Episode Transcript
Speaker 0 00:00:00 We, uh, we were in a saloon. I know that's hard to believe. Visualize, visualize a brand new saloon. That's a rock in place in grand Rapids, Minnesota. What have you, you can't be in a more rock and place than that Canyon. We walked in and there were two seats left in the whole place they had just put in this beautiful, great, big horseshoe shaped bar and all these nice bulls and stuff. And it's wide open. Everybody is a part of everybody's conversation in there and they've got 64 taps on the wall and they've got two seats. We walk in, sit down McKayla and Valerie, two young women, late thirties sitting next to us, chatting, chatting pretty soon. You know, a little bit of chatter from our side goes to them and they comment a little bit and, and they're hitting it pretty hard. These two and the one, one girl says, you know, I get to go out about every three months cause uh, my husband works hard and he's a firefighter.
Speaker 0 00:01:16 I don't do this often, but I do it. I said, Oh, good, good for you. And uh, she says, uh, so, uh, McKayla, what, uh, what is it with you? What do you, uh, what are you? And I said, Oh, um, well, uh, trans gender, female. I said, I'm female. And, uh, yeah, explain that a little bit. You know, and as I start explaining it to her and best I could, and um, she said, I got a real problem. And I said, what's your problem? She said, well, I'm not supposed to like you. And I said, what, what do you mean? You're not supposed to like me? She says, well, my family says, I'm not supposed to, like you, my church says, I'm not supposed to like you. And I said, what do deal like me? She said, yeah, that's the problem I got. And then she went and threw up in the parking lot.
Speaker 1 00:02:44 You're listening to sound mind where queer voices across Minnesota explore mental health through art. I'm Jane Ramsay, R Miller artistic director of one voice mixed chorus. Minnesota is lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, straight allies, chorus. We acknowledge that sound mind is produced. And our 120 singers reside on the sacred traditional lands of the Dakota and initial snobby people. Each fall. One voice takes our music to greater Minnesota to connect with queer folks and their families and communities in places where LGBTQ people may experience more isolation compared to the twin cities. But this fall, we were in the middle of a global pandemic, no choir tour folks, but we developed sound mind as a way to share stories of queer folks in greater Minnesota. For this first episode, I had a chance to sit down with McKayla Raymond and her wife, Valerie Connor in September, when they were visiting Minneapolis from their home outside of big fork, Minnesota, a town four hours North of Minneapolis at age 72, McKayla came out to her family and to the big four community as a transgender woman, she was generous enough to share her story with us.
Speaker 1 00:04:01 I met McKayla through Patricia Feld, the artistic director of the edge center for the arts in big fork. One voice performed a concert for and with big fork residents back in 2013. And I remember it well because there were officially 446 residents in big fork. And when one voice arrived with 100 singers and partners and kids, the population increased by 25% that day, we had a blast performing in the big fork community and enjoyed a huge potluck hosted by the edge theater folks. So my very first podcast phone call was to Patty asking if there was someone connected to the edge theater that might be a good fit within hours. I had a call from an actress singer in big fork, except I didn't quite understand who was calling. See McKayla has this low resonant voice. And I immediately mis-gendered her. I couldn't figure out why this seemingly straight man was interested in a queer podcast until her amazing story started to unfold.
Speaker 1 00:05:07 And I realized her name was McKayla. In spite of the pandemic, I was able to meet with McKayla and her wife, Valerie, in my backyard in Minneapolis, following Mikaela's gender confirmation surgery. This September, she was excited about the recent visit with her doctor full of energy and infectious humor and eager to share her story. We're recording outside. So you have the added benefit of hearing my neighborhood dogs, the daycare kids next door. And even my neighbors chainsaw for McKayla theater and music have been a source of joy and fulfillment. And this is how she got started
Speaker 0 00:05:47 Right after I left to patrol. And I, uh, became self-employed, uh, a woman asked she was the artistic in this town out in Wyoming and acquired director at a church. And I sang at her church. She asked me if I would be in a play. And I said, no, I don't want to do any players. I'm afraid of that stuff. She said, nah, I want you to play curly in Oklahoma. I got Lori and she is, you'll like, Lori, why don't you be curly? And I knew Oklahoma. I said, boy, I don't want to do that. L and I don't want to do that. And she's no, no. I want you to do you, you come, you come to rehearsal and you, so I went to rehearsal and, um, this wasn't too bad. Uh, Laurie was one beautiful young lady and just a pleasure to work with.
Speaker 0 00:06:39 And, uh, we started rehearsing and I, we got to opening night and, uh, company, I start see over a chair and I as curly and backstage in the wings. And I had a saddle there that I had to pick up and put on my shoulder and stroll out at a certain point after the overture was over and begin singing. Oh, what a beautiful morning. And I could feel my heart rate picking up as your overture was winding down. I wasn't sure it was going to pick that saddle up. And then the trill for, Oh, what a beautiful morning started done piano. I grabbed that thing and put it up there and I thought you got to do this because nobody else is going to go out and do it. So
Speaker 0 00:07:37 And the audience I walked out on stage and the lights were there and audience, some of them are clapping and quiet. Don, I'm singing. I'm singing here. Oh yeah. The monster was born 40 years later. I'm still doing theater now. And I was really nervous until that first, uh, response from the audience game. And then I thought, well, I got them pooled. I got them food.
Speaker 2 00:08:08 So I asked the Kayla, when did you first have a sense that your outward gender presentation didn't fit with who you are on the inside
Speaker 0 00:08:17 Up to maybe seven years of age, six, seven years of age, my mother would be Redding four of us for school. I had three sisters and I was, the youngest is cute little boy. And I would always go to school as a boy. And I, I felt I should be going to school as a girl. And I, I can't tell you when that feeling came on, but right away, I thought I won be going to school as a girl. And that was the first conscious parts of, uh, fighting with the, the inner turmoil. Uh, because I remember playing with little boys in the dirt, you know, with these little trucks that would leave neat little tracks. And I played baseball at the boys and whatnot, but there was always this other side. And I remember I wanted dolls at a point. And I can't say when maybe seven, eight, nine years of age, uh, I found, I became, uh, interested in the cross dressing aspect.
Speaker 0 00:09:29 I'd be around on a Saturday morning alone or something. And I would start experimenting, cross dressing a little bit. And I got tremendous, tremendous, uh, uh, satisfaction out of that. And, uh, uh, it was sexual to a degree on it was, uh, emotional. Uh, but, um, I then, you know, I would do it and I would feel so good. And then I would feel guilty later. And I would say, you got to stop that stop, that you can't do that. That's wrong. It's wrong. I didn't know why it was wrong. But I had thought about this one situation with a neighbor kid. Uh, we were, I was like a year older than this, uh, neighbor boy, one day we're running around we're I don't know what we were doing at that point, but I said, Hey, Bruce, you want to try something? And he said, well, what?
Speaker 0 00:10:27 I said, well, come on in the house, I'll show you something. So we went in the house and I went in my sister's bedroom and I said, uh, you ever try on girl's clothes? And he said, no. And he had a sister, I think, uh, and I said, well, you want to try on two girls clothes? And he said, I don't know. And I said, ah, nobody's going to catch us. You know, you want to try it on and, well, okay. So, uh, I, I put on a few things and he's kinda sorta trying on stuff. And he finally said, I don't want to do this. Let's go outside. And that was it. I never brought it up to him again. And I, I wasn't grooming him for anything, but I thought I would share this fun thing. You know, I thought I would try that with him. And if he liked it, I don't think we were going to skip off into the sunset together. But, uh, my best years in school were up until about 10th grade and then 11th grade, I, uh, begin to
Speaker 3 00:11:41 Party
Speaker 0 00:11:41 Too much, I think. And, uh, it was really interested in girls and you know, where they take you, they take you down rutted roads and rainstorms. And, but senior year I had an attitude and I'm not sure if maybe McKayla began crying out, what are you going to do about me? You know, because I was back and forth with my, uh, issue of being a transvestite or a cross dresser or whatever, I was calling it at that time. And it was so seldom. Uh, but it was so obvious to me it was something, it meant something, but I was confused with, uh, who I was, you know, I just, I didn't know what, what this meant. And of course it was a secret. And, uh, my senior year, early on, we had a new nun at Duluth cathedral high school. She had come from Stanbrook hall.
Speaker 0 00:12:53 Stanbrook hall was the girls school at St. Scholastica now in Duluth. And, um, she taught English up there. She came to our school and I, this is really strange because I was thinking about this the other night, she began talking to us the first day of school and I, it was eating at me. And after a couple of weeks, I finally slammed my fist down on the desk. And I said, sister, I stood up. I said, sister, I wish you would recognize that there were boys in this class. I said, you're treating us all like a bunch of little girls, huh? Isn't that ironic that I'm fighting with my own, uh, sexuality or gender. And I would blurt out something like that. She threw me out of class for the year. I did not graduate with my high school class, but I had access with sisters to this closing that, uh, was, uh, feeling pretty good to me. Uh, during high school, I tried not to cross dress. And I think it was because I feared that I was becoming gay or something. I didn't know, uh, what gay was, but I heard things that I didn't like, you know, I was afraid everybody was afraid. Um, they wanted to do it.
Speaker 1 00:14:43 Fear plays a big role in the lives of many LGBTQ people in Minnesota. And especially for trans individuals who are indigenous or people of color, the 2015 transgender survey for Minnesota found that among transgender people who are out in kindergarten through grade 12, more than half 50, 4% were verbally harassed about a third were physically attacked and 12% sexually assaulted. And sadly, these issues continue into adulthood. One third of trans folks who saw a healthcare provider in the past year reported being refused treatment, verbally harassed, physically, or sexually assaulted, or having to teach the provider about transgender people in order to get appropriate care. But there is hope NAMI, Minnesota, the national Alliance on mental illness at a partner for this podcast offers support groups across Minnesota. You can find links to them and other organizations that provide support on our podcast website during the COVID pandemic. I've also experienced story after story of people, battling depression and isolation, by connecting with art drawing, painting, songwriting, knitting, singing on doorsteps and outside windows. One voice singers even started their own stitch and bitch weekly zoom knitting club, but the knitting is optional, but let's return to McKayla's story.
Speaker 0 00:16:09 I think it was in the early 1980s, I had, uh, left the highway patrol, uh, uh, and I was so frightened of ever being discovered cross dressing at that point in my life, because it would have been career ending immediately. Um, so I, I stifled it really well at that time. But, uh, early eighties, I began to try to define myself. I still had not heard the term gender dysphoria or, um, you know, transitioning. I was pushing 40. Yeah. And, uh, so I was under a lot of fear while a lot of emotion through, throughout life, early on, it was confusion. Uh, you know, you'd do it. And then you say, I'm never do that again. Then you'd do it. And he'd say, I'd never do that again. And at some point you start, uh, realizing, yeah, if you ever do it again, you get caught.
Speaker 0 00:17:23 You're going to be in a lot of trouble. Your parents are going to be mad. Your boss is going to be mad. You're going to be fired. You're going to be put in jail. You're going to be, uh, ostracized. I didn't know that word at that time, but, uh, you're going to be put into a bad spot. People will point at you and make fun of you and laugh. And, um, uh, when I went through my second in the early nineties, I literally thought about selling my business, uh, leaving the area, moving to the Northeast part of the U S and either buying a resort and opening, uh, LGBT, however far, those letters extended in the early nineties. Now they're a little longer, you'd have to have a bigger sign out there to welcome everybody, but I didn't do it. I didn't do it. Uh, I thought stay here and see, see what happens.
Speaker 0 00:18:33 And then all of a sudden, uh, I ended up, uh, back in police work out there. I had done a little volunteer search and rescue work, and they made me the head of search and rescue. And then there was a mass murder in our community and they had just fired a couple of deputies for politicking. And, uh, it was getting around election time and they knew I owned a gun and I had been a cop and they asked me if they could swear me in as a temporary deputy to guard this 16 year old mass murder in the hospital. And I said, sure, I'll do that. So I sit with this kid in the hospital, he's just blown his family away with a shotgun. And I knew that kit. And he said, uh, they haven't been in the hospital because he's underage. And they, they haven't arrested him yet, but they know he's done it in the district.
Speaker 0 00:19:30 Judge wouldn't let them put them in a adult facility at, so I show up to guardian. He said, so they hired you, huh? Yeah. Jamie, they hired me. Yeah. You said, you're going to shoot me if I run. I said, it probably will. I don't know you're going to run. No, I won't run it. He had run on the former deputy that was watching him. But, uh, so, uh, that was the beginning of a second career in law enforcement. And I ended up becoming the undersheriff and the County I'm cross dressing now under my uniform. It's the 1.1 time in life where I really had the freedom. And, uh, I was, there was a little risk doing it, but I was very comfortable with it. And one day my secretary came into my office and she was kind of a buddy of mine. She put her arm around me and on, and I'm doing some paperwork and she's 10 years older than me.
Speaker 0 00:20:37 So she's mothering me in on how you doing. She's rubbing my back. And I know she knows I got abroad and I could, she never said what, so what's going on with this now. But, uh, I always know that she, she was on to me, but, uh, she never said anything. Yeah. I went through two marriages and I, I think that my gender dysphoria played a role in each marriage in its own way. I was probably struggling. You know, I, I was only attracted to females and certain females were more attractive than others. Um, and one of the things that once I had decided I was transition transitioning or had already transitioned mentally was I wanted to get other viewpoints on this same type of thing. How, how can I be a seemingly heterosexual yet, want to be a female and not want to male?
Speaker 0 00:21:56 Well, I read a couple of different, uh, authors books on that very thing. And they felt that they dated the women as they, when they were a male, they dated women that they wanted to be like that they admired that they saw something. And that was the type of female they wanted to be. And I, I ran that through my head a few times. Uh, it made some sense, but I can't definitively say that, uh, that was the, uh, type of female that most appealed to me. But it seemed like in that same respect that later on, I bored with them or something. You know, I be either begin to fantasize that I was the female in that relationship and was guilty over it. You know, there's something probably psychologically undiscovered there.
Speaker 1 00:22:58 McKayla story is actually very common for trans individuals. I think sometimes people assume that being gay or lesbian is the same as being transgender, partly because we use those acronyms LGBT so often and lump them all together. But sexual orientation, the G L and B is about who you're attracted to. And that's different from gender identity. Like all other people, transgender people can be gay, straight, lesbian, bisexual, or anything in between, within our one voice community. We have several couples who were married when one of the spouses came out as transgender. And they've managed to weather that transition like any other big life change for a family, but there's no doubt that reconciling gender identity can be a significant challenge for a relationship, especially when there are few resources and little support.
Speaker 0 00:23:53 You know, my first wife and I, when we divorced it was ugly. Uh, there was barely enough cooperation. I did get custody of the kids. She wanted me to have that, but never shared information with me later. And so we had been in a very hostile relationship for many years. And just recently
Speaker 4 00:24:20 I threw my daughter, apologized to her for my husband. <inaudible>
Speaker 0 00:25:18 My second wife, before we got married. She was quite a bit younger than I was, um, her, her mother and I did theater together. And her mother, soon as I got divorced, her mother was pushing me to date her daughter who was moving back to town from her college days. And, and, uh, I didn't want to get into a relationship. Well, I got sucked right into that. I started dating her, but, uh, anyhow boy, we're heading for marriage within six months of my divorce. We're heading for the altar. And I said, Hey, I got it. Before we print anything, or talk about this any further and send out invitations. You, you gotta know something. She said, what? So he started to explaining to her that I crossed dress once in a while. And I said, uh, it's not something that goes away. It always pops up at some point.
Speaker 0 00:26:17 And she said, Oh, no problem, no problem. I thought it was something serious. Like, you know, you murdered somebody or something. I said, well, it is serious, but, uh, no, I didn't murder anybody, but I just, I don't want to go into this marriage without you knowing that no problem. Well, it became a problem for if I wore a nightie to bed, she thought a week of that, and that would be it. And, uh, you know, it was kind of a catalyst for, uh, uh, a, a marriage to have that little spark for me. And, and, uh, she wasn't totally against it, but she began to look at that as something I could tell she wasn't pleased about. And that ended real quick, uh, not another word on it. Uh, she finally moved on after she had the child she always wanted. And, uh, and she was a little more established and we left on reasonably good terms. And we're now friends. Uh, um, so really, uh, I didn't tell her, I felt I was female yet. That was an absolute, a sacred, a sacred, and it had a lot to do with my inability to grasp religion fully, to, to feel like an accepted child of God, because God always knew. I knew that God knew, you know, so I just went to church for the music. It, uh, it sticks and it's, uh, um, a real feeling because now I do have a spiritual relationship. It was a very emotional
Speaker 4 00:28:06 Moment.
Speaker 0 00:28:09 Um, she describes it as an epiphany that's McKayla's wife, Valerie Conner. Yeah. It, um, it was, um, at a point when I had come to grips with, I had already, um, explained to my family, I think had already gone through a few counseling sessions where I felt I was on the track I wanted to be on. And, um, but I still hadn't, uh, made a connection with, with, uh, God.
Speaker 4 00:29:04 So
Speaker 0 00:29:06 I, uh, I said a prayer And I asked God if he accepted me as to who I was, no, can you accept me? I got the strongest feeling of support that I ever had in my life. I can explain the fullness, the fulfillment, the, uh, joy that I felt.
Speaker 4 00:30:17 Ah, okay.
Speaker 0 00:30:19 And I, uh, after that, I, I just decided that we, we will be judged, but the judge isn't our neighbor or our coworker, or a farmer friend or a family member, uh,
Speaker 4 00:30:46 There's one judge.
Speaker 0 00:30:48 And everybody looks to that person. But once my family by and large accepted me and not only accepted me, but relished it, relished it. So when I did finally come out, there was that my God, that was easy.
Speaker 4 00:31:15 That was easy.
Speaker 0 00:31:17 Why didn't I do this before? It was time. It was coming out. Um, and, uh, I stayed up all night talking to my daughter about it. We were just giddy throughout the night. I probably told her at midnight, everybody else was sleeping and we were giddy five o'clock in the morning. We finally said, Hey, we got to go to bed. We got an 11 o'clock tea time or something. I went upstairs to get some sleep and then intended to tell Valerie, uh, probably on the golf course, except Valerie was awake. When I got upstairs at 5:00 AM. And I looked at the clock and I said, the clock's broken. She said, no, it's not 5:00 AM as, Oh my God. Well, I got something to tell you, dear, but I got to go to sleep first.
Speaker 5 00:32:09 And I said, no, you're telling me now
Speaker 1 00:32:13 McKayla came out to her wife, Valerie, just six weeks shy of their 22nd anniversary.
Speaker 0 00:32:20 She could hear my daughter and I
Speaker 4 00:32:22 Ships.
Speaker 5 00:32:25 I had no clue. Well, you know how 5,000 things run through your mind in a second, the one I remember is this is, first of all, she confessed being transvestite. Not this word. I was trying to cut right
Speaker 0 00:32:40 To the heart of it without trying to label myself fully yet, because I still wasn't.
Speaker 5 00:32:48 The thing that really hit me was, Ooh, this is a challenge to the old marriage vows. And almost instantly, it was no, it's not, you know, she a person, not the sexual proclivity. So then we talked and we talked more and more and more. And I said, I think we need some consequence. So we know exactly what we're doing with and her immediate reaction. I don't want some bigoted religious coxswain. I said, no, no. We get someone who's a specialist.
Speaker 0 00:33:21 Now, mind you, I didn't know where I wanted to go. I didn't know if I figured out where I wanted to go, if she would follow me in there. So we were still totally up in the air, but we're on, she known knows. And that was such a tremendous feeling of relief, uh, that you can now release that 50% of your brain. It's a big area to block off your whole life. And you always had to work around that. Uh, or at least you felt you did. I have two gay sons out of three sons, my oldest son, and my youngest son by two different wives are both gay. The oldest son never came out to me. He dated girls. He was extremely intelligent when into TV, which took him into politics. And he's in Washington, DC now never told me he was gay. I was wondering who I was.
Speaker 0 00:34:34 And I'm wondering if my son could be like me, but did I ever tell him who I was? No I didn't. And um, so we both had the secret and I was encouraging him to do things in high school beyond being a smart student. I wanted him try other things. And so he joined boy Scouts and he came back from a camping trip one weekend and his sleeping bag was full of marshmallows, burned marshmallows, just all over the bag. And I scolded him. I said, you ruined a sleeping bag. You know, you do you eat marshmallows? Like a drunk would drink wine. You know, it's terrible. Turns out his fellow boy Scouts knew he was gay and that was punishment. And they must have tortured him that night. And I rated him and we'd never reconciled that.
Speaker 0 00:35:51 Goody. Tell me after that, my youngest son did discuss with me his, no, he was in his first year of college, but he did share with me that he indeed was gay and we have a very good relationship. And I at least I have a relationship with my oldest son now. Uh, but, uh, you know, I've never, uh, told him, uh, much, I regret that misreading an incident where he must have been horribly abused by those kids. Um, and I think every parent can look back at situations they misread and, uh, regret, you know, and wished, but you can't, you know, you just can't go back and, and, uh, undo stuff like that. Uh, I've had a few people say to me in the past couple of years, boy, that's brave of you to come out. It's really neat, really brave of you. And my response has been, I was so damn brave. I would have come out 50, 60 years ago and I really wasn't so brave, but now I think it adds an extra layer of responsibility that I have to, uh, try to help where I can. Now I can't just transition and go into retirement
Speaker 1 00:37:32 For each podcast interview. I've selected a song performed by one voice so you can hear the chorus in action Mikayla throughout our interview, I was struck by your lifelong clarity to see who you are and your tenacity to share that clarity with the people around you. This song is recorded on one voices, 20th anniversary CD titled old new borrowed cue available on our website, along with lots of other great recordings. This is one voice mixed chorus performing on a clear day from the 1970s comedy fantasy films. Starring of course, queer icon Barbara Streisand <inaudible>
Speaker 1 00:40:59 This has been episode one of sound mind from one voice mixed chorus, Minnesota's LGBTQ and straight allies chorus. This podcast is made possible by the voters of Minnesota through the Minnesota state arts board. Thanks to a legislative appropriation from the arts and cultural heritage fund. Yay, Minnesota voters. Thank you to audio engineer theater writer and all around smart tech person. Paul Cruz. Join us for the next sound mind episode to meet Candace Creel Falcon, a identified Chicana queer femme who went rogue from her academic tenure track and is now living as a mostly self-taught artist in rural Ottertail,
Speaker 6 00:41:45 Minnesota.
