Pride Day…Hold the Pride

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Ever since I started working in San Francisco in the mid-80s, I’ve loved the Gay Pride Parade. If I had to work in the office on Pride Sunday, I always took a good long break to head over to Market Street to soak in the joy and happiness and hilarity. It felt like being a witness to history – and a positive history, for a change. Other times I brought my kids in with me from Marin to see history in the making with their own eyes and feel the love for themselves (though some things along the parade route did require a bit of awkward explanation on my part). I explained that what they were seeing was like the civil rights movement I had seen as a child, except with Harleys and dance music and the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence. They got it.

I’ve missed the last few parades. But this year I at least got the chance to catch the very tail end, when I came into the city for an appointment. Getting off the BART train at the Civic Center, I was greeted by a multitude of revelers heading for their own trains – all raucous laughter, hand-holding, and pink tutus. I was like a salmon swimming upstream against a giddy current.

As I emerging onto Market Street, the concluding festivities had apparently just ended, and people of all shapes, sizes, colors, and levels of intoxication were flowing happily in every direction. The food and drink booths were closing up but there were still thousands of people milling about, gradually taking the party elsewhere. It seemed like the most thoroughly mixed-race event I’d ever seen in San Francisco.

With some time to spare before my appointment, I headed into the thick of things, up Larkin Street into Little Saigon to treat myself to a Vietnamese banh mi sandwich.

But I was immediately struck by the vast amount of garbage in the streets, despite the abundant trash cans. “Litter” doesn’t come close to doing it justice. I’ve been to many large public events in my life – from huge concerts and music festivals, to massive demonstrations, to Burning Man – but I’ve never seen more trash simply thrown to the ground at any event, ever. The monumental volume was staggering. The first two or three steps leading up into buildings were piled high. Every step I took in my trek a few blocks up Larkin required my eyes on the ground, navigating a safe passage through the hideous sea of human indifference and waste.

I was struck by the absolute lack of pride in thoughtlessly trashing the beautiful city that made this otherwise wonderful event even possible. I wondered who was responsible, hoping it was out-of-towners, here just to gawk and get hammered. But the level of filth and thoughtlessness, for me, took away from the good feelings I had always felt for the Pride Parade. How sad to feel shame at an event celebrating pride.

Later in the evening, when it was time to head back to BART, the crowds were gone and only scattered groups of people wandered about. One group was walking in the same direction down Market – maybe eight strong, half men/half women, all white, and in their early 20s. They were weaving and shouting and I tried to ignore them and made a wide circle as I passed. Unfortunately, they too were headed to BART, and ended up sitting on the platform near me waiting for the next southbound train. They were very drunk and very loud, shrieking with laughter at their own alcohol induced “humor,” oblivious to anyone but themselves and hell-bent on disturbing everyone within shouting distance.

My bad luck continued as they boarded the very train and car I was in for the trip down to Millbrae. The car was crowded at first, so they had to split up. They spent the entire half hour trip shouting to each other, swearing at the top of their lungs, as everyone else onboard struggled to ignore them. I couldn’t decide who was more obnoxious, the boys or the girls. The boys stalked around and were vaguely menacing; the girls were hysterical and verbally aggressive. As we headed south, their volume increased steadily. It was a very painful trip for the rest of us.

Suddenly, one of the girls plopped herself down in the vacant seat next to me. Her mascara was running, no doubt from some aspect of her group’s non-stop drama. Surprisingly, she was polite and asked if it was okay if she sat with me.

“I’m so sick of these assholes and need to get away from them.”

I told her I could see why she felt that way. Only half drunk herself, she explained they were friends from high school on the Peninsula. She was home for the summer from the University of Arizona, which she explained had a beautiful campus but that Tucson was otherwise the meth capital of Arizona, with all that entails. She preferred Phoenix for its better bars and nightlife.

As we talked I kept one eye on her friends, who were getting louder and angrier. The boys – egged on by one of the shrieking girls – were picking a fight with a group of three young Filipino guys sitting two rows behind us. Their targets were trying their best to mind their own business, but one of the drunk boys clearly intended to fight, regardless of what they did.  He screamed horrible taunts at them from two feet away, all bulging veins and drug-induced fury. People were quickly moving towards other cars to avoid what was coming.

Suddenly, the provocateur dived at one of the boys and began punching him viciously in the face, while his friends menaced the victim’s friends enough to keep them out of the “fight.” My cellphone was dead so I couldn’t call the police. I had an urge to jump up and grab the attacker around the throat from behind and pull him off, but – fortunately for me, no doubt – my seatmate was in my way. So my likely beating at the hands of the three drunks was avoided.  In the pandemonium, one of the attackers yelled that someone had pulled a knife. But it was over in moments, when the Filipino boys made a quick escape at the next stop, one of them bleeding profusely.

As the victors celebrated in true Lord of the Flies fashion, my seatmate just shrugged.

“See what I mean?”

I asked her, “What if the kid being attacked had had a gun?  What if the police had shown up? Haven’t’ you seen ‘Fruitvale Station?’ Somebody could have been killed.”

“They’re just idiots,” she said, stating the obvious.

My heart was still pounding when, moments later, the train reached the end of the line. My seatmate gave me a hug and apologized for her friends. I quickly headed for the door, a trail of blood leading me to the exit. The drunks continued to howl and jump around.

As I went up the escalator, one of three young lesbian women standing ahead of me asked if I’d been on that car.

“I was. Truly disgusting.”

“We’ve known those kids since junior high.” She shook her head. “They were assholes then and they still are.”

Heading home, I was saddened by the violent, garbage-strewn flip side of Pride Day. Even in a day for celebrating something as glorious as civil rights and dignity for an oppressed people, humanity’s dark underbelly is always just below the surface, eager to defile something (and someplace) beautiful. On Pride Day, the best and the worst were on stark, vivid display.

Shakespeare was right: What a piece of work is a man.

 

Copyright © 2014, Daniel W. Hager. All Rights Reserved.

I Was Warned

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This excerpt is the first section a recent autobiographical essay entitled “Fishing For My Self.”

I Was Warned

“Inexorably, the aim and direction of your purpose resolve into the blinding light of the rising sun.  The death of your former life has given way to birth.  All is holy; all is aflame with the glory of life.  Nature is but a mirror of the newly born.”                                     Steven Foster, 1938-2003

I had spent four days alone, fasting in the high, wild White Mountains outside Death Valley. According to Native American tradition, I was to remain awake through the last, long night – my symbolic death – to greet the dawn and rebirth.

I was in my late thirties, marking what I hoped was a passage through a turbulent stage in my marriage. Prolonged anxiety attacks were plaguing me for the first time since law school. I nearly abandoned going out alone into the mountains, fearing I would panic. But the leaders of our group, Steven and Meredith, lovingly helped me get back on course. I gathered my courage during the days we prepared to go into the wild, each of us alone.

Before we met each morning, I fished at dawn for rainbow trout in Big Pine Creek as it flowed through willow forests down the east side of the Sierras. I happily fed our little band with my catches. The anxiety faded; maybe I could live four days alone in the wilderness.

On departure day, I woke to the sound of Steven playing his cold banjo off in the distance, rousing us before dawn. I tried not to think about Deliverance.  

Reasonably confident, I set out from our mountain base camp as the sun rose, after a quiet, solemn ceremony of prayers for my safety and success, the scent of burning sage in the cool morning air. Stepping outside a ring of stones to begin my adventure, I became invisible – and the others ignored me as I began my ascent.

I camped nestled among scrubby ancient Piñon pines, just big enough to support a tarp – my only shelter from the sun and afternoon showers. Fasting slowed my pace to a crawl. But I explored during the bright, warm days, finding quartz with the bits of gold that lured gold miners there a century ago, and shards of obsidian from ancient Paiute arrowhead makers. I gazed over precipices plummeting thousands of feet toward Death Valley, watching hawks and vultures soar endlessly. Immense white sand dunes shimmered below, many miles away.

The fasting and sheer solitude sharpened my senses, but with a surreal edge. I could focus on even the smallest and usually overlooked things, being entirely in the moment. I spoke to a rabbit squatting at my feet one day. Unafraid, it feigned interest in my warning about the red-tailed hawks circling overhead. I silently wished the hawks good hunting as well. I laughed at male lizards doing push-ups on the rocks to impress the ladies. I watched for rattlesnakes with every slow, careful step. I painted and wrote, including a story for my children. The anxiety attacks disappeared.

The final night was the hardest. At 6,000 feet, the moonless May evenings were breathtakingly clear and cold. For hours I watched the brilliant night sky, marveling at the darting shooting stars and slow moving satellites. I listened attentively to the owls and other night creatures. Four days without food had weakened me. I wanted to stay awake to greet the dawn, following the venerable ritual. But part of me wanted to sleep so morning would come and I could return to companionship and my first food in days. Not necessarily in that order. Waves of fear were followed by waves of deep contentment and connectedness to all things, including myself.

Eventually, restless sleep won out. In the most vivid dream of my life, I found myself in San Francisco’s Golden Gate Park, thinking, “Why am I here?  I’m supposed to be in the mountains finishing my vision quest?” I desperately wanted to get back to where I was supposed to be.

Later, I found myself in London, in a shop owned by an early member of the Grateful Dead. He was pleasant, but no help at all in returning me to the White Mountains. My desperation, and hunger, grew. Riding in a gondola in Venice, I devoured a crunchy head of lettuce, then realized it was a delicious pair of socks.

After a globe-spanning struggle to return, I was suddenly back in Golden Gate Park. But it had changed completely, the gardens and towering, fragrant eucalyptus trees replaced by strip malls, fast food joints, and other plagues. I was utterly forlorn as the dawn approached and I could not find my car to race back to the mountains. But just before I died of despair, a young dark haired boy came to me, smiling. “Don’t worry, mister, I know where your car is.” He led me by the hand to my car. My vision quest was saved and I awoke.

After I hiked gingerly down to base camp, we hugged and smiled and feasted on hard-boiled eggs and fruit. Back at our original camp, we plunged naked into the icy creek, rushing with fresh Sierra snowmelt. We lounged in Steven and Meredith’s beautiful sweat lodge in the willow forest. Then, for three days we sat together in soft grass in a clearing, one by one telling the stories of our experience.

s-m-2  Our leaders were my beloved, long-time friends, Steven Foster and Meredith Little. In the early 70s they rediscovered the ancient vision quest ceremony for recognizing, marking, and honoring life’s passages. Since then, they had been introducing it to a Western world that had lost its way, giving countless people the opportunity to live their own hero’s journey.

Doing this work for so long, their deeply thoughtful insights into our stories were illuminating. After I recounted my epic dream, Steven said without hesitating that the little boy who saved me . . . was me. I shuddered and knew, of course, he was right.  I had saved myself when all hope seemed lost.

Steven and Meredith had known me since I was sixteen. They knew about my marriage, anxiety, and disenchantment with my career as a lawyer. After sharing his thoughts about my vision quest story, Steven also shared, with a chuckle, a prediction:

“You’re in for one helluva mid-life crisis!”

I laughed nervously, fearing his powers of perception.

Copyright © 2014, Daniel W. Hager. All Rights Reserved.

Class Clown

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When I was twelve in New Jersey in 1971, our good-natured and exceedingly patient teacher, Mrs. Barry, gave our sixth grade class a months-long writing project. She gave us time every afternoon to work on the many specific topics we were to write on. We were a racially diverse bunch living through stormy political times, which was not lost on me. Here are a few excerpts from my final submission, along with Mrs. Barry’s conflicted reaction.

Black Power                                                                                                                     “Right on!” said Karen.                                                                                                       “You tell ‘em sister!” said Sarah.                                                                                        “We gotta fight our battles!” said LaNora.                                                                      “Right on!” said Karen.                                                                                                     “You tell ‘em sister!” said Sarah.                                                                                        “We gotta fight our battles!” said LaNora.

Later that night…

“Right on!” said Karen.                                                                                                      “You tell ‘em sister!” said Sarah.                                                                                              “We gotta fight our battles!” said LaNora.                                                                                “Right on!” said Karen.                                                                                                     “You tell ‘em sister!” said Sarah.                                                                                        “We gotta fight our battles!” said LaNora.

Time                                                                                                                                          I usually don’t spend my time. I keep it at home in a little box. Sometime I must show you my time collection. I’ve got the largest in the world. When I do spend my time I usually spend it at the Acme. They give you a 25% discount if you use spare time instead of wasted time. I just thought of a disadvantage of time collecting. When you put time in your time book you’re always getting extra time on your hands.

Why We Salute The Flag (Hard Hat Version)                                                                         We salute the flag because we are proud of our country, the best country in the world. We want to let the world know that we love our country much more than these dirty-commie-weirdo countries. We say it because we fought for our county; we made it safe from our second greatest enemy, foreigners, Indians especially. Some of these “hippies” don’t think too much of the Pledge, but I think they can go back to where they came from. That’s what I say, “Love it or leave it!” I say the pledge because it’s “My country right or wrong.”

Our Week At Sixth Grade Camp In Stokes State Park                                                Stokes was very fun after the difference of opinion between the student body and the Senior Citizens (teachers). Actually it was not a difference of opinion, it was more of a series of arsons, bombings, and muggings. It all began when the teachers would not agree to make a few small changes: co-ed cabins; a cocktail hour between 6:00 and 7:00; and a class on the teachings of Karl Marx. But after a day of arsons, bombings, and muggings, the teachers came around to our way of thinking. After our day of rule changing we still had Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday to explore the wonders of nature.

When I Was Young                                                                                                                  When I was young I was a mere child in my ways of thinking. I actually didn’t like girls, liked plain peanut butter, and thought that the good old U.S. of A. was fine the way it is.  Now I’m much more adult in my ways of thinking. I like girls, like crunchy style peanut butter, and call for total world revolution. Also when I was young I thought all teachers were great, but now I know that some teachers who sit around and read strange stories written by strange authors are a little strange themselves.

Science Facts                                                                                                                   We have a digestive system. We have a skeletal system. We have a circulatory system. We have a respiratory system. We must not have a reproductive system, because no one ever wrote anything about it in our science or health book.

Early Man                                                                                                                                I could tell you that cavemen first lived in trees, then caves, and then skyscrapers, but I won’t. I could also tell you that they discovered fire, discovered tools, and discovered sex, but I won’t. I might also tell you that early man learned of war, learned of death, and learned of race-riots.

Communication                                                                                               Communication is the art of communing. It was started by the ancient tribe of Cations in the land of Comm. A related art is the art of talking, which was started by the ancient Talks in the country of Ing. This story is all true, but everything has been changed to protect me.

Beginning the trend of letting me get away with academic murder, Mrs. Barry responded to my literary effort:

“I know you did these hurriedly – as a matter of fact you did the majority of them May 25th. However I still like them. They are generally short but generally well written. You are lucky you can get by with something like this. You received an A in all five areas of this book. However, you wasted class time and caused some disturbances in the room as you chose to talk rather than work.”