Image provided by: University of Oregon Libraries; Eugene, OR
About Just out. (Portland, OR) 1983-2013 | View Entire Issue (Jan. 1, 1992)
J“ »« »m t V fmmmmry «9 9 9 T 3 « The key to the gay kingdom ■ ■ H E R E WILL ALWAYS BE t/N- “T h o u S h a lt N o t M ea su r e . T h o u S h a lt N o t I n st a ll . No culture should stand on a liquid base ^ ■ b eu evers D o u bters A n d D o -I t -Y o u rselfer s B u t T h e I I t h 8 12 t h C o m m a n d m e n t fo r th o se THAT HAVE FOUND M l MlNIBUND® THEIR ENTHUSIASM RUNS HIGH. NEVER BEFORE HAS THE WORLD KNOW SUCH LOW PRICES. SüCH HUMBLE AND CHEERFUL by Lee Lynch was raised in a family which ran the spec trum of attitudes toward alcohol, from a grandma who was probably thrilled by pro hibition to people who exhibited varying degrees of addictive behaviors. There’s no doubt in my mind that I inherited a proclivity to alcoholism, but I also had role models who might have spared me this suffering. Until my sexuality is factored in. As a kid I hated to see adults drink. They thought it was fun; I thought their changed behav ior was scary and ugly. The worst part was riding in a car with an in- — — i . ebriated driver. I cowered and held on for dear, dear life. I didn’t want to act like them and I wouldn’t. Never, never, never. Until I was seventeen. By then I’d spent two years hanging around the capital of gay watering holes. If some curious soul had asked me what lesbians do I might have unbearable pleasures to me. Bursting into my real skipped the sex part (I was very shy) and an life. I’d feel stripped raw and open to the place, to swered, “Drink.” Certainly that’s what I saw my own people. I’d feel like I was on fire inside. grown lesbians do. And we gay kids aped them. Fortuitously, I was in exactly the right place to The legal dykes went to the SeaColony, Googies’s, temper that fire and soothe what Radcliffe Hall the Swing, or the Music Box, and we, tired of called “the terrible nerves of the invert.” At the same time, of course, being with watching them, or cold, or hungry, went to strangers in crowded, smokey places totally PamPam’s ice cream parlor on Sixth Avenue in Greenwich Village. There we’d squeeze, unwel unconducive to humanity, yelling to be heard, come, into booths, or sit at bar stools and guzzle trying to dance on a tiny floor hidden in a back room-all of this was a letdown. How to make it coffee for lack of chemical fare. Inside, or fooling around outside, we all worked seem better? Drink more! Bars were the center of lesbian culture when I on how to look gay, posing, getting boisterous and showing off, daring to make out a little and always was coming out A strange blessing of capitalism, pretending, self-conscious, to ignore the kids we the gay bar sold bottled dreams to the disenfran were trying to impress. Mostly, we knew we were chised. My dream was of a place where I could, practicing for the real thing, life in the bars. simply, be me. In the bars, those crowded walk- The first time Suzy and I entertained another in closets, I was as near as I could get. Because I faked them with the help of liquor, lesbian couple we felt obliged to offer them a beer. Oddly brazen, I bought a six-pack when I never learned real social skills, still feel like I ostensibly shopping for my mother. The adults don’t know what social lesbians do. When I were away, we had the apartment to ourselves, stopped drinking I found that the only way I could and I’d just graduated from high school. Adult- even approach being comfortable in groups was to carry around a glass of ice water, like a pass hood-the real gay world-here I come! It was an incredibly awkward visit. Of course word that signaled belonging. Oh, the velvet city night, with fireworks just we knew older dykes got together and socialized, but there was that question again, what did they over the next rooftop. I loved that time, high on actually do? They drank, right? And with the liquor maybe, but also high on being gay, on addition of alcohol to their systems surely the rest loving women, on entering The Life. At what came easy. I joined the others when they opened point did the alcohol stop enhancing the romance their cans. The evening continued to feel like an of the gay world and cripple me so that I needed audition for gay adulthood. The next time I the chemical more than I needed the place to be socialized I didn’t stop at one beer. I drank until me? Probably long before the first beer with my I felt high. It might not have given me the key to friends. Probably the answer is as deep in my the gay kingdom, but drunk, or passed out, or vomiting in the ladies’ room, or making love to genetic structure as my queemess. It’s been over II years since I last took a drink, light Jamaican someone, anyone-if I was high, who cared? rum having been my final poison of choice. I That’s how easy it was for this baby dyke to become a problem drinker. There was more to it, don’t go to bars any more. Drinkers look like the though, on so many levels. For instance the way adults I despised as a child, their faces flushed, I felt when I was going to be with gay people. their eyes unfocused, their personalities turned Normally I was in school, my peers apparently strident and shallow. Drunken dykes are especially straight, my teachers supposedly the same. In the frightening to me because I’ve been inside the dorm, the cafeteria, at the literary magazine of fear that made me drink and because I’m only one fice, everyone but me either was or acted straight. drink away from drowning there again. Like so many of us for whom alcohol is When I got a chance to go “into the city,” the dangerous. I’ve found a way to get into the gay excitement would well up in me. I’d be a live kingdom without the stuff. No culture should wire, tingling with anticipation, a pointing breed, poised toward that moment of arriving in lesbian stand on a liquid base. Ours, particularly vul nerable to tidal waves of oppression, least of all. land: a bar. The intensity of my anticipation and the ex Like my teetotaling grandma at last, I don’t let hilaration of arriving in the promised land were demon rum in my home. I AMAZON TRAIL Jß M m il ^HE m T ¿O F LARGEST MOBILE WINDOW COVERING ^ Mark Huckins-Founder 15 W E A M C FAST ^ *' THROUGHOUT THE NATION THAT M l MlNIBLIND® IS HERE. THE \ FRANCHISE IN AMERICA. DEDICATED OWNER OPERATORS UNAFRAID TO WORK HARD FOR TOUR BUSINESS WILLING TO MEASURE AND INSTALL t & f S ï Â i NAMEBRANDS WITH A BEST PRICE PROMISE® AND LIFETIME GUARANTEES THAT RESTORE TOUR FAITH IN MANKIND. So THE TIME IS NOW. To CHANCE YOUR WAYS N o LONGER TO BE TEMPTED BY MORTAL / —" " i f N A T - I O N A L ___ A 9 9 9 9 9 9 n O Q l M m w M m f THOUGHTS OF MEASURING AND INSTALLING YOUR OWN BUNDS. THERE IS A BETTER WAY. ALL WE ASK IS ^ THAT YOU' BELIEVE J g ; m w m +■ m M WE’RE not just miniblinds anymore m ar • le y o k t • m “ doughs * • lo uvbo w e * • w e* • del h r * ________ THE OREGON C ITIZENS ALLIANC E WANTS TO TAKE RIGHTS AWAY. O n October 3 , 19 91 , the Portland City Council passed an historic ordinance protecting the rights of lesbians and gay men in housing, employment & public accommodations. Now, the Oregon Citizens Alliance wants to take your rights away. The O CA wants to pass a law prohibiting the City o f Portland from providing any legal protection or benefits for gay men & lesbians. The Portland Fairness Coalition is working to defeat this initiative, support w ill make the difference. Get Involved today! Y E S ! I WANT TO D E F E A T THE O C A ! ! ! □ □ □ □ Enclosed is my check for □ $300 GSl OO □ $50 □ $25 □ other $ ____ Please call me to volunteer. You may use my name on literature to support the campaign. I would like to host a house party. Please contact me. Name Occupation Address Home Phone City m Zip Work Phone Make checks payable to Portland Fairness Coalition 921 SW Morrison, Suite S18 • Portland, Oregon 97205 • Phone (503) 228-5825 Paid for and authorized by Portland Fairness Coalition. Member Organizations: A C LU • Am erican Jewish Committee «Burnside Advocates Group Dem ocratic Party of Oregon «Ecum enical M inistries of Oregon «Equity Foundation Jewish Federation of Portland «Lesbian Community Project «National Lawyers G uild«N o On Hate N .O .W . «Oregon Coalition Against Domestic Sexual Violence «Oregon Fair Share Right to Privacy «Oregon NARAL« Representatives of business & religious communities & f c l f M i n
