Page 12 HIGH GEAR JULY 1981

Cleveland hedonism falls flat

(Continued from page eight) Arabica has all the makings of a terrific gay coffee shop, yet I've noticed very few of you taking. advantage of the atmosphere there.

By my standards, Cleveland is a very closeted city. A closeted city is one where the heterosexual community is unaware of the contributions the gay community is making to the color, culture and lifestyle of that city. (Where I have been living. we have gay radio and gay TV, and the local and national politicians make appearances at gay functions. We also have gay "all-candidates" meetings where political hopefuls are sounded out on

their views concerning gay issues. It is even said that the current mayor won due to supPerhaps this is a justification of port from the gay community). gay ghettos such as the Village in New York or the Castro in San Francisco-it makes people directly aware of our existencean important first step if there is to be any real gay liberation.

A closeted city is also one in which the gays masquerade as straights on their jobs from Monday to Friday. When Friday night comes, they can safely "let it out" at the bars and the baths. But only until Monday morning when it's time to return to work. Someone suggested to me that "camp" is actually a form of psychologi-

cally repressed behavior. A clorelationship/commitment with that the psychoetceteras seted city will produce a lot of another gay man? Men loving of Trinity are going to counteract depressed people. Therefore, no them...is this not the real issue of the efforts of patrons to blot out here. wonder there are a lot of queens being gay? There comes a point what little consciousness they do in our lives when we should realpossess, by popping pills, smokize that we have not really ing dope and getting drunk. accepted ourselves as being gay Besides, I'm not so sure the sorts until we have the courage to trust that go to bars want this kind of others to accept us, too. I think redemption. Most of the stimulat-. it's called maturity. ing people I've met simply stay at home and do bizarre things like read. Eventually this will probably include me...I'm not a big drinker anyway.

And married men! (This representing the other extreme.) This past week at the baths I met my third married man in as many months. I see this person out frequently-two or three times a week-and wonder if this sort of behavior is really fair to the wife and family left at home. Not to mention to those people he uses on a sexual level, (me, for one) unable to make any sort of commitment. The man had warm hands, but a cold heart. What kind of gay man is it who is unable to seek and estah

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Looking into the future at Cleveland's gay scene, imagination is becoming reality, or so they say in the advance publicity for Trinity, a bar which will open soon. This will not be just an ordinary bar-oh, no. It will have the capability to "elevate consciousness" and make people "socially aware." How all this, you ask? Simple-by psychoacoustics psychovisuals and psychosensuals.

Welcome to 1984 and newspeak, everyone.

It seems to me that all we really want from a bar are pleasant bartenders, breathable air and cruisy johns.

If the people responsible for the concept of Trinity are really concerned about our environment as bar-goers, they might first consider installing decent ventilating equipment. Furthermore, it's just plain pretentious and naive to assume

The foregoing comments have admittedly focused on topics of a superficial nature. Quite frankly, I'm afraid to delve deeper for fear of confirming my essential cynicism. I might find, for example, that the one overriding quality we as gay people share with one another is our lust for a hedonistic lifestyle. It used to be that people, if they wanted to meet me, would introduce themselves to me. Now they just ask me if I want to smoke a joint-something I stopped doing years ago because i found that it usually only made people uglier and more self-possessed.

Real beauty is a privilege given to those who realize that it must first represent an internal quality. And more and more, all I see around me are ugly people.

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