It’s Southern Decadence, here in New Orleans where thousands of gay men have flocked to dance and celebrate another year surviving being gay in America. I went on a search and rescue mission for my gal pal Bruce last night. He’d bought an ostrich feather mask and some beads that had toucans every 6th bead to break up the monotony. That afternoon, while dancing a frenetic custom made zydeco dance, in order to make me scream laughing, he paid for his $7 joke as I doubled over a few feet behind him. “That mask is going to wreak hell on your T-Zone. You are blocking your pores.” He is not listening to me. Bruce sways his khaki cargo panted hips without a care in the world, as he snaps the elastic behind his head, masquerading as just another queer party animal/Girls Gone Wild casualty on the dance floor of Oz.
Mask and the dance were fair subterfuge, and as I searched the crowd, he was nowhere to be found. I’d never braved the vast terrain of late night excess on Bourbon Street without a bodyguard, which never makes you safer, just easier to recognize. Having a huge person cutting a path for you through the throngs of revelers gives free reign for said throngs to fuck with you. Head down, interior lights low, it is effortless to maneuver my way through the homosexual jungle of well-muscled arms and legs. I enjoy my anonymity, not that I am so famous that it causes logjams at every turn, but in gay environments, my name shoots to the top of the charts, number one with a bullet, practically household. Even before I became a performer, underage me in gay clubs would still be hoisted onto shoulders and carried out in the bar, as fag hags are always famous, being responsible for much rotator cuff injury and lower back distress. Being the only biological woman in a sweaty sea of men is cause celebre, and I shine like a dusty jewel amidst all the glittery drag queens.
I didn’t find Bruce. Not in Oz, not in the street, where three Bible carrying men walked against the human traffic, denouncing their hellbound homo ways. I am surprised that they are not crushed underfoot, swept away in a crimson tide. The anger unleashed by some gay men flows like a mighty river, as it is the rage of ages, from schoolyard fights long lost and unrequited love still holding fast to the heart. Fists fly from Christmas past, as blows from the father are thrown by the son. But the men are allowed to walk up the street, with their Scripture and their thinly veiled homosexuality, onward Christian soldier.