Heritage, So To Speak

I always thought that this weekend was the New York City Gay Pride parade, the one I saw on TV, or at least the most G-rated video they could find every year. I have never been to one. I mean as a straight guy who does not particularly like parades, there was never much draw. Of course I now wear the gay mantle so in spite of my lack of affinity for parades and mostly in solidarity with my friends, I made the pilgrimage.

The first thing to strike me, well before I even arrived: the traffic reports spoke of the “Heritage of Pride Parade.” Where did the “Gay” go? By no means major, but it seemed a harbinger of things to come. It is a long parade and I parked near where it went through midtown and took a train to the West Village where the parade would end (and one might say where it once began). It was a day of thunderstorms and I was invited to meet my friends at an apartment party seventeen floors above the fray. I gladly accepted.

So the first question is whether I even went to the parade. I suppose I did, I was on the streets shoulder to shoulder, I was there. But no, I did not stand there and watch and cheer. But I did watch from above and saw the Macy’s float and the Google banners – just a part of corporate America which seems happy to stand with me and my checkbook. I guess they don’t know I am more parent than DINK (double income, no kids).

Of course my perch was really the place to be – an open house by someone who is my age but has been out for his lifetime. It was a pretty gay crowd – a few outfits of sorts, a dress here or there. These were the people who remembered the old parade, “their parade”. There were a few moments that did strike me. Standing with a nice man in a headdress and nice underwear (yes that was the extent) watching the thunderstorm approach, discussing the joys of watching weather in all its glory. I had this image of someone in the distance watching us talk and imagining something so much sexier.

And then a little later, another moment: these two twenty something lesbians, tres Goth, walk by and my friend whispers that the lead one was a boy. I steal another glance and no doubt about it: a he. And it strikes me that at this strange party the strangest looking couple of the day is the only straight pair in sight. Oh where are you James Dobson when I need you?

After a time we left the party, the rains and parade were over but the street festival was in full force. We shuffled with the crowds, feeling more refugee than proud gay. We had a mission: one of my friends has been coming for near thirty years now and he always ends up on the small side street by the Dugout, a real bear bar. He and many there are closer to my age than the throngs we shuffled with and it was there that a different understanding came to me.

For my friend, and his friends, this was much more than a parade. This was a thirty year tradition with roots going back to a time when one could pay a heavy price for being gay, a time when corporate America was not supplying floats, where there was real danger. And this was a group which saw their small to start fraternity ravaged by AIDs, these were the survivors in a sense.

A few of us left – 8 PM, family to see, home to return to, but my one friend stayed. This was his night and he wanted another a few hours. Eventually he caught a 2:15 train home having visited all of his haunts. It may not be what it once was for him, but it is still, and I suspect will always be his day.

I suppose the message, if there really is one, is to appreciate how fortunate I am to be coming out into the world of today, to look beyond the “trudging refugees” and to appreciate the thousands of kids, so many of color, who can be who they choose to. And as I write this I realize there is probably some jealousy on my part that when I was their age I had so little clue as to who I was and the possibilities that existed.

So next year I will probably again join my friends – this is my world now – but if I miss it, that will be okay. I think this day is for others – the ones my age who remember the beginning and maybe more importantly all those kids who hopefully will not carry such memories and will just be free.