On the Friday before Mother's Day,  my "contact" at the flower warehouse  came to my house and gave me a box of 250 beautiful daffodils in bunches  of 10. She says her boss told her to give them to us, "free of charge." 

Oh Happy Day. 

She says, "Cut the stems at an angle, put them in tepid water in a dark room, and keep them nice and cool." I open the box and they are all  sweetly snuggled together as if asleep, so naturally I am reluctant to  wake them and cut off their little stems, but do as I'm told, two hundred  and fifty times, all the while thinking, "This is going to be great. We  are going to make history, you daffodils and I." 

So down they go into the bowels of my basement. My exercise equipment  moans at me from underneath their cobweb quilts, "Come see me, honey.  Ride me. Walk me.  For heaven's sake, dust me, at least." I rumble by  them with my daffodils in their buckets. "Can't you see I'm busy? Can't  you see I have daffodils to nurture? Shut up. I mean it." 

Friday night I go down to give some encouragement. I slightly rearrange,  fuss a bit. Tell them not to open quite yet. Rest up. They've had major trauma! 

Saturday morning, still closed--still recovering. 

Saturday night, still closed--still recovering. 

I casually look at my local grocery store flower supplies. It's the day before Mother's Day. If I could find 250 replacement flowers they would cost me $500. I love PFLAG. I don't love it nearly that much. 

I have made 250 labels which will go around their delicate stems, telling  who PFLAG is, the time of our meetings, our hotline number, pertinent  info, yadda yadda.  I can barely sleep I am so excited and anxious. At  5:00 AM, I jump out of bed and run downstairs, hoping to find 250 hardy, glorious little daffodil faces staring up at me, waiting to be labeled and nestled inside my two canvas bags, lovingly prepared with wet paper  towels in the bottom. This will be their final home before resting in the  outstretched hands of our grateful gay and lesbian brothers and sisters,  sons and daughters. I try and forget Neitzche's admonition, "Gratitude is  hatred in a mask." What the hell did he know? 

Those suckers are shut tighter than a tick. Not only that, but they are  kind of crinkly and brittle. Suddenly it hits me like a Peterbilt. Those  are *ex* daffodils. They have gone to join the daffodil choir invisible.  They have passed into daffyheaven. I swallow my panic, I beg the  excercise equipment to stop yelling, "nyaa, nyaa, nyaa, nyaa, nyaa." 

I run upstairs to get my trusty pinking sheers. I'll *force* them open.  All cannot be lost. I realize I have probably truly snapped as I am  cutting the petals with pinking sheers...ragged petals now have a  fetching saw-toothed look and a lot don't make the cut. I laugh  hysterically. I've made a bad pun. I am in deep doo doo. 

Mickey Solomon comes to the door at 10:30 AM. She realizes I have slipped  precariously close to major insanity. We get in her car to pick up two  other Mom's and drive down to the "'hood." There is a photographer,  Jason, waiting for us from the Windy City Times. This will be great.  Publicity for PFLAG as we put PFLAG once and for all on the MAP. We break  up into teams of two. Mickey and I begin with the photographer, Jason,  following us along, snapping pictures. "Would you like a flower from PFLAG? Happy Mother's Day." 

"NO." 

Repeat ad nauseum. Almost all of the women we approach say, "I'm not a  mother. I'll never *be* a mother." One of them says, "Can't you see I'm exercising?" Implied in her voice is the phrase, "And from the looks of you, fatgirl,  it wouldn't hurt you to be doing some either." 

Do I hear muffled laughter from the direction of my home? Mickey tells me she really didn't mean that. I am certain that she did. Finally, some  people take our offering and say, "thank you." We meet a gang of men and  their rottweilers outside of Starbuck's. Mickey doesn't want to go there. 

At this point I say, "What's a rottweiler bite? I'm up for a series of  rabies shots. I'll take any response but, "No." 

The men are delightful. Their dogs are friendly. They have heard of PFLAG! 

We begin to say, "FREE FLOWER FROM PFLAG. NO STRINGS ATTACHED. WE WANT  NOTHING. NO MONEY. JUST TAKE THE FRIGGIN' FLOWERS, WILL YA?" 

Jason is amused. He says that his theory is that people are so inundated  with "Streetwise retailers," beggars, the homeless, rapists, muggers, and  bag ladies that they are immediately suspicious." 

However, the four mom's do get several pictures taken and we will be on  the cover of the Windy City Times, probably for the Gay Pride Month Issue. 

As I slink back to the car with visions of "The Mother Theresa's of the  Gay Community" thoroughly destroyed, I try and look at the good side. We  did get publicity. A few got the message and my exercise equipment and I  have called a truce and are going to work together for the convention in  October. 

Yeah right, that'll happen.:-) 

4/24/96 Nancy's testimony to the Illinois House of Representatives 
 
 
 

4/24/96 Kurt Olson's Testimony to the Illinois House of Representatives