March 26, 2008

I need to leave to work too early to make travelling by motorcycle in the heavy rains a viable option. Because of my night vision not being quite what it was, and the lunacy of other drivers being what it is, I'll ride in rain or darkness but not both.

I've done this kind of commute before, to Redmond. It sucks, and it takes four hours out of your day. Last time I did this I did find one somewhat silver lining - I ended up much stronger and larger after being mentored by two highly homophobic ex-football players who also worked security for the pastor of the local church. Said pastor works tirelessly against the gays, you know. He's been in the news quite a bit for harassing Microsoft for its policies of inclusion and its support of same sex-partnerships. I wasn't quite comfortable with their banter, but that was a tide I just wasn't willing to swim against.

So I'm back to commuting, so I take a small light rail train from my place of residence to the city in which I work. I returned here to a different house and a different job. Some things are the same - the tattoo parlour which I frequent welcomed me back with open arms. Some things are quite different - they day I left the house my ex-wife and I owned to drive her stuff to her across the continent, the old man across the road sat on his porch and sadly watched the children and their belongings leave for good. Two hours later, after I was halfway to Spokane, when someone realised he hadn't moved for three or four hours - they went to see if he was alright and found him staring at the empty house with dead, vacant eyes.

But I digress.

Every morning I stop at a small shop in a building that used to be the old rail station. It had since been converted into the kind of partitioned boutique mall that little old ladies sell shabby chic finds from garage sales in in their spare time. A single mother sells her homemade soap. Larger spaces carry specialty goods from India and from England.

But the lynchpin of the mall aside from its food court is a small convenience store/gift shop that sells the strangest and most wonderful knick-knacks. The owner is a slight, older gay man with a quiet voice and kind eyes who is not only the cheapest place to buy many goods in town, but also donates a significant portion of the shop's profits to local charities. He once bought a set of tissue dispensers that look like the heads on Easter Island, that dispense Kleenex through one nostril. Nobody's bought them, though everyone remarks on them, and he keeps moving them around the store in a desperate attempt to find the place in which they will actually sell.

That reminds me, I need to get my housemate to sew my "Corporate Whore" patch on my riding leathers.

I had a noder friend with me in town, and we stopped in the local alternative record shop. Even though you could get the same records in this town as in nearby Seattle, the difference here was that there were five local and adorable young teenagers playing punk and ska music at one of their first gigs, nervous as hell but doing a very good job. And the appreciable all-ages crowd (including a little girl who bounced on her long-haired hesher father's shoulders).

I love this town for its community. And it has some truly wonderful people therein.

Which is not to say it's not all community. Coming out of the local second hand guitar store last week, I walked past the only gay bar in town, to hear someone jeering from a car who'd clearly thought I'd come from the door next door.

Can you tell me where the local gay bar is, faggot?

Enough is enough.

I was actually happier he thought that than thinking I was coming from the Republican Party office next door to that on the other side (now that is some awkward neighbour situations, there).

Him stopping at the light some twenty yards up gave me the opportunity to catch up with his car. To my surprise I didn't find myself saying "I'm not a faggot", but instead "it's back there, and when you're finally ready to grow up and admit certain things to yourself, there it is." He was the one to break eye contact, not me. He had no retort, no rejoinder, no bon mot, not even some surly eighth grade comeback.

What do these two things have to do with each other?

The proprietor of the store I just mentioned is one of the most assured, quiet, serene, giving and charitable men I have ever met. It's not politics, it's his nature. Politics means he would only do things for others when others are looking. I've personally seen him mind three stores when one other person couldn't make it, but needed the money badly anyway.

But he's also old enough to remember a time when the vast majority of people wouldn't have been as nice to an openly gay man.

How someone, anyone, could write off a fellow human being for something so trivial and irrelevant is beyond me. If I had the choice of people I support and hang out with, and believe me, I do, give me the legion of quiet people who do the right thing and make an actual difference. I'll bet he's been more of a comfort and a spiritual guidance than many pastors.

He's also a tremendous gift to our town, and I am incredibly thankful to the powers that be for it.