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About Just out. (Portland, OR) 1983-2013 | View Entire Issue (Sept. 1, 2000)
3ß ju s t o u t » September 1. 2000 G a y D a d s a real stereo store D is c u s s io n / S u p p o r t G roup for real music lovers M eetin g s T w ic e m o nthly You’re not the only one who’s gone honkers at the loss of a loved—or despised—one P ertinent T opics : C oming O ut D ivorce C ustody R elationships with K ids C omments from K ids ... because music matters. For information call: M ike /D on T erry 667-9159 697-7004 STUFFINGS Gifts • Art fforrewGre Yintag-e & H g yCool (Stuff 2627 N.E. Broadway/Portland/ 280-0910 www.stereotypesaudio.com ‘R ealty Coot S tu ff Antiques Treasures / *- & x, V p h o ts te rc i -S e S tu d io 1313 NE FREMONT P O R T L A N D 503.493.8037 7372 SW C apitol Highway Portland, OR 97219 • 503-246-6267 We are located in Multnomah Village near The Bridge. Call for directions. Coventry Cycle (V W orks P ro fe sio n a l Service C o m fo rta b le B ik e o Recumbento a Specialtyl Open Tuesday-Sunday 230-7723 2025 SH Hawthorne W estover H eights C L I N I Fernando’s Hideaway in PRICE $209,950 Contemporary style 3 bed, 2 1/2 ba, a rowhouse alternative, decks on 2 levels w/ mtn & nver views, minutes drive to Dwtn locations. Richard V o m . GRI CENTURY 21 PENINSULA REALTY 503 -8 0 4 -9 4 2 4 Cell/VM 5 0 3 -2 86-5826 Office Drive with Pride C O ffe r in g g e n e ra l internal m e d ic in e a n d e x c e llin g in se x u al h ealth care i S ervin g the com m u n ity fo r / 7 yea ro Schedule your appointment today with: C h ristin a Sigw art 503 - 256-3700 REY REECE DEALERSH IPS 2330 N W Flanders Suite 207 226-6678 Breaking up is hard to do 0LDS-ISUZU-V0LKSWAGEN-USED clsigwart@hotmail.com 122nd & East Burnside www.vwcity.net I wrote her I knew it! dozens of letters, That was my for months, all of reaction when them unan 1 heard the swered. I called news: Anne and her answering Ellen, Heche and machine at work DeGeneres, over. to hear her voice Finished. Kaput. when I knew she Americas lesbian was not there poster couple and her answer were breaking up, ing machine at their 3 1/2 years in home to hear her a blinding spotlight voice when I knew she finally ending. was at work. Within hours came W hen she canceled word of Anne Heche s bizarre our vacation— the one she sug and babbling appearance at the gested we take— I Kxiked a room front door of some unsuspecting in Key West. While she took the folks in Fresno, Calif. Geez, whatever vacation we planned by herself, I spent happened to consoling yourself with a five days by myself at a lesbian guest house, pint of Ben & Jerry’s? the only person there without somebody else. I Heche, whose film credits include Psycho, sent her a hill for my vacation, and she paid it. appeared to he having a breakup Oh, yeah, and therapy. Lots and lots and breakdown. Was it grief? Ecstasy? A lots of therapy. And medicine. And wine. And man? If only these walls could talk! television. Thank god for Behind the Music and Whatever it was, it got me remi E! True Hollywood Story— lifesavers, Kith. niscing about some of the crazy W hat is the problem? Why couldn’t I just things I’ve done in the throes of a get over it? I put that question to two big-time bad lesbian breakup. Yeah, I got to lesbian therapists. thinking back...way hack...like, “You can’t make her come hack, you can’t oh, roughly, six months, four days make it not happen,” Betty Berzon told me. and two hours ago, when a “It’s about trying to keep a connection with woman— in an act of temporary that person, even in a meaningless, negative writers generosity I will resist the way. It’s aKiut not beingTeady to let go.” urge to tell you her name—decided without consulting me that the You’ve got that right. time had come for us to part Mamy Hall says a bruiser breakup is almost (which, in hindsight, should have a rite of passage for lesbians, “where you’re happened about five min close to insane if not insane. It’s utes into our first din aKiut the investment, the level I walled ner date). of intimacy and therefore the We issued no level of betrayal” that can and screamed press release, no public happen between two and demanded to know statement, although 1 women. “You’re just suspect some members crashing and burning, WHY, WHY ARE YOU of the public below her and you think every- DOING THIS AND open living room win KxJy else should crash dow were probably able and hum too.” ANYWAY I DON'T LOVE to hear me as I wailed As for Anne and and screamed and Ellen, Kith Hall and YOU ANYMORE demanded to know Berzon think they AND I DON'T EVEN WHY, WHY ARE YOU know what went wrong: DOING THIS AND ANY the glare of the public eye, KNOW IF WAY 1 D O N T LOVE YOU the pressure to be the perfect ANYMORE AND I D O N T I LIKE YOU!! lesbian couple, even the ideal EVEN KNOW IF I LIKE YOU!! breakup couple. “Poor thing, I’d be W hat they couldn’t see was her, just sitting wandering along in Fresno too,” Hall told me. there on the couch looking at me like: “Don’t Personally, I am feeling much better now. I you get it? It’s over.” I didn’t wind up stumbling haven’t written any letters or called any along some road in Fresno, hut here are some answering machines or indulged in any stalking of the things I did do. behaviors in, oh, two or three months. I’ve I took absolutely everything that had any seen her duck me on the street, and I don’t thing to do with her: unconsumed cans of caf care. W hen I come across something that feine-free Diet Coke; packets of Sweet N ’ reminds me of her, I don’t even waste my time Low; cards and love letters; her mattress pad, returning it anymore, I just throw it out. which temporarily had been living on my bed The only thing I can’t get myself to toss (don’t ask); and a great set of bookends she’d down the trash chute is the really nice Eddie given me—one the Empire State building, the Bauer ski sweater she gave me for Christmas. I other the Chrysler—a pair I’d come to call think 111 give it to the homeless guy on her the butch and femme of the New York City new block (which is right near my block— skyline. I took absolutely everything I could couldn t she pick someplace else to live?). I think of, stuffed it into a shopping hag, sprin hope she likes the way it looks on him. kled the top with the photo booth minipic tures we’d taken together (which I’d cut up I BARBARA R aab is a uniter and televisión pro' into tiny pieces) and dropped the whole thing ducer in N ew York City. off in the vestibule of her building.