[EDITORIAL NOTE: Gay and Gray is a monthly column at Time Goes By written by Jan Adams in which she reports on issues of aging lesbians and gay men. Jan also writes on many topics at her own blog, Happening-Here.

Nine years ago two single people met. They were both in their fifties and without partners after long previous relationships ended by illness and separation. Their friendship grew. Like many elders, they realized that continuing to live in San Francisco would not be affordable or even pleasant when they retired. They visited central Ohio where one had grown up and the other had had relatives living in the past, and decided to buy a house in a small town. Shortly thereafter, they decided it was time to tie the knot. Their relationship was blessed by their church on December 30, 2007. This summer, they'll move to Ohio for good.

This happy story would be quite unremarkable, except that Gary and Stuart are gay men. They were kind enough to talk with me about their partnership and their planned move.

On retirement: Gary was almost thrust into involuntary retirement a couple of years ago when the family-owned wholesale supply company for which he had worked for 32 years ("minus two weeks," he emphasizes) was bought out. The new corporate owners wanted younger workers. He was lucky enough to catch on at a similar job running data systems for a storage company. But the abrupt lay off turned his attention to making a future without employment.

Stuart's work, on the other hand, will remain similar as long as he is with us; he's a Vietnam vet on long-term disability whose "work" has been getting the Veterans' Administration to care for his needs. He was part of a groundbreaking study of PTSD in the 90s that set the pattern for care of his generation of vets and he generally applauds the system.

On choosing to move: there's more to this move than economic necessity. The city they've enjoyed for decades has begun to feel inhospitable. Gary says that these days San Francisco seems to him "crowded, congested, uncivil, thoughtless." And so they looked to the country, choosing a town in Gary's state of origin that has a nearby VA hospital. And they were able to find a big house they could buy outright. Both have family back East. And there's an historic Episcopal church to consider joining.

On family: Gary and Stuart are of a gay generation in which relationships to our families of birth are often conflicted. Gay people a little older than these two usually had clearer, if unsatisfactory, paths: they were either thrown out by family for perversity or their "peculiar" relationships simply went unacknowledged. Young gay people today, though their orientation may cause their families great distress, nonetheless belong to a recognized type. But gay people currently becoming elders live in an in-between world.

So when the guys went east to look for a retirement location, the visit involved introducing their new partners to their surviving parents and siblings. There was nothing easy about this. Both of them express a shy wonder that they received what younger people might consider a tiny measure of acceptance.

Stuart's brother and sister-in-law are Pentecostal Christians and Republicans. Gary's father is an Ohio Republican bigwig and a "rock-ribbed Presbyterian."

Gary and his father had had always had an unspoken "don't ask, don't tell" agreement about his orientation, even all the way through his losing his previous partner of 22 years to cancer. But Gary took Stuart "home" to meet his father. As they were leaving, he was overjoyed to hear his father say to Stuart, "welcome to the family."

When they decided to have a church commitment ceremony, they felt they were being a little bold because they invited their families. They were delighted when a nephew wrote, asking for a picture -- "we want to see him." And Gary's sister even traveled to San Francisco to be part of their big day.

Stuart and Gary’s story is so like that of many of their heterosexual age peers. But being gay men of their generation carries additional worries – and occasional surprising joys.

Stuart, Gary's sister Jeney and Gary at the ceremony blessing their union. Photos thanks to Patrick Lane and Michael Reardon.

[At The Elder Storytelling Place today, Sharon McKinney ponders the question of elder wisdom in Graceful Aging.]

[EDITORIAL NOTE: Today, I am pleased to announce the launch of a new Time Goes By category, Gay and Gray, which will address issues of aging lesbians and gay men. Some of the issues will cross over with those of straight elders, and some will be unique to homosexuals. Because this is not in my personal experience, I asked Jan Adams to become the Gay and Gray columnist and she graciously agreed.

Jan lives in San Francisco and has been a political activist for most of her 60 years. You will find more about her here. She has been blogging at Happening-Here since 2005, and her Gay and Gray column will appear at Time Goes By on the 26th day of each month, or thereabouts. I know you will welcome her to the TGB fold.]

I didn't really want to "listen." Who does, when listening is a matter of duty?

But because of one of the projects I am doing for work these days, I felt I had to listen. You see, I am organizing within the Episcopal Church for the full inclusion of our gay members within the life of the community.

Compared to most Christian outfits, we're not that bad on this, especially locally. Many parishes have gay members; there are gay, lesbian, even transsexual priests; heck, to the horror of the fundies and our own conservatives, this denomination even made a partnered gay man a bishop.

But it would be great if we could move from "not bad" to good at this elementary facet of respect each others' dignity, so I'm working for the folks who are organizing to get us over the hump.

One of the steps along the way has been a thing called "The Listening Process." Gay people wanted to stop being talked about and start having real conversations with our more conventional brethren and sistren. We persuaded the official bodies of the church to say that such things should take place about 30 years ago, but mostly this "listening" has been a good idea that doesn't happen. And despite not always playing out the whole process, we, this particular church, have muddled toward putting up with and even loving each other.

However this season, the small, very gay parish where I am a member, St. John the Evangelist in the San Francisco Mission District, was invited to engage in some listening events with the people of a suburban church. Uh oh. I knew I had to put my body where my mouth is and go to these things.

It seemed an odd idea. I've been out so long in the world and in the church that I've almost forgotten the angst that too many LGBT folks still suffer in hetero-Christian-land. I'm an "I'm here, I'm queer, get used to it!" kind of person. So I didn't know what to think.

Off a little bunch of us, gays and friends, trooped on Sunday to a very friendly, suburban congregation. We shared worship followed by a very nice potluck lunch. One of our folks quite bravely told the story of how hurt he had been by being forced by another denomination's authorities to hide his relationship with his partner. Then we broke up into tables of about six people each to discuss further. Each table consisted of one or two of us visitors and the rest from the local congregation.

I found myself at a table with several mature parishioners from the suburban church and several of their quite elderly visiting parents. Now this was in a room with a low ceiling and some 40-50 people. That is, once we started talking, the din was cacophonous. Though we could barely hear each other, we gamely attempted to address the discussion questions.

After a few minutes, the elderly woman seated next to me reached out and gripped my arm. She was elegantly dressed and groomed, every hair in place, carefully made up. She seemed tiny to me, wispy. Her very white skin was almost transparent; I could see a bit of blue vein peeking through her scalp. She whispered with a slight accent I couldn’t place.

"I worked in fashion. They all worked there,” she said. “There were so many of them. They were so creative. There was a young man, he used to ask me to go places with him, to be seen with him. We'd go places together. You know, so he'd be safe."

"When was that?" I asked.

"The Hitler times," she answered. "Then we came to this country and I worked in fashion. There were so many of them. They were so beautiful."

The din overcame us both. We stopped trying to talk, but she squeezed my arm.

Here is the sort of thing that happened in "the Hitler times":

"An account of a gay Holocaust survivor, Pierre Seel, details life for gay men during Nazi control. In his account he states that he participated in his local gay community in the town of Mulhouse. When the Nazis gained power over the town his name was on a list of local gay men ordered to the police station. He obeyed the directive to protect his family from any retaliation.

"Upon arriving at the police station, he notes that he and other gay men were beaten. Some gay men who resisted the SS had their fingernails pulled out. Others were raped with broken rulers and had their bowels punctured, causing them to bleed profusely.

"After his arrest he was sent to the concentration camp at Schirmeck. There, Seel stated that during a morning roll-call, the Nazi commander announced a public execution. A man was brought out and Seel recognized his face. It was the face of his eighteen-year-old lover from Mulhouse.

"Seel then claims that the Nazi guards stripped the clothes of his lover and placed a metal bucket over his head. Then the guards released trained German shepherd dogs on him, which mauled him to death."

- Wikipedia

[At The Elder Storytelling Place today, Darlene Costner explains how her mother prevented potential disaster during Sunday drives in Grandpa.]