Tag: Ray S

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Solitude by Ray S.

“Hear that? It’s Debussy’s Le Mer.” How appropriate for the moment. Sounds just the way I feel. It is so hard to get started in the morning, the prospects of managing another day’s routine and decisions nagging at my subconscious.

“Subconscious, why do you command so much energy of my old mind? We are always at swords point or you’ve taken over completely. You’re the victor and I’m the defeated. You revel in the worst negative. O, these quiet hours of solitude.”

And then I said, “Well, how did you know when your retreat into self-imposed isolation would result in the discovery of your real self.” Did it settle all of those damning self-doubts? I guess it did, it is hard for me to imagine you any different than you are now. How long did it take in meditation or whatever to lift that millstone from your back? Can you show me how? I don’t think I have the will or discipline to beat my evil twin.

The music swells and I envision a soul departing this vail of all it demands. See it rising into the sky like a balloon, oh feel the relief from escaping everything earthly. What an adventure. The vastness of the universe beckons. Maybe this soul will be drown to all the other family of soul that took this trip earlier. How about that. A family reunion. It might be crowded.

OMG. Will this all end up the same old, same old? No, remember you left all that sub conscious junk back there. You’ll just have to be patient.

Sounds like the sea has crashed it’s final crescendo and the two battling sub-consciousnesses have given up until tomorrow morning, ready for another go at whatever.

How do you know anything, when, how, where, why? Solitude can be so tired, deadly and lonely.

And then there comes another melody with words:

“Never treats; me sweet and gentle, the way he should.
I’ve got it bad and that ain’t good
Lord above me make him love me the way he should
I’ve got it bad and that ain’t good!

I end up like I start out,
Just crying my heart out.
I’ve got it bad and that ain’t good.

(With apologies to Earl Father Hines.)

© 30 September
2013

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An Exaggerated (Fairy) Tale by Ray S

Once upon a time there lived a very big bear. He was a grand specimen right down to all necessary details. He was at least ten feet tall on his hind legs. All the lady bears desired his attention and services, but he could not seem to be attracted to any special beautiful shiny black bear. He spent many occasions visiting and playing with the ladies but could not decide which one he could please the most like he was supposed to do.

When hibernation time ended and spring time came Bear’s special pastime was hunting for berries, fruits, and nuts and sometimes a red blooded animal or two. But Bear’s diet was almost vegan inasmuch as he drew the line at eating humans.

Humans could be dangerous and killers, but so many had good feelings for the animal world, and he evidenced that many humans had great love for one another.

Bear especially enjoyed and appreciated observing the youngest human’s childhood.

Because he was invisible at will, her would patrol his territory visiting all of the young human girls and boys in their sleep. He would always see that they were loved and safe and developing all of the necessary physical and emotional attributes to grow into kind, loving, brave, questioning and joyful humans–because that is the way they were meant to be.

He carefully checked each innocent body to see that no harm or disorder occurred in the development of each child

That the little girls were all perfect in body and spirit so as to grow emotionally as well as physically beautiful women.

That the little boys were all perfect in body and spirit and that they too had all the necessary potential intelligence and body parts to insure the survival of generations to come.

While on a territory hunt for food, Bear came upon a pair of beautiful lady bears who were gathering berries in a nearby thicket. He noted how warmly they treated each other. How they would feed one another berries and speak softly to each other.

The startled lady bears looked up and invited Bear to have some berries too-if he wished. He thanked them and asked if he frequented this part of his territory often. They replied only when it is Magic Time in the woods. Bear was curious about what happens during Magic Time and they asked him, if he wasn’t lonely for the company of one of his kind?”

He wondered what that had to do with his inquiry until he looked away from the ladies at a blinding flash in the darkest part of the forest.

To Bear’s amazement there appeared a duplicate image of himself. They carefully approached each other. Hesitantly one reached out to the other, not in anger or aggression, but gradual recognition of a like being seeking friendship and maybe love.

With another blinding flash where the two lady bears had been reclining through the mist appeared two lovely nude maidens.

And then simultaneously Bear and his duplicate shed their bear skins and stood naked staring in wonder at each other.

The maidens were amused by the two young men and their wonderment. They chided the boys and said, “Watch us loving each other and then follow suit. That is why you found us in this part of the woods–to find a loved one.”

Now you have learned what Magic Time is all about and become wonderful Bare Humans, to live and to love as you were meant to do forever and ever.

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My Favorite Place by Ray S

At first thought the subject today calls for ancient memories and especially nostalgia. My sand box in the back yard was a very favorite realm over which I was king. A fleet of yellow Tootsietoy sedans, roadsters, and two town cars with front seat open tops for the chauffeur, separating the enclosed passenger compartments. There were miles and miles of miniature roads and highways, bridges over rivers thtat sometimes flooded and washed out the roads due to the torrents of water from the garden hose. No, there was never any loss of lives. Those drivers knew what they were doing.

Along side the venerable sand box kingdom, father had constructed a club house from used wooden refrigerator crates. All sorts of secret and sometimes forbidden activities took place in that hallowed hall. Oaths of life-long friendship, confidences for no one’s ears but your best buddy, and a place of quiet consolation when things just became too hectic in the big people’s world.

Once that was a favorite place, but things change. An unrealized dream house materializes comfortably nestled in the verdant forested hills of some make believe New England landscape–all white clapboard and green shutters, stuffed with American antique funiture. “Autumn Leaves,” Thanksgiving by Currier and Ives, “White Christmas,” “Moonlight in Vermont,” etc, etc. Meanwhile life moved on in a post war ranch house in suburbia. Another unfulfilled “Favorite Place” is the magic city on the bay, or the drive up the coast past an oceanside community romantically named Sea Ranch. There, clinging to the cliffside a cluster of weathered cedar shingled cottages. Dream on…….

All of those material Favorite Places are or were important; however, is there anything that can supplant a warm hearth, the luxury of a cozy nesting place, strong shoulders to lean on, two arms to hold you tight and the security of another’s love. That is the ultimate “Favorite Place” to be for me.

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One Summer Afternoon By Ray S

“What are you doing, father?” It isn’t quite summer, but almost. And this afternoon the question was voiced by one of a couple of gay revelers passing by as I waited for the next #10 bus.

“Waiting,” I replied and then quickly added, “for the next bus.” Then it struck me, the title by which I had been addressed and then my prompt reply.

First, I am a father and today is the national holiday honoring fathers. Just coincidently Denver’s Gay Pride Sunday. There certainly are statistics establishing how many gay fathers there are. Guess this is our special day as well. One never knows who will turn up a father; do you?

Second, I thought after the boys passed by that the word “waiting” looms either ominously or in joyful anticipation for all of us, and in my case—for what or whatever the future may hold.

Besides the initial carnival character of the setting at Civic Center and then the Pride Parade, I was aware of the general ages of the celebrants. Don’t gay men grow beyond downy-faced Peter Pans that will never grow up or full-blown bronzed Adonis’s with such an abundance of self-confidence and arrogance? This question was haunting and even more so after countless hours of observing the beautiful, bizarre, minimally-attired populous. Was this whole charade dedicated to the Fountain of Youth and the exciting discovery of carnality? Here is a parody of the song. “Old Soldiers never die,” etc. that goes “Old Trolls never die, they just fly away.” Is there nothing to look forward to besides a good book, getting fat from countless dinner parties, recounting lost opportunities with other disappointed brethren, indulging in the occasional gay porn DVD in the lone comfort of your bed, and on and on, so be it?

Then like the first blush of the sunrise my eyes were opened wonderfully to the real world of beautiful, crazy, happy, gay attendees of this huge street party celebrating many other positive aspects of the right to be who we are and equal to all the rest of the seemingly God’s chosen.

The exterior physicality has a way of transforming. The ultimate result is the chance for a real inner beauty to emerge, if it hasn’t been there already . The value of friendship, companionship and love beyond the flesh core. The truly life-sustaining elements of all GLBT relationships. And of course human nature will see to the sometimes overarching flesh thing.

Waiting one summer afternoon. Well just relax, breathe deeply, look around you, see the beauty and love in all of us, and eventually that bus will come.

© 19 June 2013

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Coming Out Spiritually by Ray S

     My muse took the week off when she learned what I wanted her to address. She looked askance at me, and allowed as how someone lifted her Ouija Board years ago. I can’t complain too much though, she’s really tried hard for me.

     Spiritually, I’m not sure how to explain the word relative to coming out. We have all had some sort of “ah ha” moment when after a long and arduous trip we’ve leapt, crawled, ran, or stumbled out.

     But to put it simply for myself the moment really materialized into reality when I learned how wonderful it is to affirm my friendship and love for my GLBT companions with a sincere kiss and or caress, and the swelling in my chest when I saw the stars and rainbow stripes flag bravely flying next to the red white and blue of our other flag on the suburban porch of a neat neighborhood brick bungalow–how proud they must be and how curious and proud I was to see their statement and maybe come to know them.

© 23
February 2013

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Keeping the Peace by Ray S

Maude and Emily, nee Clyde and Frank Le Clerke, they were married in Canada and Frank took Clyde’s surname in preference to his own Germanic Danglebunger.

They have a long history together, now in their late sixties they are the epitome of ideal monogamous married folks. Oh once in a while they were known to stray from the straight and narrow but just for an occasional fling—nothing more than a brash alcoholic one nighter when one or the other was away on business, and later in life the excitement of some mutually arranged three-ways. But, enough of the intimate details.

The two had met soon after the Stonewall period in a rather select hotel bar, not the usual black hole of Calcutta with a key to the back room. At the time they were two butterflies emerging from their constrictive cocoons. Clyde was a wanna be theatrical producer whose primary occupation was assistant to a well-known stage costume designer—until retirement recently.

Lt. Col. Frank Le Clerke, nee Danglebunger, Retd. had enjoyed a carefully closeted military career with the aid and cooperation of his lovely wife, now moved on to greener pastures. It had been a rewarding-in-so-many-ways period in his life, even with the 2.4 children and a choice dictated by a good WASP family life and successful entry to the military academy. You had to do what formulas and middleclass America required then, and other possibilities were unheard of, replete with influences leading to a reward of hell and damnation. Thus knowingly or unknowingly he sought the cozy confines of the nearest closet.

Since all of that water passed over the dam, the “girls” have led a relatively peaceful and comfortable gay life. They are now rewarded with five grandchildren, courtesy of the younger Danglebungers, and the acquisition of an early twentieth century brownstone overlooking the city’s downtown. Needless to say, Clyde supervised the interior makeover of the old house. Frank saw to the bills and supervised the various young sub-contractors.

As described in the preceding information, all was harmonious at 6969 Oak Avenue until several months ago when the subject of the approach of the annual Gay Pride events and especially the grand parade on the last day of Pride Week came up.

For as long as they care to remember they had entered into the parade plans with enthusiasm verging on manic. Each year their entry and participation had to outdo that of the last. Hadn’t they won first prize seven odd times and become known as the Queens of the Floating Prides? These two were committed, this time of the year preempted all other yearly celebrations including birthdays and holidays. Each had his just due by the Pride Parade, and their own entry took the lead.

But this year try as they may the two couldn’t seem to agree on a theme and subsequent design and costumes. Was there anything in the way of stories and guises that the city’s drag queens hadn’t used before? The answer was of course NO, but there had to be something different this year.

What about a miniaturized replica of the Stonewall on the float with the two of them dressed as a drag queen and a New York cop? Frank said yes, and he could even wear his old Army sidearm. Clyde responded that Frank was too old to expose himself, when Frank then corrected Clyde explaining sidearm was a common term for a pistol in a holster, not an anatomical part.

Clyde had his own grand vision of the two of them presenting themselves as models in a 1920’s fashion show descending a circular staircase built on the float. Turned out to be too high to clear the utility lines across the parade route. What about a Broadway Ziegfeld follies theme, lower stairway with them costumed in Clyde’s own designed follies gowns. Frank didn’t like the stairs in any case because he no longer was as steady as he used to be in those six-inch stiletto heels.

Alas, the time was growing shorter and neither could agree; keeping the peace was to be a lost cause.

It was three weeks to go and a Saturday morning. Frank had suited up for his early run in the park. Clyde had accompanied him, only to find his usual park bench close to the running path so as to enjoy viewing all the naked boys, well at least stripped to their waists. Springtime in the park turned out to be inspirational in so many ways.

Frank enjoyed the respectful, admiring and acknowledging similes of some of the naked boys as they passed him. He visualized how these men would appear dressed or undressed as Athenian athletes racing each other in an Olympic marathon. He was glad he had his loose fitting running shorts on.

Clyde was distracted from his studies by the nearby cackle and proud array of one of the park’s peacocks in full plumage display. “That’s it,” the light bulb shown brilliantly in his creative imagination. He hadn’t been a producer in show business, but he had produced some great costume designs. Hope springs eternal!

Sunday morning, the parade’s designated meeting place has been accomplished and the show is well on its way. Weather is cooperating, the girls’ pancake and mascara isn’t running. The bands are playing loud and noisy. Then to the tune of the familiar “Moaning Low” the contingent of “Floating Prides” arrived at the reviewing stand.

Oh, so many beautiful, bizarre, horny queens in full array and display. It was a wondrously true sight to behold.

But what of our girls? Where were the perennial prize takers?

Seems that Saturday afternoon after the park, Maude and Emily, nee Clyde and Frank, had a nice al fresco lunch and bottle of bubbly to discuss some brand new float designs gained as a result of their morning’s exertions.

Then as so many old queens tend to do, they went antique store browsing. Nothing in particular in mind when both were struck by a really cheesy style gold guilt pharaoh-like throne, replete in leopard print upholstery. Ta-da.

OMG—look at that! Here comes a team of four sort-of-white horses with applied zebra stripes drawing a float complete with a temple of Karnack backdrop; raised dais for that chair now elevated to a throne for none other than Cleopatra dressed in shimmering gauze revealing her tasteful black lace lingerie and fish net hose. All of this crowning her black Egyptian wig with a full peacock crown. I swear it could have been Claudette Colbert in the DeMille Cleopatra, or maybe even Liz.

And at her side in full man-tan stood as naked as he was allowed due to children attending the parade stood Frank, nee Emily—this time doing his damndest to recreate the fit Frank Danglebunger of past times. Marc Anthony would have looked half as good if he had lived long enough to qualify for various military benefits and Social Security, or whatever.

The horse-zebras drew our two Pridly Queen’s float past the dignitaries on the reviewing stand (one of the animals couldn’t hold it any longer—must have been all that music and cheering) and left a respectable deposit for the occupants of the reviewing stand, as well as the rest of the parade. Oh shit! But they kept the peace in the Le Clerke homestead for another year.

Denver, June 2013

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House Cleaning by Ray S

The inspiration or need to excavate some 80 years worth of one time essential acquisitions long since forgotten in their deep dark hiding places–under the basement stairs, the long forgotten coal bin, through the trapdoor to the spidery crawl space. You know what I mean. Out of sight, out of mind.

Why start? It’s just a never ending task with so many unknown challenges and memories to be confronted with. You set out to clean up the mess, sort out the savers, discard that which you cannot even remember where it came from, or was it even yours?

Because of a faint flicker of conscience fighting its way to the fore, guilt is the reward for the slacker so get on with it, you haven’t got all day or forever for that matter. The voice of conscience and virtue spurs you on to…let’s start at the top this time–it’s too dark and moldy in the nether regions.

Open the stairway door to the third floor, with trash can, broom, dust pan, and flash light it is an all out attack on the ancient history–stocked, stored, and discarded of 107 Bloomingbank Road. Watch out sleeping dreams of long ago, ghosts of growing and growing older, forbidden and forgotten memories. You’re about to be rousted out of your dusty but cozy shoe boxes, photo albums, school year books filled with pictures of people you can’t recall or one’s you yearned to know well or more intimately.

O M! There’s a picture of gorgeous Ian McCullum. I was in love with him before I even knew about same sex love, or was it lust? Anyway he asked me to be his partner in an Apache dance skit for the senior hight talent night. I couldn’t believe it. He’d been pleasant enough at school, but we weren’t pals. The truth will out. As his partner, I had to appear in black satin pajamas and flowing scarf topped off with a feathered turbin. You can guess where this was going….

After the show ended so did my infatuation primarily because Ian liked girls better than apprentice fags. So much for the 1943 year book.

Wonder if this box of 78 RPM’s would bring anything at collector’s row? Probably Value Village would turn them down. Oh well, let’s move on. Now, look at this all wrapped up in newspaper–the Chicago Tribune, June, 1941–the old and cherished Lionel steam locomotive, all that remains of your train board that you received on an earlier Christmas 1938 which was immediately commandeered by your older brother and dad. But it’s the thought that counts and you did get a tunnel and train station the next year.

Here’s a box of letters to the family when I was going to be an Air Corps hero. If naivete was a qualification for the Army Air Corp, I was overly qualified. After the Army’s foregone decision that washed out all of the cadet squadron, the men (all 18 year olds) moved on the many and varied military positions: guard duty, kitchen police, butt control, and, if you’re lucky, a corner in the squad room.

In the process of pursuing weekend passes and R&R the more important (depending on your point of view) aspects of emerging male on male associations had taken a particular precedence over sporting events and cultural pursuits; such as, the grand old hotel in Richmond that hosted a military gang bang in room 769. Talk about advanced education opportunities.

Look at this–an old post card post marked Chicago, Ill. from dear sweet Tom the warrant office that made my acquaintance on the bus returning to the Air Force Base from D.C. Just enough time to establish the fact that maybe he could find a place for me in his office. Gee, I wish I’d kept in touch after we got our Ruptured Ducks, but he was married anyway and I didn’t know about the subtleties of being BI.

More fodder for the trash bag of years gone by–some misspent, some not–one can only judge from the long view back. Housecleaning, as I told you, can be a never- ending chore that sometimes can only be concluded by one of two situations: the house burns down or you stop reading those letters and breathing.

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SPECIAL EDITION: PRIDEFEST 2013

Today’s Special Edition presents stories by three authors. 

One Summer Afternoon 
by Ray S

“What are you doing, father?” It isn’t quite summer, but almost. And this afternoon the question was voiced by one of a couple of gay revelers passing by as I waited for the next #10 bus.

“Waiting,” I replied and then quickly added, “for the next bus.” Then it struck me, the title by which I had been addressed and then my prompt reply.

First, I am a father and today is the national holiday honoring fathers. Just coincidently Denver’s Gay Pride Sunday. There certainly are statistics establishing how many gay fathers there are. Guess this is our special day as well. One never knows who will turn up a father; do you?

Second, I thought after the boys passed by that the word “waiting” looms either ominously or in joyful anticipation for all of us, and in my case—for what or whatever the future may hold.

Besides the initial carnival character of the setting at Civic Center and then the Pride Parade, I was aware of the general ages of the celebrants. Don’t gay men grow beyond downy-faced Peter Pans that will never grow up or full-blown bronzed Adonises with such an abundance of self confidence and arrogance? This question was haunting and even more so after countless hours of observing the beautiful, bizarre, minimally-attired populous. Was this whole charade dedicated to the Fountain of Youth and the exciting discovery of carnality? Here is a parody of the song. “Old Soldiers never die,” etc. that goes “Old Trolls never die, they just fly away.” Is there nothing to look forward to besides a good book, getting fat from countless dinner parties, recounting lost opportunities with other disappointed brethren, indulging in the occasional gay porn DVD in the lone comfort of your bed, and on and on, so be it?

Then like the first blush of the sunrise my eyes were opened wonderfully to the real world of beautiful, crazy, happy, gay attendees of this huge street party celebrating many other positive aspects of the right to be who we are and equal to all the rest of the seemingly God’s chosen.

The exterior physicality has a way of transforming. The ultimate result is the chance for a real inner beauty to emerge, if it hasn’t been there already. The value of friendship, companionship and love beyond the flesh core. The truly life-sustaining elements of all GLBT relationships. And of course human nature will see to the sometimes overarching flesh thing.

Waiting one summer afternoon. Well just relax, breathe deeply, look around you, see the beauty and love in all of us, and eventually that bus will come.

© June
2013

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One Summer Afternoon
by Merlyn

Pride Sunday 2013 was the kind of summer day that will always be special. Michael and I walked in the Pride parade along with the color guard with Ray S; Cecil and Carl rode in a convertible  At the end of the parade Cecil and Carl joined us on the corner of Colfax and Broadway for awhile to watch the parade pass. We had fun looking at all of the people. Carl stood up and watched as the green Rolls Royce drove past that Cecil and he had ridden in last year.

We spent 8 hours helping out in the Prime Timers and The GLBT Center’s booths on Saturday and were planning on enjoying Sunday.

We would have to leave around 3 to go over to his daughters house for a father’s day dinner for Michael at 5pm.

After the Parade was over we had about a hour to walk around before Michael was supposed to work at his church’s booth. A storm went though with strong wind but no one cared. I was planning on checking out the four Prime Timers booths to help out if one of them needed help for a couple of hours.

Everything was under control so I decided to enjoy myself. I walked by Michaels booth he was wearing the red hat with flowers all over it, he was having a ball putting stickers on the people that went by. It was crowded and I was in the way, so I decided to walk around.

I saw a bench that was in the shade and sat down. I really enjoyed being able to sit on the bench and not do anything but watch and talk to some of the people that stopped for a break.

Two men in their 30s feel asleep in each other’s arms laying on the grass 20 feet away where I was sitting and no one cared. When I was in my 20s or 30s I could never have imagined a world where it would be OK to do the kind of things that seem so natural today.

We made it to dinner a few minutes late, had a real good time and came home around 9PM. We laid down to relax awhile before we watched the end of a movie we had started Saturday night. Both of us fell asleep, We woke up just in time to go down to and go to bed around midnight, but that’s another story about a different day.

© June 2013

About the Author

I’m a retired gay man now living in Denver Colorado with my partner Michael. I grew up in the Detroit area. Through the various kinds of work I have done I have seen most of the United States. I have been involved in technical and mechanical areas my whole life, all kinds of motors and computer systems. I like travel, searching for the unusual and enjoying life each day.

One Summer Afternoon 
by Phillip Hoyle

As a dedicated people watcher, I sat alone on a coffee shop patio watching the parade go by in front of me. The East Colfax show was endless, varied, noisy, quirky, clean, stylish, unwashed and in rags. With loud sirens blaring, Denver Fire Department trucks sped by. Cars stopped to parallel park; other vehicles impatiently continued up and down the street. I watched a never ending flow of people and automobiles loving what I saw. Then I thought of the parade I’d see on the following Sunday, the Parade for Denver PrideFest 2013.

I first attended PrideFest in 1999. I wanted to go but realized I might not get to do so since my son Mike and his wife Heather and their four young kids were staying at my apartment. They were slated to leave Sunday afternoon to return to western Colorado where they lived. Early that morning one of my granddaughters asked to go to the playground she remembered from an earlier trip. “We can’t,” I explained. “The playground is closed because a parade is lining up in the park.”

“A parade,” she responded with excited eyes. “We can get candy!”

I told her I didn’t know if they’d have candy, but there would be lots of clowns. We did go down to Colfax to watch the events, and the children got much more candy than they had ever gathered at a parade. Back then few children attended the parade, so the candy givers were quite excited to see the stair step youngsters seated in a row on the curb and quite generous with their portions. So I saw my first PrideFest parade through the eyes of my grandchildren who loved not just the candy but every minute of the spectacle. Together we saw floats, dykes on bikes, bands, drag queens, politicians, dancing boys, and leather men. I thought how differently the world presented itself to my grandchildren when compared with what it showed me or my children.

Pridefest 2000 added a new perspective for I was in love with a man who was dying from the ravages of HIV and his anti-AIDS medications. I was dedicating much of my time to be with him for doctor appointments, chemotherapy, clinic visits, yard work, and socializing. I wrote in my morning pages on Saturday that I was going to meet Tony and Roy the next day to see the parade no matter what Michael, my partner, wanted. I wrote: “I’m going to be at Marion and Colfax and cheer on the troops.” I did see the parade all the while knowing that the two men I had been deeply in love with both wanted too much to fit in. The first one wanted to fit in with the beautiful; and this one, Michael, with the ordinary. When Michael said he was just an ordinary guy, I suggested to him that he was just an ordinary Queer! The differences these men represented helped me realize how much I was thoroughly queer and queerly individual.

I don’t recall anything particular about PrideFest 2001—perhaps I didn’t attend it due to my too-recent loss of Michael to AIDS—but in 2002 Mike and Heather and kids were back visiting and my life was once again changing drastically. The plot was that we attended Buskerfest on Saturday and PrideFest on Sunday, the former as a family, the latter accompanied by my wild friend Dianne and her boyfriend Craig. The subtext of the story was that a man I had become obsessed with but had not yet spent any time with—Rafael—was now, just that weekend, entering the main stage of my interest. The family met my good friends Roy & Richard as well as Rafael, my new flame who was setting off Roman candles in me both Saturday and Sunday nights. I left him early Sunday and Monday mornings to rush home and make breakfast for my family. I don’t know if I even slept for three days. Again I was seeing my changing life through the eyes of my children and grandchildren, and my friends. I was extremely attentive to the grandkids at PrideFest where Kalo, then nine, disappeared. I spotted him sitting on a high vantage point watching the nearly nude mob of gay guys dancing. He saw me looking at him and smiled and waved. Still he watched. Oh my, I wondered, do we have another generation of queers in the making?

The next year, 2003, Kalo was back but without his parents. He was spending a week with me in an improvised urban survival art camp. Sunday featured PrideFest. This time, with me coping with my loss of Rafael to death a few months before, Kalo and I joined Roy and Richard and Tony to view the parade. We also spent time that day with a group of body-painting lesbians. I wondered at the child’s perspective but saw him be very mature around the girls, wide eyed during a drag show, and worldly wise in the way he reported all the things to his parents. Kalo also met my next partner, who did not choose to join us at the festival.

But in 2004, I announced to him—Jim—I’m going to the parade. He accompanied me.

In 2005, I met a long-time drag queen friend of Jim’s. He’d never mentioned he’d even seen drag shows let alone knew and really liked Scottie Carlisle, a long-time drag queen, once Empress of the Royal Court.

In 2006, I met the author of the first gay novel I ever read recalling how important that book was to my development as a gay man.

I don’t recall what happened in 2007.

In 2008, I was in the Rockies on retreat where I read my short story about the parade and PrideFest adventures of Miss Shinti, a white miniature French poodle. The week before I went on retreat, I had urged my friends Roy and Richard, “Make sure Jim goes to the parade. Call him. Insist.”

“Why?” Richard asked.

“Because I don’t want his condition to become terminal.”

“Huh?”

“He has CEATTG,” I informed him. Richard looked concerned. “Chronic Embarrassment At All Things Gay,” I clarified.

The 2009 parade brought me insight into pride, politics, and church. It also introduced me to parties surrounding the festival. I made a record of all these things with my new camera. For me, the highlight of the parade that year was the stilt-walking drag queen Nuclea Waste, festooned with multi-colored long balloons, surrounded with a consort of adoring Speedo-clad dancers, each in similar fashion but decorated monochromatically.

2010, and 2011 provided more insights into my own gay life. In 2012, I loved it when the walker-toting elder brigade from SAGE made their way down the street, and I got all teary-eyed when a group of young GLBTs reminded us not to forget about AIDS.

And now in 2013 I am at yet another PrideFest. I want to know more about my world and my gay self and am delighted that what I really appreciate this time is how much the festival attracts straight folk and how, beyond the extreme costumes and hype, the most queer thing there seems not queer at all: men holding hands with men, women holding hands with women, hand holding that seems not at all self-conscious. And many children are here with their parents. How I wish my own kids and grandkids were here this time. It all seems so normal, except that I never once hold hands with my partner. Drat. What’s wrong with me?

Oh well, Happy PrideFest 2013. What a wonderful summer afternoon.

© June
2013

About the Author

Phillip Hoyle lives in Denver and spends his time writing, painting, giving massages, and socializing. His massage practice funds his other activities that keep him busy with groups of writers and artists, and folk with pains. Following thirty-two years in church work, he now focuses on creating beauty and ministering to the clients in his practice. He volunteers at The Center leading “Telling Your Story.”
He also blogs at artandmorebyphilhoyle.blogspot.com

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Some Rambling Explorations by Ray S

It was during the summer of his eighth year. Father had set up camp for the family at the Indiana Sand Dunes State Park. Close enough so he could commute into the city and be with the family all weekend. When you’re that young you take a lot for granted and looking back now it is amazing to realize how well planned and engineered the little camp community was. Besides his family, mother, father, and older brother, there were three other families that met at the campgrounds each summer. All with various canvas domiciles. One was even a real circus tent with the interior sub divided by sheets hung on clothesline to allow for some degree of privacy and decorum. But nothing in his mind could compare with Father’s layout.

There were three of the latest no-center-pole square tents. If memory doesn’t fail, they were interestingly or curiously named Dickey Bird tents. Father set the two tents up facing each other with the front flaps joining to make a dining-sitting area–the sides draped with a zippered doorway and made of something called ”bobbinet.” All of this was set upon a 6-inch high wooden deck to keep the sand out and dry in case of rain. The T-bird tent was for him and his brother.

The little kids would go swimming, or learned to swim assisted by adults in beautiful Lake Michigan–oblivious of the nearby steel mills of Gary.

There were exploring expeditions in the shoreline sand hills collecting little pails full of wild blueberries, which Mother made into wonderful pies for the crew’s communal dinners. And, yes, she baked them in a fireside tin oven. The lady was quite adept at camping culinary cuisine.

Usually on the 2nd of July a pit was dug a little way from the tents. About 5-feet square and 4-feet deep. Then the men would build a big fire and keep it going until morning when there would be a goodly pile of hot coals. Fresh ham roasts, loins and pork ribs were seasoned and wrapped tightly in layers of butcher paper followed by three layers of wet burlap sacks, all tied and bound. The bundles were lowered into the pit of coals and then covered over with the excavated soil.

The next day, the 4th of July was celebrated with everyone enjoying the pit roasted barbecue and all the trimmings.

Brother and his buddies all went down to the lakeside in hopes of finding some teenage romance. The little kids sat around the campfire watching the adults doing what adults do when it is party time and celebrating the demise of prohibition.


Summer at camp, swim and play, and know there would never be an end to those happy days.

But he does recall how everybody became so quiet and spoke in hushed voices one day. He finally asked Mother and Father why this change in the people’s mood. One of the families actually had a car radio and had heard the announcement of the plane crash and subsequent deaths of the pilot–one Wiley Post and his passenger friend, Will Rogers. This was the major national tragedy of the time, the Great Depression notwithstanding.

Exploring the childhood days of the early half of the 20th century has led from blueberries, sand and camp to realities of the Graf Zeppelin at Lakehurst, the soup kitchens and bread lines in all the cities, the underworlds personalities of John Dillinger, Al Capone, Bonnie and Clyde, the rise of totalitarian governments in Europe and the Orient, and the ultimate reality, World War II.

So much for exploring. On to our next topic, “No Good Will Come of It.”

© 1 May 2013

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Getting Caught by Ray S

What a vast subject–depending on what you get caught at or doing. Certainly someone will recall, as I did, the old saw “getting caught with your pants down.” (Don’t you wish.) Caught by the boogy man in a bad dream when you were a kid. You remember. Running, running, running, and the harder you tried the more your feet were stuck in the mud-like glue on your path. Finally kicking and screaming you wake up escaping a horrible fate.

There were numerous times when you thought you didn’t get caught only to live with lingering pangs of conscience. With effort and appropriate therapy this too passed.

Then there were those delicious times when you were engaged in an activity in which you were tempting fate at getting caught. Those are the memories of “caughtness” that enrich our life experiences.

It all boils down to caught-positive and not caught-negative, so for me and maybe you I’m still out there catching that falling star.

2-4-13

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