Joyride

- I don't know what's for lunch, do you?

No, I didn't think to look, - Ah.

- Or if I did, I immediately forgot.

- Hi, I am John Wingler.

I grew up in Pasadena for the last 32 years before we moved to Claremont.

Lee and I lived just about one mile from where I was born in Hollywood.

Table three.

- I'm Lee Conger.

I grew up in the not New Orleans part of Louisiana, which is to say, rural Louisiana.

Like any good Southerner, I met my future spouse in church.

- This is our marriage license.

I'm 10 years older than Lee.

When you get to be 65 and 75, 10 years is a lot of difference.

- [Lee] Hi, Brooke.

- Hi, I'm Brooke.

- I'm Lee.

- Nice to meet you.

- Nice to meet you.

- I'm John.

- Nice to meet you, John, I'm Brooke.

Hi, my name is Brooke Sebold, and I'm your pilot for this episode of "Joy Ride."

- It's gonna be hard to make eye contact with you.

- Okay.

- I'm gonna pretend it's psychoanalysis.

- Great, great.

- Cycle analysis?

- [John] Cycle analysis.

Yeah, we're outta control!

- [Lee] Runaway chariot.

- I'm excited to get to go for a ride today with John and Lee.

They're gonna take me on a little tour of their community, and just learn a little bit more about their life, and about what their community looks like.

I've been working as a filmmaker for over 20 years.

I typically do documentaries, and they frequently investigate gender and identity.

John and Lee live in an intentional community, just a little bit outside of Los Angeles in Claremont.

It's called Pilgrim Place.

And what brought you to this community specifically?

- When John began researching retirement communities in Claremont, he came upon the Pilgrim Place website.

- It defines itself as an intentional community devoted to justice, peace, and activism.

- And inclusion.

- Yes, and inclusion.

When I read this, I thought they're saying a lot of the things that we really believe in.

- Is there a strong queer community within this community?

- You know, our lesbian friends told us that there are 20 lesbians living in, hey, Caleb, in the independent living area, and there are, as far as I know, about five male gay men.

The very first thing we did was write an application saying we're interested, and you put your name, and then the next line said, "Your pronouns," and I thought, "Who are these people," "that are so clued in, that they want to know our pronouns?"

- I was also curious just about your coming out story, and what that looked like, and meeting?

- I came out in my twenties.

My mother took me aside and said she was worried about this situation with this fellow I had been living with because she thought he might be a homosexualist, and I said, "That's not really a word, and he is gay, and I'm gay, too."

And my dad said, "I'm 70 years old, do what you want.

I'm gonna have a drink," but my mom said, "Have you talked to your priest about it?"

And I thought, "Well, okay, that's an interesting idea."

I saw the priest out in front a few days later, and he said, "Oh, you know, I'm sorry what you're going through with your parents.

As far as coming to church here, my lover, Richard, comes with me.

He's very welcome here.

All the people treat us as a couple, and I think you would continue to be very comfortable here, so tell your mother that it's okay."

When I was in college, I came out as being queer.

It took me another 20 years to come out as non-binary, and part of that was just because I was afraid of disappointing my mom, which now sounds kind of crazy, because her reaction was so wonderful, but I think even as a 40-year-old, I just had fear that somehow being non-binary was a disappointment, and thankfully, I don't feel that way anymore.

- Subsequent to my coming out to my parents, they disowned me, took me out of the will, and my mother never lost touch with me.

She would stay in touch.

Some of it was to criticize me and say what a mess I was making of my life, but in a way, we stayed in touch.

- Yeah, and I didn't come out until, well, gee, I turned 40 in December, and that was only by writing a letter to my mother.

My father had already died, so did not play out well.

When I wrote a letter to my mother, coming out, she had met John.

You know, we were roommates.

In general, well, our relationship really began to deteriorate, and continued to deteriorate until I eventually broke off contact.

Many months after I came out to her, I wrote a letter to my brother, and his response by letter was to tell me that I could not have contact with his two children.

And so, I elected then not to have contact with him, but I bided my time, and when my nephew turned 18, I reached out to him, and he and I have a lovely, very sweet relationship now, and ultimately then with his younger sister as well.

- This is a photo of our nieces and nephews that got together when we...

The same year where we got married, they had gotten married, and we decided to show off our wedding rings.

- So you met at church?

- Like any good southerner does.

I wasn't even a believer by the time I got to that church.

The reason I started attending that church was that someone I'd known at Oral Roberts University was there as the rector, and moreover, he was the first openly gay priest hired by the Episcopal Diocese of Los Angeles.

So I thought, "Let me just drop in on Mac."

My first impression of John was actually his gallantry, just seeing him interacting with some of the other parishioners.

It was a very small parish.

Yeah, this is the rose window of the church where we met, there in East Hollywood.

- We got married at the registrar's office, so we didn't have a ceremony, so friends threw us a party.

This is a photo taken at a Valentine's party the year we got married.

- [Brooke] That's a little different.

- After my mother died, my dad lived four more years, and during that time we became very close, and you know, really, very touchingly, when he told me, "We've changed our trust agreement, and we're putting you as the executor," I just said to him, "So this is a really big change.

What happened, Dad?"

And he broke down in tears, and he said, "I was wrong."

And for anybody to say, "I was wrong," it's very vulnerable, but for my dad, who was tough and distant, to tell me that, and we could sit there and tear up together, it was pretty wonderful.

- Well, I know as we get older, there is sometimes an impulse to slow down, and to sometimes become a bit more isolated in our own worlds, and both of you, I feel like have made an active effort to do the opposite.

The older that I get, in some ways, I feel like I have a little bit less of a connection to the elderly community.

When I think about my elders, I think about my grandparents, who are so pivotal in my life, and really shaped who I am, and I lost them, you know, a decade ago.

And so I love getting to sit down with people of a different generation and just learn from them.

Well, we were talking about aging, and I'm curious if you think about mortality?

- I remember many years ago, I got kind of panicky at some point.

I don't know, I can't give you a backstory to it, but I got panicky about, "Oh, what if I can't figure out, like, when the moment comes, what if I can't figure out how to do it," you know?

But at some point it occurred to me, you know, everybody who's died so far managed to figure that out.

- You know, the lecture.

- Everyone that's ever lived?

- Everyone who's ever lived and is no longer living, - Yes.

- They've managed, at some point, to figure out how to do it.

Let's point out the castle - Oh yeah.

- There just to the left.

There are Qigong sessions there throughout the week.

I have a piece of paper that calls me a teacher of Integral Qigong and Tai Chi.

It's coordinating gesture with breath and meditation.

- I'm excited for you to show me this practice, because I've never done it before.

- It has really enhanced my life, hugely.

Funneling the energy into the top of the head, and then drawing it also to the heart.

We're gonna do this a few times.

- Chatting with John and Lee is so interesting for me as a filmmaker, because I really love stories and storytelling, and so it's wonderful to be able to chat with them, and just hear a little bit about their life, and the work that they do in their community.

- [Lee] Breathing in.

- [Brooke] And also just to hear the stories of, you know, what their experience was like.

- Hands in prayer position in front of the heart as we acknowledge each other with gratitude.

- Thank you both so much for taking the afternoon to spend with me, - thank you.

- And to get on the bike, and trust me riding, and showing me- - Yes.

- This beautiful practice.

I really appreciate learning from both of you.

- [John] Wonderful.

- [Lee] My pleasure.