“Animals can also zero in on clues that we provide without knowing it.” One supposes it’s called, Straydar. The Grim Reaper in the guise of a mild-mannered tabby named Oscar is making news lately. A [...]

“Gay is good. You are not alone.” This was the slogan when the Affirmations LGBT Center opened its doors in Ferndale more than 20 years ago. It was a bold statement to make at the time: reassurance for many cautious, confused, isolated young people in need of understanding, trained organizational support and a place to hang out.

some with caution some with confidence some seeking rainbow courage (now!) all join hands and promenade: black, white yellow, red stripes and stars unfolding our marching drums our music, yes play it proud (so out [...]

Long, long before The Village People made "Y.M.C.A." the unofficial, persistent national anthem of Winter Olympian skater Brian Boitano, the Young Mens Christian Associations played an important role, second only to bars, as places to meet available others of like-minded, body-mind-and-spirit, triune persuasions (“You show me your triune, I’ll show you my try-unity. Let’s shower in unison. One with the others”).

“It’s a pity that youth is wasted on the young,” said George Bernard Shaw, whose play “Pygmalion” was given a fresh start, with an ongoing heart pacer as Broadway's “My Fair Lady.”

At 19, I went to my first gay bar, The Silver Slipper, a dyke bar on Grand River, near downtown Detroit. I used borrowed ID, was escorted authoritatively by two lesbian regulars, Speedy and Draino.

This week’s issue of Between The Lines marks the kickoff of our celebration of 25 years of our dedicated, meaningful, challenging, rainbow-community outreach publication. Whew! Who would have thought it possible? (Did you?)

In 1987 some 165,000 people pledged $1,000 to Muskegon-born Jim Bakker’s Heritage USA, a Bible-themed vacation and so-called recreation village. For their ready cash, each attendee was promised a four-day stay and a [...]

It’s 12:01 a.m. according to my now celestial iPhone. I have been just 60 seconds in Heaven — the result of a Michigan Republican-sponsored pothole tripping mishap, courtesy of Gov. Snyder — but it seems like an eternity to me.

MODEST DISCLAIMER: There are several books about afterlife experiences on the New York Times Best Seller list, including one by a 5-year-old kid (with a little grammar and spelling help from his word-savvy dad). Another [...]

Once upon an evil time, when darkness began to gather, hate by political hate, at rainbow’s near end of tunnel, those anointed LGBT and Q by special life’s enchantment and DNA calling, began once more to tremble.

Well-known Spanish philosopher Jorge Agustin Nicolas Ruiz de Santayana y Borras — known succinctly in English as George Santayana — was born in 1863 and died in 1952. He was gay — lived through the [...]

In 1953, a madam by the name of Polly Adler wrote a tell-all best seller about her 30 years in the brothel business, "A House is Not a Home." It created a sensation (I was [...]

Charles Alexander Were I 50 years younger, and given a now wishful-thinking opportunity, I just might make a pass at Justin Bieber, troublesome idol turned born-again celebrity entertainer. What has captured my foolish, [...]

Charles Alexander This is the story of Dorian Lavender who has vanished from the party scene of music, stimulants, sex and is now ironically beyond the saving grace of suddenly-discarded friends of which [...]

Charles Alexander Mart Crowley's "Boys In the Band" opened off-Broadway 50 years ago. I bought a copy of the play in Chicago in 1968 and read dialog aloud while driving back to Detroit [...]

There are paths that by strange chances on Christmas Eve mix up in time, space, thought, crazy activation. Some fact. Some fantasy. Who knows? So it happened once upon a near but distant whimsical time [...]

As a gay teenager I hung out at the Hub Grill in downtown Detroit, a greasy spoon of a place, located at Farmer and Bates Streets, in convenient walking distance of four quite popular gay [...]