My mother has been storing a lot of my stuff in the family home for years. And years. When she announced she was selling the house and moving into a place half the size, I arrived at one conclusion: She was no mother of mine.

I raced across the country to decide what I could live without. The newspaper stories predicting a Mondale/Ferraro loss could go. But a group of mainstream magazines of a more recent vintage could not. These journals were a Magical Mystery Tour through modern gay history.

“We’re Having a Baby” blared the Newsweek cover featuring a cozy Melissa Etheridge and Julie Cypher. It was Nov. 4, 1996. The Newsweek interviewer noted the sperm donor “is rumored to be Brad Pitt.” Both women laughed themselves sick over that, and small wonder, since they would eventually reveal that the daddy of that child and the next was David Crosby. Brad Pitt played Achilles. David Crosby looks like Achilles’ heel.

I don’t have a magazine dissecting the breakup of Melissa and Julie in 2000, which focused on the ghastly bombshell the latter dropped in couples’ therapy: “I’m just not gay.” Their bust-up, and especially that of the other iconic lesbian couple Ellen DeGeneres and Anne Heche a month before, left many lesbians surprised, hurt and testy.

Speaking of Ellen, I found in my collection both Newsweek and Time for April 14, 1997. There she was on the cover of Time with the big red words, “Yep, I’m Gay.” Yep, her coming out and her character’s coming out warranted cover space on both weeklies. That actually seems a little hard to understand in this post-“Will & Grace”, post-“Queer Eye” era. Which suggests her actions were trailblazing – a regular Daniel Boone.

We human beans tend to recall where we were when the big stuff went down. I remember where I was when President Reagan was shot, for instance, and I remember where I was when I watched the coming-out episode of “Ellen.” (As I expect to remember where I am when President Bush announces he realizes he got where he is through money and connections, and that someone this mediocre really shouldn’t be President.)

Following the momentous events, Ellen stepped on an elevator that only traveled down. Her show died, another sit-com fizzled and the end of her relationship with Heche seemed like it was being scripted by Stephen King. Talk about bouncing back. Now she has a huge success with Finding Nemo, her talk show is Emmy Award-winning and, like Melissa, she has a relationship that seems to be thriving. Now I hear she’s slated to appear in a remake of Oh, God! She’ll be playing the title role. And if playing God isn’t the world’s biggest comeback, I don’t know what is.

Ellen takes pains to say she’s not an activist; Rosie O’Donnell has become a clear-cut one, bless her. But in my National Enquirer of May 27, 1997, she was one of many featured in a cover story, “Who’s Gay, Who’s Not.” Rosie was, the magazine suggested. With such an authoritative source stamping “L” on her forehead, why were so many surprised when she made it official in 2002? Goodness, if the Enquirer says it, I believe it.

On the cover of Newsweek dated Aug. 17, 1998, ex-gay poster-couple John and Anne Paulk try to look cozy and straight. The bacon and eggs and orange juice in front of them fail to transform them into Ozzie and Harriet. This cover alone seems to set up John’s eventual backslide; he was eventually discovered in a gay bar. And we know it wasn’t a healthier breakfast he was looking for.