Well, praise the Lord!  Thursday, July 13, 2006 marks my 68th birthday.  I love it when folk say to me:  "You certainly do not look that old!"  One of life's mysteries to me is folk who lie about their age.  Everyone grows old.  The overweight can diet -- yet there is no pill that can turn back the clock and make one younger.  Kathryn Kuhlman "fibbed" about her age, according to her official biography.  And yet, Sophie Tucker used her age and incorporated it into her comedy songs.  ("If a big fat mama my age can do it," she exclaimed -- "then why the hell can't you?").  In her song, "I'm Having More Fun Since I'm Sixty", she said: 

 

    "Let the birthdays come and go, they never leave me feeling glum --

        why, the more candles on my birthday cake, the hotter I become!"

 

And in her song "The Fountain of Youth" she said:

 

    "Ed Sullivan made a crack, and he wasn't far from wrong;

       when he said that I found that damn Fountain, before Ponce DeLeon."

 

(I hope some of this risque humor doesn't offend any religious folk.  In the latter years of her long show business career Sophie worked in nightclubs to adult audiences.  In her autobiography she insists that the humor in her comedy songs is NOT "dirty", and I totally agree.  I feel sorry for people who are so religious and pious that they can't enjoy life to its fullest.  Darcelle XV closes her shows by saying: "When we learn to laugh at ourselves, then we can laugh at everybody else"!).  There is no Commandment that says: "Thou shalt not have a good time".

 

"Oh," exclaimed a Grandma when leaving the Darcelle XV nightclub, "this is the most wonderful place to celebrate your birthday."  "The place to celebrate" is what has kept Darcelle XV, a cabaret in Portland, Oregon, going all these years.  And when you visit Portland, this is a show that you should put on your "must see" list.  It is cabaret entertainment at its best.  Glitz, glamour, and comedy.  I am truly proud to have been connected with this establishment over the years. 

 

Last night I spoke to a group of Trans people at a local Trans Resource Center.  (There is also a support group in Portland for Trans youth and/or teens searching for their identity and place in life).  I shared some of my high school memories with them -- the years 1952 through 1956.  The word "transsexual" had not even been coined yet.  Those who were innately "different" were harrassed and even persecuted.  There was no support of any kind for Trans youth.  Thank God for Christine Jorgenson -- the first publicized male-to-female transsexual.  In 1952 Christine's story was published in a three-part series in the Sunday newspaper magazine.  When I read her feelings while growing up, I felt like I was reading about myself.  Since then, there has been much enlightenment on the subject, although there are still mountains of ignorance to hurdle.  Transsexualism is the most misunderstood subject there is.  I thank God for friends who have taken the time to get to know me, and see beyond the physical into my heart in the same way that God sees me. 

 

And after nearly dying in February of 2005, God spared my life to complete my mission and calling in this life.  An autobiographical book and a film documentary are in the making, although moving slowly.  These projects will come to pass. 

 

When conducting a service at Angelus Temple (in Los Angeles) in 1967, Kathryn Kuhlman shared an experience when she and her secretary Maggie visited the grave of Aimee Semple McPherson, that great woman of faith who founded the International Church of the Foursquare Gospel.  When approaching the tombstone, a woman and her son were talking.  The woman said to the young man: "Oh, if you could only have seen her.  Her ministry made Jesus so real to me,"  Kathryn Kuhlman said:  "After I have departed, if ONE person can stand over my grave and say that, it will have been worth all of the struggle. 

 

Sophie Tucker said: 

 

    "And when at journey's end some day, I take my last curtain call,

       Let smiling faces hear me say, "My thanks, and God bless you all." 

 

My prayer is that years from now, after I am gone, someone can say that my ministry helped them in their life's struggles.  In my teenage years at the Wings of Healing Temple in Portland, often when receiving the offering, they would sing:

 

    "We're building a road, building a road, helping the weak and blind;

       we're going to smooth out that road, that leads to heaven's abode,

         and make it easy for those behind!"

 

So let us continue to "build a road", plowing through the wilderness of ignorance, prejudice and bigotry, to a brighter day.  The scriptures declare that the day is coming when

 

    "The knowledge of the Lord shall fill all the earth as the waters cover the sea".

 

And as the song says:

 

    "But until then, my heart will go on singing,

       until then, with joy I'll carry on,

          until that day my eyes shall see that City,

       until the day God calls me home."

 

God bless!

 

copyright 2006               SISTER PAULA NIELSEN

                                              PO Box 2206, Portland, OR 97208