As Bo posted a few days back, we had a great time in Philadelphia last week at the LGBTI Health Summit.
Among the many activities and workshops we had an opportunity to do a visit to to the Walt Whitman House in nearby Camden, New Jersey. It was a moving experience to be in that near-sacred space, where Whitman spent the last years of his life and to see the bed he lay in and died in and just the objects that were part of his last years. The house has been lovingly kept up and we had an engaging, and at times quite lively, conversation about how Whitman’s story is told. How his relationship to Peter Doyle and others is shared with visitors. One small delight I had noticed on an earlier visit were these tiny painted white cranes on the brass light fixtures on the first floor. I took it as a prescient bit of coincidence that our symbol in our work would be present in the great Gay sage’s house.
On Saturday Toby Johnson & Steve Berman held a delightful reading of their new book, and Lambda Literary Award finalist, Charmed Lives at Giovanni’s Room. It was great to have the two of them reading selections from this volume of short stories they edited. Toby and Steve have been working on books together for a few years now and this weekend provided the opportunity for them to finally meet face-to-face. That’s a reminder of the wonder of long-distance collaboration by phone and email.
Well, I’ve attached a few pictures from the weekend. Hope you enjoy them.
