HAPPY PRIDE MONTH (GETTING THIS OUT UNDER THE WIRE)
My Godfather, Mr. Roarke, Pride, Kites, and Gay Rights
“I am not young enough to know everything.”― Oscar Wilde
Happy Pride Month, Friends! I know I’m getting this Stack out under the wire, but I think we should celebrate love, freedom, and equality for LGBTQ folks every dang day, don’t you?
When I started to write this post, it occurred to me that my arrival on the planet in 1970 coincided with the very first gay pride parades (in NY, LA, Chicago, and NY), which marked the one-year anniversary of the Stonewall Riots. I attended my first march in West Hollywood not long after, at around age 5 or 6.
MY GODFATHER, BRUCE
My *godfather, Bruce took me and my brother, Chris to the parade that day. I sat on Bruce’s shoulders and gazed out at a crowd dotted with leather caps, waving hands, and dancing bodies. The sheer euphoria of the marchers, the colorful getups, and the thump of a disco beat filled me with delight.
*To clarify, my brother and I were not baptized in a church (we’re of Jewish descent, ergo, “it’s complicated”). “Godfather” was a term of endearment for Bruce who was much more of a father to us than our biological dad. My pops, Tony, had his charms, but parenthood was never his strong suit.
Born in 1944, Bruce, a self-made, successful lighting and furniture designer and philanthropist, came from humble beginnings. Akin to a scene out of Oscar Wilde’s The Importance of Being Earnest, Bruce was abandoned as a baby and left in a basket on some church steps in Boulder, Colorado. Soon after, he was adopted by a devout couple of little means.
He moved to LA, and, at age 19, set up his design shop, Bruce Eicher Inc., on Melrose Ave. By the early 70s, Bruce had made a name for himself and his wrought iron fixtures and furniture were snapped up by the rich and famous. My paternal grandmother, Muriel—an interior designer and later a hotel proprietor—collaborated on decorating jobs with Bruce. They became fast friends and, through Grandma’s introduction, my mother and Bruce also grew close.
Back then, I didn’t have much of a grasp of Bruce’s level of success. It wasn’t until the day I was hanging out at his showroom and the TV/movie star, Ricardo Montalbán rolled in to say hello and have a look around. I must’ve been around 8 or 9 at the time. Bruce, sensing my excitement and awe, introduced me. “This is my goddaughter, Hilary. Her grandmother has a fabulous beach resort in Haiti,” he said.
“What a nice little girl,” Ricardo Montalbán said and patted my head while I silently freaked out and thought, OH MY GOD, MR. ROARKE TOUCHED MY HEAD AND NOW ALL MY WISHES WILL BE GRANTED.
My parents split up before I turned two and my father headed to the Caribbean to work on his tan. According to Ma, Bruce moved into our West Hollywood pad with us to help pay the rent. I have no recollection of that period. In my earliest memories, Bruce lived in the Hollywood Hills with his partner, Roger in a tree house-type abode constructed from dark wood with big glass windows that overlooked the city. The place was outfitted with Bruce’s custom-designed wrought iron light fixtures shaped like tree branches and delicate leaves, leather woven chairs from Mexico, and a smattering of panda accessories. Bruce loved pandas.
Often barefoot, and wearing a pair of faded Levis, Bruce, with his head of shaggy blond hair, and year-round tan, never put on airs. He preferred simple pleasures like scarfing down a chili dog at Pinks, fishing off a rock at the beach, and driving out to the desert in his Jeep Cherokee with the top down. Anyone or anything he adored was considered “fabulous!” And when he found something funny, which was most of the time, he threw back his head and let out the most gleeful cackle.
Generous, perhaps to a fault, Bruce enjoyed doling out gifts and money to everyone he held dear, including his pious mother who’d assured him he’d burn in hell for being gay.
For me and Chris, Bruce was the ultimate arbiter of fun, adventure, and creativity. At Christmas time, he showed up with a huge tree and fashioned a wreath from branches. He’d sit with us for hours with a needle and thread, stringing together popcorn and cranberries for homemade garlands until our fingers were sore with pin pricks. He taught us that we could make beautiful creations out of just about anything. On Easter, he brought all the fixings to dye eggs and gifted us baskets full of treats. He took us to the Renaissance Fair, and drove us to Mexico in his jeep with the wind whipping our hair into knots as we chugged cans of Coke—a drink my health-conscious mom never allowed in the house.
One year, our school had a kite flying contest. In the workroom of his shop, Bruce supervised as Chris and I fabricated homemade kites out of butcher block paper and pieces of wood. We each painted an intricate design on the paper; I’m sure mine was Snoopy related. Bruce deemed the kites “fabulous!” The day of the contest, a sea of kids unspooled their strings and watched their store-bought kites glide in the air. Meanwhile, Chris and I ran around the playground trying to get our clunky creations to take flight. Aerodynamics had not been factored in to our designs and the kites dragged along the asphalt, too heavy to catch air. On an up note (🙂), we both won an award for Most Artistic Kites and honestly, that’s still a point of pride for me today. 🥇
Bruce battled his demons of course—anyone abandoned as a baby and made to feel like a sinner by his adoptive mom surely would. He turned to substance abuse on and off to cope, and a few cars were totaled in the process. Eventually, he joined AA and committed to recovery.
As a child, I believed Bruce to be superhero-esque and seemingly unbreakable. This was based on a couple of key incidents. Once I watched him step barefoot on a parking lot tire spike, cut open his foot, walk onto the beach, fill the gash with sand, then rinse it off in the ocean without wincing. Another time he got a fish hook stuck in his eyelid, calmly removed it, and proceeded to cast his line for fish! I held tightly to this theory in the mid-80s when many of Bruce’s and Ma’s friends started to grow ill and die from AIDS.
For a while, Bruce remained hale and championed the cause, giving money to various charities and supporting efforts for AIDS research. But eventually, his body broke down. He started to lose his eyesight, and for a visionary like Bruce, not being able to see destroyed his spirit. The spark in him began to fade as the medicines and treatments took their toll. He tired easily, lost weight, and grew irritable. He had a wonderful partner, Michael, taking good care of him, but in November of ‘97, Bruce was hospitalized and his system shut down. My mom and I booked a flight to Palm Springs to say goodbye.
At the gate, our flight was delayed. We paced back and forth and pleaded with the desk attendant at the airline to find a flight for us. The attendant clacked away at a computer for what seemed like eons and Ma said, “What are you typing, the Magna Carta?”
We booked another flight and managed to make it to the hospital in time. Michael said Bruce had waited for us. I try not to remember Bruce as he appeared that day—so painfully frail, unconscious, and his breath labored. At only 53, the disease had ravaged his body so badly and he seemed much older. I held his bony hand and told him I loved him.
He died soon after and we were shattered. He was far too young. I miss Bruce all the time and it’s hard to write about him without getting weepy. He enriched my life in so many ways and I’ll forever be grateful for all the wonder and whimsy he brought to my childhood.
Bruce Wayne (Like Batman!) Eicher
April 10th 1944 - November 19th, 1997
From the LA Times:
“Bruce Wayne Eicher, 53, internationally popular interior decorator and philanthropist. A native of Boulder, Colo., Eicher set up his design firm Bruce Eicher Inc. in West Hollywood in 1963. He began with a line of chandeliers and went on to design furnishings for the Ritz-Carlton and Four Seasons hotel chains and for wealthy individuals here and in Saudi Arabia. His work was regularly featured in Architectural Digest. A donor of millions of dollars to gay and AIDS groups, Eicher set up West Hollywood fund-raisers to involve the design community in contributing money to combat AIDS. He was a founding member and active in the Bank of Los Angeles, AIDS Project Los Angeles, Project Angel Food, West Hollywood Alcohol & Drug Center, Gay and Lesbian Community Center and others. On Thursday in West Hollywood of complications of AIDS.”
SUPPORT THE LGBTQ COMMUNITY
If you’re able to volunteer your time or donate to organizations fighting for LGBTQ rights, please do. The battle for freedom and equality is ongoing and never-ending. The two nonprofits below do amazing work.
The Human Rights Campaign
HRC’s campaigns are focused on mobilizing those who envision a world strengthened by diversity, where laws and society treat all people equally, including LGBTQ+ people and those who are multiply marginalized.
Project Angel Food
Project Angel Food is the loving neighbor who knows that food is medicine, food is love, and food nourishes the soul. We believe no one fighting critical illness should go hungry, which is why we personally deliver, with care and compassion, free medically-tailored meals, handmade with healthy ingredients to those in our community who are hungry and alone.
What a beautiful tribute to Bruce! It's heartbreaking how much true family we lost to AIDS. Thank you, Hilary! xox
Thanks for sharing this! An excellent read and tribute.