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ju s t o u t ▼ ju n o 7 . 1 0 9 6 ▼ 41
CENTER FOR LESBIAN RELATIONSHIP THERAPY
AMAZON TRAIL
Kao Rhiannon, Ph.D., Nelly Kaufer, MA,
and Cheryl Wilton, MS
Learning to march
57 y.ars combined experience specializing in leebian therapy
UPCOMING WORKSHOPS
For a people accustomed to hiding, to living in shadows,
pride comes in steps
9 une 29 Sexual Snitimacy:
Coving M e
Y
I didn’t march that first year. The
significance of the Stonewall riots
had not yet become clear to me. Gay
Liberation was suspect. Civil rights were for
minorities. I didn’t feel like a member of a minor
ity group back then. I had a lover, a job, an
apartment, a car. I simply accepted that I had to lie
to my family, my co-workers and just about
everyone else in my life in order to get and keep
what I had.
For me, it was The Ladder, that monthly
declaration of lesbian independence, that opened
my eyes. For others it may have been a simple
yearning for freedom, or telltale ulcers— some
tip-off that living
in closets wasn’t
good for us.
T hen there
was a women’s
dance held in the
basement of some
sympathetic
church. A small
group of lesbians
met every week to
talk, not drink. At
a party some ex
hilarated gay man
described a fabu
lous march in the
city with more
gay people than
he could have
imagined. Mainstream newspapers reported
crowds of hundreds, thousands.
There was something in the air beckoning,
challenging, daring us to all to come out for a few
hours, one day a year. We were too young or too
oppressed to know that the taste of freedom was
more addictive than any substance we’d ever
used to dull the pain of living condemned and in
hiding.
Those slow, early years of liberation may be a
jumble of memories, but not my first march. It
was big. We filled the streets as far back and
ahead as I could see. You’re not really aware
you’re making history while in the midst of it, but
that day I knew— I think we all knew.
We were a force of nature—a river of queers
overflowing our banks, a tidal wave of agony
splintering a hundred thousand closet doors, the
human spirit rising in a tide that would never
recede— right there on familiar streets.
Before, we’d walked those streets only at
night, alw ays frig h ten ed , w hispering,
hypervigilant and timidly defiant. At my first
march the sun shone. We sang “Here come the
les-bee-uns!” Didn’t we bellow; didn’t we strut
and sashay.
Oh, the bulldykes and the guys in cowboy
hats, the bedazzling, bedecked femmes of all
genders! The long-haired boys, the short-haired
girls, the costumed and the barely dressed. The
chants that blew the roof off the city, the visions
that were bom and grew. The laughing cops who
couldn’t guess that we’d be walking beats beside
them.
The massed excitement would carry so many
of us into then unthinkable queer careers: orga
nizers, politicians, singers, historians of the gay
culture. That day we were, unknowing, carrying
not only banners and posters, but America’s fu
ture. While we thought we were having fun, we
were creating a revolution, spawning everything
from protective legislation to gay credit cards to
rural gay sanctuaries. We were laying the founda
tion for the Supreme Court to rule against
Colorado’s Amendment 2.
Deep in the shadow of the citadels of respect
ability, thousands of us marched. There were bar
floats and fun floats and religious floats. We were
not only educating those who watched, but our
selves. Imagine, gay people in organized religion.
Could we change even the major institutions of
our oppression?
Drag queens blazed in their finery, moving
sparks of angry, exultant life. They sang their own
songs, the cheerleaders of our parade. I remember
feeling tom: We’d be damned for their stereotypi
cal antics, but they
were at the very
heart of queemess.
I wanted to hide
them and was
ashamed for want
ing that. I feared
th ey ’d ruin the
revolution, and
knew their fierce
defiance was the
revolution.
I
wanted the drag
queens to go
aw ay, and I
wanted to be a
drag queen. Next
year I’d wear a tie.
Next
year.
Once part of our great upheaval I had no doubt that
there would be a next year. I looked around that
day and saw, by sheer numbers alone, that we
were unvanquishable. Strangers smiled at one
another. Before, in the bars, in a store, at work, we
had used highly evolved signals that involved
ducking the head, averting the gaze and tele
graphing recognition all at the same time. It was
a double-survival tactic: We risked no overt con
fession and were strengthened by acknowledg
ment.
When the ticker tape began to float down from
windows full of cheering, waving, smiling people,
I felt that we were being blessed. We were war
heroes. Outer space pioneers. We were presidents
that day, and Olympic champions. We were the
toast of the town. No one who has been so cel
ebrated can ever go back into hiding.
A woman I’d known in college rushed out of
the crowd and hugged me. I’d suspected, but now
she told me, told the world, “I’m GAY!” All over
the streets the silent sister- and brotherhoods were
shouting in welcome and appreciation of one
another.
We were thirsty and too excited to wait in line
for sodas. We were tired and too buoyant to rest
our blistered feet. We were hot and too euphoric
to seek shelter.
Shelter found us as we reached the city park.
We showered ourselves with water fountain spray
and flung ourselves onto the cooling grass. As the
speakers praised our numbers, a prowling straight
woman tried to pick me up, eager to come out, to
be a part of us.
Like the drag queens, the religious queers, the
butches with beer bottles, and the women and men
who stepped off the sidewalks to swell our power,
we marched because everyone deserves a pride
day, week, month—a life of pride. You always
remember your first.
<£
you
Ongoing Therapy:
Personalized counseling
for your partnership
by Lee Lynch
ou always remember your first.
Gay Pride march, that is.
|
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assisting lesbians in creating
satisfying & enduring relationships
248-0759
248-0018
Pride Northwest, Inc.
Presents
T ra v e l th e w o r ld ,
b u t c a ll u s first...
“Together for Freedom
United for Justice”
Lesbian, Cay,
Bisexual, Transgender
Pride 1996
Friday June 21st
5 10 pm
Dinner at the Waterfront
8 - 1 1 pm
Youth Dance w/DJ Alex
Waterfront Park
SW Front A Ash
-
Saturday June 22nd
11 am
The Parade
NW 9th A Everett
1 pm
The Rally
7 pm
The Dance
w/Boka Marimba
Waterfront Park
SW Front A Ash
Sunday June 23rd
9 am
Pancake Breakfast
10:30 am
Interfaith Service
12 noon
The Festival
all at Waterfront Park
SW Front A Ash
2 pm
Rose City Softball Assoc
vs. the Portland
Police Bureau
Alberta Park
NE 22nd A Ainsworth
Field *2
requested donation $5
(503) 295-9788.
232-5944
1 800 232-5944
-
-
1939 SE Hawthorne Blvd, Portland
M yra A nn Donnelley & D on ald l Horn
(aka My-Don, Inc.)
in conjunction with
triangle productions!
cordially invite you to the
Dedication and Open House
of
-
----------------------
The
------------------------
■ AIDS ■
M e m o r ia l !
« R*QO*M ■
A
Living Room for Us All
and the
ARCHIVES ROOM
Located at
THEATER! THEATRE!
3430 SE Belmont
D ay o f Compassion
June 21, 1996
2:00 - 7:00p.m .
The AIDS Memorial Room establishes a
permanent local display of “life journals”
representing those men, women and
children who have lost their lives to AIDS.
The Archives Room will be available for
collecting, storing and displaying gay,
lesbian and theater community
memorabilia. For more information
contact Don Horn at 230-9404.