The West End in Vancouver was my first time living in a gay ghetto. Nobody else referred to it as such but I suppose I felt constrained in terms of choices. The gays seemed to be everywhere and, in other parts of the city, it felt like your chances were better for spotting a leprechaun than someone who even knew what the rainbow flag was. (This was last century, back in 1994.) I thought of the West End as possibly the prettiest ghetto in the world, yet it was a ghetto nonetheless since that’s where we were corralled and contained.
My friends thought this was amazing. Gay men everywhere. A place to feel free. A place to feel a sense of belonging. And then there was all that eye candy, too.
When I’d lived in L.A., the gay ghetto was West Hollywood. It felt more ghettoized in the derogatory sense. It was hard to access since it was a considerable distance from the freeways—so many stoplights—and I thought it was plain ugly. Drab. The section of Santa Monica Boulevard traversing the community was lined with ho-hum businesses with zero curb appeal and even less shopping allure. It may have been adjacent to Beverly Hills, trendy Melrose and tourist-packed Hollywood, but it looked and felt like nowhere-land, a place the gays could have by default. I know many gay men will strongly disagree with me, likely due to having so many memorable experiences in the nightclubs there. I had fun times there as well; it just didn’t look so great in the daylight. Plus, there was a lot of attitude in West Hollywood. It could feel like a place of dismissal rather than a place of belonging. L.A. was a town of model/actor wannabes who paid the rent from catering gigs. The gays flocked there because people back in Omaha and St. Paul told them they looked like a movie star. They practiced that inaccessible persona before ever landing a hemorrhoid commercial that would surely be their big break. West Hollywood was a nice place to visit (in small doses), but I never wanted to live there.
My apartment in Vancouver’s West End was three blocks from the beach. Other than work, everything was in walking distance. I’d meet friends twice a day for coffee at Delany’s down the block and we’d grab window seats to view the daily gay parade strolling along the sidewalk. Sometimes we’d take our coffees down to the beach to sit on a log to watch the sunset (and maybe a few more strolling gays). For the first few months, I loved it. Everything was overwhelming in a good way, like when a kid is at Disneyland or every time I step into Vancouver’s La Casa Gelato and have to choose from 238 flavors. (I can quickly eliminate Roasted Garlic and Chocolate Bacon, but does that even count as narrowing things down?)
It wasn’t long, however, until I felt I was living in a pressure cooker. I have social anxiety (at the time, undiagnosed) and low self-esteem (at the time, blatantly obvious) so I worried every time I left the apartment. Back then, I’d put myself out there. Despite my insecurities, I had outgoing friends I could hang in the shadow of. I believed in love and I felt certain the ghetto would yield great prospects. Once I fell in love, I wouldn’t have to live in the ghetto anymore. That made for high stakes every time I stepped out. There was a 100% chance I’d see someone who was gay and I had a 90% shot of seeing someone I knew…a friend from the gym or the coffee place or a friend of a friend whom I’d been introduced to and knew by name even if they didn’t always know mine or recall ever having met me.
I had to look presentable—datable—every time I was in public. I couldn’t just dash to the grocery store a block away to get milk. I’d heard about people having flirty conversations while searching for fennel or selecting a desirable banana. Maybe my future partner and I would reach for the same carton of skim milk at the same time, leading to love and a commitment ceremony six months down the line. (Things move fast when it’s love at first sight. If we liked the same milk, surely we could build on that.)
The ironing board in my bedroom rarely got put away because I ironed all of my casual clothes. If I stepped out in a wrinkled shirt, I was certain men would be turned off. I even ironed my gym shorts. If I steamed and spray starched just right, men would notice me. I’d get a boyfriend. We could drink skim milk together.
I wasted so much time ironing.
Nowadays, that same ironing board is somewhere at the back of my closet in the booby trap zone. Pull one thing out and ten other objects come crashing down. That’s my excuse for not ironing. I wear wrinkles now—on clothes and, sigh, other places. I’ll blame COVID as the reason I’ve stopped putting any effort into what I look like. As my hair grew and grew during lockdown, I’d glance in the mirror before heading out and realize no amount of sculpting putty or gel could tame the wild mane. I was thankful I could partially hide behind a mask—which also got me out of the habit of shaving. Lockdown let me let go. Freeing? Yes. But it was supposed to be temporary…the virus and the shaggy, unkempt look.
Temporary still doesn’t have an end date.
When I go to the grocery store, I make sure my shoes match, but that’s about it. Finding my match over a carton of skim milk sounds ridiculous. I’ve moved on to oat milk, after all. Winter isn’t particularly cold in Vancouver, but I still put on a coat whenever I head out. No one is going to see the shirt I’m wearing and how well it fits or doesn’t. No one will notice if my socks complement anything. I have a limited mask collection from which I try to select the best match, but I don’t want my face apparel to get me noticed. (Face apparel…did you ever think?) I don’t want to get involved with some guy who has a mask fetish.
I’m still overly cautious about the coronavirus, Delta variants, Omicron and whatever’s next. I know there are people with the view that they should just get it and get it over with. I’m of the opposite view. I’ve spent two years being super careful. Why would I give in now? What would all that vigilance have been for? To each his own. Practically speaking, my caution means I’m not writing in cafés for the time being and I’m not meeting friends at indoor spots. We’ve had lots of great walks. I don’t feel deprived. I could have a tantrum and announce, “I’m done with COVID!” but, at the moment, that’s as potent as declaring, “I’m so over taxes” or “Donald Trump does not exist.” Fanciful notions but nothing more.
What all this comes down to, for the purposes of this post at least, is how I feel about being a fashion dropout, content with wearing a sweatshirt with an armpit hole, gym shorts with frayed hems, running shoes with the soles worn down and a jacket with thread dangling where a button is supposed to be. (I’m sure there’s a YouTube video on how to thread a needle, but I’m self-aware enough to know I’d need a medic on hand if I tried to follow along. I have to accept the fact that healthcare workers have more pressing matters, pandemic or not. This is also why I won’t try one of those electric scooters. Or hopscotch.)
It’s freeing to know how I look and what I wear doesn’t matter. I can save energy by getting dressed in the dark. I could do away with shampoo. Why do I need to take a shower when it rains here regularly? I can just leave the umbrella at home and multitask when it’s pouring, getting a cleanse as I pop out for more oat milk. It doesn’t matter!
Ah, but it does. Or maybe I’d like it to. Just a little. I have bought a few nice casual clothing items in the past year and, for a while, they were left hanging in my closet, tags still on them. There hadn’t been an occasion for wearing them. Why would I dress nicely just for me?
I’m beginning to try again. I don’t know if I feel any better about myself from wearing something that isn’t tattered or that only has the holes that originally came with it. I’ve watched enough episodes of “Queer Eye” to know I’m supposed to feel better.
Honey, I’m gorgeous!
I’m owning this look!
I can rock a French tuck!
It probably works better when a crew arrives and totally redoes my condo as a little side project.
Maybe my fancier days during this pandemic are dress(up) rehearsals. Maybe I’ll leave the mask at home someday. Maybe a cashier or a barista will pause for a split second and say, “Nice shirt, sir.” Or maybe I’ll just whisper that to myself, minus that unsettling respect-your-elders “sir” tag.
It’s been twenty years since I lived in the West End. After doing a circuit of living in other parts of the city (and beyond), I’m West End-adjacent. It doesn’t feel like a gay ghetto anymore. It’s rare that I step out and run into someone I know. Gaydar is rarely even activated. People see me as much as I see them, which is more about social distancing logistics than anything else. Post-pandemic, it will remain so, at least from my perspective since the social anxiety is vaccine-averse.
Shaving, showering, dressing with the light on…it’s all for me. Practically speaking, I suppose it always was.
