Praise then darkness, and creation unfinished

I just walked close to two miles, as part of the Belmont pride parade, which I found out about as they were walking past our house. I wasn't planning to go anywhere today; in fact, I was planning not to, for the sake of my hips and left knee.

cattitude happened to notice the parade going past on Beech Street, and I couldn't see an obvious reason not to join them. He had an obvious reason--no shoes--but I grabbed a mask and set out before remembering I did have a reason, and by then I was a couple of blocks from home and decided to keep going for a bit. I hope I don't regret this later in the day, or the week.

I hadn't expected a Pride parade this year, since the big-city Pride events have all gone virtual because of the pandemic, and Boston, at least, then said they are scaling down and refocusing the online stuff to focus on Black lives matter and anti-racism. This parade was small enough that we mostly maintained social distancing, and I hope they're right about outdoors and sunlight, as well as masks, being protective.

When we were still on Beech Street, someone offered me a flag, so I happily waved a small trans pride flag at passing cars, people sitting or standing on the other side of the street, and so on. The parade got friendly waves and honks from almost everyone we passed

I turned before the parade got to Belmont Center, because walking that far before walking home seemed like more than I could handle.

(My route/walk, just because: https://www.mappedometer.com/?maproute=815131)
Also, I have now met my state representative, who introduced himself as we were walking down Common Street; we chatted a little, both general stuff and about legislation to make it easy to vote by mail.

[continued]
adrian_turtle and I had lunch Saturday morning and then went into Boston, again taking the train to Park Street. We found a not-too-crowded spot a few blocks from the end of the parade route, and watched for a bit, though I couldn't see much (I’m short, and there were four or five rows of people there). Then there was a pause between floats/organized groups in the parade, so I stepped into the street and walked the last bit, while Adrian went to do volunteer work for Freedom for All Massachusetts.

The Pride Parade is a lot more establishment and capitalist than when I was marching in New York in the 1980s and ‘90s, but the cheering onlookers as we marched still had me grinning. I hadn’t planned to march and had no sign, but I was wearing my (new) t-shirt with lines of text including "Science is Real," "Black Lives Matter," "Love Is Love," and "Women’s Rights Are Human Rights."

There were what felt like too many politicians at the end of the parade route/entrance to City Hall Plaza, and Bob Massie and his people were enough in my face that I am less likely to vote for him than I was last week. (He’s one of the two Democratic candidates for governor; if he wins the primary, I will vote for him rather than Charlie Baker.)

I spent some time walking around the assorted booths at City Hall Plaza. I bought a rainbow-colored hat and skipped a lot of very commercial booths (no, I do not want my photo in a Nissan tweet, and I didn’t need fried dough). Wandering brought me back to the end of the parade route, so I sat on a wall and watched more of the parade. I'd thought the parade was close to the end when I joined it, but even after getting arriving a bit late and what I missed looking around the street fair, I saw a variety of marchers: politicians and gay sports leagues, a bank and Dunkin' Donuts and Taiwan Pride and a whole bunch of Unitarian churches each with its own sign, and more people just walking in ones and twos, like me. One person was carrying a sign with a picture of the rainbow flag and "Our flag is not your ad"; I hope he heard me saying I liked it. Then I went back into the plaza, and found more of the community/movement organizations, and eventually the official Boston Pride merchandise tent.

I now have a t-shirt with a picture of the Stonewall Inn sign and the text "Bring Back the Riot 1969 2019." Boston Pride was selling those, and "rainbow resistance" shirts--I like the sentiment there, but the graphic is ugly enough that I'm pretty sure I wouldn't wear it--along with things like tie-dyed "We the People Means Everybody" shirts. I also have a lot of new pins, in sizes from tiny to quite large—the "Rise Up, Resist, Repeat" I got at the Dyke March; a clenched fist on a rainbow-colored background; and little pins saying "Dyke March 2018," "Trans Rights Now!" "Fight the Patriarchy," "The Future is Female," and "Stop Profiling Muslims," all bought from the Dyke March people. (I gave them a couple of extra dollars, because we’d had to leave Friday night before I got a chance to donate for their expenses.) I may still order a retro/reprinted "Bisexual Pride" button to replace the one I lost a couple of months ago, but I am feeling much better equipped than I was last week.

This weekend is the fortieth anniversary of the Stonewall Riots.

A lot has changed since then. Not everything, not enough, but a lot: people who would once have been wondering "is it safe to be seen in public with my partner" are fighting to have their marriages recognized.

I'm not, physically, up to being downtown at the NY Gay Pride March celebrating today, but it's important that it's there. It matters that it's part of the fabric of the city and the year: the cycle of parades, the MTA noting which buses will be rerouted (most parades go right down Fifth, and this one turns west to go down Christopher Street), the local newspaper Web page with photos of previous years and lists of events as the front page for New York City yesterday. That, and the sponsorships and banners hanging from the lamp posts on Fifth Avenue, are a different message from how it felt when I first marched in the 1980s, and we had to deal with counter-protestors shouting insults near St. Patrick's Cathedral. I can miss the extent to which it felt political, but I don't miss having people trying to get in our face to tell us we were evil.

I'm not much connected to specifically LGBT social groups, because I haven't felt much need, and haven't always been sure I would fit there. A piece of that is that cattitude is male, and was my only partner for a long time. But another piece is that I've got a social group, defined on other axes and interests, that is basically queer-friendly, people who don't react differently to "this is my partner" when I'm introducing adrian_turtle than when I'm introducing Cattitude. And that's not my cleverness, that's time and change in large parts of US and other western society.

When I mentioned a girlfriend to my parents at 17, they sent me to a psychologist. So I didn't introduce them to more girlfriends for a long time. But when I told my mother about Adrian, she said "I want to meet her," and did, and they like each other. That's not just that my mother is a cool person; it's a quarter century of progress and people pushing and being visible in a lot of ways and places.