Pride (in the name of love) – U2 1984

Hold onto your hotpants, I went to my first Pride. I’d been to Mardi Gras in Sydney dozens of times and glittered and sequined my straight-breeding self from one pink end of Oxford St to the other.  But I had never been to Pride, certainly not in Paris, certainly not where people are happy to frolic naked in the street.

  Is it a bird? Is it a Plane?

You see, I don’t really frolic. My thighs prevent me from rapid movement of any kind without the support of Nike running tights and Chinese binding underwear to truss the hams and ensure I don’t fall over or set off a fire alarm. If such thighs preclude frolicking they would naturally preclude anything that involves getting naked in public.

And thus begins my ode to people who are so confident and proud of what and who they are, that they can close down most of the Fourth Arrondissement and get naked listening to a middle-aged man-slash-woman on stage sing the wrong lyrics to Kylie.

The day after NY decided to let boys marry boys and girls marry girls and still reeling from the fact that I’ve got more chance of marrying scaled marine life than a human of either sex, Braveheart introduced me to his tribe’s festival…and I don’t mean that day where they don tartan skirts and hurl long poles at each other across a highland (all puns intended). He took me to Pride.

All hail the long tall round thing. 

I can’t imagine what it must be like to be obliged to announce to everyone you know that you are different, that part of you loves people who have the same parts as you, an act that will cast you forever as ‘out’. The worst thing I’ve ever had to do is come home from an ill-fated high school party after some ill-advised ouzo consumption followed by some ill-advised male interaction and show Motherbear my neck. A neck resembling Bella’s after Edward went all Toothsome and Twilight on her but the bruises faded, Motherbear’s anger waned, she moved on to Edward and the episode ended. Although it would wind up as only episode one in the ongoing saga that is ‘Stupid S**T MM does when she is the mistress of Bacchus’. 

I am different too, but only in that Gobby Chick with Fuzzy hair and googly eyes kind of way. I wish I had a street festival to celebrate this fact so I could dress up as Kate Bush or Susan Sarandon, and revel in my googly eyed and fuzzy hairedness. But I digress.

Most of my dearest friends are Fabulous. I have to wonder why?

Is it a shared enthusiasm for everything that Madonna, Kylie or Gaga ever did, does or might do? An infatuation with women that have more looks than Derek Zoolander? A passion for a boppy pop song with lyrics that don’t ask a lass ‘to put a ring on it’ but rather to Express Herself, Get Outta Her Way or be Born Her Way? In these past few months of self-analysis and solitary confinement, I have come to learn that there is more to it than a catchy tune and hotpants.

 

In the company of other women, women can be cruel and judgemental; the Sex and the City franchise knew it, branded it and transformed it into a modern Blahnik’d phenomenon. Somewhere there is a Sapphic idyll but it is not to be found among similar aged women in the same city who are on the hunt. Just like lionesses, they’ll scratch each other blind to score the perfect mate. Able to rely only on my wit, I am more acidic Miranda than cutesy Charlotte in the war of the Amazons and we all know she ended up with a fiscally deficient loser bartender.

In the company of straight men, women compete or deplete. It is all about appearing as one should, demure, ladylike, giggly, all floral summer dress and Kate Middleton-y. Women with Phds who have launched rockets into space will happily titter inanely at some doofus’ joke if it means she is in with a shot at a Tiffany Princess Cut on Platinum and a Landrover with mini-me’s Amelia and Noah in the back seat Bugaboos.

In the company of the fabulous, there is no threat, there is no temptation and there is no competition. Instead there is laughter, integrity and brutal ‘yes it does make you look fat’ honesty. As I type, I am keenly aware this sounds as clichéd as Gossip Girl but it has proven true in my little life and there are a string of examples to prove it.

The first man I kissed in public was my co-star on a long distant stage in a long distant age and maybe even in a galaxy far, far away. He Seymour to my Audrey; I kissed him hard and fast to our drama teacher’s (little shop of) horror but only because I knew he would never kiss back. My first two boyfriends ended up Fabulous and another of the more recent was grinding behind my back though thankfully not while I was looking.#

Back in the land down under, Pauli Lupone is practising his Broadway Standards and chilling the Pinot in anticipation of my homecoming and a party that will be full of Gaiety, Glee and Gershwin. And here in Francalia, you’ve by now read about Louis XIV, the only man I know, not related to me who has slept in my house, seen me sweat on a treadmill or been admitted into my presence while I am wearing shorts (c.f. explanatory notes on thighs at the top of this page).

I wish Seymour, Louis, Braveheart and Pauli (and those other ones who were pretending) all the love and happiness that this world has to offer and I am proud to be their Megan Mulally. They have given me so much sympathy, so much of their time and all the while with the best soundtrack in the world!

 

 

♫ one man come in the name of love ♫ 

 

#I just read that back and seriously you must think I am blind, ignorant or stupid. Perhaps all three, or just the world’s most limited capacity to judge a Y chromosome since Elizabeth Taylor …although unlike she and Richard, the F-Word and I never actually got married once and certainly not twice

 

Comments

[Seymour]

I have read this properly and I love the humour, good fun but also the sincerity of it. And touched that you remember our first embrace. I do too - back of the boys toilets about two minutes before we repeated the act on stage much to the roudy cheer from the "green" room. I was impressed how you dipped me instead of me, you. A progressive woman from the first moment! Glad that moment hasn't scarred you rather made your life a little bit more Fabulous!

[MM]

Hi Seymour, great to hear from the first of the Fabulous! Thanks for reading :)

[Jacqui O]

This is coming from your older, married, much less worldly cousin from the much less cultured States ... DO NOT SETTLE! You have the world by the preverbial Balls! There will be a man who can meet you in the library, kitchen, garden, and if all the shit lines up, the bedroom too! I have faith in you, from what I've heard from our Auntie D. YOU ARE FABULOUS! So wish I could be there to be your wingwomen!

[MM]

Thanks for the words of support Jacqui O, how could I not listen to the advice of another fine strong woman!