Back in the mesozoic era of LGBT rights-probably about 1985 or so-I remember reporting for a local gay newsweekly on a young woman in a less-than-affluent Boston suburb who was demonized for trying to take her girlfriend to the prom. She struck me as a little unstable and troubled, as anyone would have had to be to risk the harassment and death threats that hounded her. And even though I was the snotty anti-prom type during my high school years (see under: poet) and went with my best friend to a Greek Orthodox Easter midnight mass instead of my high school's prom, I was in awe that this teenager would take that on. I hope that my impression was wrong, and that she ultimately fared well.
I thought of her when I saw this item on a California lesbian couple at Patrick Henry high school, where the crowd cheered insanely as they crowned the pair homecoming king and queen. Neither one appears especially butch, but those titles were the only ones available. They're absolutely adorable, just too cute to live; they make me want to channel my great-aunts and squeeze their little faces. It's lovely to come across such a thing when the Georgia Baptists are still pushing their homos out-or rather, in. What a vast and varied country we are!
