Our
next-door neighbors at our campsite where gay couple in their 50s
from California. To that point in my life I've never met a homosexual
couple and 'gay' was use only as a pejorative for something boring,
uninteresting, lame or effeminate. They were there hiking, painting
and camping in Red Cliffs pretty much like normal people as far as I
could tell. Besides having shorter shorts than most guys and not
wearing their shirts enough they seem like pretty okay dudes. One day
when we were heading out hiking we passed them on the trail as they
were setting up easels to paint a gnarled tree growing along the
path. One of the guys, being quite furry and quite sunburned, had
huge flakes of skin peeling off and sticking into his back hair in a
horrifying image that haunts me to this day. My girlfriend and her
friend stopped and talked with them for a little while and they
offered to come by later to our campsite and play some guitar and
sing some songs. My girlfriend enthusiastically took them up on that
offer but I was little wary. What if they came over and did gay
stuff? What would we do then? We would be left without recourse
because we had invited them into our campsite and I was not sure if
the same rules apply to homosexuals as do to vampires but I was
pretty sure if you invite them in that's bad. We hiked for a couple
of hours and came back by to see that they had done a pretty good job
of doing a watercolor painting of a gnarled tree sitting in the path,
the sort of thing that everyone knows is technically art but
generally ends up a thrift store when the person who loves it dies.
We got to camp, made a fire, made dinner and we talked and joked
sitting around the dying fire our new friends made good on their
offer and came by with a couple of guitars and an unrealistically
cheerful attitude for people completely sober, so I assumed that they
were not. I was right they pretty early on confess to having partaken
of illegal mind altering herbs and alcoholic beverages. I was really
nervous then. Gay, drunk and high? How could this possibly and well?
Why am I writing so me rhetorical questions? The last one wasn't
rhetorical, I was wondering if you had some insight. They asked what
kind of music we liked, and my girlfriend told them all the girl
singers she liked and we told them Cat Stevens, Simon and Garfunkel,
Bob Dylan, and the Beatles. Somehow these guys knew all about those
bands and how to play their songs. I guess people even way back in
the 60's and 70's knew about the Beatles. They played their guitars,
sang songs and invited us to sing along when we knew the words. I
didn't know if this was how homosexuals normally acted, but this
wasn't gay at all, it was actually pretty cool. We all got into it
and had a pretty fun night, when they were too tired and ready to
head off they played a two guitar, well harmonized version of 'The
Boxer' by Simon and Garfunkel. It was amazing in the cool, quite, new
moon night with the light of the fire makeing a warm circle around
our impromptu concert and I snuggled in tight with my girlfriend
while they sang. When they finished we applauded, they said goodbye
and I never saw them again. It was the first time in my life that I
can remember thinking that there might be more in heaven and earth
than was drempt of in my philosophy.
