Today is the 30th anniversary of the day our younger son Bill committed suicide when he was 17 after he was the victim of a hate crime assault based on his sexual orientation. Thirty years!
I wrote and published his story on my website a year later in hope that sharing it would help end the hate. There is much there including other essays by me and over sixty pages of email and guestbook responses by others. See https://gabiclayton.com/bills-story/
I want to share this list of music that Noel picked for his brother’s memorial service. Music was SO important to Bill! Some of these were songs Bill loved, and others were ones that Noel thought needed to be included as part of his and our goodbye:
- “Hold Back The Dawn” – Robbie Robertson – Storyville
- “Calling You” – Jevetta Steele – Bagdad Cafe
- “Fare Thee Well” – Indigo Girls – Swamp Ophelia
- “Nightswimming” – R.E.M. – Automatic for the People
- “Vuh” – Sky Cries Mary – This Timeless Turning
- “Imagine” – John Lennon – The John Lennon Collection
- “All Apologies (Unplugged)” – Nirvana – MTV Unplugged in New York
- “Healing Chant” – The Neville Brothers – Yellow Moon
- “Ghost” – Indigo Girls – Rites Of Passage
- “Silent Lucidity” – Queensryche – Empire
- “Cursum Perficio” – Enya – Watermark
- “Be Careful Of My Heart” – Tracy Chapman – Crossroads
- “Sweet Lullaby” – Enya – Deep Forest
- “Love of My Life” – Queen – A Night at the Opera [Bonus Tracks]
- “Ain’t No Cure For Love” – Leonard Cohen – I’m Your Man
- “Sounds of Silence” – Simon & Garfunkel – Sounds of Silence
- “Pesky Angels” – The Righteous Mothers – Pesky Angels
- “These Are Days” – 10,000 Maniacs – Our Time in Eden
- “Let It Be Me” – Indigo Girls – Rites Of Passage
- “Shine On You Crazy Diamond (Parts VI- IX)” – Pink Floyd – Wish You Were Here
- “Yesterday – The Beatles – Help!
Also, it wasn’t written yet but now I would add “Will It Always Be Like This? (Gabi’s Song)” by Steve Schalchlin. It is on two of his albums The Bonus Round Sessions and Beyond the Light. Steve sang the song in public for the first time at a national PFLAG conference in Washington DC in 2000 with Alec and I sitting in the audience.
And “Why Worry” – Dire Straits – Brothers In Arms was added by me after the memorial because of “Window” (see below).
I created a playlist on Spotify of most of these and it is here:
https://open.spotify.com/playlist/5l7KBEizF3TR6Tlg5mVc6X?si=2dbf615b2fc64065
“Window” (below) is a film I made for my final project as a senior film student at The Evergreen State College in Olympia, Washington in 1989. Some brief but important notes were added at the end along with the much shorter original video this film was made from. The boy in it is my son Bill at age ten.
I used Dire Straits “Why Worry” as the soundtrack, and I am grateful that Mark Knopfler’s management gave me permission to keep it in the film when they found I had used it. https://youtu.be/M_xlgnegIkI
It may seem odd to include this but there is quote by Richard Nixon from his farewell to the White House Staff on August 9, 1974 — months after I married Alec. At that time I thought Nixon was going to be the worst president of my lifetime, and we all know how that turned out. At any rate, here is the quote:
“Always give your best, never get discouraged, never be petty; always remember, others may hate you, but those who hate you don’t win unless you hate them, and then you destroy yourself.” ~ Richard Nixon
Everyone, please do all you can to end the hate.
If anyone who is reading this would like to make a donation in Bill’s memory to an organization that is working to end the hate that he could not bear, I would like you to consider these:
PFLAG – either the national organization (https://pflag.org/donate/) or our local chapter here in Olympia, Washington (https://pflag-olympia.org/membership-donations/) or find one in your own area in the United States here (https://pflag.org/findachapter/).
Or you could make a donation to FUST – Friends Ugandan Skills Training (it used to be Friends Ugandan Safe Transport) which is a project of my Quaker Meeting, Olympia Friends. I have been co-manager of FUST since we started in 2014. (https://friendsugandanskillstraining.org/).
We could really use your support for all of these.
Thank you.
Gabi Clayton
Addendum
It has taken a long time (most of 30 years) and I want folks to know that I have forgiven the individual people who hurt Bill. Alec has too – he got here earlier than I did. This is a whole other part of our story and I may write more about it someday, but I have briefly spoken to one of them and let him know, and I would speak to the others if I could. He had reached out to me wanting to talk through a couple of other folks several years ago, and it took me until a few months ago to get to where I responded.
I’m not telling anyone they should do this, I’m just sharing my journey.
Here is a collection of quotes by others about forgiveness that have helped me.
“I learned a long time ago that some people would rather die than forgive. It’s a strange truth, but forgiveness is a painful and difficult process. It’s not something that happens overnight. It’s an evolution of the heart.” — Sue Monk Kidd
“You can forgive people without welcoming them back into your life. Apology accepted. Access denied.” — anonymous
“If you haven’t forgiven yourself something, how can you forgive others.” — Dolores Huerta
“Forgiveness means it finally becomes unimportant that you hit back. You’re done. It doesn’t necessarily mean that you want to have lunch with the person. If you keep hitting back, you stay trapped in the nightmare…”
— Anne Lamott ~ Plan B: Further Thoughts on Faith
“Forgiveness empties the past of its power to empty the present of its peace.” — L.R. Knost
“Nothing that is worth doing can be achieved in our lifetime; therefore we must be saved by hope.
“Nothing which is true or beautiful or good makes complete sense in any immediate context of history; therefore we must be saved by faith.
“Nothing we do, however virtuous, can be accomplished alone; therefore we are saved by love.
“No virtuous act is quite as virtuous from the standpoint of our friend or foe as it is from our standpoint. Therefore we must be saved by the final form of love which is forgiveness.” — Reinhold Niebuhr
“We can easily forgive a child who is afraid of the dark; the real tragedy of life is when adults are afraid of the light.” — Plato
“To forgive is to set a prisoner free and discover that the prisoner was you.” — Lewis B. Smedes
“Forgiveness is the fragrance that the violet sheds on the heel that has crushed it.” — Mark Twain
“We must develop and maintain the capacity to forgive. He who is devoid of the power to forgive is devoid of the power to love.”
— Martin Luther King Jr.
“Forgiveness is above all a personal choice, a decision of the heart to go against natural instinct to pay back evil with evil.”
— Pope John Paul II
“Forgive others, not because they deserve forgiveness, but because you deserve peace.” ~ Jonathan Lockwood Huie
“Not forgiving someone hurts you worse than it hurts him…even if he doesn’t deserve to be forgiven…Not forgiving someone is like not pulling a thorn out of your foot just because you weren’t the one who put it there.”
— Mercedes Lackey ~ The Wizards of London
“Forgiveness means giving up all hope for a better past.”
— Lily Tomlin
We sure miss you, Bill.
Thank you Gabi.
A lovely tribute to Bill and wise words/thoughts for us. Bill would have been 47 today. A couple years younger than my son. I can’t even imagine. I would like to say we as a society have evolved into a bit kinder world but I am not so sure.
There are no words.
The music you selected is lovely.
Thank you.
Many Blessings.
Thank you for sharing this story. I did not know this had happened and I send my very belated love and condolences to both of you.