Just out. (Portland, OR) 1983-2013, January 07, 2000, Page 46, Image 46

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    W hat M akes a Gay S o u l?
Tacky tabby
An Educational Support Group for Gay Men
on A Spiritual Journey.
Monday Evenings in February and March.
K«
.)
LESBIANS
) ENJOYING THE
SCIENCES
Men’s Weekend Retreat Friday Evening
February 11th and Saturday February 12.
S ool Salon: Weekly Interfaith Spirituality
Group. Thursday Evenings in April and May.
Pre-registration required for all programs.
For information call:
DATE: 1/22/99
TIME: 6PM-9PM
PLACE: Call 289-3605
Dale Rhodes, M.S., M J L
NEWCOMERS
IMVTTTDf
i Mo
Spiritual Director
Interfafth Spiritual Center
3910 Southeast 11th Ave. Portland, OR 97202
(503) 289-4103 Djrho5@ aol.com
tr ia n g le
>
the K athy
&
P arallel L ives
X
S how :
January 12 - February 6,2000
Thursdays, Fridays, Saturdays, and Sundays
by Kathy Najimy & Mo Gaffney
The Millennium begins with laughs.
Valory Lawrence and Karen
Boettcher-Tate star. Meet the Angels,
Hank and Karen Sue, Gina and
Annette, and the rest of the wacky
characters that make up the “parallel
liveg' of Kathy & Mo.
3430 SE Belmont
Portland, OR 97214
Box Office: 503/239-5919
■
Email: trianglepro@juno.com
Web site: www.tripro.org
“You're looking very very pretty tonite.
Call for tickets
503 . 274.6588
Tickets also through Ticketraaster
503.790.ARTS
Show your transfer at
the box office and get a free
ride home from Tri-Met!
w w w . p c s . o r g
A classic American love stor
J a n u a r y ’ 1 5 —
FEBRUARY 1 2 , 2 0 0 0
GALA* N i g h t J a n u a r y 2 5
* Gay and Lesbian Audience series
»
■■
kevBank
iu s t n r n i
J
I he Mark S p rn rrr Hotel
merrill
CORPORATION
AmericanAirHnes
Catty observations about compulsive shopping
ast year I was poking around an antique
shop in town looking for a gift when I saw
it. High on a shelf, fire-engine red,
unlovely, forgotten— the red cat. I turned
away, appalled. How could anyone create such
a tasteless insult to feline beauty? Yet my eyes
were drawn back again and again
from the flower-patterned cham­
ber pots, the iron door stops, the
huddles of blue glass on old
maple highboys.
I bought the red
cat.
«flUBÉa
If I’d left that red
cat behind, life as I
knew it would have
gone on. Instead, I
set it on a shelf and
grew to love the
thing. How
many more
objets de
non-art out there
depicted cats? Wouldn’t it be fun to
have a Tacky Cat Collection?
Poor Lover. How was she to
know when we got together that
my addictive nature would take
this form. How was I to know?
For a while I hit that same shop
J monthly. Then I branched out to
—— r
another a few miles away. (I didn’t
want anyone to know I was out of
control.) Bingo, another kitty col­
lectible.
Meanwhile, Lover— inadver­
tently and to her subsequent dismay— thought
to please me with little surprises from her
favorite antique shop. Every time she stopped,
she’d bring home another deliciously tacky cat.
Except they weren’t so tacky any more. They’d
become too appealing.
Maybe, I decid­
ed, it’s the concept
of collecting cat fig­
urines that’s tacky. I
remember all the old
women of my
childhood who set
porcelain figurines
of clowns and
birds and chil­
dren on
doilies
______ ^
inside glass
cabinets. Or
} J women of my generation with our
political pins or crystals or stuffed ani­
mals. Ah, I’m just a late-blooming collector.
Except for old books, that is. And miniature
toy vehicles.
In any case, once I received Lover’s
unintentional blessing, I was lost. Any­
thing was fair game. 1 now have a Cheshire
Cat grinning from the bathroom wall, a
crouching blue-eyed kitty under the
chair by the hearth, several figurines
prancing across my dresser, a cat
clock on my desk, a shelf full of minia­
tures and several more shelves full of wood,
glass, porcelain and ceramic cats.
It’s been a challenging year. Not to find all
the little guys, hut to do anything other than
look for them. The temptations go well beyond
antique shops. As a matter of fact, I stay out of
those— they’re way overpriced. We went to a
junk shop up north with friends, and one of
them proudly revealed her find for me: a home­
made, two foot tall, sitting, putrid-green cat. It
L
BY
LE LYN
CH
is truly tacky and resides next to the roly-poly
papier-mach£ tuxedoed cat, which is adorned
with a rhinestone tie pin and cigar.
People are weird.
Weird enough to think
anyone would bid for
such items in online auc­
tions. But the prices!
T he oddities! The
adorability quotient! I
am convinced that
I single-handedly
drove up the price
of cat figurines within
a month of
discovering
eBay, partly
because I
didn’t
understand
how some
auctions
worked. In
between bidding on
cat statuettes, I managed to purchase
a new computer by mistake. Luckily, it was a
good deal.
Soon, what with increasing numbers of gifts
and exciting finds, I began to run out of shelv­
ing, and floor space, and windowsills and book­
shelves. Lover suggested 1 purchase a C D case,
one of those stand up jobs with multiple
shelves. That soon filled up.
Then an eBay auction yielded the first three
miniatures. Definitely the cutest doodads I’ve
ever seen, with their pastel painted clothing
and tiny detailing. This was the answer to the
space problem! I’d only collect miniature
domestic felines. Alas, other compulsives hap­
pened on that solution. Miniature cats are diffi­
cult to find, and the bidding is fierce at the
auction sites. It’s hard to win an auction when,
like me, the buyer has a $3 price ceiling. I
found new miniatures in a gift shop in New
Hampshire last fall that were a better buy. And,
after an extensive wrapping session, flew them
home.
Then last weekend, when 1 was buying
some fabric at Wal-Mart (we don’t have a fab­
ric store nearby), I passed the button rack.
There I saw a pair of cat-shaped buttons. They
were smaller than the smallest figurines. They
were hand-painted. They were under $3.
In the blink of an eye, I had a new fever. I’d
microspecialize! Kitty buttons
don’t take up much space at
all. If I avoid brass and pewter,
fabric-covered and large, I’ll
reclaim that feeling of being challenged and we
won’t be crowded out of our house. If I can
learn to resist every red, putrid-green and pastel
cat figurine I see. But— will buttons be tacky
enough?
I L ee L ynch is a novelist who lives on the Oregon
coast.