SUMMONING PRIDE

I’m trying to fight my reticence. Seattle’s Pride events culminate in its parade and other events this weekend. I’m going, even if I’m dragging my rainbow Converse-clad feet.

 

I’ve never participated in Pride in Seattle. It’s not my city and I’m not one of those to do a whole Pride summer tour. Ordinarily, it’s enough for me to bow out of Vancouver’s Pride activities which come to a head at the end of July or the beginning of August. It’s convenient for me to travel elsewhere at that time of year. The cottage in Ontario calls or, if not, I schedule a hiking weekend around Whistler or on Vancouver Island. I don’t require the annual Pride booster.  

 

This year non-participation is not an option. I’m in a new relationship with Evan who lives in Seattle. He’s one of the masses who loves Pride. We alternate spending weekends in Seattle or Vancouver and it was a given that we’d be at his place for Seattle Pride and then at my place for Vancouver Pride. I get to a double booster. Doubly Proud. Yay. Not yay.

 

I know very well how I sound. I’m the party pooper. I’m the rain on the parade. I have to work through this so that, when it’s time to celebrate, I’ll blend in. Let me not be the death of the party. Of course, if I appear blasé or, worse, mopey, no one will notice. No one but Evan. 

 

I could hit the beer garden. Evan likes it when I’ve had a drink. He says I get chattier and I’m giddy. One drink is about my limit. It shouldn’t be a surprise that I don’t do excess anything. Still, I’d rather track down an iced oat milk latte and do what I can to feed off the energy, not so much from eyeing the corporate banners or the go-go boys on floats, but from watching Evan take everything in. Let his joy be mine. 

 

As I drove to Seattle last night, I attempted to conduct my own therapy session. What’s your problem with Pride? How does it make you feel? 

 

My first Pride parade was in West Hollywood way back in 1990. I went by myself and sheltered beside a friendly group of lesbians. They made me feel safe while taking in a spectacle that was overwhelming. So much leather, so much drag, so much skin. There was lots of talk about the Gay and Lesbian “community” which, at the time, seemed conflicted about the B and the T. Bisexuality was often derisively questioned, a half-step out of the closet at best. I’d heard talk about transgender being a distraction to gay and lesbian causes. The thinking was that it was hard enough for America to accept gays and lesbians. People who were trans would have to wait. In many respects, they’re still waiting. 

 

However broad or restricted the “community,” I had a hard time seeing my place when I looked at the people in the parade. I was a repressed twenty-five-year-old, raised in a reserved family, having lived eleven years in Texas prior to moving to Los Angeles. I took the parade too seriously, at face value…or, really, the value seemed more focused on lower body parts—jiggly thongs and boobs with pasties. This was what I was supposed to be? I couldn’t see myself in bare-assed leather chaps. I failed to see the parade as a performance piece, as a stir-the-pot device to rally the troops, as a party on steroids…our version of Carnival or Mardi Gras. 

 

What I managed to connect with were the more serious entrants in the parade: the local politicians glad-handing while perched in convertibles, the PFLAG contingent that I knew would never include my own parents and the AIDS organizations demanding action now. Indeed, the parade planted the seed for me to become a volunteer buddy at AIDS Project Los Angeles a year later when I finally decided I couldn’t sit on the sidelines, buried in law school case studies in beach-blessed Malibu. When the parade wrapped, I left with a smile on my face—a genuine one without any nudge from booze. I couldn’t process the gay garb, but I truly felt the core message of Pride: It was okay to be gay. I was not alone, in spirit at least. There were tens of thousands of gays, lesbians and allies who would high-five me if I dared to relax and venture beyond my overly cautious life, skimming issues of The Advocate on newsstands and staring at my socks while sipping club soda at Rage on Saturday nights. My version of bold was asking the bartender for a lime wedge.

 

In subsequent years at various Pride events, I felt less affirmation as my inner critic cringed at seeing the more daring, out-there components of the parade. I’d learned that the stir-the-pot moments were the ones that made the TV news which didn’t seek to accurately portray the crowd but instead wanted viewers to react. My agenda had been normalizing being gay. I wanted people to realize “We’re just like everybody else.” Others stole the show with the counterargument: “No, we’re not.” I needed approval; they didn’t. 

 

I’ve evolved—to some degree. I love the drag queens. Really, I always have. I just wanted Joe Public to see the average Joes under the rainbow, too. Of course, the big wigs and glittery gowns made the evening news. Any decent drag queen will do what it takes to pull focus. 

 

I’m understanding more about the T in LGBTQ. I embrace trans rights even though my personal interactions remain far too limited. I appreciate the greater focus in the press and in the entertainment industry. I’m incensed how conservatives are using trans issues to get their followers frothing at the mouth and coughing up political donations. Fear the unknown!It’s outrageously manipulative. 

 

I’m in awe of the entire alphabet spectrum of terms younger and/or newly out queers can draw from in considering identity. I’ve heard others my age bemoan all the new labels and I get it. We worked hella hard to be accepted as gay. Let that be enough. But it’s a larger menu now. Other people choose what’s the best fit for them. COVID expanded my gay universe, allowing me to listen to and learn from a broader, more diverse group of queer writers than I’d ever encountered during my limited out and abouts, pre-pandemic. 

 

While I don’t think my attempt at road trip therapy last night made any inroads, I’m realizing this writing session is proving helpful. The last time I took part in a Pride parade and the showier events was probably seven years ago. Much has changed, some things for the better, other circumstances raising new concerns. Back then, I was single and I people watched the crowd more than the parade entries. I glanced at older gay couples, I studied younger straight couples who brought along their children with rainbow unicorns painted on their cheeks and I crouched down to bond with labradoodles and, wherever possible, schnauzers. I loved the drag queens, but I didn’t need to ogle the shirtless boys showing off tanned abs and toned biceps. As someone who will likely always struggle with an eating disorder, I’ve learned that I don’t need in-your-face displays of gay gods and the more awkward mere mortals desperately striving for that status. I don’t want to go to Pride and feel worse about myself. My issue. Let me shake another paw with Fido who looks rather festive with the rainbow leash and collar. 

 

I’m an introvert and, as I wrote last year, I get more from quieter moments during Pride month. But I think I can put on a happy face—a genuine one this year—and feed off Evan’s joy while celebrating the more diverse representations of pride. Let me cheer people pushing for trans rights. Let me whoop for LGBTQ seniors. And, as a bonus, let me boogie to the old school soundtrack…a little Bronski Beat, a dash of Gloria Gaynor, some sideline Voguing, a couple of Village People tunes and “Born This Way” as a takeaway earworm.    

 

Okay, Seattle. Pep talk completed. See you Out in the streets.