AUGUST 15, 2008
of them, Riverside Sports Bar,
directly abuts the low-budget
hotel my travel mate and I
are staying in. At midnight,
Riverside was hopping with
tattooed young dudes in their
20s, kicking back Miller Lites
and throwing down fivers for
the mainstage dancing girls.
I look for any signs of latent
queemess or closety behavior
from these tough guys...and
come up empty-handed.
•11:40 a.m. Aug. 2: Outside Hermiston
Drug on Main Street, two women—Louise, in
her early 50s, and Deborah, around mid-30s—are
peddling homemade goat’s milk soaps and herbal
sachets as part of the town’s Main Street Bazaar.
I tell them about today’s “Equality Event,” and
they say they haven’t heard a peep about it.
“I don’t have a problem with the gay lifestyle.
I’m not gay. Umm, I...I believe in respect for ev
erybody,” Louise says. “But...why do people need
to have recognition for that? I mean, you know,
personally, because I’m heterosexual, 1 don’t get
recognition for that.” She laughs. “1 mean, I don’t
see the need for that.”
Deborah pipes in: “Well, you know what,
1 think that it’s really persecuted.”
“Well, it shouldn’t be,” Louise shoots back.
“And they want to have something that, they
can meet people,” Deborah continues.
“Well, they can do it just like we do it,” Louise
says. “You know, if somebody wants to be gay,
that’s no reflection on me. But sometimes, you
know, the demonstrations like what we see in
New York, what we see in San Francisco, that just
doesn’t fit."
• 1:34 p.m. Aug. 2: I’ve made it over to
Victory Square Park for the “Equality Event,”
and here’s the news so far: There’s a barbecue
grill fired up, an F-150 Pickup blasting Spanish
pop and a crowd of about 30 milling about. For a
perfect, dry, 80-degree afternoon, the crowd seems
scant.
Blue-topped open tents dot the park’s
south side—United Farm Workers, Cascade
AIDS Project, Oregon Gay Straight Alliance
Association—with tables full of cards and bro
chures. The north swath is bisected by the “Eyes
Wide Open” Iraq war exhibition, including a
field’s-length series of Tibetan prayer flags strung
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in purples, reds and whites, on which the names
of Oregonian casualties are written. A light breeze
flutters the flags up and down the line. Like little
stammering spirits, the flags seem to speak with
the breeze. It’s a completely engrossing visual
statement on the war.
• 3:35 p.m. Aug. 2: I’m sitting down in the
sun to talk with a bisexual 18-year-old woman
named Linda, a lifelong Hermiston resident.
Linda tells me that she’s identified as bisexual for
a few years now and that it’s been pretty much
a nonissue for her, at least in school. 1 ask about
her dating life: She claims “about four or five girl
friends and maybe seven boyfriends” in her high
school career. Not bad.
• 3:52 p.m. Aug. 2: Some of the tabling or
ganizations have already packed up and gone, and
Roa stands alone on the south lawn, smoking a
cigarette. His chatty and affable mom (wearing
big hoop gold earrings that say “Darlene") is sit
ting with a few friends and family members in the
shade. “We wish people had come out for this,”
she says, her big brown eyes swimming.
• 4:48 p.m. Aug. 2: I’ve finally spotted my
first unquestionably gay local: a stocky, wavy-
haired barista wearing a silver-studded belt,
working the Hermiston Starbucks drive-through
window. When my travel mate and 1 order our
drinks, he stops cold and stares us down, makes
small talk and giggles nervously. I don’t remember
seeing him earlier at the “Equality Event”—may
be he was working? Maybe he didn’t know about
it? Maybe he’s not out? Not knowing how to in
tervene—or even if we should—my friend and I
grab our coffees to go, wave grxxlbye and hit the
highway back to Portland. ©
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