IMRU - LGBT Issues - Monday, June 22, 2026

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1. queer people and breaking democratic norms.
2. Tune in to This Way Out, the international LGBTQ radio magazine,
3. Mondays at 7.30 p.m. following IMRU,
4. or online at This Way Out.
5. Discover the heart of the global queer community,
6. strong, proud, and resilient.
7. You're listening to KPFK 90.7 FM, Los Angeles.
8. I am, are you, are you?
9. Who are you?
10. Welcome to IMRU, broadcasting out loud and out proud on KPFK 90.7 FM Los Angeles.
11. I'm your host and executive producer, Michael Taylor Gray.
12. As Pride Month continues, we're taking a look at the many ways LGBTQ plus lives and families
13. have evolved over the last several decades and how those journeys continue to shape our
14. communities today. Coming just after Father's Day, tonight's conversation also reminds us
15. that family can be created, discovered, reimagined, and strengthened in ways previous generations of
16. LGBTQ plus people could scarcely have imagined. My guest tonight is acclaimed poet, novelist,
17. biographer, Brad Gooch. His new memoir, Good Morning Moon, a snapshot of an American family,
18. is a deeply personal exploration of love, loss, parenthood, identity, family history,
19. and the surprising discoveries that can change how we understand ourselves. Brad Gooch,
20. welcome to IMRU. Great to be here. Thanks for inviting me. I just have to tell you, your book,
21. I purposefully started reading it
22. I'm a fast reader
23. I started reading it on Father's Day
24. and that's kind of where the book starts too
25. so I just
26. because I wanted it to be really
27. really fresh and I'm telling you
28. I think it's just
29. one of the best books I've read in a long time
30. but before we talk
31. about the book itself
32. I understand it was actually your children
33. who encouraged you to write this story
34. Walter and Glenn
35. How did that come about and what made you decide that now was the right time to tell your story?
36. Well, it came about, I mean, there are a few times, I'm not a dutiful diary keeper,
37. but there are a few times in my life when life has gotten as intense as fiction or something,
38. I've just started keeping journals.
39. Once I was modeling in Europe in the early 80s and I was keeping a journal that turned into a novel called Scary Kisses.
40. And then when my lover Howard Brookner, a filmmaker, was sick with AIDS in the late 80s, I was keeping a journal kind of about our entire relationship over 10 or 11 years at that time.
41. and and i as soon as we started conceiving meaning thinking of having having a child and talking to
42. people it it it brought us into such new emotions and and and a whole landscape um scientific
43. medical legal and otherwise to deal with that i started keeping a journal so i was you know i was
44. aware of the potential, would I ever write this down, and also the doubts about that
45. in part because of what happens when my children read it or when people talk to them about
46. it.
47. Is it fair to do this to them?
48. They very precocious kids so they will be reading very quickly Yeah well one of them is But during this time I written a biography of Keith Haring called Radiant came out
49. My two kids were going to book parties and things, and they turned out that this was fun, and they were getting a lot of attention.
50. so the older one then said to me one night what are you going to write your next book about and
51. i said i don't know what do you think i should do and he said well what's the most important
52. thing that's happened to you which was a good editor's question and i said i said having you
53. two kids um so what else is important to you and i said well meeting papa and he said well you
54. could write about us, a family. And I said, what a great idea. No, of course, I've had this idea
55. and I've been kind of working my way through it. But then I felt I had permission with an
56. exclamation point to go ahead. I love it when I've been talking about your story and telling people
57. that you became a father for the first time at 63. And then once again, for a second time at 66.
58. and it's just you get some really wide range of responses to that what kind of reactions do you
59. get when you tell people this well it's interesting because i you know both kids are now they're age
60. 7 and 11 they're in an elementary public school and i would have i in chelsea in manhattan and
61. i sort of expected the gay two dads issue to take up all the oxygen in the room um and it's sort of
62. no one is that interested.
63. I mean, there aren't that many kids with gay parents, surprisingly,
64. like five or something in this entire school.
65. But it's not really brought up.
66. It's not really part of their perception.
67. But my being in my 70s and being a dad, that's far more fascinating.
68. You look fabulous, by the way.
69. Not that that matters, but you too.
70. but i know so like when my kids come home they don't talk about oh we have two why we have two
71. gay dads i mean that is an issue but um but more often it's sort of dad you look good for your
72. 70s or you don't look like someone who's in their 70s and i realize this is not coming from them
73. this is coming from the parents but it's nice that they're parroting those positive remarks
74. that's right right and these parents of most of these kids are also then much younger than than
75. i am and so there's a funny dynamic where i don't know if they're aware of it but i'm aware of
76. wanting to jump in and give them life advice and you know stop well i that was a part of my
77. awareness i remember when i first started college and i noticed that you know like on orientation
78. day when all the kids were being dropped off and i noticed some families that with older parents and
79. I was always fascinated by that.
80. I don't know why, but just...
81. I mean, so far it hasn't made a difference.
82. I'm also...
83. I would have been a terrible parent in my 20s, 30s, 40s.
84. I mean, I was just interested in partying and networking.
85. I mean, so no one liked me.
86. And even when Paul and I started talking about having children,
87. he was the proactive parent.
88. I mean, he was the proactive wisher to have children and such a family.
89. I mean, he was 12 years younger than I am.
90. He came from a large family.
91. I'm an only child.
92. So I was the ambivalent one He was the thought leader Were you kind of looking for the off during that process at times You know like okay Paul going to oh he going to exit here
93. Yeah. And then there were also, you know, conversations between us that were
94. almost parodies of the sort of supposed straight
95. conversation where the woman, you know, breaks up with
96. the man because he doesn't want to have children, I mean, in a family.
97. so he's not serious.
98. We had kind of a version of that.
99. A momentary blip.
100. Yeah, an extended blip.
101. But it kept coming up, moments of decision kept coming up
102. and moments of choice about how we would do such a thing.
103. When I was together with Howard, who was my lover,
104. I mentioned filmmaker in the 70s and 80s who died of AIDS,
105. we would have conversations about what if we had children, but we didn't mean it.
106. And we didn't, you know, it was like talking about if space travel tomorrows became available, would we buy a ticket?
107. I mean, so these are now very different conversations.
108. But I love the response that you gave to Paul, your husband, when he asked you, was Howard, your first husband,
109. Was he the love of your life?
110. And you remember your response.
111. Yeah, I said, I hope not.
112. It was not our first date, so that allowed him.
113. But, you know, that was interesting.
114. I mean, good question.
115. Yeah, very good question.
116. You know, in that period, then the 90s into the aughties,
117. those of us who had survived AIDS up to that point
118. or had partners who had died of AIDS,
119. you know, sort of had this invisible widow's veil on or something.
120. I mean, and also had PTSD.
121. Oh, yeah.
122. You know, they just didn't enter in to the same kind of joy of promiscuity, joy of relationship.
123. I mean, there was a lot of shadow around.
124. Yeah, it's hard to shake that weight when you're going to three and sometimes more funerals in a week.
125. Right.
126. So that was the one key question Paul asked me.
127. Another was later when we kept going back and forth, me more back and forth.
128. He was, we even saw a therapist to talk, a couples therapy to talk about this.
129. And then he just said from the kitchen one night, I was in my office,
130. would you rather regret something you have done or something you haven't done?
131. And then I said, something I have done.
132. And so he said, okay.
133. Yeah.
134. Oh.
135. he thought i'd catch on that one but yeah now you've spent much of your career writing about
136. fascinating lives like you mentioned uh keith herring uh and frank o'hara to flannery o'connor
137. now what what was different about turning that same level of scrutiny on yourself
138. and your own family through the suggestion of walter your son
139. um well many things i mean but um i mean in some ways it's easier uh is it really
140. well it's easier in the sense that I remember I talked to Philip Glass
141. composer once about Robert Wilson and how he'd done hundreds of plays and I
142. said how is this possible and those because he doesn't go next door for his
143. ideas and so there's something about memoir where you're writing about your
144. life so you not needing to do the same kind of research the same kind of fact I mean you fact yourself so there a and there so much feeling um that there this kind of flow to it um and biographies tend to take seven eight plus years um you know
145. memoirs have as i just said a flow and so it's something to you can um write um very quickly so
146. So that's the part that's simpler.
147. The other is, you know,
148. sort of how you're writing about real people with their names.
149. It's not a novel.
150. And how they're going to respond to it.
151. And then especially when you're talking about kids,
152. then how are they going to respond to it when their friends bring it up?
153. How are they going to respond to it in 10 or 20 years?
154. that those are kind of haunting issues.
155. I think you're going to be just fine.
156. Okay.
157. Yeah, and on that, you know, this memoir, it feels remarkably candid.
158. And I have to say, your vocabulary is off the charts.
159. I have to keep looking up words.
160. I like to consider myself well-educated, but I'm like, what is that word?
161. So I have to look it up.
162. So you're very, very smart.
163. you're very smart yeah you're beautiful sorry no it challenges me i love that you know we should
164. always raise our game now were there moments when you found yourself hesitating before putting
165. certain memories or emotions on the page uh for me one particular moment that stood out
166. uh you didn't you didn't delve into it deeply but it really stood out to me
167. the night you saw a ghost at his parents' family home,
168. which was the first night that you and your husband, Paul,
169. actually shared a bed.
170. Right.
171. That little moment just really struck me
172. because I've had some visitations similar to that,
173. like what you're talking about.
174. I just thought if you want to expound on that a little bit.
175. Yeah.
176. I mean, well, that's where you get into the truth stranger than fiction
177. sometimes in writing memoir that these actual events would be different.
178. You wouldn't really imagine them.
179. And also part of, I mean, in the early days after Paul and I started dating,
180. after I explained that I wasn't, you know, bound to the memory of Howard
181. and was available emotionally, we didn't really, you know,
182. we didn't do like a 70s, 80s thing.
183. I mean, we didn't immediately start sleeping with each other.
184. I think we were both a little cautious.
185. I mean, I was saying I had some PTSD from the whole AIDS period, I think.
186. I mean, I think both of us were aware that we, you know, there was something here.
187. And so we were, you know, we moved kind of slowly.
188. And so part of that was then we went to Paul's family has a house in Cape Cod.
189. And we went there.
190. and so we went into our separate beds
191. because that's what we...
192. This was like a day or so before his parents arrived.
193. Yeah, and then I hadn't met.
194. And then I saw this ghost,
195. which doesn't happen to me every day.
196. I don't believe in ghosts.
197. But I did and I kind of yelled out
198. and Paul came in
199. and he didn't seem so surprised about the ghost thing.
200. I think as he had grown up with tales of ghosts in that house.
201. It was that kind of 19th century house.
202. But it led to our getting into his sort of comforting me
203. and getting into bed with me.
204. And then that was our first night together.
205. You think he called that ghost?
206. Did what?
207. You think he called that ghost?
208. Or did I invent the ghost?
209. Oh, yeah.
210. But I love his response.
211. Are you scared?
212. Not like, you know, what's happening?
213. What's going on?
214. It wasn't inquisitive.
215. It was very pointed.
216. Oh, interesting.
217. And true.
218. I mean, all of this is.
219. Now, for many gay men of, I wouldn't say your, but our generation, because I'm not far off from you,
220. The idea of marriage and parenthood once seemed out of reach, to say the least.
221. At what point did you begin to imagine a different future for yourself?
222. Yeah, I mean, it's hard.
223. Well, I definitely feel that what changed my life was coming to Columbia College in 1971
224. and making my way to the gay lounge in the basement of a dormitory.
225. the first such safe space in the country and and that you know quickly became my
226. Underground Railroad to gay life downtown in Manhattan and and then being
227. part of the gay community through all these radical changes when you think
228. about it I mean I had grown up in the 50s and 60s in Wilkes-Barre Pennsylvania
229. and it was very much I mean there wasn't even a word there wasn't the word gay
230. And it was...
231. Nobody spoke those words.
232. I mean, that was not in our lexicon.
233. Also, it wasn't like, don't ask, don't tell.
234. It was, don't ask, don't even think about it.
235. That's right.
236. Don't you dare think about it.
237. But then you come to New York, and in the 70s is the time of liberation, the golden age of promiscuity.
238. Then in the 80s, there's this smash cut of AIDS, which everything changes.
239. I mean, from color to black and white and from romance to tragedy.
240. And that we were all in a kind of war and people were actually dying.
241. That and then somehow we get to gays in the military and then gay marriage and gay family.
242. So it's sort of the history in that time.
243. And certainly in the earlier part, I would never even imagine gay marriage.
244. I mean, forget gay marriage.
245. And then in the 70s, I wrote a story called We Are Family,
246. a title taken from the Sister Sledge song.
247. That may or may not be playing at the end of the show today.
248. I'm just saying.
249. Oh, that would be awesome.
250. So thanks for planting that seed.
251. Okay.
252. Good.
253. But, you know, the idea, I think, was pretty much among us was chosen family.
254. Yes.
255. You know, that we were choosing our family by choosing our lovers and our friends and our community.
256. The notion of gay marriage and families at that point was still basically unimaginable.
257. And it started to move later and then, you know, move very quickly.
258. Yeah.
259. I was displaced in age for this, but I was, you know, there I was.
260. And I remember a friend of mine who did have a single father, gay, had a kid.
261. I was asking him about whether to do, whether not to do.
262. And he said, well, Brad, we can do this right now.
263. meaning the science and medicine and the politics at that point it kind of come together And with the Obama administration it administration there was now surrogacy was still not legal in New York State
264. but gay marriage was, and eventually became federal.
265. So all that was happening, and it made it, so it was possible.
266. There are threats to all that now, which sometimes I think of that.
267. Well, I look at your life and the family that you've built, and tuning in right now, I know tonight is Miranda Davis and her brother, Christopher Dickerson, and his husband, Justin.
268. They're just outside of Charlotte, North Carolina.
269. My nephew, by the way.
270. They've adopted three children.
271. And in fact, two younger siblings that they adopted nine months after their marriage.
272. And I was at their bed and breakfast Asheville wedding.
273. It was beautiful. And then, you know, he puts in for adoption and and not one, but two.
274. He didn't tell his husband this, that he put in for two because you were more likely to get chosen if you, you know,
275. selected, chose in multiple kids, you know, and siblings.
276. And then just recently they finalized the adoption of another child from that family that had needed.
277. He was the only one of six kids who had not been adopted, and he was in the foster care system for seven years.
278. And now he has a permanent forever home with his two younger siblings, my nephew and his husband, there in North Carolina.
279. Oh, wow.
280. Yeah, like I couldn't fathom like that.
281. In California, New York, but North Carolina?
282. Right.
283. I was like, what?
284. Yeah, and he's doing it, and doing it beautifully.
285. well we wound up having child through gestational surrogacy which is you have one woman who's
286. is the surrogate carries the egg one woman provides the i mean carrot yeah now you use
287. the same woman for both for both your sons uh for the egg right and then two different surrogates
288. yeah but in both cases with the surrogates yeah um i mean one's one son is born in las vegas the
289. other in Oklahoma City.
290. And the women who were surrogates were really, you know, they're from military backgrounds
291. or they were obviously conservative in politics.
292. And that just seemed surprising.
293. I thought it really was so, I mean, I hope we get to the point where we're not surprised
294. by this anymore.
295. But it was lovely.
296. The things you noted about them, you would expect them to not choose you, but they did.
297. Exactly.
298. Right, right.
299. and they did choose because it was what i discovered it wasn't us like the hr service
300. choosing them but i mean that's actually a valid valuable service they're providing and a lot of
301. people want it and so they're the ones who are looking at um who's who's what family they want
302. to get involved with and so that was so you chose the gay family in new york city in new york
303. interesting yeah i mean vegas i kind of get it because vegas has an edge to it and all that
304. Sin City, but Oklahoma City?
305. Oklahoma City, where her husband was an oil rigger.
306. Right.
307. I'm like, in Texas.
308. So you learn a lot.
309. I mean, stereotypes get smashed all over the place.
310. Which reminds us that we need to keep an open mind as well.
311. Now, Brad, this is Brad Gooch we're talking to.
312. He's author of Good Morning Moon, a snapshot of an American family.
313. also author of Radiant The Life and Line of Keith Haring Have a Thesaurus nearby kids because he real smart He uses some big words but they beautiful words You such a beautiful hand in writing I just love yeah I enjoying this I going to probably read it a second time before I pass it on to my nephew
314. But one of the things I really appreciated most about your memoir is that you don't present parenthood as a fairy tale.
315. No pun intended.
316. You write honestly about exhaustion, worry, uncertainty, and vulnerability.
317. Why was that important to you?
318. Well, I was just describing, I mean, I talked a little about how I'm this kind of ancient
319. mariner and, you know, not even by design found myself in these kinds of, these historical,
320. certainly gay historical moments, you know, and part of my natural routine as a writer
321. has been sort of chronicling that.
322. And I've also worked as a journalist. So, you know, talking about in the golden age of promiscuity, a novel I wrote about that time in New York. And I really, and in Smash Cut, also about the 70s and the 80s.
323. I, you know, I part was just really wanting to have a record, a time capsule out there of the steps of having a child for gay men at this point.
324. And, you know, and also the experience.
325. So I remember my agent, not even in talking about writing a book or not writing a book, said to me early on, when you talk about having kids, it doesn't sound like anyone else.
326. Yeah.
327. And part of this is because we have all different, you know, way different life experiences and different kinds of references.
328. But I completely forget about – these are two gay men raising a family, having kids, and it's just a parent dealing with everyday needs of their children and the wonder of their minds and seeing them do their first things and seeing how they develop and uniquely becoming this individual that's never been on this planet before.
329. And some of the harrowing things that can happen, too, that you can't plan for.
330. Accidents happen and how you deal with that.
331. All I could feel was that, you know, you're a parent.
332. And that, to me, rings true throughout.
333. It just so happens to be that you're two men raising these two boys.
334. Yeah.
335. I mean, a lot of it was, as you just brought up, I mean, just physical at that age.
336. I mean, there's just this terror.
337. I mean, I think all these things that could go wrong.
338. They could walk out into the street.
339. They could roll over and stop breathing.
340. They could break a coffee pot.
341. Yes, so yes, Walter got burned and wound up in a burn unit.
342. I was on pins and needles with that.
343. Yeah, I was.
344. Now, what surprised you most?
345. Now, we have about two and a half minutes left in the show.
346. What surprised you?
347. This goes by so fast.
348. What surprised you most once you actually became a father?
349. I love that you cried when Walter was born
350. Yes I did
351. I did the same thing too when my friend's son was born
352. Yeah something about
353. Something about miracles
354. That make you cry
355. And then I suppose again
356. Coming back to what I said
357. Everyone expected me
358. They were dubious
359. About me I was dubious about myself
360. As a parent everyone else was
361. I mean there was kind of agreement
362. That Paul was made for this
363. kind of role Me I don know But actually then it turned out I was kind of made for the whole thing I mean I was actually I discovered I was someone who could get down on the floor and play for hours
364. And it was kind of like writing.
365. And I love putting in.
366. But Brad, you're over 60.
367. How is that possible?
368. I know, right?
369. So all of that was a surprise.
370. I mean, it was another part of myself that I did not know was there and that was brought out by them and by family life.
371. It's beautiful. It's beautiful. Now, Good Morning Moon, a Snapshot of an American Family by Brad Gooch. This book arrived during Pride Month and just after Father's Day. What does your story say about how queer families have evolved over the course of your lifetime?
372. Well, I mean, trying to make queer families is interesting. I mentioned the chosen family idea,
373. and you know, and that's still an option and a great option. And then, I think, you know,
374. in the 50s and 60s, that time, it was more gay men marrying women, and then it was all closeted
375. in some way. So it looked like a regular marriage and they had family that way. And then,
376. So in the 90s, then, gay men were sperm donors for lesbian women.
377. And now we've arrived at a much, you know, this version of do-it-yourself with the help of women.
378. And so it's changing all the time.
379. Women make the world go round.
380. I'm going to say it out loud.
381. It's true.
382. And one thing for us was figuring out which roles we had.
383. We didn't have any roles.
384. So we had to figure out.
385. Oh, yeah.
386. Who's the wife and who's the husband?
387. Really?
388. Right.
389. Right. And the annoying question, who's the mother?
390. Oh, yes. I mean, come on.
391. But we get to do it without those roles, so it's exciting.
392. Now, Brad Gooch, you're a prolific writer, which I love. You write, you don't do enough.
393. And I have genre ADD, so I do different kinds of...
394. Perfect. Yeah, that's right. Now, what do you hope readers take with them after they finish Good Morning Moon?
395. Well, I actually, I mean, in terms, I'm not, it's not a book about, I'm not trying to proselytize for having a family, since I don't necessarily want one.
396. Not everyone's made for it. It depends what time of life you're at.
397. But there was happiness there, and I actually thought it's almost transgressive to write about happiness in a sense or a secret.
398. When I was gay, or I mean when I'm still gay.
399. When were you gay, Brad?
400. Not married and not having children.
401. Go to the 80s, 90s, and talking to straight people who had kids, and I would ask them about their family.
402. They would always say, oh, it's terrible.
403. You're so lucky not to have it to be free.
404. now though when you have those same conversations
405. their eyes light up and then they say
406. oh isn't it wonderful
407. so it's like
408. I wanted to share
409. I just want to thank you so much
410. Brad Gooch, you're an author
411. you're a poet, you're many many many
412. things, when it comes to writing you do it all
413. and thanks for joining us
414. tonight on IMRU
415. you're a good interlocutor so that's good, we like that
416. yes I love that, now your memoir is titled
417. Good Morning Moon, a snapshot of an American
418. family, cue the music
419. Yes, it's Sister Sledge with We Are Family. Your wishes have come true. It's a moving,
420. thoughtful, and often surprising exploration of love, parenthood, identity, family history,
421. and the many ways our understanding of family continues to evolve. Special thanks as well to
422. Yelena Gitlin-Nesbitt, Executive Director of Publicity at Harper Books, for helping arrange
423. tonight's conversation. And of course, my thanks to our co-producer, Arnella Barbara,
424. our board operator, the family.
425. Fabulous Irene and all of you for listening and supporting