Friends at SF Memorial Service

  Tesia, Marianne, Nicole, Lisa, Pam, Sally, Julia, and Amy B.

Lori, Marianne, Laura, and Julia.

Laura, Nicole, Valerie, Denise, Mitra, and Esther.

Christina and Julie.

(Photos courtesy of Amy Rubin).

Rocking the Short Shorts

At Stonehenge. In flip-flops. Because there's nothing at all to stub your toe on at Stonehenge...

Too Cool to Be Without Shades

With Kar and Margo at the LA Fest, modeling the latest in filmmaker eyewear.

(Courtesy of Esther Orioli)

Bay Area Memorial Service

The Bay Area Memorial for Ingrid will take place Saturday, Feb. 23, from 2 p.m. to 5 p.m. at the LGBT Community Center, 1800 Market Street at Octavia Street, San Francisco.

It’s an “aw shucks” love fest for the gal who loved polkas, women, cats, films, and setting Cheetos on fire. Come as you are!

• Share your favorite Ingrid memory or story
• Sing a song, play a tune, dress a part
• Bring your pictures for a photo wall
• Contribute ideas, fabric, or pieces for a quilt in Ingrid’s honor

Rutgers: The Good Old Days

Ingrid and I met in September 1979, our sophomore year at Rutgers College. We lived down the hall from one another. She had come to New Jersey on a national student exchange program. She was eager to escape Boise to get to New York, and Rutgers was a way to do it. At the time she was experimenting with being out of the closet, and was the first person whom I knew who was open about being gay. I was a pretty awkward straight guy, obsessed with women, but not doing a whole lot about it. Our shared obsession though was just one of the things we had in common. We viewed ourselves as cosmopolitans. I thought that I belonged in New York and not Jersey; Ingrid was convinced that it was her destiny to be in a big city rather than Boise.

Soon after she got to Rutgers, we took the train into New York. We did lots of touristy things --the Statue of Liberty, the top of the World Trade Center (She reminded me of the World Trade Center trip when we talked on the phone after 9/11), and the Metropolitan Museum of Art. I still repeat something she said at the Met. We were walking through this room filled with a couple hundred Greek Vases. There were so many of them, that it became boring to study each one. She was outraged that there were so many. She said, "If there was just one of these in Boise, humanities teachers from all over the state would take their students to see it."

Ingrid was kind, trusting, and trustworthy. She had friends of all genders and orientations and could talk to anyone. For all of her fascination with big city life, Ingrid had grown up on a farm and was deeply suspicious of people who put on airs. She often spoke of how people she met might appear to her family back in Boise. I'll always remember how she could flip back and forth between lesbian feminist and Boise farm girl.

In our senior year we shared an apartment. I did my school work, applied to graduate schools (in psychology), and almost nothing else, but Ingrid was always doing an art project or working on a film. I remember her working for days at a time on her films. Years later when I tracked her down through the internet, I saw that the films she made in college were now for sale on a videotape. Every now and then we’d get involved in some big cooking project together. Once, Ingrid found a recipe for homemade Kalua and insisted that we make it. In those pre-Starbucks days, it involved large amounts of vodka and instant coffee (Yuck!). We shared a stereo. I remember none of the records I owned at the time, but Ingrid introduced me to Patsy Cline and I still sing along when I hear her songs.

After college, Ingrid and I didn’t do a good job of staying in touch. I always figured though that at some point I’d make it out to California with my wife and daughters. Ingrid always struck me as someone who did what she set out to do and I’m sad that my daughters never got the chance to meet her, see the example she set, and laugh with her.

Jonathan Steinberg
Cincinnati, Ohio
February 2008

The Catnapster

Iggy Bob and Ingrid, modeling the latest in fleece and cat-fur napping blankets. Iggy Bob has a Catster page and requests the honor of your presence. Now.

A Life in Pictures

These are the photo posters that we put together for Ingrid's funeral in Boise. Please make sure to click on each poster in order to see it at a viewable size.

The Only Good Gift

Ingrid and I gave each other more than a few presents over the years. But once we grew up, we developed a winter holiday ritual.

Every year, she'd send me a CD of music she was sure I'd never listen to otherwise, and I got to see how her taste in music grew and changed over tme. Music was the measure of her life. And every year, I'd send her some sort of interesting and unusual calendar, because she was interesting and unusual, and because I wanted to give her time.

Time was important to us--we talked often about the many years we had loved each other, the ways our friendship had matured and changed, and what we would be like as old women.

In the end, it turns out, we gave each other the most important thing we had to give. We gave each other time.

I consider it an honor to have been part of the progression of Ingrid's life--to have known her as a girl and to see the woman she became.

I miss them both.

--Caren Crockett

Give It a Squeeze

I met Ingrid in the early 1990's in San Francisco. At first we were simply co-workers, but it was inevitable that we would become friends. How could you not with her? She was a fun-loving, mid-western-slang-slingin', creative, and talented gal.

I also had the honor of doing a few video projects with her and got to witness just how professional and meticulous she was about her own work as well. I admired that in her. But the best part about her was the sayings that would periodically come flying out of her mouth. Our friend Mark just reminded me the other day how she always said, "You know what really chaps my ass?" I also remember while we were filming "Mister Sisters" there was some line about tube socks in the script. Lisa and I talked her into "hipper" dialogue, but we laughed our asses off and as a compromise she shot the tube socks so at least they would make an appearance in the movie.

Her accordian was another great thing about her. She loved playing that thing, and it showed. While she and my partner Christina were doing their act Cabaret Tormento, she made a T-shirt with a great photo of them that says, "Strap one on and give it a squeeze." Well said, Ingrid! (I continue to proudly wear the shirt to this day.)

I think what I will remember most about her is her infectious laugh and her walk. She kind of bopped and bounced, especially when she was in a hurry (usually!).

I'm still in shock. I miss her dearly, but I know that I am a better person from having known her.

Peace out, Ingrid.

your pal, sal

--Sally Carter

Everybody Who Knew Her Is Richer

I'm sitting here bawling even though I only met Ingrid a few times. Such tears are for life wasted, love lost, dreams exploded, hopes up in smoke and plans that vanish into thin air - a part of the life cycle that really transcends our ability to understand.

I will continue to send warm and loving thoughts to you all…The cruelty of not having the time to say all of your goodbyes has to be tempered with the fact that she knew how loved she was by each and every one of you, her support through this abrupt and shocking ordeal.

You're all in my thoughts and prayers. Give yourselves and each other hugs for me, as you hold and comfort each other.

…

There's really nothing that can be said to make this ordeal less painful. It's such an unthinkable waste to lose good people in the prime of their lives, to say nothing of so suddenly! I believe the LGBT community has learned a lot and taught a lot to the rest of the world about care-giving and sharing responsibility, etc., during these events that take young people away prematurely from such dreaded diseases.

It may sound trite at this point, when you're feeling so raw, angry, disappointed and bereft, but the memory of Ingrid, her passions and causes will indeed live on in each of you, as well as the tons of friends who grew to care about her throughout her all-too-brief lifetime. Everybody who knew her is richer for that; everybody who cared about her is better prepared to take on life's challenges because of what they learned from her.

I've been in similar shoes to yours and know enough to know that peace will only come in its own time, probably on a different schedule for every single person in her various concentric rings of relationships. As you know, there's no “formula” or “cookbook” available for making it to the other side of the pain... Each will have to be patient with and supportive of the others whose schedules for recovery are different from their own. Some may be able to make it through the day without weeping after a few days or a few weeks - others will take a lifetime - and nobody's doing it "right"... Everybody's dealing with their own fragile-broken relationship system, various demons, family histories, genetic predisposition, and myriad other of their own realities, in addition to their own attempt to make sense of this senseless situation...

Be gentle with yourselves and each other; no time to take any perceived or real "slight" personally; everybody's feeling too wounded to be held terribly accountable for some inappropriate "this", unreasonable "that", or thoughtless "the other thing"... This is a time to celebrate the tragically short life of a remarkable woman, not a time for "shoulda", "if only" or recriminations, internalized or externalized... Hugs-n-kisses... Wish I could be closer to do the hugging myself...! I'll be thinking of you as you make your way through this nightmare - and you will...

--John David Dupree, Denise’s uncle (excerpts from e-mails to Denise, with permission)

We Are Family

At Kuna Caves with her Mom and Dad in 1981. See that black hole just beside Ingrid, with the rickety-looking ladder? That's the entrance to the Kuna Caves. After Ingrid, the caves are the most famous thing about Kuna.

With Brett and Amy, stylin' in her short shorts and rainbow suspenders.

(Courtesy of Amy Rubin).

What Babies We Were

Ingrid is about 19 in this photo, so that makes me about 17. This was taken at my house outside Kuna, just before we left for Boise so I could shoot photos of Ingrid for some reason that I can no longer recall. This photo proves three things: 1. we were, in fact, young once; 2. old photos are very poor quality; and 3. Ingrid used to wear Easter-yellow pants.

Fatale Attraction

Even if you don’t know Ingrid’s name, you probably heard of Fun with a Sausage or L’Ingenue, both videos some of the first ones distributed by Fatale Media. They played at the film festivals back in the early 1980s.

“People loved them,” says Fatale Media President Nan Kinney. “Lesbians were taking themselves so seriously in those days, it was grim. Then along came Ingrid and she made them laugh at themselves. Her sense of humor was a delight.”

We mourn the passing of a witty, intelligent woman who wasn’t afraid to break the rules.

--From "In Memoriam", posted on the Fatale Media web site (with permission)

An Indefatigable Spirit

I had known Ingy from her assistant editor days at Western, and, most recently, saw her everyday at Lieberman. I knew I could count on a great smile, an indefatigable spirit, and a great laugh to sing harmony with my own. I feel deeply deeply sad and can’t begin to imagine what you each must be feeling. I know Ingy is still laughing somewhere and wishing for those of us she left on this plane of reality, speedy healing with the knowledge that she is now wiser, peaceful and her same joyous self....and undoubtedly, gathering an accordion angel band.

--Iliani Matisse

Make Your Pixels Polka

I designed Ingrid's original business cards many years ago, for that she was always so, so grateful and complimentary, returning the favor by editing my demo reel. Ingrid was the type of person to return a favor ten fold. It was a pleasure to know and work with Ingrid. I will miss the smile and the laughter.

--Lisa Berghout

(Photos courtesy of Lisa Berghout)

The World Is a Little Bit Quieter

I'm just so sad over such a wonderful person being taken away from us. And I'm even sadder because I thought there would be time to see her. But she was gone so soon!

I do have some funny stories about her though. Gosh she was a hoot! Way back in the '80s when she first did Fun with a Sausage and L'Ingenue we were all hanging out. I get a call one day from Ingrid...."Can you wear a size 10 set of leathers?" "Uh, sure," I say.

The next thing I know, we're all over at Maude's shooting video, Renata is banging on the jukebox and I'm dancing with Ingrid. We ended the evening by shooting (and reshooting) a very funny scene in the alleyway next to 27 Ord. Ingrid with gum behind her ear, wearing a sweatshirt with a big cow on it, and me standing in black stilettos on some bricks. I have never laughed so hard in my life.

Ingrid made me laugh. She was always goofy and funny and adorable. I will miss her and the world is a little bit quieter without her laughter. Safe journey, Ingie.

--Tesia Blackburn

Insanely Cute (And the Cat's Not Bad Either...)

With Iggy-Bob, engaged in their favorite pastime: Catnapping on the couch!

(Courtesy of Nicole Grimmer).

The Woman Who Invented Cat-Velcro

Couch-surfing at "the Ranch" on December 25th. Ingrid said that Bubba was doing a catscan on her and she was hoping it would help. She always loved riding the couch with her "Heater-Cat" for hours.

(Courtesy of Nicole Grimmer).

Holy Cow, She Could Work a Cat Into Anything

Ingrid's 2007 Birthday Ride in the Oakland hills, wearing the kitty shirt her mother sent her. And after that much hill climbing, any self-respecting drink abstainer does what? Why, a Cake-a-polooza, of course!

(Courtesy of Denise Dupree).

Pretty, and Proud, in Pink

The year is 2007, Pink Saturday and Pride. We danced our booties off Saturday evening and walked until dusk the next day. Who else do you know that would buy a PINK BOA from a street vendor because her neck was cold and not only get away with it, but look like a fashion statement?? Ahhhh Ingie, who's going to improve my fashion sense? Who's going to help me get "my party pants on" to go dancing? Will I ever look hip again??

--Denise Dupree