*
Dee Westenhauser (DW): If you were to see Aunt Yaya
back in the day the way I saw her, she was tall.
She had a beautiful angular face with high cheekbones
and she had brown eyes.
They almost looked like owl eyes, scanning everything.
And the way she walked around a room would tell you
she held herself in high regard.
One weekend, my mom and my dad, they decided that
I was going to go to Aunt Yaya's house.
I was nine years old.
And once the door closed, she says,
"How would you like to change into something
"that's really comfortable for you?"
And what was there were a blouse and a wig.
I knew I was a girl.
And so that weekend, I got to be me.
We went shopping in my outfits.
Everyone in the neighborhood knew Yaya.
And she would introduce me
as her niece.
-Martha Gonzalez (MG): Would you
go home and mention anything like that? - DW: No.
She said, "When you go home, you have to be what they want."
Because if you don't and they find you out,
you will be hurt.
She was the one who taught me early on
that I have to play the game.
Yaya... she had a lifelong friend.
And it wasn't until years later that I finally figured out
that her friend was her lover and her partner.
And you never spoke of that back in the day.
Yaya never got the love she was supposed to
from the rest of the family.
And Yaya wanted me to be
everything that she wanted to be
if she could live her life over again.
She gave me pearls of wisdom.
You could string a necklace to the moon and back
with everything that she would share.
I loved her, she loved me back,
and behind that white door
became my place to be
the little girl that I needed to be.