Oral History with Keith Robinette

Tina Madison-White:

Okay. I'll begin. Today's date is September 24, 2020. My name is Tina Madison-White and I am talking with Keith Robinette. Keith was born in 1966 in Bristol, Tennessee. His preferred pronouns are he, him and Keith has been living in Asheville for five years. Keith how are you?

Keith Robinette:

I am doing fantastic this morning. It's a lovely rainy day. But, doing really good.

Tina Madison-White:

Well fantastic. So, Keith, we're here just to get a sense of your story as a person, as a member of the LGBTQ community and let me just start by saying when you tell your story to someone, where do you like to start?

Keith Robinette:

I mean, for me I start at the beginning. So I'm a very emotional person. So I may cry, so I'll try to keep it [inaudible 00:01:02] together. But I think that 00:01:00my journey to where I'm at today has ... it's different and sometimes for me it helps for me to start at the beginning. Growing up in the South, with a very religious southern Baptist family and trying to experience what I went through growing up and then transitioning as I got older. So I think it's important to talk about what it was like as I grew up in the rural South, small town. Transitioning to different environments, and ending up here in Asheville which has opened up doors for me to be more accepting of myself. So I think that that's crucial to start at the beginning.

Tina Madison-White:

Okay. But let's start at the beginning.

Keith Robinette:

Start at the beginning. So like I said, so I was born in Bristol and then within 00:02:00a year we had moved to the small town Roachville which my parents still live in the same house. So, grew up like I said in a very religious family. My dad is a deacon we went to church every time the doors were open. We were always there. ... understand a lot. But I always knew that I was different early on because even before we went to kindergarten and everybody was talking about the girl next door I was attracted to the boy next door. So, I didn't really understand those dynamics. I even remember writing a little note to my next door neighbor do you like me? I like you. So, it was very different and I never really 00:03:00understood what was going on with me.

Keith Robinette:

As I grew up in this going to church everyday I did start to hear the preacher talk a lot about homosexuality. It seemed like it was every other service dealt with homosexuality and the sin. In the beginning I didn't really understand what they were talking about. My mom and dad were very closed off to that. They were homophobic. So, I never really fully understood what it meant and what I was feeling. As I went through grade school it was the same thing. I was always more interested in the boys than I was with the girls, even though I was supposed to have a girlfriend. That was the normalcy of life.

Keith Robinette:

The first experience that I really had was when I was in the seventh grade and I 00:04:00remember I was in the hall and at that time seventh grade started with high school. I remember running up and down the hall and I had on this little outfit that my momma had made me and it was polyester bell bottomed pants with a little vest that matched. I was running down the hallway and one of the older kids said, "Look at that faggot running down the hallway." So it just hit me and I didn't know what that meant. I had no clue, so I actually started talking to my mom. Then that started the whole process of, "Well that's about gay people. That's a sin and you shouldn't live that life, you shouldn't want to be that life." So I had that thought process when I went into high school in eighth grade.

Keith Robinette:

Then when I got into high school it was probably the worst four years of my life. I was teased a lot. I was bullied because I was different. I was a little 00:05:00bit more effeminate. I started hearing more about being called gay and faggot. So all of that stuff started to really hit home with me, even though I still had all of these feelings and still attracted to the boys in the neighborhood. It was at that period that coming from a religious background, I went through phases of really bad depression and just prayed to God to end my life so I didn't have to deal with this because I didn't understand and I didn't want to be scrutinized and made fun of. But I didn't know how to stop it.

Keith Robinette:

So, it was just a really dark time for me. Always feeling different. I was very introverted, afraid of everything. Afraid of somebody going to beat me up or 00:06:00continue to the bullying. So I was very afraid to go to school everyday. So I started to have girlfriends and hoping that that would help. And it still didn't. I still had the same feelings and it was just for show and I started at that point with some people in the neighborhood having that experimentation with some of the boys in the neighborhood. I enjoyed it, but it scared me at the same time. It was like, "Why am I doing this? This is wrong. This is against the Bible. This is sin." So it just really left a mark on me. Growing up in that religious background in that small town and small minded people, I really wished 00:07:00at that point that I was dead.

Keith Robinette:

So, it was just a long process to get through that. Then when I went to college and started college I started to come out, not come out a little bit, but started to be more myself. I started to stop noticing slurs or language against being gay. So it didn't affect me as bad. When I was in college I had my first gay experience and in that moment completely freaked me out. I went home and I took four or five baths and I was like, "This is so dirty. This is so wrong. I can't live this life because it was a really bad experience." And so, in that 00:08:00moment I pushed it all away. It was shortly after that, that I met my ex-wife. I just went home and I said, "This is the girl I'm going to marry." To myself I'm like, "I finally broke the cycle. I can change. I can live the normal life that you're supposed to live."

Keith Robinette:

So we got married and it was just an absolute horrible experience. She was not a very nice woman. She's still not a nice woman. Very controlling. Really just messed with my head. So over the course of a couple of years all of the barriers started to break down and I just started to feel extremely lost, unwanted, 00:09:00unloved. And didn't know what direction to go. As I was driving back and forth to work everyday I started passing a car on the other side of the road. In that car there was a guy and everyday that we passed for about two weeks he would stare at me. And I was like, "That's really weird, what is happening?" Then he started flashing his brake lights. It intrigued me because I didn't really understand what it was really all about because I didn't know what cruising was. I didn't know what all of that was about.

Keith Robinette:

So we actually wound up at a gas station at the same time and he just introduced himself and started talking. We started to build this friendship and then one 00:10:00day it just happened and he invited me to his house. I went to his house. There was a sexual interaction with us and it was the first guy that I had really kissed that was gay and in that moment it was just like I had this sense that came over me and it was like this is who I am. So I had to deal with a lot of struggling with that being married and having these feelings. So I had the discussion with my ex-wife at the time and it wasn't, "I'm gay, I'm leaving you tomorrow." It's, "I've met this man and I think that I'm gay." So we went to counseling and it was gay counselors. I mean it wasn't gay counselors it was Christian counselors is where we wound up going.

Keith Robinette:

At that point my ex-wife would never accept any of her wrongs. It was all me and it's the fact that I was gay and I was destroying our marriage. So, none of the 00:11:00counselors would continue conversations with me and after three or four they all said, "If you're going to be gay, if you're going to continue this path we're not going to have this conversation." So, I continued on and at that point conversations with my ex-wife is like, "I don't know if I can stay married. How are you going to feel being married to a gay man?" It was just very awkward. Then a couple months after I came out to her, I came out to my family. So everybody knew and then a couple of months later she became pregnant. That started to compound even more of, "Oh, my gosh now I'm married, I'm having children. And then she didn't tell me until a couple of months after, probably the second trimester that she had went to her doctor to get on fertility pills 00:12:00to get pregnant so I wouldn't leave her." That's the reason that we have twins.

Keith Robinette:

So that just compounded everything even more. So now I felt very trapped and I always wanted children and never thought that I really would because I was never attracted to a woman, really. I never thought that I would be able to have any type of sexual relationship with a woman due to that. So, the thought of being a father was fantastic and it was so overpowering to me. But at the same time, where I was at in life it was not a good place for me to be able to enjoy that. I still continued to see the guy that I had met behind her back. So it was just that secret and all of the other stuff compounded. I got to a point to where I could no longer eat. I had to have home healthcare come into hook me up to IV's 00:13:00because I couldn't even keep water down. I began going through a cycle of self-mutilation. I was smoking so I would burn myself with cigarettes. I would punch walls. I was just so overwrought with so much trauma, I didn't know what else to do so I just self-punished myself.

Keith Robinette:

And so after the girls were born I had the discussion with my ex-wife and I was like, "Either I'm going to stay or I'm going to leave. I'm not going to wait four or five years. I'm not going to ... we have to make a decision." So a couple of weeks after my daughters were born I left. And so that caused a huge disruption within my family. I lost a lot of family members. My mom and dad were not accepting of it at all. I was the abomination at that point. They loved me, 00:14:00but I was an abomination and I was going to hell. I was never going to have a life. I was going to wind up dead. I would never have friends. I would be a very lonely existence for myself.

Keith Robinette:

And dealing with that, within about six months of dealing with coming out feeling like a failure as a father because I left my children behind, I tried to commit suicide because I didn't think it was worth going on. So, in that process I wound up of course in a mental institution because of the suicide attempt and I started to finally look at things a little bit different. I realized that I 00:15:00had to start accepting who I was. The journey to get there was still a long way off, but I was gay. I had to come to terms with that. It did not mean that I was a bad father. I was still a good husband, I was a good son. I had two daughters to live for.

Keith Robinette:

So that started the journey to transition, to start having some acceptance of being gay. I slowly started to develop some friendships with gay men which is something that it was very different. Unfortunately, the guy that I was with and the same guy that I had been with while I was married, we were together after I 00:16:00divorced. The experience that I had with him coming out was not a great experience because he took me to every [inaudible 00:16:17] side of being a gay man. He's the one that showed me about the cruising and the hookups and three ways and that was what I had always thought being gay was all about. It was a sex thing, that if you're gay, especially a gay man it's sex, sex, sex and that's all your life revolves around. And so that was my experience coming out was it's exactly what I thought it was. It's just sex and I never thought that I would ever make friends because I didn't want to sleep with everybody to become their friend. Unfortunately, that's where it was in the beginning. Started 00:17:00abusing alcohol quite a bit. Still continued to burn myself because I still just didn't understand the dynamics of what was going on.

Keith Robinette:

So I mean life started to slowly turn around. I started to find friends who were accepting. I did find a few gay men that supported me. I found a lot of females and even their husbands, they were accepting of my lifestyle. Didn't care. Didn't matter. I was who I was. I was a good father. I was a good friend and it didn't matter to them that I was gay. So, they started to help me with that transition piece of okay. It's really okay. Sorry, my nose is running. So, they started to help me to start believing in myself and I never really even thought 00:18:00that I was different at that point. I was just who I was. I didn't notice people saying anything negative. I didn't notice the gay remarks. It just wasn't a part of my life at that point.

Keith Robinette:

So I started to feel really good. I wasn't in a relationship. Started to really focus on myself and so then things really started to turn around after that. And as my kids were growing, becoming getting older, they started saying things that made me realize that I was a good person, I was a good father. One of my really emotional experiences was my daughters were five and I had the flu. So it was the first Christmas since they had been born that I wasn't going to be able to 00:19:00see them. At that point I was transitioning between jobs so I didn't have a lot of money. So, talking to them I was like, "I'm not going to be able to buy you a lot of things and I'm probably going to miss Christmas." And so they were on the phone, sorry.

Tina Madison-White:

It's okay.

Keith Robinette:

And they were like, "It doesn't matter. Our best Christmas would just be for you to be here." So, that really touched my heart and to them it didn't matter. They didn't know what gay was their selves either. But it didn't matter. I loved them, they loved me. So that really started this path of self acceptance. I say 00:20:00a lot that we helped save our children, but my children helped save me. So, as we progressed I always still found that there was something missing. One of those pieces was Logan and so we've been together for 16 years. He was the first person who wanted me to just be myself, be the real me. It didn't matter about having the perfect body or super blonde hair or tanned or whatever. He just wanted me to be my natural self. So through him I started to build that persona as well and so that was missing. I always needed to be superficial and it was 00:21:00super blonde hair and a tanned body and going to the gym all the time. To him that wasn't important. He wanted me to take out the colored contacts and take all that stuff off and just be raw and be myself.

Keith Robinette:

So that helped me to my journey when my daughters were 14 to actually come out to them. Because I started and I always felt that I needed to be honest with them because I always told them to never hold back. Be honest, you can tell me anything. Nothing is going to bother me. So I did finally tell my ex-wife who didn't ever want them to know that it was time. The reason being is we started watching television and there started to be shows to come on where fathers were coming out to their daughters and issues that were coming on of coming out. As 00:22:00we would watch these shows I would see them watch television and then they would look at me. Then they would watch television. So I knew they were starting to wonder because I wasn't with another woman. Hadn't been with another woman. They always told me, "We don't want you to be with another woman because we want you all to ourselves, so we don't to have to compete with somebody else's time."

Keith Robinette:

So I knew it was time to tell them and I was nervous, stressed me out because I was afraid they wouldn't love me. So we had a weekend together. We were driving around and I was like, "We got to pull over." So we pulled over and they were like, "What's the matter?" I was like, "Well I just needed to talk to you for a minute." And of course at that minute I just broke down. I was crying everywhere and they were like, "What is wrong?" And they were crying. I was like, "Well, there's something I need to tell you to be honest and I'm gay." And it was just 00:23:00a split second and they were like, "We don't care. You're a fantastic dad and we love you. We want you be happy. We do not care at all." And so we all just cried for a bit and we hugged and we drove off and they both looked at me and said, "Yeah we knew two years ago. We were just waiting for you to tell us."

Keith Robinette:

So that was like that piece that was gone. The burden was gone. I started to find peace. I was so happy they met Logan. We took our first vacation together. We went to Florida and we bonded as a family and my kids have just embraced it, loved it. I mean we went to school they were just like, "Oh, look my dad he's 00:24:00guy." They were like, "Oh, he's so great. We love our dad he's so much fun." So they helped me to realize that it wasn't bad. It wasn't bad. So, my kids accepting me and loving me it didn't matter if anybody else in the world did. I mean I had Logan. I had my daughters. Life was really great. My parents were still not there. Logan wasn't allowed to come to my parent's home. My dad still just could not handle the fact of me being gay.

Keith Robinette:

So that was hard on Logan and he was like, "I don't understand why I can't go to your house that you can come to my house." Because his family was totally different. They just welcomed me with open arms and it was a great experience with his side of the family and he couldn't understand and really disliked my parents, which is understandable. I mean he wasn't allowed to step foot in their house.

Keith Robinette:

So, as we continued to go and the girls graduated and Logan came to graduations and all of that. So he participated with what he could. As we continued when my kids turned 18 we took our first trip to go to Athens. This was the first time that we lived away because his family is from Knoxville. So that was our first time moving away and was an okay experience. We didn't like Athens. It wasn't our place. Then this Asheville store, because the reason we moved is because of my work. So, the store here in Asheville opened and it was like, "Let's move to Asheville. It'll be the area we're both close to home." So we moved. During that process my daughter Sierra was my first daughter to get married and her husband called me and did the whole thing of, "I'd like to ask for your daughter's hand," which I thought was really cool. Because he and his family are extreme 00:26:00Republicans. So I was like, "I don't know if he would ever accept me." But for him to even come to that point to ask me for her hand in marriage.

Keith Robinette:

So her getting married changed a lot and that's why I say my daughters have done so much to transition thoughts. So when my daughter was planning her wedding, of course she's like, "Logan's coming, correct?" I said, "Yes." And I was like, "Well I don't know how your papaw is going to feel about it." So Sierra had a conversation and said, "Logan's coming to the wedding. He's just he's our stepdad. I want him to be there." She told me dad, "You can either accept that 00:27:00or not come and I want you to be there, but Logan is going to be there as well." And that changed my dad's perspective a little bit. I don't really know if he was just trying in the moment just to be supportive of Sierra. But he called the year my daughter got married and asked Logan to come to Easter.

Keith Robinette:

So that's the first time my dad ever had reached out and he actually asked Logan. It wasn't through me. When he was there my dad had conversations with him and as he left he was like, "Logan's really not a bad person. I like him." So I was blown away at that moment. I was like totally unexpected and even said the same thing when Sierra got married because Logan came and he helped and he was serving food. My dad invited him to spend the night because he had to drive back 00:28:00to Knoxville. So that was a total different view of my father who is so Southern Baptist, of being ... and he may not be 100% accepting of it, but he still asks about Logan. "How's Logan doing?" Even to this day. So my daughter helped transition his thought process that Logan's really not a bad person.

Keith Robinette:

Of course my daughter Taylor she's my wild child. She's very much into colored hair and tattoos and her and her husband have always been accepting. When she got married she's just a supporter. She came last year, was after 53 years, last year was the first time that I had ever attended a Pride. So she came with her husband and friends and they came down to support me to be a part of Pride. So 00:29:00Taylor has always been an extremely supportive child. Sierra is slowly transitioning a little bit because I think of the influence with her husband and all of the Republican side that she has to hear. She's become a little bit more standoffish. But still loves me and still communicates. But it's been a little bit different of a struggle with her.

Keith Robinette:

Of course we have two grandkids, so she's had two of our grandkids. We have a 19 month-old grandson and a two-month old granddaughter. So they're just precious. So, as I continue on, so there was still something that was missing. I had my daughters. I had a job that at that point really loved. I had Logan, but there 00:30:00was still something missing. I didn't really understand what it was until we have met this phenomenal group of friends and we call ourselves the seven dwarfs because there's seven of us. We did have two more, but they have unfortunately moved away. But, they have created this amazing support system and knowing these five people that make our group seven, the two that have moved on, they have brought the sense of pride in me because they are who they are. They live their life everyday just being who they are and they just love and accept and want 00:31:00people to be the best. And this group came to my daughter Taylor's wedding.

Keith Robinette:

There we were, seven gay men in a little small town for a wedding of my daughter. It was the most amazing experience. My mom and dad came and met them all, talked with them all. Never had anything negative to say about them and to have a group of gay men who I never thought that I would have a friendships like this to support me in a way to travel and spend a weekend, rent a cabin and have just this amazing time. So, as I've journeyed through my life and I've seen and heard of how being gay and what your life is going to be, it's really not that 00:32:00way. It's the same as everybody else. Struggles are the same. The happiness are the same. Our life experiences may be different, but the outcome is basically the same. We're normal. We love, we laugh and we enjoy life. And I think for me finally having this group of friends has completed that circle for me.

Keith Robinette:

I'm becoming very proud of who I am. I'm not perfect. I'll never be perfect. But I know that I am a good person and I am a good father and I'm becoming a strong, gay man. But above all else, I just feel like I'm a good human and I think that 00:33:00really comes from one person and that's Butch [inaudible 00:33:25]. He's just been a really strong inspiration. He's truly an amazing human being and I'm fortunate to have met him because he is one of the few people that has changed my life, all for the better.

Keith Robinette:

So even last year I was taken back a little bit when I went to Pride for the 00:34:00first time. There was somebody walking around and I think they were talking about the rural history at that point. There was a woman and she was walking around and she was like, "Can we sign you up to get your story?" I was like, "Sure I would love to be able to talk about my story." She's like, "So are you here?" I was like, "Yes it's my first time coming out. I mean coming out to Pride. My daughter is here and her and her husband." She said, "Oh, you have children?" I said, "Yes." And she said, "Okay, I'm sorry for that." I'm like, "I'm not sorry that I have children." She said, "Well I really would like to hear your story as long as it's not a heteronormative gay story." So, I was 00:35:00like, "But what does that mean? I mean yes I was married, but I've always been gay. This is just how my life went." She pushed me off, which upset me in that moment because I'm like if we're building a sense of community my story shouldn't mean that I'm not valued because it was different.

Keith Robinette:

Because I felt that way when I first started coming out because I noticed that a lot of gay men that I would talk to once they found out that I had been married and had children, then they didn't really want to get to know me. So that started to make me feel very excluded in that moment from being gay because okay, I was married and then I felt excluded for being in the straight world and 00:36:00now I'm excluded for being in the gay world because I was married and had children. So that took me back a little bit to have that experience the first time I was at Pride. But eventually that just went away and it is what it is. My story is my story. It's not going to change. My experiences has brought me to the point where I'm at today. I'm at peace. I am proud of who I am and I look forward to what's to come because I think there's still so much life out there to experience and I have a loving family. I have a loving husband. I have loving friends and life right now is really great, other than the pandemic. Other than that everything is fantastic. So that's my story.

Tina Madison-White:

A beautiful story. I have to tell you yesterday my wife and I were interviewing 00:37:00for our story, but in a very different context. I published a book and-

Keith Robinette:

I do apologize, I can't hear you very well.

Tina Madison-White:

You can't hear me?

Keith Robinette:

I can't. It's gotten softer than it was before.

Tina Madison-White:

Yeah I think I know why. Let me play with the recording settings just a second. Audio, microphone. Is this any better?

Keith Robinette:

No, it's still real light. That's really odd.

Tina Madison-White:

Let's try that. Is that any better?

Keith Robinette:

Mm-mm (negative). We just had difficult getting this thing going haven't we?

Tina Madison-White:

Well importantly, God I hope ... Now how's this?

Keith Robinette:

Mm-mm (negative).

Tina Madison-White:

Doggone it. I'm testing the microphone. I wonder if you've got the volume on your phone turned down, because it's showing that it's working at this end.

Keith Robinette:

Ah, now say something to me.

Tina Madison-White:

No I'm getting-

Keith Robinette:

There you go.

Tina Madison-White:

Is that better?

Keith Robinette:

It must have turned itself off because I hadn't touched it.

Tina Madison-White:

Yeah we originally connected on the cellphone and in fact, 25 minutes into the 00:39:00interview I suddenly realized we were still on the phone and I think that that may have ... But you may get when we send you the transcript, there were about five seconds when I couldn't hear you and then your voice cut back in. I don't know if that was just my computer or if we lost the recording. But if you get that you'll probably know what words to insert in there and we can at least put them into the transcript.

Keith Robinette:

Okay.

Tina Madison-White:

But a couple of things and then we'll get back to a couple of questions. And by the way, it'll be up to you. We can always cut this part out if you feel it's not relevant to the story or you can leave it in. Yeah when I heard about that incident at the festival I was furious and we had a bit of a meeting about that. 00:40:00I do want to apologize personally. Sadly, I think we have even in our own community, which just disappoints me, prejudice and judgment and you would think our community of all would get how hurtful that is. So it led to quite a discussion. So I'm glad that you persevered because your story is incredible. It's hard to say it was yesterday my wife and I were interviewed for a very different purpose. I published a book about my story and so they were interviewing the two of us about our story.

Tina Madison-White:

Listening to you, almost word for word even you use the word transition and I 00:41:00felt like ... you were talking about your children and the pain I felt with my children. It's so similar and what I find behind all that is that is why we need to have a great variety of stories is I think in that we discover we all share humanity and it's the same struggle for acceptance and a sense of self worth. But anyway, I just had to that was very beautiful. Let me ask a few more pointed questions or specific questions. You mentioned in your intake form that you think one of the most important priorities in the LGBTQ community is to build a stronger sense of community. Could you tell me more what you're thinking?

Keith Robinette:

I think that's what we we were talking about earlier with there's still some different prejudices that are out there. I mean when people are sharing their experiences or whatever. Even life's journey they're taking right now, I still see that we still turn our heads to certain things. We don't accept certain things. I know as we transition and there's the pronouns and all the different things that define who we are, I think that sometimes that can turn switches off. This community already has its built in struggles and whether it's political, religious whatever. Those struggles are there, have been there and unfortunately will probably always be there. But if our community as a whole is 00:43:00not there to rally and empower and to accept this is who you are, we love you exactly the way you are. We're here to strengthen you, empower you, support you, then the community is always going to be fragmented.

Keith Robinette:

For me I think that's why it's really crucial. We all have different stories. We come from so many different backgrounds, political, economic, whatever. We all have different experiences to share and I think it's important that we as a community just rally behind each other. Just looking at the tea dances that started or you needed the support groups that are better out there whether it's WinCAP or just people in general. The older community, the younger community that are coming out. What are we doing to really support them? To help them in their journey whether they're coming up or whatever their life is. So I think 00:44:00that's why it's important about the community is that we're really there to show that we've got each other's back.

Tina Madison-White:

Have you ever personally had to struggle with, even if only temporary, with accepting perhaps some of the other letters of the alphabet or other groups that are within our community?

Keith Robinette:

So that's a really good question. When I was first coming out and started going to the bars I guess for the first few times going to the gay bars that were in Knoxville, I had bad experiences with a few lesbians. They were very much into your face. They were very confrontational and at that point I was scared of 00:45:00lesbians. So I really didn't. So I guess to your point, I pushed myself back from that aspect of our community. Once again it really wasn't until I got to Asheville that that perspective changed. I had a woman that worked with me, Gale and her wife and she invited me to tea dances. I started meeting Rosie and Alicia and other people. I realized that that was just my few experiences.

Keith Robinette:

So that was an experience but that's not how everyone is. So, that changed that perspective. And then meeting Jessica, I had never met anyone who was transgendered. But it was amazing to me. I was just like, "You're really going. You're accepting who you are. You're going with what you need to do." I never viewed her any differently. So I think as I've gone through I've started to meet more of the letters in our community. It was just that one that took me that was difficult for me at the beginning to get around. But no, not now. I love them 00:47:00all. I'm just like woo, I want to squeeze them.

Tina Madison-White:

What about I'm curious when I talk to gay, lesbian, transgender, people of a certain age and we talk about younger members of the community, particularly those who identify as queer and introducing new language and ideas and challenging a lot of old ones. What's been your personal experience and exposure to that part of the community?

Keith Robinette:

I haven't had a whole lot of experience with that side. Now some of my daughter Taylor's friends they go with different pronouns and I'm almost 55. So some of 00:48:00it I don't understand. So it takes me awhile. I think it's maybe just to get a better understanding of it and an explanation of getting to know more about that from individuals. But I really don't know a whole lot or had a lot of experiences with it. And then I always wonder if I said the wrong thing. Did they go by this pronoun? Did I say the wrong thing? Is it going to stress me out because I didn't use the correct one? But no I haven't had a lot of experience with that yet, other than what I've seen on TV. But I've not personally had that experience.

Tina Madison-White:

Okay. There's been a lot of discussion in the past few months about racial equity, racial inclusion and well it's focused on race I think and that of other 00:49:00ethnic religious. In your experience of the community, I mean the people you've hung out with or the bars you've been to, what has been your experience of the degree or lack of inclusivity or integration in western North Carolina and eastern Tennessee of the LGBTQ community?

Keith Robinette:

I'm so sorry. I heard the first ... So you're talking about the inclusion of friends and how that have I?

Tina Madison-White:

In your personal experience, meaning whether it's the bars you've hung out at or the friends or the festivals, I was curious how you would describe the LGBTQ community in terms of does it feel diverse? Does it feel inclusive or does it 00:50:00feel very segregated? Does it feel accepting?

Keith Robinette:

I think there's various components to it. I think there is a point that I feel that there's inclusiveness. I don't sense a whole lot of racially motivated within the group as far as ethnic to me and my experiences to the friends when I came out. I think that sometimes for me, going to bars, I think sometimes even the gay bars sometimes want to pull themselves back in. So they themselves creates their own form of not being inclusive, if that makes sense. I think that there becomes this competition, "Well I want you to come here. I want you to come here and we're going to do this." And the group of people that go to this 00:51:00bar don't want to go to the other bar and they're going to say something about that bar. So that in its own way starts to divide the community because we should be able to support all the establishments that are here to help it grow. So for me that's the only thing that they start this nitpicking like, "Oh, I can't believe you've gone there. I can't believe you supported that when we're supporting this." So I think that's where I've seen that part come from. I don't think there's anything about not being inclusive. I think it's more of it's almost like when you're growing up and you have these niches of people and their little clan and they're just together.

Keith Robinette:

When I first started coming or when we first moved to Asheville I didn't see that. But it seems like now as it's progressing over the last couple of years it's starting to have these little bitty subgroups that are I'm only going to support this place and everything that they support, but I'm not really going to 00:52:00branch out and support everything that's a part of the community if that makes sense.

Tina Madison-White:

Mm-hmm (affirmative). Now that you're living in Asheville do you feel generally, now moving beyond the LGBTQ community, but just roaming around the city working in your store. Do you feel generally at ease?

Keith Robinette:

Absolutely. When we moved here after a year or so Asheville reminds me of Key West in the mountains. I mean I never feel threatened and the reason I say that is because it's always nervous when you move to a new place. I mean you're always wondering what's going on. I remember when I was first moved here and was hiring people for my store I was hiring over at the Asheville mall. I was sitting outside smoking and somebody who worked in the mall was standing outside 00:53:00with me. We were just talking and talking about how I just moved here. And I remember his comment was, "Well you'll really get to love Asheville because if you think you're weird or different, behind you is somebody who's even weirder and more different and behind them is even more weird, but we all just accept and move on. And to the point that we don't care that they're different. We support their difference.

Keith Robinette:

So I think that's just been the experience. I think that you can ... it is, you can be who you are. I mean there's always going to be those one offs, but I've never felt unsafe here. It's probably the first place that I've lived that I 00:54:00feel completely accepted and I think that a lot of that comes from the people because I've met some really great people at the bar, outside of the bar. But, it's just a different caliber of people here. I mean they're really about the community and they really love and support each other. So no, I've never felt uncomfortable here. I've always felt very at peace.

Tina Madison-White:

So I'm intrigued that you mentioned that it was last year that you went to your first Pride festival?

Keith Robinette:

Yes.

Tina Madison-White:

There's a lot of debate, there's been a lot of debate in the past year whether Pride festivals should be events of protest. Whether they should be more focused on celebration and community outreach and connectedness or whether they should 00:55:00be more focused on pointing out issues, yet unresolved. There's also been discussions about who should and shouldn't be at a Pride festival. Just based on your experience, how important is a festival to you or that kind of an event and what would you change or what do you like to see at them?

Keith Robinette:

So, last year was my first festival and unfortunately my first festival I was having a kidney stone. So I couldn't fully wrap my hand around the whole event because I wasn't there, able to stay that long. The reason I had never gone is work always seemed to keep me from being able to go when they were having Pride 00:56:00celebrations. But I was always nervous and afraid to go. I didn't really have a group of people. I mean when we were in Knoxville it was just basically Logan and I. So we didn't go because it was just the two of us. So, meeting our group of friends here they really are involved in Pride, so they're the reasons that I went. And to me it was really great because it is a celebration about this community. So, to me it's important. I mean going forward I want to be able to attend every event that I can because it does make you feel like a part of the community and you're very accepted and it doesn't matter what you look like. It doesn't matter where you come from. It's just there to celebrate and support and reach out and show that we love each other. Love wins. This is what the community is about.

Keith Robinette:

And there's always going to be that political side and there's always going to 00:57:00be some unrest that comes with it. But for me I love the celebration part of it. I don't think we do that throughout the year, but I think if you're here, like my daughter coming and her friends, they're celebrating. They personally are not a part of the LGBTQ community. But they support it and I think for those people who are coming to celebrate whether it's your dad, your friend whatever. So to me the politics are something that we can look at a different day. I think we need that day to just let loose and celebrate this is who we are. This is me and we're going to celebrate it today because tomorrow could be totally different. So let's celebrate it and enjoy it today.

Tina Madison-White:

Okay. When you think of your generation what do you hope future generations or 00:58:00younger people today know or think about your generation in the LGBTQ movement? What do you feel your place is and what do you feel might be misunderstood?

Keith Robinette:

So I think that coming from ... Like I said growing up it's not like it is now. I mean there is more acceptance. So I think that still needs to be the progression of this acceptance piece because it wasn't that way in the 70s and 80s. I mean you really had to be closeted, especially in certain areas where you 00:59:00lived. You really couldn't be yourself. You had to guard yourself and I guess for me even looking at my generation I have met and talked to people who still can't live their truth, who are still married. They go out on the side to do whatever they need to do and you see that they still have that little bit of misery and unhappiness because they can't live their truth because they are afraid of it. I think that's the difference in the generation that I grew up, the people that can't live their truth are still in that miserable state. And I hope that my children, well especially Taylor hopefully Sierra, are just really supporting people and it's like, "Okay, so you're gay? Okay." It's just a normal.

Keith Robinette:

I would love to be able to get to the point because you don't have to run out 01:00:00and say, "Hey I'm straight. My name is." So it really shouldn't be we have to run out and say, "Oh, I'm gay and this is my name. Accept me and let's just move on." That it just becomes an afterthought. It shouldn't be something that you have to announce to the world, not that there's anything wrong with that. But I think that that's where I would love for the generation and my grandchildren as they grow up, that that's really not anything that's major. You are just who you are. Oh, this is your husband? Great. Oh, this is your wife? Great. And it's just normal. I think that that's where I hope that it will go and that people ... I mean it took me a long time. It took me a long journey to be in my 50s to come to at peace and be happy and have this realization.

Keith Robinette:

I think for the young people that are coming up is that I hope you don't have to 01:01:00go through that long of a struggle. I look at how much of my life was spent, over half over of being in struggle and turmoil and unhappiness. I hope that they don't have to go through that. That they can self accept and they can just be who they are and even the generation that's for me I hope that they find the strength and the power within themselves to be themselves so they can leave this life happy as well and feeling whole and being themselves.

Tina Madison-White:

I'd never thought about this before, but let me just ask two questions. One, if you were to go, I'm going back to festivals for a minute as just a test case. If 01:02:00the you 20 years ago who felt unaccepted, that your life, your job all those things were at risk, would you have gone to a festival wanting something different than what you just described today? Would the you of 20 years ago felt differently about festivals?

Keith Robinette:

I don't know. That's a good question. I don't think that I would because I even remember the friends, the people that I knew that went to Pride, they would always talk about how energizing it was to go. I just personally was too afraid 01:03:00to go there. I think if it's 20 years ago and I went, I think my journey to self acceptance would have been quicker and I think I would have found a stronger sense of community and I wouldn't have felt alone. I think that that for me is what Pride does, is it helps you realize that you're not alone. And I think you could start to build and you can find those people that have similar stories. Like for me I would love if there was a group of men who have been married who came out who have children to where there's a group to where we could get together to discuss it. And we can talk about our lives and our experiences. I think that that would help grow this community as well. I know I'm going off subject. But I think that at Pride you could have found those people. I could 01:04:00have found those people 20 years ago if I had went to a Pride. I would have eventually found those people who had similar life experiences to myself and my self acceptance journey would have started quicker.

Tina Madison-White:

The reason I was curious about it, when I moved here one of my chief concerns was how siloed the LGBTQ community seemed to be and there were all these separate groups and cliques. A lot of that I feel is manageable. I can see ways to connect people. The one that continues to concern me is the divide between haves and have nots. People who feel they're living on the edge, some of whom are homeless. Some of whom still feel very at risk. When I talk to them fairly 01:05:00or not, what's in their mind is they feel unsupported by people who are feeling more comfortable and we could debate whether they're separating themselves or not. But I was just curious, are there things that we can or should be doing as a community to support people who probably are still struggling or for acceptance and to be able to be out?

Keith Robinette:

I believe, I mean to me I think there's still a ways to go. I mean I can even see myself at that point as well. It's what you were just talking about because I think that we do sometimes go through normal life with a little bit of a 01:06:00blinder on, even if we're like, "Oh, I'm accepting and I'm whatever and I'm out to build." But I think there's still always a little bit of a blinder. So, to your point the homeless population or the youth who may be out there I think sometimes we, not all, but I think there is that tendency to bypass them and not realizing that they have a story and they have a struggle. So I think that that is a part that we could look at of how do we support this group who doesn't feel supported or they don't really know what to do because who knows? They could be a homeless youth who got kicked out of their home or whatever because of being gay and we just look past them. So is that going to be a statistic because they get to the point to where they feel like suicide is the only option? And I think 01:07:00that that is crucial.

Keith Robinette:

I've been through that mentality of suicide and feeling this is the only way that I can get out of this. This is the only way that I can feel and end my suffering. And I think that we sometimes forget about that. The struggle is still real. There's still people everyday who struggle and it's finding the right groups to be able to handle that. I mean I don't know how to start something like that. I mean you can always get involved because there's programs through Pride and Blue Ridge Pride and different things to become involved in. Maybe that's something that we as a community really look at. What other opportunities can we do to support that? What groups can go out and we go out 01:08:00and try to help the community. Have a membership draft, I don't know. But I think that there are a lot of people who still struggle that we unfortunately do let go by the wayside.

Keith Robinette:

I mean, like for me when I go out, so normally when we're out I mean I'm just out with my group of friends. So I don't really look around. I mean I'm just focused on this little group, even though Butch is really strong and he's always wanting to be a part of building community. Sometimes that blinder just goes I'm focused on this. There's so much more that we can focus on everyday and to help us continue to grow. Does that make sense?

Tina Madison-White:

It makes a world of sense.

Keith Robinette:

But I do think that we overlook certain parts of the community without realizing it.

Tina Madison-White:

Yeah. Okay, well was there anything else you wanted to cover that we haven't? 01:09:00We've certainly ranged broad and far.

Keith Robinette:

No. I mean, it's been great for me and to be able to share my story. I've been through so many different experiences and sometimes I feel like I'm by myself a lot because of those experiences. But community, this community here and I'll keep really stressing that for me, this community here in Asheville has been a blessing. I've learned a lot. I've met a lot of people. I've grown a lot and 01:10:00truly helped me to accept this journey that I'm on and be proud of it. So, I always think that there's a reason for everything. So I am a religious person. I believe things happen for a reason. I got married for a reason because I wanted children. It didn't work out, but things grow. We move on. And I was brought here to Asheville for a reason. There was a part of my life that was missing and that part was filled by Butch and Tim and Christopher and Johnny and Charles and Gabriel. Those people are my family and that's amazing for me at 50 years old just to meet this amazing group of people.

Keith Robinette:

To be involved in this amazing community that is here and I really look forward 01:11:00to my journey as I continue on because I feel that I can still grow. I can grow from meeting and getting to know someone like you and helping me to find my way in Blue Ridge Pride. Is there something that I can do to help you through Blue Ridge Pride? Like I mentioned earlier I would love to be able to have a group to where I can sit down with other gay men who have been married, have children, been divorced and it not be a heteronormative story. It's just your story and have those people who understand where I'm coming from. So, I look forward to the journey and I'm excited about the journey, what's to come in the future. I think it's going to be great. I think we have a lot of things to celebrate.

Tina Madison-White:

Fantastic. Keith, thank you so much for sharing your life with us today.

Keith Robinette:

Well thank you so much for listening.

Tina Madison-White:

And-

Keith Robinette:

What?