They say that travel is broadening, and besides an expanding waistline, I will agree with that sentiment wholeheartedly. I just finished nearly a month on the road in various long and short trips that have taken me from Germany (with students) to Columbus, IN. I spent many days in Indianapolis (due to IE Action) and Bloomington for work, and I enjoyed my first trip to California – both San Diego and San Francisco. Travel brings many memes to mind about home.
First, the more you travel, the more you realize that there are certain commonalities to all locations. People both love and hate their area for different reasons. But whether it's a small town or a large city, there are always certain archetypes. There are the doers and the talkers, the creative ones and the ones who never tire of being bored. The museum exhibits, the street scene and the bars change, but there are still the same types of people in each.
Some of the places I have been are tremendously open and freeing for GLBT people. San Francisco is certainly among these, but the people I met at the presentation I did for the Columbus folks were very enlightening as well. It's possible to find like-minded folks wherever you are. And for all its glory, SF had just as many judgmental and jealous people in the community as Indianapolis. I guess it’s almost a human condition to jockey for the best position and most power.
More to the point, however, was the overwhelming feeling of being in the presence of history as I visited the Castro for the first time. From the moment I walked out of the MUNI onto Harvey Milk Plaza.. well, it felt like the movie still, even though I know it has changed tremendously. There was a sense of exhilaration and destiny in walking there – even though it must become second nature for those who have chosen to move there. And I am sure I looked like the slack-jawed tourist they must deal with daily. But just witnessing couples walking freely together, sharing a stolen kiss, riding the subway to a pitch-in, knowing that many of them may be married, with long-term relationships and supportive job environments and even able to express that in most any part of the city – that's overwhelming for this rural/ small town Hoosier.
One of the highlights of my trip was being in the San Francisco City Hall. Now, this is the part that my friends would recognize as the political geek/ sentimental fool archetype in me. I went there alone like a pilgrimage, and had I thought of it, would probably have brought flowers for what was surely Harvey Milk's last spot alive. (We had already seen his suit and shoes in the GLBT center on Castro Street.) For those of you who have never been there, City Hall is probably as big or bigger than the Indiana State Capitol. And those stairs! Harvey was right, you have to sweep up them. There was a black heterosexual couple celebrating their wedding with family at the top, but I could imagine what it must have been like to see Mayor Newsome performing some of the hundreds of gay weddings held in this spot.
I explored the interior a while and found the Mayor's Office. Just as I snapped a flash picture of the door, I was approached by a woman in a wheelchair. She introduced herself as Mary and asked where I was from. (Ok, I'm sure I was tourist geek and awestruck looking – an easy mark.) We shared some thoughts about how much the movie MILK meant to us and she offered that she and her partner had been married on the balcony opposite. As she worked in the building, she offered to show me into the Mayor's anteroom. I can't explain how much this small moment crystallized my trip.
But there was one moment more. As I chatted with friends later, we discussed this moment and the effects of the national GLBT organizations on the federal issues we face – DADT, Matthew Shepard and DOMA. One was not happy with what he sees in the lack of action in the Obama administration and felt like we should withhold our money from the Democratic Party and the national orgs until we get what we want. Another simply couldn't understand why people don't just get over it and grant what is so obviously ours – full civil rights. I concede the points, although I pointed out that we're never going to get to our destination without allies – we're just not powerful enough in numbers. As purist as we'd like to be, we have to find the bridges to cross and get to our own Promised Land.
The clincher for me was when one friend later talked about how he thought that local / state organizations was where he wanted to focus. Now, the twist is that he rarely even writes a check or an email. He can't be bothered to pick up the phone and probably doesn't know who his state senator or representative are. Even with all the time I have worked with Indiana Equality, he's still likely to tell me on any given day that "all that stuff you do isn't making any difference—it's Indiana after all." But things don't just happen – they take effort, time, resources and personal involvement. And while I realize that day-to-day living takes most of our time, being informed about local/ state issues and making the efforts needed to make change happen takes everyone. Even the progress seen in San Francisco would not have happened if ordinary heroes like Harvey Milk and the thousands of anonymous people without plazas named after them who came before and after him hadn't gotten off their butts and acted.
My second cliché will have to serve as the closer today. Home is where the heart is. Look, I could be like so many of the people who tell me to move to a gay mecca and have a great life. But there is struggle there like here. I choose to stay and fight here. And to make this corner of the world more like the openness of the rest of the world is task enough for all of us - together. Sometimes you have to travel far away to actually come home.
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