March 16, 2026
Kat Talks to Me
When I least expect it… I am talking to someone and telling them about Kat and a memory rushes in. In my mind, she’s 2, 5, 7, 13, 15… We’re driving together. She’s behind the wheel. She was behind the wheel from the time she got her license… until she couldn’t drive.
Some people collect coins. Some baseball cards. I collect information. I have a terrible memory, so I capture data, things I want to remember: movies, books, poems… I have them all at the ready. I’ve forgotten nearly all, but the data is there ready to be accessed. I collect poems.
I’m sharing a poem. Another poem pops up in my list of poems that I have collected. Did I say that I collect poems? I forget.
I collect information. My daughters tell me things and I don’t want to forget even though I know I will. But some of it is still there, ready to be accessed.
Kat is sick. We’re driving and I’m at the wheel. Kat and I are talking about grim things… things neither of us wants to talk about and both of us want to talk about. They are both true at the same time. She told me what her favorite poem was. I collected the information.
I forgot
I didn’t put the poet’s name in the place where the author should go. That made this poem sit at the top of the list with the other poems that apparently wrote themselves (but didn’t).
I opened it
At the top above the poem were these words, “Kat told me this was her favorite poem when we were driving back from Duke Hospital.”
I wasn’t ready to read it then. I’m not sure I was ready just now. But I am moved to my core.
A Woman is Talking to Death by Judy Grahn
September 23, 2024
Twelve Years
I am struggling to write something to honor Kat on the 12th anniversary of her death. It’s not that nothing comes to me, but everything comes to me. The art of writing-speaking is deciding what little slice of life you can communicate in the moment, then staying on topic.
I want to share my daughter’s existence and her impact on me with everyone. So many of my friends never got to meet her. And I’m always mindful that I would never have met many of you if she had not been gay and if she had not died.
I’m so thankful she was who she was. I am so glad that she was gay and I am so honored that I got to be her dad. I am grateful for each of you I have met in the past 12 years because of Kat, mostly at PFLAG and Charlotte PRIDE Band. I grieve her loss while I endeavor to channel my love for Kat into my world and what would have been her world.
If you’ve spent any time with me, you know how I love to talk about my four daughters; their accomplishments and the ways they are impacting this world. Today is about remembering Kat, but I want to tell you that Kat’s older sisters were all instrumental in my changing my mind. From the time Kat came out, they modeled for me what a good ally looks like. They told me things I didn’t want to hear and yet somehow I did want to hear.
When I did the TED talk 6 years ago (prompted by my one of my daughters), I searched for documentation that would help me remember as accurately as possible where my thinking was at the time. I found an email from one of my daughters who was vehemently standing up for Kat’s sexuality. I remembered how I felt when I read that email back then and yet now I could also understand that she was right on the mark.
Another daughter posted things that allies post on social media. She marched in San Francisco PRIDE and I didn’t understand why. Now I don’t fully understand why I would even wonder why. Her actions were not about me, but they caused me to examine my own actions and what I was doing to honor Kat’s memory.
Another daughter befriended some queer people where she worked and through her, I got to know some of them. I’ll never forget a party she had at my house to which she invited her friends including a number who were queer. I was upstairs at my computer with the window open that looks out on our front sidewalk (it’s where I’m sitting now). I heard her walking up with someone I knew and someone I didn’t know. The one I didn’t know had expressed some discomfort about coming into our home. I heard my daughter say to them, “This is a safe space”. Hearing that helped me understand the significance of creating safe spaces. Creating safe spaces by listening to the stories of others is what I want to do as long as I still have breath.
If you want to read more about Kat’s life and how she impacted me, it’s here
If you want to know more about PFLAG Charlotte, it’s here
If you want to know more about Charlotte PRIDE Band, it’s here
If you haven’t seen my TED talk about my journey to accepting Kat, it’s here
Jimazing Thoughts 
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