Drag Queens

Ya gotta love them. They're a mixture of the outrageous and the flamboyant mixed in with femininity, yet gay beyond belief. Some are angry, some are sexy, some are just way over the top (well, relatively speaking, that is) some are fat, some are really tall, but not many are short. I guess I've never really seen many short ones. I wonder why that is.

Anyway, today I was a drag queen. TGSF had a float design that was going to portray Stonewall and family values. The front end of the float would have a bunch of drag queens dancing around a Stonewall set with the back having a house and white picket fence setting. In between both sets, there would be a model of the Golden Gate Bridge and a rainbow to 'bridge the gap' from Stonewall to Family Values. The people who built the float did an excellent job both in the design and the construction....enough so that the organization was awarded a vehicle to pull it and a prime spot up front.

I portrayed a drag queen over two years ago when I did nine performances of La Cage Aux Folles in a community production. The costumes were so over the top and our makeup was quite outrageous. I didn't feel like going that 'all out', but I was able to dig up a few items from previous costumes and stuff I bought when I was still dealing with some of the GID aspects before transition.

Instead of wearing my own hair, I decided to wear this ugly blonde wig that I had initially started out with so long ago. I made small little pigtails and looped them up, bobby-pinning them back to the wig. For the rest of the outfit, I decided to go mainly black since that was one of the colors that I had a lot of. This included a black corset, my black boy shorts that I wore at the Cotillion, shiny black thigh high boots, and black spider web gloves. On my BART ride into the city, I applied some drag makeup. I got a few looks on the way there.

When I arrived at the float location, there were numerous people that simply did not recognize me. I guess I looked more like a DQ/TV than anything. Actually, that's kinda what I was going for.

Anyway, I had a fun time up front on the float. They had some oldies music playing on our float and, when I could, I'd dance to the rhythm. I went over the top here and there, just to give them a good show and to play the part of an angry drag queen.

Near the end, my wig started coming off, so I just pulled it the rest of the way off and let my hair flow free. I probably didn't look as much like a drag queen at that point. Our time on the parade route ended and I started slipping back into the regular clothes that I had...first removing the boots and putting my sandals on. At the Day of Remembrance booth, I changed into a black T-shirt and slid some jeans over the boy shorts. I finished it off by wiping all of the drag makeup off my face.

A few people who knew me before, saw me in drag, and then saw me after I wiped everything off said they liked me back the normal way. So did I.

After that, I simply worked the rest of the afternoon at the Day of Remembrance booth with Gwen Smith and her wife, Bon. It was a nice relaxing afternoon. Although it wasn't that exciting, at least it wasn't a drag.