Proud Mother

I met Sister Dottie Dixon a couple years ago at Salt Lake City Pride and I was instantly drawn in by her energy. It all began when I was searching google images for Utah Pride and happened upon Dottie’s images and I could not contain myself. Her images made me smile big and think she belonged on Saturday Night Live! I wouldn’t qualify myself as a stalker but I tracked Dottie down! After a few email exchanges, I knew I had to meet her. And that I did months later at SLC Pride. Well, I will let her tell her story in her own words and you will see why I was drawn in. After you read her story, go ahead and google her and you will see what it’s all about! Cheers!

This is Sister Dottie S. Dixon, a rilly proud mother of a gay son Donnie P. Dixon, and I live in Spanish Fark, Utah. Yep a Mormon Mama on a Mission, er MMM as I call it. I am eversa happily married ta Donald D. Dixon, the first love of my life. I am a activist fer all kinds of things– like LGBT rights, Women’s rights, Multi-cultural rights, Homeless rights, all the downtrodden, marginalized, minimalized, and miniaturized. I love em’ all I rilly, truly do.

The proudest moment a my life was when I realized that even though change and choice are the only constants in life, I didn’t haveta CHOOSE! I didn’t haveta choose between my child er my church. I could love, support, and keep both in my life. Mormon parents are taught ta bleeve that church comes first, and this was a rilly hard struggle fer me, when my dear & darlin’ gay son Donnie come out ta me at age 17. I thought I was losin’ everything I had worked sa hard on my whole life, getting my family back tagether all in one piece in the afterlife. Through some very difficult times, many prayers, lotsa soul searchin’ I realized that God didn’t want me ta choose one over the other. God wanted me ta just love. God wanted me ta STAND FIRMLY on the side of love. Love over fear, shame, guilt, judgment, er ignorance. I didn’t haveta choose. We could proudly and loudly support our gay son Donnie in his life journey, hopin’ that he eventually found love, fulfillment, spiritual relevance on his own terms, beauty, intimacy, connectivity, and ultimately giant happiness. I am also very, VERY proud ta announce that he has found alla those things, and that makes me the happiest Mormon Mother on the planet. Donnie and I always were, and have remained the very best friends, even as he has grown inta adulthood and become a wonderful & amazin’ younger man. We still laugh, cry, discover, travel, go ta fast food joints, enjoy movies, cook, walk & hike together, Gadfreys even bicker at times! That bein’ said–me fully understandin’ that one giant thing when he was way back and 17 years old, has made all the diffrunce. It has changed me as much as Donnie, it has allowed me ta engage and embrace life ta its fullest, every single day. Life is hard, it is supposed ta be, that’s how we grow, stretch, become more abundant and hopefully give back. Just the other day I come across a wonderful passage frum Louise Erdrich. Landsamighty it made me think, think long and deep. It’s rich just like her last name suggests.

“Life will break you. Nobody can protect you from that, and living alone won’t either, for solitude will also break you with its yearning. You have to love. You have to feel. It is the reason you are here on Earth. You are here to risk your heart. You are here to be swallowed up. And when it happens that you are broken, or betrayed, or left, or hurt, or death brushes near, let yourself sit by an apple tree and listen to the apples falling all around you in heaps, wasting their sweetness. Tell yourself you tasted as many as you could.”
— Louise Erdrich

Ya do! We all do. We haveta love and feel and experience and meet people and change ourselves and evolve. That’s what LIFE is mostly all about.

Oh, oh oh–I almost forgot! I simply love my Pride Sox, they are sa cute, and I wear em’ all Summer long, overta the Provo mall, downta the grocery store, upta Salt Lake City fer luncheons, just everywhere. People always notice and comment. Hellfries, in fact–I have pretty much chosen ta wear Capri pants year round just so I can wear my Pride Sox! Now that’s bein’ Proud–cause Change Begins with ME!

Respectfully,
Sister Dottie S. Dixon