Montreal Pride

Pride was great last night. I think the NDP is the liveliest group I've ever marched with. montrealais and em_fish were there with us (a few pictures be here), and we ran into foi_nefaste in the crowd. ubergreenkat was marching behind us, somewhere near the country-western dancers dressed like cowboys, whose music was fortunately drowned out for us by the intervening cars.

One of our two cars was electric. We gave out oranges (the party colour, of course, being orange). Half the group were sympathetic straight people, though with sympathetic being a relative term. The gorgeous Mathieu, a straight Catholic, was holding a banner in front of our group, and seemed a little nervous about what would happen if friends and family saw him on TV. I promised him next year a t-shirt announcing his heterosexuality :D

Pride is always an interesting experience, particularly since every parade is like a sedimentary record of one's past romances, flings, and friendships. You meet people you haven't seen in almost a decade (one such person was marching with the NDP this year), and people you'd hoped you'd forgotten.

One of my past flings, a guy I'd always referred to as "the Closet Case" because he was afraid to tell anyone about his relationships with men and even went fundamentalist Christian for awhile -- well he was there, marching, where little else besides leather underwear.

I don't think he's in the closet anymore.