Moving on
butter; ; salt and pepper. Turn on burner and
s m ooch.
oo
sm
If still unthawed when checked, re-
J
M
^
'S
jt
u
r
n
tc
to
sm
ooching. Discuss whether to turn
Part 1
open. Try and recall whether our
chickens had ever been red inside.
—
Nice fumish$vrs t^ row out and eat Cheerios
able
July 2 9 t h r o u ^ s,y -some lesbians when
I suppose I should be
tiable. Call SKE at 2 9 4 ^ nt on refusing to learn
posed to any ghetto, to
sage at 2 8 4 -5 2 9 2 .
future husbands,
qay ghetto like the Ca^l
rtners will have
lage But when I hear bedroom nef r
ves!
hood” like Portland’s, or
carpe ,
rStreet,
in the heart
m oving in up the road from m ^ ! ,. „ ON
/as magical to us.
I'm more com fortable right here irv'
Fow
sideyard we affec-
gas station town of mine because I knov.
LESBIAN FOR(
rGarden of Eden. Week-
there
two gay guys up the road,
twc
preters for the hearii ir drunken man would sit
dykes,
two more men, and the women
>nt (about 2 h o ^ s the street and sing loud
com ing and going up on the mountain. We re
SpV>-4386 dof. O ur friend Walter lived across
probably well over our 10* quota, but the
the
h a li. ^ ^ is ite d frequently with us. He
rednecks haven’t caught on because we re
particularly enjoyed my naked manikin Myra
spread o u t I only have to endure suspicious
Breckinridge whom I'd wheeled home from
the Goodwill across town. In broad daylight.
We also had Marty and his girlfriend up the
alleyway to visit — if we were in the m ood for
perpetual Rolling Stones, hallucinogenics
and black light posters. Wow, man.
Aside from the toilet and shower in the
hallway the apartment's main drawback was
a no-pet policy. We thought to elude this by
referring to our cats only in code. We called
them — no, I do n’t remember why — Christ
mas Trees. When we were certain the land
lord was at work we'd sneak out to walk the
Christm as Trees in the Garden of Eden.
It was while we lived in that apartment that
we m et ou r first gay compatriots. I'd begun
driving lessons, hoping the $6500 a year
fro m m y new state job would allow me to buy
the VW o f m y dreams. (How would I ever
meet the payments on the price of a brand
looks down at the General Store, even though I
new Bug: $2300 including tax and dealer
wear a shirt and a smile. Could it be
prep!)
My first driving instructor was male
m y tweed cap that tips them off?
and by ou r second lesson he'd asked me out.
Not that hostile stares are new to me. If
I m ust have looked at him like he'd asked me
New Yorkers do i t could I expect less of rural
to cook a chicken dinner, because Jane
Oregonians and transplanted Californians?
showed up for m y third lesson.
It’s my im pending move onto m y lover’s land
Jane Dow. I was in love at first sight. I mean,
that has me thinking about lesbian and gay
she
was good-lookin', a gay grown-up, and
geography, and rem em bering my own m ulti
sm ooth as instant chocolate pudding (C’s
tude o f moves. W hy have I wandered so
and
m y favorite gourm et dessert). I was so
much? Does a search for a place of our own
crushed out on her I almost flunked my driv
move us on?
ing test not because I couldn’t parallel park,
My First Apartm ent was pink. Not the in
but because she was in the back seat. She'd
side walls, but the three-story house itself.
explained alm ost immediately that the other
Not only that, but the house next door was
driving teacher was gay. had been sounding
pink too. Both were owned by Mrs. Lanni-
me out, and passed me on to Jane when he
man, a majestic boat of a middle-aged wo
was
sure I was a dyke.
man from the West Indies. Every Saturday
It
wasn't
long afterwards that we moved
m orning Mrs. Lanniman would unlock our
fro m the Garden o f Eden to a four-story older
door and sail in to collect the re n t Which was
apartm ent building around the corner from
quite okay before C. and I became lovers.
Jane’s. N ot that we saw her much, but the
Afterwards . . . Well, nothing could undo the
charm of that First Apartment. The home to
which I brought my First Cats. I m ight even
have stayed, but C. had to return to the dorm
for her senior year.
I cou ldn't afford Mrs. Lannim an’s prices,
anyway, or such invasion of m y privacy; nor
had it occurred to me to take in a roommate.
As far as / knew m y lover and me were the
only queers in Bridgeport, Connecticut —
there was no way I could have shared my
♦
closet with a straight in those days. So I
moved on into the back half of an already
meager first floor owned by Nick the grocer.
Nick did not appear every Saturday morning.
As a matter o f fact, he’d been tolerating my
bounced checks at his store for years. But
THE BROADWAY COFFEE MERCHANT
there was a problem. This little palace with a
1637 N.E. Broadway • 284-9209
view of a gas station, and a barking German
♦
Shepherd guard dog for a neighbor, cost me
$ 110 a month. Cheap? Not on m y secretary-
THE HAWTHORNE COFFEE MERCHANT
3562 S.E. Hawthorne • 230-1222
salary o f $65 per week! I pooled food money
with C. and our unenlightened straight friend
Dorothy. The arrangement saved me in two
ways: not only couldn’t I afford to eat, but I
cou ldn't cook and Dorothy could!
When C. finally left the dorm to join me, we
moved into m y all-time favorite apartment,
but lost Dorothy. C. couldn't cook either. We
still have giggling fits when we remember our
gourm et chicken recipe: place chicken
breasts in frying pan; smear with lumps of
by Lee Lynch
I
are
and
F
HELP W>
and
AMAZON
TRAIL
always
The
A
Coffee Merchant
neighborhood glowed with romance because
she was near. We learned, then, that like at
tracts like, even when the likes don't kn o w ...
A classmate of C's moved in downstairs
with another woman. Were they? O f course
they were. O ur excitement was high. We now
knew three lesbians. Then a gay man from
ou r school took another apartment in our
building. It seemed I couldn't go out in my
new blue VW (which used $3.50 in gas a
week) without bum ping into a gay.
But we had a hard lesson to learn. The
presence of queers did not make a co m m u n
ity. Though we were separated only by stair
ways and walls, we remained isolated but for
those casual encounters. O ur boxlike d o m i
ciles were too full of fear. We'd learned to
cook a chicken by then, but not to reach out
to other people. We'd learned so well to pro
tect ourselves from exposure, and internalized
so deeply fear and disdain of ourselves and
ou r kind, that while we sought safety in num
bers, it wasn't a feeling of safety we found. We
even feared people would notice that we lived
in a building full of gays.
Soon after this I moved with C. to the ou t
skirts of New Haven, a city that boasted a gay
restaurant and bar. Perhaps here, we thought,
we could find friends. Surely where there were
m ore gays we'd have less trouble connect
ing. Fascintaed. m oths drawn to the flame,
we’d fled one isolation for another.
We lived in that last apartm ent together still
alone, still lonely for our own, still helpless to
give ourselves what we so badly needed. I
c o u ld n ’t figure out why it felt so m uch better
to always watch for signs o f gay neighbors,
gay co-workers, than to actually get to know
them . I d id n ’t understand m y ambivalent feel
ings and continued to listen, for a while, to my
fear o f running with a telltale crowd.
W hat a tale o f love and fear! O f approach
and withdrawal. O f hope and failure. I left the
last apartm ent and m y post graduation m ar
riage then. Surely it had been the relationship
which kept me wanting, kept me feeling un
whole? I, with thousands of other women and
gay m en in the early seventies, moved on to
explore whole new concepts of shelter and
com m unity. And kept on m oving from place
to place in search of a whole healthy self I
needed to see. to reflect, to accept.
O U T
I N C .
The finest imported coffee
beans, teas, chocolates, and
beverage brewing accessories.
Just Out. July, 1986
P
□ inner Mon-Sat
Sunday Brunch
2913 SE STARK
2 3 0 -7 9 8 0
Copyright Lee Lynch 1986
M E D I A ,
CELEBRATES
LESBIAN &
GAY PRIDE
EVERY MONTH
RINT MEDIA BUYING
Based on your annual
advertising schedule, w e ’ll
work directly with the right
publications to insure you
get in before deadline.
PRODUCTION
•L We’ll execute your artwork
and copy to fit your tastes,
not ours. Business cards,
brochures, flyers, logos, etc.,
at affordable prices; camera
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original art and photography.
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to give you the most effective
exposure. Press releases,
letters, photos, flyers —
m any times hand delivered
in Portland — follow-up.
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17