Another sister wrote, “Separatism is a tricky question in my mind. The Separatists at the music festival whom you spoke of do seem unreasonable and impractical for that situation. However, Separatism as a short term goal is often used by oppressed people such as Afro-Americans and Chicanos, in an attempt to build group strength and redefine their identities, which have been warped and weakened by the dominant group in society.”

The year after my mother circulated her letter at the National Women’s Music Festival, she performed there again, and this time my then partner Carole and I were in the audience.  Carole was one of the organizers of Women Library Workers, which started in the Bay Area in 1975, and in 1977 we were having a national meeting in Detroit just before the Festival in Champaign. The organization had rented the top floor of the Detroit Women’s Building and many of us were staying there as well as meeting there. Carole and I shared a room but were being circumspect about our relationship. Carole was the field organizer, traveling around the country helping new chapters get going and we were afraid WLW could be seen as lesbian organization and straight women might stay away.

A few other women who had been at the WLW meeting were also at the festival. My mother sang “Carolina Cotton Mill” which had been inspired by a visit from the writer Jill Johnston, who was wearing blue jeans and talking about having her chakras read.

Carole said that song would put off a lot of the audience, who were into new-age stuff. I assured her that Mom would now sing “We Don’t Need the Men,” which she did. Carole said, “That will make everybody happy again.” “Yes,” I said, “but now she will sing her song for my father, and annoy them again.” Which she did, introducing the song, “Bury Me in My Overalls,” by saying it was for her dear husband whom she had been with for forty years, and with whom she had had a daughter who was now happily married to a woman. Carole and I looked at each other and sank down in our seats, outed by my mother. One of the straight women from WLW told us later that she had wondered about us in Detroit, but when our van was broken into and our Sisters’ Choice quilt stolen and we didn’t fall into each other’s arms, she figured she was wrong. My mother said afterwards that she realized she should have checked with us before she said anything. I figured it had just come out in the moment, but now I don’t think so. Ellen Stekert interviewed someone who had heard her introduce the song in the same way, and this woman had only been to the festival the year before--the year Mom handed out the letter--so probably my mother was repeating in our hearing in 1977 the introduction that had worked in 1976.

©2008 by Nancy Schimmel