Tommy Rainbow
The thing about the court ruling this week is that the country has changed colors on the gay community.
My thinking has certainly changed as well.
Let's take it back about 33 years.
When I was 18 years old if someone called you gay you were supremely insulted. In fact, during those years, teenagers from all over used gay as a way to start a fight...there were a whole bunch of other names that went along with that. All of those names are now considered horribly offensive.
When we said them...we were just looking to be hurtful...to guys we figured weren't really gay...but may have seemed less than masculine.
Still.
It didn't appear that I actually knew someone who was really gay back then. At least, if I did, they kept it quiet.
Cut to college.
During my freshman year I decided that it might be fun to be in a couple of plays.
Yeah...I wanted to do some acting!
Gannon University had a great theater community and I believe I received class credits for my starring appearance in two plays. I do remember telling my roommate and lifelong buddy, Mike Palmer, that I liked being in the plays, but that everyone seemed a tad off.
"That's cause they're all homos. The guy who's directing the play is really gay," Mike said. "We should call him Tommy Rainbow."
Yep.
33 years ago Mike mentioned that.
But a small-town boy from North Collins wasn't convinced. So the next time I saw Tommy I said exactly this:
"My roomie thinks you're gay," I said.
"I am a homosexual," Tommy said.
My face must have registered great shock or fear or disbelief.
"But we can direct plays, and have conversations, and even be friends with people who aren't gay."
Tommy Rainbow offered the first lesson to me.
By the way...I was unbelievably great in those two plays...had a ton of fun. Even fell in love with the co-star of the first play, a senior named Marissa. As a freshman I worked up my nerve to ask her if she'd like to go to a real play at the Erie Playhouse.
I held the two tickets I had purchased out to her.
Marissa took them from my hands and shrieked!
"Of course I'll go!" she said. "Two tickets! My boyfriend will be so excited!"
Yep.
I gave two tickets away.
And they say that gay people have trouble.
But back to our story...
...Tommy took a lot of heat from a lot of guys. Mike and I were friends with him. We may have been the only guys on the floor who thought 'Tommy Rainbow was all right.'
And that changed things.
Mike's acceptance (he was from the great state of New Jersey near NYC) allowed me some range when it came to thinking about the lives of gay people.
And then I spent a summer working construction in San Francisco.
And seeing men holding hands with men, while still shocking to my small town sensibilities, allowed me a thought process that is unchanged today:
We can direct plays, and have conversations, and even be friends with people who aren't gay.
Yet...there were my religious beliefs!!
What about those???
How could I reconcile the gay life with what the nuns had tried to guilt me into??
"It's not your life," Mike said all those years ago. "You don't have to reconcile Tommy Rainbow's life with your religion."
And who knew that a short, soon to be balding, borderline alcoholic, could prove to be so wise.
It didn't matter to me.
As a decent human being, however, I could still be friends with Tommy...
...Tommy Rainbow.
My thinking has certainly changed as well.
Let's take it back about 33 years.
When I was 18 years old if someone called you gay you were supremely insulted. In fact, during those years, teenagers from all over used gay as a way to start a fight...there were a whole bunch of other names that went along with that. All of those names are now considered horribly offensive.
When we said them...we were just looking to be hurtful...to guys we figured weren't really gay...but may have seemed less than masculine.
Still.
It didn't appear that I actually knew someone who was really gay back then. At least, if I did, they kept it quiet.
Cut to college.
During my freshman year I decided that it might be fun to be in a couple of plays.
Yeah...I wanted to do some acting!
Gannon University had a great theater community and I believe I received class credits for my starring appearance in two plays. I do remember telling my roommate and lifelong buddy, Mike Palmer, that I liked being in the plays, but that everyone seemed a tad off.
"That's cause they're all homos. The guy who's directing the play is really gay," Mike said. "We should call him Tommy Rainbow."
Yep.
33 years ago Mike mentioned that.
But a small-town boy from North Collins wasn't convinced. So the next time I saw Tommy I said exactly this:
"My roomie thinks you're gay," I said.
"I am a homosexual," Tommy said.
My face must have registered great shock or fear or disbelief.
"But we can direct plays, and have conversations, and even be friends with people who aren't gay."
Tommy Rainbow offered the first lesson to me.
By the way...I was unbelievably great in those two plays...had a ton of fun. Even fell in love with the co-star of the first play, a senior named Marissa. As a freshman I worked up my nerve to ask her if she'd like to go to a real play at the Erie Playhouse.
I held the two tickets I had purchased out to her.
Marissa took them from my hands and shrieked!
"Of course I'll go!" she said. "Two tickets! My boyfriend will be so excited!"
Yep.
I gave two tickets away.
And they say that gay people have trouble.
But back to our story...
...Tommy took a lot of heat from a lot of guys. Mike and I were friends with him. We may have been the only guys on the floor who thought 'Tommy Rainbow was all right.'
And that changed things.
Mike's acceptance (he was from the great state of New Jersey near NYC) allowed me some range when it came to thinking about the lives of gay people.
And then I spent a summer working construction in San Francisco.
And seeing men holding hands with men, while still shocking to my small town sensibilities, allowed me a thought process that is unchanged today:
We can direct plays, and have conversations, and even be friends with people who aren't gay.
Yet...there were my religious beliefs!!
What about those???
How could I reconcile the gay life with what the nuns had tried to guilt me into??
"It's not your life," Mike said all those years ago. "You don't have to reconcile Tommy Rainbow's life with your religion."
And who knew that a short, soon to be balding, borderline alcoholic, could prove to be so wise.
It didn't matter to me.
As a decent human being, however, I could still be friends with Tommy...
...Tommy Rainbow.
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