she's a really, really popular basketball coach in Asheville. I don't think it was up until maybe the last five years that she came out. Well, not out, but publicly she was named the head men's basketball coach at a high school. And then it was like, all right, it's pretty known now this is a gay woman. But all the years that I grew up knowing that coach or that gym teacher, she never was really... and so I would see other black women that I could identify with and relate to and what I would presume to be gay, even back then as a 13 year old growing up, none of them were out and proud about it.

Anna-Marie:

And so again, I mean, mid 20s, that's when I'm starting to see people really proud to be who they are and coming out. I'm trying to think at 25, who did I know other than myself, not a lot of people. I guess all that time went by and those older gay women got older and the ones that will be my age, they were already kind of... I didn't have to come out in a really big way. My mom said, "Pick a side and that was it." And then I got to just live my life, out. And then everybody that I knew that would maybe be my age, they were the same. I didn't know a lot of people just trying to cover it up other than older black women. They are not out and proud about it. I think they're still kind of 00:21:00skating by in this town, just kind of-

Giannina Callejas:

Staying low.

Anna-Marie:

... staying low. Not causing attention to themselves. It's been like that my whole life. So I didn't notice them and now that I do notice them, they still keep a really low profile. And so I don't know a lot of people that I can relate to in terms of being black women and being openly gay. Here's where it changes though. I know plenty of black transwomen who are proud of who they are. And that's because of my participation through the Lorde's Werq. That's when I would meet black transwomen. And I didn't understand it until we all had to go around in a circle, introduce who we are, give our labels and pronouns and backgrounds and all of that.

Anna-Marie:

And I'm like, "Oh, those are black transwomen. That's cool." And then I would kind of just watch them. I was mesmerized by how the ones that I met were very 00:23:0000:22:00open and very proud about who they are, whereas the gay black women back home, because I hadn't met any trans black women from Asheville, but the gay black women from back home were low profile kind of still in the closet a little bit. And so I just felt like my whole world opened up when I met transwomen. And I was like, "[inaudible] that's cool. That's different." Not a whole lot to go on here and answer you because it's very... [crosstalk] and it gets opened up.

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

Here's a way to maybe kind of frame the question is, and this is for both of you, when, for example, did you become aware and meet your first gay men?

Giannina Callejas:

When do we become aware of gay men?

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

Yeah. Maybe when you had your first friend who was openly a gay man.

Anna-Marie:

In church. That's a joke, but it's a little bit of truth. Growing up in church, like I said, my grandfather stopped making me go to church at 16 or 17. But up until that age, it was plenty of gay men at church, very apparent. And so I will honestly and jokingly say the Baptist Church up until the point that I stopped going. They weren't my friends because they were always older at least by 10 or more, but plenty of gay men in the church.

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

Then I noticed that you don't use the word lesbian, do you prefer gay women as to say to lesbian?

Anna-Marie:

You know what, I'm born and raised here, and so for a long time, I use the word they because it's just a Southern way to identify. Them or they, and then I learned, Oh shit, they and them is a non-binary. And so some people say, "Oh, you prefer to say they and them or she goes by they and them." And I'm like, "Nah, I'm Southern. That's all." So gay is just still my ignorance to all of the letters in applying them appropriately. Gay is a shortcut. Lesbian is what I would probably use if I was writing some document about myself.

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

How about bisexuals? When would you first become aware or meet somebody who was openly bisexual or talk about it?

Anna-Marie:

What about you?

Giannina Callejas:

Bisexual?

Anna-Marie:

Yeah.

Giannina Callejas:

Why did you say me?

Anna-Marie:

I don't know. I was my first bisexual. So I'm like, what about you.

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

It's your turn.

Giannina Callejas:

It's interesting. Well, when you asked the first question of when have you noticed the first gay men? My mom's best friends were gay men. She had three very openly out gay men who were loud and proud who... and it was amazing. His name was Carlos, Diego and Papi was the other's name. I don't even know his real name, but everybody called him Papi. And interesting is that when I was young, my mom and I would go with them to the pride festival and I thought I was the coolest. I was like, "Yep, my mom took me to pride festival and in New York." So it's not a little pride like here. No, it's huge. Exactly. So I thought I was the bomb diggity, because my mom was so cool to take me. I just remember my mom 00:26:00could like take me. I just remember my mom collecting all the stuff or playing it around and we had all the gay flags, anyways. So yes, that's when I seen New Man, I think that was like my first exposure to like openly proud gay men and bisexuals. When I first started growing up, I thought that I was bisexual, but that didn't really work with me. I like how you just ask them, do you call yourself a lesbian woman? Emma and I had this conversation, as I'm recently having this conversation with my family. They call me lesbian, but never has that came out of my mouth. I've never opened up to my family and say, hi, I'm lesbian, and I think the reason why I haven't done so is because the lesbian 00:27:00word has such a negative connotation.

Giannina Callejas:

There's such negative association with being lesbian, right? In terms of like how society views this group of people, and I don't want to be like, I don't want people to see me and be like, Oh, there's this lesbian woman, like promiscuous and highly sexual, you know what I mean? That's not who I am, that's who you think lesbian women are, but that's not it, I am a gay woman. So, that was the thing, and then bisexual, it wasn't until college that I learned about pansexuality.

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

Yeah, I was going to ask you about that. When did you become aware of that term in that concept?

Giannina Callejas:

It was college, I think it was because of one of my mentors in college. One of my mentors in college, and I remember someone saying, I'm pansexual, and I was like, what is that? It just means you like people, and I was like, that's what 00:28:00it is, that's me. I like people. I don't care for your private parts. I always used to say I don't care for your private parts if a toy, or I can give myself an orgasm or reach climax, why would another person not be able to do such thing? It doesn't matter what, and I think this is more of a conversation we should be having with heterosexual people that a little penis does not mean climax.

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

No. How about the word, the term queer, when did you become familiar with that? It's interesting because when I speak to particularly the older gay men, they're not comfortable with that term, but how about you all? What do you think?

Anna-Marie:

Other than television? Yeah other than television and naming, either in an 00:29:00insult calling somebody queer or when that show the Queer Eye for the straight guy, first came out. I would see the host and I'd be like, Oh, okay, that's queer, got it. It almost matched up with the insults that you would see in movies where some character would be condemned queer, and I'm like, ah, I got it, I think I see what America deems queer. Then I met a friend who I used to work with, and when I met them, she went by she, or they went by she.

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

Sarah Brown, ill call her back.

Anna-Marie:

So I met this friend named Erica, who we worked together and I really like 00:30:00Erica. Erica is this white person who is a couple years younger than me, maybe like three or four years younger than me. So we worked together and the significance of Erica being a white person was that we worked with black communities and Erica came in kind of the tail end of our operations and fit right in. And I was like, I really like how courageous she is and how she just, like my students, my black students were all kind of flocked to her for really sensitive things to talk about. And I was like, Oh, Erica, that's really cool. Well, fast forward, like three years in and Erica kind of starts to change like their appearance more and more.

Anna-Marie:

They become more and more kind of, dress like me, which was like a masculine kind of presentation. And two more years later, I was under the impression that 00:31:00Erica preferred to be referred to they and them, and that they shortened it and started going by Ejay, and that they identified as queer, and so they would constantly use this word queer, and I'm like, well, now I'm perplexed again. I thought queer as in the guy on the television or the character in the movie, and now here my friend is the same, I identify as queer. I still haven't gotten to the bottom of everything, but that was my first experience, and that was just not too long ago. That's been within like the last six years, that again, queer is now part of my vocabulary, but I do not understand it. So I don't use it often.

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

How about trans folks, when did you first encounter trans folks and become aware of them? Well have you? I know you have but...

Anna-Marie:

You know I have, and I'm in love.

Giannina Callejas:

Her weekend retreat and she was like, babe, trans women are so gorgeous, I just met these phenomenal people just have crushes on these trans women.

Anna-Marie:

They go through these rigorous lives, but put on this really bad ass, not a bad ass but like this really kind of head up, chest out, I'm still going to like, I don't know what to call it, but just physical, I was mesmerized by most of the trans women that I've met and just dumbfounded to the point where I came in here, I'm like, Oh my God Giannina, I don't know what to call myself, I'm just blushing. The other thing that I shared with her was they shared a lot of stories about how this physical shell that they're in, presents a threat too to 00:33:00their lives.

Anna-Marie:

They would share these stories about, some of them were like, fuck love, I don't want to be in love, and I'm like, why not? I was so innocently perplexed that most of the trans women I met said they don't want to be in love with anybody or that they weren't in the pursuit that I was in, in terms of wanting to be in love, I just want to be in love. They were like, Oh, that's cute, that's not our experience. And I'm like, well, why not? They would tell these stories about how in the pursuit of love, they would have these horrible experiences where the person that they loved and that loved them back would just kind of switch it up out of fear for their own lives or own kind of social status, and they would completely ditch them. I'm like, Oh, I never thought about that.

Anna-Marie:

Anyway, trans women have really opened my world because of the stories that they 00:34:00shared with me. I thought we were all pursuing the same things, this kind of fairy tale romance, and a lot of trans women said nah, not really, I'm not looking for that, what you looking for? I didn't know that, I thought we all wanted it. What has been, have you met any trans women? And gotten to know them?

Giannina Callejas:

I think to say that I have trans, well I think we would need to define what trans, because people who are like Ejay, identify as trans, yet. So when you're gender non-binary, you're a transgender person. That's why first we need to define, but if we're thinking about like very specifically like a trans woman, very specifically a trans man. Honestly, I'd have to say that it was very like 00:35:00maybe a year or two ago, and I would say it was a trans man, who I met in Atlanta who lives in South Carolina, who I met through work and they came and had dinner with us. What's his name?

Anna-Marie:

Winston.

Giannina Callejas:

Winston. There is a little bit of fear, and there's only fear from me to do something or to say something that's wrong or to hurt them or, and not my intention, so I am really hypervigilant, and knowing who I am, very often I don't think when I speak.

Anna-Marie:

She's so bad.

Giannina Callejas:

Then it's not until afterwards where I like see facial expressions or something and I'm like, oh shit. It's the only reason why I think someone would need to 00:36:00trust me and know that I'm in this process. Even Ejay was a big person, Ejay was one of somebody I worked with until literally Ejay someone we went to Columbia with, in February, so Ejay has had some, definitely some influence in my trans experience.

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

Okay. Not to talk about my stories, but I remember one time I was at a meeting and I met a bunch of young trans men. I just thought like they had it all, I mean, they were like brothers, but with none of the fighting or any of the competition. So they seemed like they had the best parts of men and women and they were really energetic, and they were really pals, but I was really impressed. Interesting people, definitely opened my eyes.

Anna-Marie:

I'll second what Gigi said too, I won't call it, it's not so much fear, but more so a lot of respect for people, I have so much respect for people that I don't want to have any opportunity to...

Giannina Callejas:

Hurt.

Anna-Marie:

To hurt them, right, or to just have, I'm cool for some mistakes, but I don't want you to leave that quick encounter or whatever long engagement and be like, man, Anna really hurt me, so same. I don't want to do that, so I'm in a learning process and it's probably going to be lifelong because there's so many different people out there, and who knew I've been here my whole life. So at some point 00:38:00there's going to be some questions where I'm like, I don't want to offend anybody. I got it. We do have that reservation about not wanting to cause any harm when, we identify within these letters ourselves, it's just that I'm so ignorant to a lot, that I know we can hurt somebody, and so we still trying to learn and, and treat it with caution.

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

Okay.

Giannina Callejas:

I also think about, because we're speaking about the trans people we have met, not as, and not been able to tell. There are some, you know what I mean? That also comes to mind, right? There are literally people that we've encountered and you know, that is, I just met this person, I didn't meet a trans person.

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

Yeah. There's particularly among people my age, it'd be dangerous to be out as a trans person. I'm 68 years old, and so people who are contemporaries of mine who, trans men or trans women, they just, it was just not possible for them to be out. They couldn't keep jobs, so that's changed a lot. I probably met trans people before I knew it.

Anna-Marie:

That's what I'm saying.

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

Do you know any older trans people?

Giannina Callejas:

Yeah baby.

Anna-Marie:

Who?

Giannina Callejas:

You always talk about him and you say that he's still, or I don't know if he's definitely trans.

Anna-Marie:

Who?

Giannina Callejas:

They dress in the, they safe sex? They always have condoms. You talk about him 00:40:00going to hairspray and then him going to his nine to five, but always showing up to show the same

Anna-Marie:

Micheal?

Giannina Callejas:

Yeah.

Anna-Marie:

What about Michael?

Giannina Callejas:

He always wears, wait. Micheal with the... No not him.

Anna-Marie:

Somebody else that works with Michael, maybe?

Giannina Callejas:

What ever, there is so many people that she knows. I mean she's been here her whole life and only very small town of people, but you've introduced me to someone and you talk about them in your younger days, but being someone who's influenced you, being a gay woman, it's this very beautiful man who wears beautiful, like he has a beard and then he has...

Anna-Marie:

Who is it?

Giannina Callejas:

You know who I have not talked about as I'm over here describing the person you are, but over here not describing somebody who I really care about?

Anna-Marie:

Who?

Giannina Callejas:

There is a person who used to be called the queen of queens in New York city. 00:41:00Now that's, I think my first exposure to an openly out trans person. Yeah, the queen of queens is this beautiful person from Columbia, and he used to be around from where I grew up in New York. He was a lawyer in the sixties and then he moved to New York and then he started, he had a parrot and the parrot would be in his head and he had a dog and the dog would be pink, and he would always be wearing these beautiful garments, and everybody loved him.

Giannina Callejas:

Well, most people loved him because they ultimately murdered him like a few years ago. And sorry, that's a bit like reality of stories, but that is my first exposure. It's so interesting because I bought this tarot cards and they gave me 00:42:00a painting... I can't, I don't know where it's at. They gave me a coloring book that came with the tarot cards and interestingly when I was passing through it, I looked at it and I was like babe, I know them. I know this person, like I have had interactions, I have pictures with them. And yeah.

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

Huh, the queen of Queens...

Anna-Marie:

That's right, the queen of queens.

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

Where there elders that you've run into, and by that I don't mean just people, but for example, movies or books or people in the public eye, who influenced you, that sort of mentored you in some way, even through their writings or through their activism or so is there, were there any books or films that 00:43:00influenced you, and made you have a different vision of what the community's like or of your own life?

Anna-Marie:

Influence? I mean, elders that influence.

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

You mentioned Michael, I know Michael.

Anna-Marie:

Well, yeah, Michael, because just all that energy that they use to kind of come out into the community, Michael used to come teach my students that like safe sex and I mean, there'll be a lot of horsing around and a lot of, straight guys who would possibly be saying some little jokes or whatever, just being rude, not embracing it. I just always appreciated the way Michael carried himself in any space, and I was like, wow, that's kind of courageous. You know? He just doesn't 00:44:00switch up, he's so consistent with wherever he is to get the work done. I don't know any elders, but I do know that my mom has told me stories about herself in her life, her brief exchange. She's never told a story more than once.

Anna-Marie:

So what I'm giving you is all I got. I remember one time my mom was telling me, I don't know if she was like confessing or what, but she briefly was in love with this woman. I was listening and I'm kind of shocked at her saying this, but I think we were in the car and she was driving and I was in the passenger seat, so I can't not listen to this, so I'm like, just play it cool. She's like, I was in love with a woman, and I think she said it was maybe back around high school 00:45:00possibly or shortly after high school. I remember she said, ultimately the reason that she stopped being friends with the woman was she was just afraid to be out, and it was such a brief story. I don't think that I consciously did anything with it, but I think subconsciously like me being allowed to just live my life because of how she set me up with saying, just pick a side, don't be dangerous, don't play with people's lives, pick somebody you want to be with and let that be. My mom big on monogamy.

Anna-Marie:

That's what she was saying, choose, don't be going back and forth between multiple people just choose somebody to be with, but she tried to confess this story, but didn't give enough context to it. So I don't know any elders other than my mom who factually was saying that this had happened because everything 00:46:00else like I said with the generation before me and the one before that, right, my parents and my grandparents. They're so secretive and they're so not, they're not okay, they don't feel confident enough or even safe enough to share every detail about their romantic interests. So you either saw what you saw or you got a little clips of stories, but no context, and so I can't say that I know any elders who are gay because they lived their lives in such secrecy that you can't prove it.

Giannina Callejas:

The question would be fascinating to us, to the generation that comes after us, they think our generation is right, the generation that now we are almost trying to change this narrative of having to hide who we are because we're not accepted. I think of course we have to thank the elders who have paved the way, 00:47:00but when we think about elders, it's interesting we're asking this question because this morning I was reading about James Baldwin.

Anna-Marie:

Right.

Giannina Callejas:

Named James Baldwin as a gay man, gay black man, but that's not how he's talked about, he's talked about being one of the most influential writers in the black community. He's not talked about, they don't talk about how he advocated so much for gay rights and gay, you know? So, yeah. I think there's one of those contexts of we probably do have influential people historically and in our lives, but because of the reality that they had to live during their time growing up, that that's not a real...

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

Yeah.

Anna-Marie:

Right. I relate to that, to that point right there. There've been this, because there's so many layers, to everybody, I would say that being, first being a 00:48:00black person and putting that as the first thing, because that's what society keeps paying attention to first, and then after that, I could identify as saying, I'm a gay woman. When I was writing that last grant for the queer mobilization fund, it was really difficult to write it because obviously I know who they're looking for and what part of me they would like to hear about most, but it was difficult because I'm black first and that's what society keeps seeing first and that's what is at the top of every headline, you know what I mean? I was like, writing this grant sounds like I was writing it to the black mobilization fund instead of a queer mobilization fund, because it's so difficult to relate to being an LGBTQ or any part of it, that spectrum, when there's layers that society deems comes first, like that should be acknowledged 00:49:00first, you know, like race, not my choice, it's just me assimilating into what everybody else does.

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

That's true, that's an interesting way to put it, is that we in some ways we don't get the choice of what people see first. So, if we want to see what's the most important thing about me and, I might say, well, that I'm a teacher, so that's the most like I'm a parent, but they may say, well, the most important thing about you from society's standpoint is you're old or you're white or you're gay or whatever, and so, why don't I get to choose?

Giannina Callejas:

Right.

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

It's not nearly, being white is not nearly the problem. Not problem, I mean, 00:50:00most of the world I live in, it's just that's just taken for granted. When I grew up in a neighborhood where half, at least a third of my neighbors were black people, people didn't take it for granted that you were white or black, but around here, I feel like most of the people I know in Asheville, it's just, well, of course you're white, everybody's white. Anyway, I just learned something talking to you that we don't get to, still, we don't get to choose.

Anna-Marie:

We didn't choose it.

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

What people think about, what's our most important thing. What do you think about the depiction, like in popular culture or in the world about LGBTQ people, 00:51:00and then we'll add that other layer, LGBTQ people of color or different ethnicities. I mean, what do you see out in the world when you see people depicted. Think it's good? I mean, do you think it's accurate or you think it's evolving?

Anna-Marie:

I think it's, I think the lens, the scope is still really kind of tight and, because in reality, like I said, in reality, what I really see like going down to Atlanta that time, I was like, what? I could have watched a fair amount of movies, so I pick up a lot from movies and stuff like that, and usually I'm kind of trying to align things, right? Like you said, what am I seeing depicted? And 00:52:00I know-- Things, right? Like, like you said, what am I seeing depicted? And I know that you were saying that in context to what, you know, what's the reality. Like, so I just say that it's a a narrow focus because what's out here really is not enough of reality being depicted in, you know, on a screen or in a book or in a, you know, an even a fucking advertisement. I'm like, you know, they all heterosexual looking people. And I say looking people, because I'm like, you ain't the them to be anything other than that. And so it's just - and there's so much. And I I really like reality, and I really wished that they put more of that on a screen or in an ad. I mean, even just commercials for crying out loud. I mean, you know, a gay commercial when you see it, because you're like, oh shit, did you see that it was two guys, like in the Pampers commercial with the baby instead of, but it shouldn't be that damn obvious is what I'm saying. And so there's not enough depiction of reality and so that's my two cents.

Giannina Callejas:

I think the media does what they want it to do. Right? Which is to accept gay white people. I think it's very important for us to name that as gay white people, to be the first, to be those who take the pamphlet. You know, when we talk about queer eye or when we talk about, you know, that's caramels, not white, but you know, it's mostly white people that are in the fourth phase. Like you just talked about two gay men and the commercial. Pretty a hundred percent sure it was white men. Like I don't even need to ask you, but a hundred percent. Right?

Anna-Marie:

Yeah.

Giannina Callejas:

You know, so I think they, they do, I think it continues to narrate that white is okay, and that white people's - now white people who are entering the scope of like, I am openly out and proud are white men.

Giannina Callejas:

So I think it does what it intends to do, because I think this brings a racial 00:54:00conversation that still black people are not accepted. Or not that they're not accepted, but still there is a, there's a level of, there's a level missing - level playing field missing. That makes sense?

Anna-Marie:

Yeah. I mean, in my own experience, I definitely know what you're talking about.

Giannina Callejas:

Yeah and we could even talk about like what media portrays as like gay men and the only one I think about that's like in like the media, like in Netflix is Caramel. But I can't think -

Anna-Marie:

Pose and -

Giannina Callejas:

Oh, that's right Pose now. Oh pose? Yeah. Oh, now it's becoming more of that. They're they're out, especially, I think this year had a transformative year within black queer community. So thank you for saying that rave you're absolutely right.

Anna-Marie:

Yeah and it was - there's such a lack of what we're talking about in media that 00:55:00you and I actually drank up all of what was available in half of a season. You know, like Summer didn't even get halfway through before we watched every episode of Pose, every episode of AJ and the Queen. And it was like, so what you're asking, I just want to point out that there is a desire for us to have, you know, more depiction of not just what I relate to, but I'm like, I don't relate to being, you know, a gay man or a trans man or a trans woman or anything along this spectrum other than just being a black gay woman is the thing that I try to relate to the most when like looking for something on the screen to relate to.

Anna-Marie:

But for some reason, TT and I you know, probably just the - we just want to see more people because we know how many different ones are out there. So we were so 00:56:00thirsty to see other people other than, you know, just this traditional kind of whatever's on the screen, you know, that we, we drank everything up really quickly over the summer. I remember that.

Giannina Callejas:

It also makes me think about the invisibilization because it's not that they don't exist and they are portrayed. Because let's talk about Tyra Banks and one of the judges was a black man. This is back in the two thousands, but was the focus and the attention on this black man? No. And so I think there's something there of the invisibilization of black gay people.

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

I agree. I've enjoyed Pose, but the only thing again, being my age it's kind of painful because the people I know from that time - they're all dead.

Anna-Marie:

Yeah. I was going to say like that has to hurt. Like, I've heard stories about people relating to - I'm at a client. I was a financial counselor in my most recent life. And I met this one client who told me about all her a studio 54 - is that it? Up in New York? Studio 54, 54 days up in New York. And she is, I think y'all are about the same age or Rachel, that client that I had. And she would tell me the stories and unfortunately at the end of it, she was like, most 00:58:00of them are dead. And she would show me pictures with like her niece, like renowned, like drag Queens, drag Kings, these trans women, trans men. And she would be like in the center - this heterosexual woman.

Anna-Marie:

I told about that client lady was crazy, but she has some stories to tell and I was just like, I just, yeah, I totally, yeah. So the reality of it. Yeah. I heard of a little bit about that in terms of being like that era, you know, whether they got sick or they were, you know, murdered or just lived not the best quality life later, you know. Like it's not a lot of people live to tell the tale. So -

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

Do you find yourself wanting to seek out elders and hear their stories?

Anna-Marie:

After accidentally hearing some stories from back in the day? And then like, like I said, getting these little nuggets from parents or, you know my dev teacher or I'm just like, I do want to know, like, where's the context, cause it's not in - it's not blatantly a history. Cause the first thing that I come to in history is race, race, race, race, race. And I'm not hearing about their 00:59:00personal lives and that, you know, whether they were great or not. Like, where is it? It matters like, you know. Or are you going to have us all kind of chasing, this really sad ass narrative, which is like, it's not just all about race. Like, you know, so much more makes up people. And yeah, we don't get to hear about it from that generation. Cause I don't think they feel safe enough to like tell their story, the whole story.

Anna-Marie:

Like my mom obviously doesn't feel safe to tell that whole story to me. And I'm like, I'm not judgemental. So I'm pretty sure you don't want to tell the whole, you know, whole country what that story is or whatever, but I just wish people felt more empowered. And I wish that the reality was that they were safe so that the information is not used against them. Or they can just be courageous and say, fuck it. Use it how you want to use it. I'm going to tell my story. Because at the end of telling your story, it just feels so damn good that you really don't give a fuck who agrees with it or who dislikes it, you know. It just feels 01:00:00good to tell your fucking story. So I hope that they get that courage.

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

Well, that's really the focus of this project. I mean, we're trying to talk to all ages of people - a lot of cases it's the elders that - those are the stories where a, that people are afraid to talk about them - one and two - we're losing them. So those stories are going to disappear if we don't capture them. So -

Anna-Marie:

Can I ask you a question.

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

Sure.

Anna-Marie:

That basketball coach, gym teacher, I'm telling you, like, I really - I don't know how they feel today, but it seems like they're more out there than ever. That woman deserves to - and I'm like, I can't even say a hundred percent if they would be comfortable with something like that. But I'm like, damn man. I'm 01:01:00like, you got your name plastered all over every damn thing else. You know that it's relative to her when it comes to sports. That's her blood. That's her second language. But I'm like you her name? Can I say her name?

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

Of course.

Anna-Marie:

Oh, it's Sonita Gibbs.

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

Okay. How do you spell it?

Anna-Marie:

Sonita? Like Sonia - S-O-N-I-T-A.

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

Okay, got it. Yeah. So that's one of the questions on the list is know if you've got recommendations of other people that you think would want to be interviewed. So that's a good lead.

Anna-Marie:

She's such an influence. I know so many people that are my age. I really believe that they were influenced by the coach Gibbs.

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

Hmm. Did you play basketball?

Anna-Marie:

I was rebellious. I tried to go out for the team and I just suck. I don't have 01:02:00good hand coordination. And then I was like, why are you only playing seniors? And they were like, well, that's the tradition. And I'm like, that's bullshit, I don't want to play. So I suck. And I didn't like the way it was structured, but no I didn't play basketball. I just admired sports. I was the mascot and I played and I ran track a little bit, but -

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

What'd you run in track?

Anna-Marie:

I would run the 200 because 100 was too short and the 400 was too long. So I can do that straight away in that curve. And then I would cave and I was like fourth string. So it wasn't that good.

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

I run track now. I Run senior track and field.

Anna-Marie:

What do you run?

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

It's kind of interesting. I did dishes for most of my life, you know, marathons, half marathons, stuff like that.

Anna-Marie:

I felt like that was the case though - your upper body. I was like, I feel like you really tall and you probably get the, just all the lives to do this.

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

But I ended up - I got a medical problem that makes doing the long stuff harder. So my kids - I've got two boys and they're both track kids and they encouraged me to try track and field. And so last year I went to the Nationals - Senior Olympics and I did that the 50, the a hundred, the 200, the 400 and the 800. I shot the discus. I never, I never picked up a shot or a discus until about two and a half years ago. And now I own the, the South Carolina record for all senior women.

Anna-Marie:

On the discus or the shot put?

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

Discus.

Anna-Marie:

And I had terrible coordination. I could not get that thing to spin right.

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

I'm still struggling with it. I'm not big enough to be good with the shot. It's 01:04:00just, I mean, most of the women, like when I play basketball now, like I would play with mostly younger people. Everybody's younger than I am. So, but the women I play with, like from college, they were all huge. You know, I like come up to their shoulders.

Anna-Marie:

Well, how tall are you?

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

Five seven.

Anna-Marie:

What? I don't know why you look so tall sitting down. I'm like, so knows Tyler though. She's still tall. So she's like my mom's height. Yeah. We only five five.

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

Well, I was tall enough to be a decent guard, but I played in a league and nobody on my team know how to play center. I knew how to play center. Cause I used to coach and - so here I am, the shortest, second shortest woman on the team and I'm playing center. But do you, did you play any sports growing up or 01:05:00did sports have any influence on you?

Giannina Callejas:

No I didn't really do sports. I did like Jay Razzi, like or ROTC and LTC. So I was more in like military working out. Yeah. But I did, I did run a marathon and I used to run five K's.

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

Wow, which marathon?

Giannina Callejas:

It's called the -

Anna-Marie:

Oh, it's here in Tennessee. The rook -

Giannina Callejas:

It's a full marathon for soldiers who have died in combat. Why do I want to say Mountain Man? Memorial March? No that's not it. I'll tell you right now.

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

Okay. But that's not minor. You're saying you haven't done sports, but you've 01:06:00run a marathon?

Anna-Marie:

Right? When I met Gigi, she was still into - I say still because COVID. Gigi was into working out when I met her and she would try to make me go to the gym with her. Listen, I am not that girl. And I would just be on the floor trying to do some sort of technical thing and just cry and laughing at myself. But her? Just so fit. So right. Like -

Giannina Callejas:

It is called Mountain Man Memorial March. They have different levels. So you could do a half marathon, a full marathon. And I was enlisted to be an officer in the army. And one of my Colonels set aside five group of like five of us cadets. And he was like, I think you have the strength to do this. He said, I think you have this strength to do this marathon. And he was like, I've been running this race for X amount of years and never has there been an all women's 01:07:00team run the marathon. I would like for you to be the first. And we all looked at each other and we're like - I hate running. I'm not a runner. Right, exactly. But we trained. So we agreed and we trained. Then we would wake up at five in the morning and we would run 10 mile days and we would put weight on our backs. So we would work out our legs. Then I was extremely fit.

Giannina Callejas:

And so that team, I remember there was three all-women teams and only two of us were running the full marathon. What was cool is that not only were we like one of two, we got third place overall.

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

Wow.

Giannina Callejas:

Right.

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

That's awesome.

Giannina Callejas:

And I remember our battalion didn't believe that we could do it. So we had to do 01:08:00a pre trial in Buffalo. This is where I went to school. We had to do a pretrial in Buffalo and yeah. And then one of our, one of the people, one of the sergeants who also, who was training us also did it. And like also came in like third or second place for his age group.

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

The American idea that was a Marine Corps many times.

Giannina Callejas:

You did a Marine Corps.

Giannina Callejas:

Marine Corps marathon in Washington, DC. It's a big race now. It's just like too big. But

Giannina Callejas:

Yeah. Well I would never do it again.

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

Yeah. I keep - I'm not smart enough to say no.

Giannina Callejas:

And it's interesting cause I went from running five K's. So that's like a little less than three miles for a race. Right? I never ran a, like a half marathon. I went from running like a 5k to a marathon. Like that was my in-between and we 01:09:00trained for like two, three months. Like we didn't have by far. And I was the weakest link for sure. For sure. I'm like, I have no problem saying that I was in the back but I think what motivated me was definitely the other girls and I couldn't let them down. We had to cross as a team. So they had to work with me.

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

Wow. That's really impressive.

Giannina Callejas:

Yeah. There was a question on here that I actually wanted to talk about a little bit.

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

I was going to ask you what other questions you'd like to talk about?

Giannina Callejas:

There's a question about like, I like lost it - but like talking about like my community, like as a Latin X person and like being like a gay person. Right there where the cursor is.

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

That's probably under Race and Ethnicity. How did race and ethnicity make a 01:10:00difference in how you experienced the queer community? Can you describe the social acceptance/rejection you experience from your family and or within the LGBTQ community? Did being part of the GLBT community bring you in contact with people of different ethnic backgrounds? Have you experienced interracial relationships? If yes, what did you learn and how are you received by others?

Giannina Callejas:

So I want, like I was thinking about the Latin X community and how heavy patriotic they are. And so because of how heavy patriotism is for a gay woman, 01:11:00it is harder for us to come out and be accepted than it would be for a gay men. Like there is a little more accepted, still not really accepted, but like a little more accepted, like, Oh, that really is a gay man. But if you're a gay woman, you are like hyper sexual, like there's that reality for Latin X community.

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

So there's - Interesting thing you're saying that the impression of gay women in Latin X communities is that they're promiscuous. Could that - that's new to me. I've never heard that or you know the generalization, but that's your experience.

Giannina Callejas:

Yeah. That, yeah - that they were hyper sexual.

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

And you said that it's because it's maybe more a patriarchal that there's more 01:12:00resistance for gay women in the Latin X community than there are for gay men.

Giannina Callejas:

I think - Yeah, I think there has something to do with, of course religion, because I think is the root of all - a lot of problems. Well, organized religion I should say. I was biting my lip. Organized religion and patriarchy, which comes from the organized religion. Right. Very, very, yeah. And I think like, even like women, like our - back from like in New York, when I up, like women were very much against each other, like, and I remember this was something that I studied when - I'm a McNair scholar and in the program for McNair scholar, like we're - it's really just to try to get our doctorate's degree. And one of 01:13:00what I studied was - Well, I studied that like women going to taking gender - women in gender classes, everybody changed their view of women moving forward because as we grow up we're so taught to like, dehumanize each other, like you bitch, like, and it's almost normal to say that word, you know? And then it's like, well, let's talk about what that, even words like that word is even like for a female dog. That word dehumanizes. And I've had a conversation with so many of my friends and they're like, but that's not how I'm saying it. I was like, but there's still the, the epidemiology. Is that how you say it? Of the word that, that doesn't leave. And like, it was so interesting to like talk about this, but I think it's so ingrained that even in the Latin X culture, because it's so heavy male centered, right? Like the men is like, I mean, even 01:14:00if we just talk about who we worship as God. It's the man, you know? So I think there's definitely - yeah.

Giannina Callejas:

Sorry.

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

I would say my knowledge of other cultures is limited by one constant - is that there's a special - in religion there's a special role for Mary and in, and in the Latin churches. So like the Catholic church and a Latin churches, Mary, as like revered in a very special way. I was always curious about that - is that area of, you know, strongly patriarchal culture, but, you know, and, and their 01:15:00religious beliefs and the Catholic religious beliefs and Latin American countries. The Virgin Mary has a very, very special role. And I was always interested as what was that? Why was that such an important part of that belief system?

Giannina Callejas:

I think it's the maternal aspect. I don't necessarily think there's so much power giving to her besides the power for her to reproduce and be the mother. And that be that for women to then be like, this is who you want to worship. This is maternal, this is who you need to be. But still, nonetheless, who we worship is her son. So I think that has something to do with it.

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

Makes sense. Yeah. That makes sense. It's - you don't necessarily respect Mary 01:16:00because of who she is, but it's because she delivered.

Giannina Callejas:

Right.

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

And so women are in - may not be recognized for all their values, but they're - the fact that they provide and care for children is what the, what their central role is.

Giannina Callejas:

Right.

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

Interesting.

Giannina Callejas:

Yeah. And even like - so when we're asking these questions, the last thing I'm going to say - and then I'll call you baby - is that like, you know, you share like LGBT influences, but I think so much of what's been coming up is that because our identity is so based on being a black woman, being a Latin X woman, being an immigrant - that being a gay woman isn't who we're - like I think for me, I'm more so seeking out people who are speaking my language, people who are 01:17:00in my next communities, people who are doing immigration work, people who are, and I'm not seeking out gay woman. Or like that gay community is not necessarily.

Giannina Callejas:

So, and I, and I think that has to say something, you know, like that has to say - like, for me, I think it goes to show the reality that this year has put in our face much more, right? Which is like the racial, right. What do you call it? Situation? I don't even know. Right. But like, yeah. From like kids being in cages and, you know, and black people just being killed, like, just because they're black and the dehumanization. Like, so I think that has to be much - that's much more of a part of - I, for me, that's much more a part of my story. 01:18:00...As much more of a part of, for me, as much more a part of my story. I think sharing that I'm an immigrant, that I had to assimilate, that I left my family, which we don't often talk about. Like, "Hey, y'all just think about being an immigrant and all the people that we're leaving behind, and yet y'all have the privilege to have all your family in the United States. You don't think we had to make some type of..." Yeah.

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

So being involved in the LGBT community here, and allies here in Asheville, one of the burning questions still is what can organizations, like Blue Ridge Pride, what can they do to address the issues of people who are Black and Latinx? Where ethnicity and, or class and, or status as citizen, what can be done? What's the 01:19:00most important things to do to reach out and support people in the community for who maybe the most important parts of their lives is not the fact that they're in that community, it's about their race or ethnicity or class issues and all that other stuff? I know that talking to people in both at the YMCA, where I work, and at university, and then of course with the Blue Ridge Pride, what can we do to address the issues and the concerns of people of different backgrounds in the community? That's the mother load. That's what really, I think, people 01:20:00want to be able to try to address.

Anna-Marie:

I mean, my personal solution to kind of cure it... The big problem I see is just, we got this issue, the situation of divisiveness, and it's not just racially. People look for all sorts of reasons to kind of clique up, and separate each other from one another. And the solution that I typically go with, it's one of my favorite things to do, is just sit down and talk to people, all kinds of people. And, I mean, it can come easy, if you've been paid to do that, or it can be a little bit of a challenge if you are just personally committing to sitting down and talking with people and just kind of creating a social 01:21:00culture that wasn't necessarily prepared for you, right?

Anna-Marie:

We all just kind of keep falling into what was prepared for us. And that's why I like seeing people, those little odd situations or encounters that you might see where one person looks one way and the other person looks a completely different way. And they sitting down having coffee, or they sharing a plate of spaghetti or some shit, and you like "That's a weird looking group of people right there," but that's the whole point. Get out and fucking talk to somebody and listen to other people, people that you wouldn't necessarily consider having over for dinner. You should go talk to them anyway.

Anna-Marie:

And so that's my solution. That's what I like doing. That's why I like people, is because they generally are comfortable enough, or can get comfortable enough, to allow me to be in a space. And I don't have no outcome or thing that I'm 01:22:00looking to get from talking to them, other than we should both be able to walk away saying... Just something to think about, that's it. You don't have to do anything. You experienced somebody else's brief reality. And what can Blue Ridge Pride do? They can keep this project going because that's all this really is. It's just, I got my coffee and you got whatever you need over there. And we just, we kind of just shooting the shit, even though we got some scripted questions. And I don't really care about the product that's going to come out of this. I care that you prompted us enough to hear ourselves. And a lot of what Gigi was sharing, I was kind of listening along, as if some of these stories I haven't heard before.

Anna-Marie:

So just the opportunity to speak openly, and in a safe space is going to be a 01:23:00product of it. So even after the oral history project is done producing whatever you're trying to produce, I think that if somebody can figure out how to keep allowing this to happen, right? Whether it's volunteers like yourself, just continuously searching people out and just hearing from them, whether they do something with the information or not, I think that's the product. I think that it's a helpful platform to just... People have to talk. They have to share their stories, and it's more healing for them to share their story than it is for the person capturing it, and who's going to publish it. You got to let people exercise that, because everybody's kind of being told to shut up because we ain't got enough time, or there's so many excuses why you don't get to just sit and share your story. So...

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

Yeah, I agree. That's a product in and of itself, just the process. But, one of 01:24:00the other things that's going to happen is that people will get a chance to hear these interviews or read them or go into the materials that we collected and realize that, "Oh, well, yeah, I've got a story to tell too. It might inspire other people to talk." And also to reach across and talk to other kinds of people. So yeah, I've had a blast doing this and learning a whole lot. So anyway, when all this crazy COVID stuff is done, I'd like to have you all over for dinner. We could talk some more.

Giannina Callejas:

That'd be nice.

Anna-Marie:

Yeah, I'm down.

Giannina Callejas:

Yeah. I love that you sent us the picture of you and your wife. And that's really nice. And how you haven't seen it for 20 something years, right?

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

17. 17, so...

Giannina Callejas:

It's something up there, yeah. Did you see the picture? I showed it to you.

Anna-Marie:

No.

Giannina Callejas:

I didn't show it to you? Oops, well, I'm sorry. I'll share it with Anna.

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

Okay, yeah. We met in 2004 and we got married within a couple months after it became legal. It's kind of a funny story. We were moving down here. So in one week we sold a house in DC area. I retired from my job. She retired from her job. We sold the house on Monday. We moved out on Tuesday. We got married on Wednesday. We loaded up the truck on Thursday and we drove down on Friday. That was a big week.

Giannina Callejas:

I would have a heart attack.

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

So, it was small. We just had a few friends over, my best girlfriend and Lauren's best girlfriend. We got together. And one of them, I mean, her best girlfriend flew in from Thailand to be there. But part of the story is that my minister, the priest in my episcopal church, he was going to retire too, says, "I got to do this before you guys go, we're going to do this." So it kind of came up at the last minute, but it was his last hurrah and our chance to kind of get this done. So we had a church wedding. It was awesome.

Anna-Marie:

That's crazy.

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

Yeah. I'll show you the other pictures sometime, but it was fun. He was a really nice guy. He had Parkinson's and he knew that he wasn't going to be able to do that stuff much longer. And so the book at our church, the church had been there since 1843, and everybody who got married, and every funeral and stuff was all in this book. And we were the first couple, it had the husband and wife, we had 01:27:00to scratch out husband, and put our name down the book. So we're the first couple since 1843 that was a same-sex couple. That was pretty awesome.

Anna-Marie:

That's bananas. You got to... Oh, these are the pictures. Wow. Wow.

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

And so there's the two ring bearers there. I sort of adopted a woman and her wife and their kids as an extra set of grandchildren, godmother kind of thing. 01:28:00And so they were all part of that. I was in their wedding too, which was a big Jewish wedding. So it was Jewish, two women both in full white dresses. It was just so beautiful. And one of them is trans, and yeah, boy, that was a lot of fun.

Anna-Marie:

Was that in DC? Theirs?

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

Yeah, that was in DC. This one woman is just really dear to me. She's a big-wheel in the CIA. And so she's quite a story. So, I worked in the White House for a couple of years. They have the Office of Science and Technology 01:29:00Policy, and the Science Advisors to the President. And I worked for the Science Advisor to the President for a couple years, and two administrations. So I kind of came out when I was at the White House, which was interesting.

Giannina Callejas:

What's your doctor degree in?

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

Didn't finish it. My first son came along and I finished all the coursework, but I'm an environmental scientist, aquatic ecologist. I love working outdoors. And I like doing research, but I didn't get to spend that much time working outdoors because I became a manager in a hurry, unfortunately. If you do a good job, they keep you in the office. So, I worked for the federal government for 33 years, worked for the Fish and Wildlife Service, for the Geological Survey, for the 01:30:00White House, for the Department of Interior, for EPA, the Food and Drug Administration, and the US Congress, among other places. So I may go back. We have a new administration. I may go back and help with the transition team for one of those agencies. We'll see. Though, I don't want to go back to working full time, but I would go up for three months and help transition to a new administration.

Anna-Marie:

Well, that's cool.

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

Yeah. It's got to be a lot of work. When I worked at the White House, it was 14 hours a day, six days a week. It was just crazy. I don't know how people do it for four years. I did it for two and I was burnt toast. Are there other things 01:31:00that you'd like to talk about that come to mind, and any ideas about going forward and improving the process? And then finally, I'll ask if there's any, particularly, it'd be really interesting if you have any photographs, for example, did you ever take any pictures at Hairspray? Or you've got any materials from The Fresh Air Fund, or experiences there, or just any kind of things that are historical that you'd like to... We'd made copies of-

Anna-Marie:

I'll look for some.

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

What?

Anna-Marie:

I'll look for some photographs. And yeah, in those days, everything was blurry quality because you'd be mid-dance move or something, and somebody was snapping. So all you see is your face blurred out and your hands all over the place. No, we'll do our best to look for something to share.

Giannina Callejas:

Sometimes The Fresh Air Fund's pages have pictures of me, but I have to look for 01:32:00it, yeah.

Anna-Marie:

To also what you were saying, I really enjoyed this process. When you first reached out, I think sometime last year, I was just like, "I can't fit this into my life. This doesn't fit in my life right now." And then when I resigned, I was like, "Maybe I can follow back up," and I didn't get to do it because I jumped right back into work. And then I quit again. And then Gigi was like, "Hey, you want to do this?" I'm like, "Fuck, man, that is awesome. Yes, let's do it." Because I wasn't able to go back and pick it up. And then it found us anyway. I really appreciate how far y'all are spreading y'all's willingness to do this project. I don't know how many volunteers are working this, or who is making 01:33:00this all possible, but it's really cool to hear that you've done 50 of these.

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

We got a grant through YMCA from the Biden Foundation.

Anna-Marie:

Really?

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

Is where some of the money came from. So yeah. So the money to have someone take the conversations and put them down on paper, basically it's $1.00 dollar, a page if it's done by a professional organization rather than a volunteer. So that's paid for a lot of the expenses of getting the transcripts produced.

Giannina Callejas:

That's the worst.

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

Yeah. That's hard, but what's really impressed me was the YMCA's dedication to this. I think I told you the story about when I first moved here, I went to a Pride. And I went by the YMCA and I got a-

Anna-Marie:

What are you doing here?

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

Yeah, Young Men's Christian Association. Hello? They go "Well, yeah, well, we're trying to do better here." And then the next year I was working there, and some people come by and go, "Well, why are you all here?" And I go "Well, y'all means all. I mean, that's the way we think we should operate." And then the next year it was like, "Whoa, you guys are one of the coolest folks here." So I've been impressed with them. They have struggled. Trying to get more, particularly, more Black people in the Y has been a struggle. They don't feel like they've done a great job, and they want to figure out how to do a better job. That's actually been more challenging, I think, than getting LGBTQ people comfortable at the Y. 01:35:00And I just think it's some of the history here. So some of the Ys that are kind of out in the smaller towns, it's still hard to get any kind of different people into the Ys there.

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

So, but I just, I'm really proud of that, the effort they're making, and they really do try hard to do that. There are a lot of Latinx people there who they have basically gone out and offered them scholarships to come there, and for their kids, and really done the groundwork to try and get them to participate in the Y and its community outreach. So I'm pretty proud of those folks. I'm proud 01:36:00of UNC Asheville. I don't know if you know this. I remember going and talking to them, why there's so much interest at these studies at UNC Asheville. And I talked to the woman who's one of the chief folks in human resources, and I said, "Well, what percentage of your student body do you think is in the community?"

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

And she looked me straight in the eye and she said "About half." I go, "What?" I said, "Well, you don't understand how this works." The North Carolina university system, different schools like Chapel Hills, if you want to be in a fraternity or sorority, you go to Chapel Hill. You want to be a surfer kid, you go to Wilmington. But word gets around, if you're in the community, you want to go to Asheville. I mean, you just walk on the campus and you can feel it. That's just 01:37:00a, really, it's a safe and queer space. I love working with the people over there. All three of the principals here I think are doing good work, but they all want to do better. So thoughts that you have about how we can improve this process. And if you've got recommendations to more people to reach out who would either want to be interviewed, or who would like to be trained to interview, that'd be awesome.

Anna-Marie:

Awesome, will do. This was a good opportunity. And yeah, thank you.

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

You're welcome. I'm going to turn off the recorder for a second, cause I want to show you something. So any last comments for the recorded session?

Giannina Callejas:

You asked how Blue Ridge can continue to do better, and Anna said something and I was like, "Honestly, for us to be able to continue these conversations, and it's also for people to show up authentically." And I think so that it's not 01:38:00small talk conversations, but "I want to know about your story." I think that's something very important. Very easily do we say we want to know, and then really don't want to. So that authentic-ness is... And then, something else that's coming up is also that acknowledgement of who we are and the bodies that we're in. For me, that's important, especially living in Nashville and "What type of white person, are you?" To be completely honest. I think that's also, again, for me important, that acknowledgement of "I'm in a white body, and I understand what that means." Yeah, that's it.

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

Well, thank you for your contributions to this project, and we'll talk some 01:39:00more. There's a couple of things, I did send you the authorization forms. And if you all could sign that, and I'll give the information. I actually need a physical copy of that because that's going to go on file at UNC Asheville archives. So I'll need you to sign those copies. And then at some point, if you've got things you'd like to share for the archive, like the photographs we talked about or anything like that, if you've got any, for example, any of the information you got from Song, or you got any information or pamphlets or stuff that you got from The Fresh Air Fund, that's stuff we'll include in it. I mean, it's really interesting when you go into the archives. Listening to the interviews is really great, but if you see a picture, say from the '60s, of a 01:40:00gay bar in Asheville in the '60s, it's just like, "Oh, that's amazing." It's like a window into a world that otherwise people wouldn't know existed.

Anna-Marie:

Right. I like the way you put that. That makes me excited to put something in there because, hell, as recent as it was, the place doesn't even exist anymore that I was hanging out at. So I'm like, "Yeah, it would be cool," to, flip through something and just be like, "Wow, that was the club scene in the '60s or '80s or the 2000s or..."

Rachel Muir, interviewer:

Exactly. Exactly, and part of my training was I was trained as a historian, and the real history is people's history. It's not about the president or famous people. It's about average people's lives. That's the real story of any period of history. So hearing your stories, and anything that's a reflection of your 01:41:00life and your experience, that's the real history. That's what generations after us, if they want to know what our lives were like, they're probably not going to find it in a textbook. They're going to find it in a resource, something like this. If they really want to understand what our lives were like. So that's why I think a project like this is so important. Well, I'm going to drop the recording part right now, but I don't want you to go away because I want to share something with you.

Anna-Marie:

Okay.