MIKE FLEMING
| 11.19.2008
THE DAYS LEADING UP TO ELECTION Night spun my emotions every which way, perhaps heightening my tears for both Obama's historic victory and the quashing of marriage for same-sex couples in California, Florida and Arizona.
I've never been a "go marriage" person. Let's stop pretending there's a consensus that it should be our priority when job discrimination and hate crimes still loom so large. But marriage was already on my mind by Election Night, following a series of clashes with my past on a visit to my hometown.
There's no way to make my Halloween Weekend sound weirder than to just state the facts: I flew to Houston to attend the Nov. 1 wedding of my bisexual ex-husband (9 years together, broken up for 15) to a woman we went to high school with. The Halloween Night bachelor party included 40 naked college boys, and then I won an award at my 25th high school reunion.
THE BACHELOR PARTY - MY EX, my brother, and a few guys we used to smoke a lot of pot with — took place Halloween Night at a little bar called Valhalla. We used to spend too much time there when our waistlines were thin and our hairlines were not.
Valhalla is on the campus of Rice University. Think Emory, but liberal enough to subsidize its own watering hole with $1 cups of draft beer. Generally, you get your beer and then hang outside among the ivy-covered buildings. About 200 people showed up for Halloween.
It was fun. College kids in costumes and cheap beer really set the tone for my ex's "last night as a single man." Then a long line of naked college boys marched up toward the bar, double-pumping their fists into the air with every "Hell yeah!" Seriously.
Apparently every Halloween, a bunch of Rice students strip down, strap on running shoes, and slather shaving cream over their privates. This somehow makes the streaking legal. I wasn't complaining.
The naked people got their beers and mingled with the rest of us. My group basically gawked and judged. Again, fun. A particularly cute nude young man approached me asking for a cigarette. Up close, you could see that the shaving cream was basically everywhere, including on his hands, so I had to light it for him.
I admit lingering in the process to prolong the experience. I also admit watching the shaving cream in his crack as he walked away.
"See anything you like, Mike?" my ex giggled.
GOING HOME IS USUALLY surreal, but I knew this trip was special when a limo pulled up at Valhalla, and a boho straight couple piled out dressed in goth wedding attire. By then, it didn't seem much out of place at all.
She wore a black wedding gown; he wore tails, a Dickensian scarf for a tie and a top hat. Both were sporting black fingernails.
"Oh my god, I know that girl," my brother said. "From the old days. She's insane. I think I slept with her."
Then the naked boys started lining up in two rows facing each other, Soul Train style. They formed "the aisle" for the bride and groom to walk from the limo to the Gothic doorway of the bar, which now had a cardboard box altar headed by an aging hippie in a tie-dyed robe. Yup, they were getting married and coordinated it with the midnight streakers.
"Could we make something like this up?" I asked.
Young women in striped hosiery passed out Fourth of July sparklers. The crowd starting humming "The Wedding March" out loud and off key ("Da-dum-da-dum! Da-DUM-da-DUM!"). And indeed, the freaks got married while we all drank beer and waved sparklers.
"At least your wedding has got to be better than this," I said to the ex.
"Shit, I'm thinking there's no way we can top it."
The next day, my little brother was the best man at what can now only be called "the other wedding." The bride's formerly hot ex-husband, now gay, and several friends from high school and college were also in attendance. The bunch of us went through a lot together and remain close friends to this day.
The groom's mother was there, too. I was never in the same room with her until that day, despite knowing her son 26 years and "marrying" him 24 years ago. As I recall, something about me schtupping him made her Fundamentalist Christian tummy queasy.
Speaking of religion and making my ex's mom nauseous, the bride recently re-embraced her Jewish roots, and my ex studied to convert to Judaism. His confirmation immediately preceded the wedding. I guess this break-a-glass-under-a-tent marriage was still more palatable than having a homo for son. I guess that's true for California voters, too.
The wedding was a somber affair, full of people my mind had already placed in the past. The vows were a little Bad Acting School dramatic, and no one cried. I had a sneaking suspicion that my ex and his bride — two old friends who I know love each other — were settling so they don't have to die alone. There; I said it and I'm evil.
I still don't know how the bride's going to satisfy my ex's insatiable urge to bottom, but that's their problem.
A DAY AFTER THE NEW JEW REVUE was my 25th high school reunion. I know; I'm a glutton for punishment. I stood there with a cocktail and thought, "I spent four years listening to these same bitches scream 'Oh my god!' Why did I return for more of the same?"
All I have to say is 1) I will never attend another reunion after this, 2) Don't mix buffet food with liquor, and 3) Gay men stay relatively thin; straight men do not.
I received a restaurant gift certificate after being voted "least changed." I tallied my own private poll for "most hot to most definitely not." There were several finalists. You really can't go home again.
So I flew back to Atlanta just in time to hear Mr. Obama say "gay" in his acceptance speech. I cried with the elated faces flashing from Grant Park and Times Square, but different tears flowed during the debacle over California's Proposition 8.
Here I was, just back from two weddings that were basically ridiculous, yet totally legal, and a country club filled with ugly straight couples I used to know. If two goth kids can make a mockery of the "institution," and two old friends can do it for companionship, why can't we do it for love?
I suddenly understood why the basic right to partner has everyone so riled up.
|
