false is true
summer is quickly evaporating in hotlanta, the southern capital whose streets held me sleeping in my sister's old tercel the night i told my parents i was queer two christmases ago. the conflict could have been avoided had i realized that my parents didn't mean it when they said they'd never be able to accept a gay-briel. last week i was smarter. on the way to lunch i was telling my mom how undeniably capable she actually was of really loving drag. the lady loves parades! she can't watch one without being touched. there's this 80's photo of her wearing a fantastic shirt of primary colors in sequins watching a parade through teary eye make up. (she's that cool. seriously, it's so refreshing that she's become so much more supportive of me.) i was telling her that there was just some old ideas she'd have to get past to enjoy it.
these notions resulted in an argument between my dad and i. he bursted out with irrational things about how i should be serving my country in war but "everybody loves the gravy train!" apparently, he's been suspicious of me living a secret drag life or harboring private dreams of cleavage and heels. "go ahead", he told me, "but that will be the day that you no longer belong to me."
shit! maybe he'd be into drag, too! his dramatic affect, inflection and all, was impecable. but since his failure to keep those promises to a queer gabriel, i called him on his bluff. he didn't talk to me for a few days, which he later blamed on, not my sexual deviance, but telling him that i thought he was talking out of his ass.
this isn't what this post is even supposed to be about and it's already growing too long. so flash>>forward to saturday night. it was probably the above circumstances that found me with an appetite for a combination of fun and falsies. i stayed out of the city perimeter and went by myself to see les drag girls of "le buzz"- a suburban gay bar.
such striking beauty, these hermaphrodites-- extraterrestrial. with someone else's voice, they sang, and with something else's body they danced around in and out of your social constructions. i turned in my seat and watched one girl as she moved through the audience. squinting to watch through the harsh spotlight in my eyes, i watched her stretch out her neon spandex, already torn at the seams, into like ten consecutive splits. she found me with her eyes and got off the floor between me and the spot, relieving my eyes of the light that only they could handle. silently, she sang something sexy into my face while her hip bells ironically clamored with the music.
these girls were super-natural-- gods of their own natures. another, below a tiara, sang solemnly some inspirational whitney houston song about being yourself. i swallowed my pride and insecurity with the last sip of my beer and went to the stage to give her a dollar. it didn't feel unlike a trip to the alters of my church days. my nervous heart pounded while i made my way up front. adrenaline blurred everything but this woman and her dazzling dress-made-disco-ball in the spotlight. face to face, her mouth moved while some cd sang into my eyes. she gave me a soft kiss on the cheek and i tingled with something worth more than a dollar. really, can't you see how divine this is? like clowns, there's some sort of self-love and deprecation in them. i looked into her color and sparkle adorned eyes and even if her thickly painted lips weren't moving to encouraging words from the early nineties, i would have heard what they were saying. she understood my alienation, and believed in my queerness. for them, she loved me. what a wonderfully queer creature a drag queen is.
with these eyebrows! no, dads, i don't dance in gowns... habitually, anyhow. but the queerness of a queen inspires me, and i won't ever accept not accepting that. i can't help but think this queer news is incredibly good news. it's gospel.
these notions resulted in an argument between my dad and i. he bursted out with irrational things about how i should be serving my country in war but "everybody loves the gravy train!" apparently, he's been suspicious of me living a secret drag life or harboring private dreams of cleavage and heels. "go ahead", he told me, "but that will be the day that you no longer belong to me."
shit! maybe he'd be into drag, too! his dramatic affect, inflection and all, was impecable. but since his failure to keep those promises to a queer gabriel, i called him on his bluff. he didn't talk to me for a few days, which he later blamed on, not my sexual deviance, but telling him that i thought he was talking out of his ass.
this isn't what this post is even supposed to be about and it's already growing too long. so flash>>forward to saturday night. it was probably the above circumstances that found me with an appetite for a combination of fun and falsies. i stayed out of the city perimeter and went by myself to see les drag girls of "le buzz"- a suburban gay bar.
such striking beauty, these hermaphrodites-- extraterrestrial. with someone else's voice, they sang, and with something else's body they danced around in and out of your social constructions. i turned in my seat and watched one girl as she moved through the audience. squinting to watch through the harsh spotlight in my eyes, i watched her stretch out her neon spandex, already torn at the seams, into like ten consecutive splits. she found me with her eyes and got off the floor between me and the spot, relieving my eyes of the light that only they could handle. silently, she sang something sexy into my face while her hip bells ironically clamored with the music.
these girls were super-natural-- gods of their own natures. another, below a tiara, sang solemnly some inspirational whitney houston song about being yourself. i swallowed my pride and insecurity with the last sip of my beer and went to the stage to give her a dollar. it didn't feel unlike a trip to the alters of my church days. my nervous heart pounded while i made my way up front. adrenaline blurred everything but this woman and her dazzling dress-made-disco-ball in the spotlight. face to face, her mouth moved while some cd sang into my eyes. she gave me a soft kiss on the cheek and i tingled with something worth more than a dollar. really, can't you see how divine this is? like clowns, there's some sort of self-love and deprecation in them. i looked into her color and sparkle adorned eyes and even if her thickly painted lips weren't moving to encouraging words from the early nineties, i would have heard what they were saying. she understood my alienation, and believed in my queerness. for them, she loved me. what a wonderfully queer creature a drag queen is.
with these eyebrows! no, dads, i don't dance in gowns... habitually, anyhow. but the queerness of a queen inspires me, and i won't ever accept not accepting that. i can't help but think this queer news is incredibly good news. it's gospel.