ODYSSEY STORYTELLING PHOTOS and BIOS

May 9, 2009 - "Families You Know"
at Wingspan
repeated on May 17 at Center for Inquiry

Matthew Jones: I am a twenty-one year old gay male who has lived in Tucson all my life. I work for a non-profit organization called open inn. I have had a very hard life but try to make the best of it. I am starting college in August and I am going to major in psychology and minor in social work. I try to take all the negitave situations in my life and turn them into positive ones. I really enjoy being a very active member in the gay community and big activist for GLBTQQIA youth.

Janet (JP) Putnam hails from the East Coast. She loves the desert, but misses rivers. JP's life has been full of such contradictory desires. As an undergraduate, she couldn't choose between Women's Studies and Mathematics, so she majored in both. JP made her first public appearance as a story teller way back in the late 1980s, featuring original erotic stories for lesbians. She returns to public storytelling with an autobiographical portrait of love and logic.

Melissa Griebel is the mother of two boys, ages 11 and 8 who were adopted at birth while she was married to an opposite sex husband. Melissa now parents the boys with her current partner of 5 years, Sue. Understanding that parenting is the hardest job she's ever done, Melissa works hard at helping her children become successful students and members of society. The ups and downs make life fun for Melissa and Sue...and we hope the end results will be worth it!

Merlin Spillers has been in about 20 stage productions as an actor and dancer. He generally prefers doing comedy as he feels it's great to make people laugh, but one of the best times in his life was when he played at patient in an insane asylum in the "Marat.......Sade" play. Since moving to Tucson in 2004 with his partner Lee, his stage work has dwindled as they have developed such a busy social life. He openly admits to being a ham and misses doing theatre work. This is his third time doing storytelling with Odyssey. He enjoys storytelling very much and is thankful for these opportunities to do so.

Thomas Sayler-Brown is an architect in Tucson and is a partner in SBBL Architecture + Planning (sbbl.biz). He is a member of the executive committee of Tucson's American Institute of Architects, a board member of the Sahuaro Girl Scouts and an active member of the ManKind Project, an international support oranization for men. Mr. Sayler-Brown also serves as a Hearing Officer for the County's Building and Zoning departments, as a member of Tucson's Planning Commission, as a frequent stakeholder in the city's various community planning committees and is co-chair of the steering committee for Real Estate and Professional Affiliates. He lives with his partner of 11 years, whom he married in October, 2008, and is a proud family man. Thomas has called Tucson home for nearly 17 1/2 years.

Drew Cronyn is just another unabashedly gay pediatrician, ultra-liberal quasi-hippie, ex-Catholic convert, single adoptive father and recent Tucsonan. Growing up, Drew was fairly certain he was the only boy in Borrego Springs, California (population 1600) who felt 'that way' about other guys. It was only years later that he found out his high school principal, those nice ladies at the pharmacy and the men who owned the Airport restaurant were also 'that way.' He picked his college out of "The Preppy Handbook" and, after graduation, lived, worked and came out in New York City. Drew then left behind the glamorous world of pharmaceutical public relations to go to med school. After graduating, he moved to St. Louis, Missouri where he worked for eight years at a public health center as a general pediatrician. In 18 action-packed months, he became a Catholic (although all of his spiritual mentors have now been ex-communicated), adopted a son from Russia and, in January of 2008, moved to Tucson, where he now works in academic pediatrics with a special interest in special needs and chronically-ill kids. He lives in one of Tucson's co-housing communities with his 5-year old son Matvey and dog, CJ.

Peter Powers-Lake is the co-father of one adorable 10 year old son named Shawn along with co-father Patrick Powers-Lake. Their journey as a family began in 2006 and has been an odyssey since then. Peter works as finance director at Wingspan, Southern Arizona's LGBT Community Center.