After spending much of the day working on the computer and intermittently checking out shots of the gay-pride parade downtown, Stephen and I went across the street to water the garden. On Broadway, I could not help but notice the striking lack of anything that could be perceived as remotely related to 'gay pride'; there were no rainbow flags or drag queens or floats full of scantily clad boys pulsing in time to the beat of ___ or ___. It could have been any other hot, summer day.
I had to contrast the scene with the many others I have witnessed along this same stretch of Broadway (in upper Manhattan, btw), particularly on those days dedicated to the celebration of the national culture of those who live here now but perhaps come from a different country, i.e., you always see cars (tediously, because no gays are involved) decked out with streamers and balloons (but not scantily clad muscle boys pulsing in time to hits by ___ or ___) headed downtown for the Dominican Day Parade or the Puerto Rican Day Parade. (I think several other countries also have parades.) I tend to view these parades with some disdain, however; to be openly gay, I realized (not for the first time), often entails the abandonment of a national identity and the development of corresponding abhorrence for those who flaunt their nationalism, particularly when they celebrate countries (such as the United States, most obviously) where non-heterosexuals remain second-class citizens. In short, I'm much 'prouder' to be gay than I am American, which is probably one of the reasons I live in Washington Heights to begin with, given that it's effectively a foreign country that maintains an uneasy relationship with the United States; I identify with this unease, if not at all with the reasons for it.
As I walked along Broadway, I kept my eyes on the buildings, which seemed like the only entities in this part of the city that may endure long enough to witness the kind of political change implicit in my disappointment with the streets where I live.
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