“It’s a good thing I was born a girl. Otherwise I’d be a drag queen.”
–Dolly Parton
I have some very expensive habits– I think my record is pretty clear on that. I’m not referring to my love of avocado on my toast or the way that I need to buy a certain amount of beauty products in order to maintain my American Psycho skin routine. I’m referring to the way in which I recently parted with a bunch of my singles at a drag show in a bookstore a few weeks ago.
It happened after dinner, but before drinks. Here’s what happened:
The Strand was putting on a drag show to celebrate Pride month and Mikaela and I were eager to get up close and personal with some drag queens as they performed for us, especially this past pride month in which drag shows were, and still are, under siege.
Mikaela and I had been hard at work at our respective jobs, so, at the risk of having all work and no play, we decided to go to a drag show at a bookstore, otherwise known as DeSantis’s worst nightmare.
They were serving free drinks. Naturally, we partook.
The drag queen that was MC-ing the show, Kendall Knight, did a bang-up job, making it more like a drag show, book shopping, and stand-up all rolled into one. She wanted to know if any of us were from the south, as she explained that we must do “hips and lips,” to stay quiet during the performances and Mikaela and I made it clear that we knew what she was talking about.
The drag queens were: Katie Silvernail, Lana Del Trey, and Bertha Venayshan. I do believe in life after love when a drag queen is singing Cher to me but then again I also do believe in love when Madonna asks me if I do. Both of those songs were played. Then came a drag show classic: Man! I feel like a Woman!, by Shania Twain.
Emboldened by my fruity drinks that may have been some kind of vodka-cran knock-off, I sang and danced along, with Mikaela by my side doing the same.
After a few performances, we started on some trivia. I was devastated when I was not called on to answer the question, “what color is the sweater?” because I knew that the sweater is “not just blue. It’s not turquoise, it’s not lapis. It’s actually cerulean.” I did however get the next answer right when I correctly stated that Britney Spears guest starred in Sabrina the Teenage Witch, followed by a meek “it’s Britney bitch,” under my breath.
Another trivia question that I knew the answer to but couldn’t answer was “finish this sentence: these gays are trying to (blank) me,” but the girl who did answer it did a spot on impression.
If you know, then you know.
Despite doubling my raffle tickets, I did not win the raffle prize which ended up being some of The Strand’s pride merch.
Once trivia was out of the way, the drag show started up again.
Bertha Venayshan went on next. She danced to the Pirates of the Caribbean theme song and since I’d rewatched the Pirates of the Caribbean the day before, this performance felt like it was just for me. A drag queen twerking on beat to the Pirates of the Caribbean wasn’t something that I knew I needed to see but I absolutely did.
Kendall Knight’s final performance opened with the audio from a scene from The Eyes of Tammy Faye, in which Tammy Faye herself announces that she didn’t hate homosexuals as a christian, because “God doesn’t make junk.”
Books, free drinks, and drag queens– why would anyone want to ban this?
On a more serious note: I think it is important to frequent our local bookstores in order to support them during this scourge of book bans and to see drag shows whenever we can. In other words, during this time of nonsense, seeing a drag show at an independent bookstore is the right thing to do. It was full of joy, and as all of the drag queens pointed out, it’s all about self-expression. People will always want to shut that down.
Kendall did make it clear to us that while it doesn’t feel like it, we are winning.
Afterwards, Mikaela and I went down the street to Oscar Wilde, the wild bar that caters to lovers of the works of Oscar Wilde by mostly just serving alcohol. We drank some more, talking to a few Australian men we met, who we could be sure weren’t hitting on us since two of them were married to each other.
We called it a night in the middle of the night and I went to bed thinking about drag queens and Oscar Wilde. It was an amazing way to celebrate the first day of Pride Month.
And though it is a few months late: happy pride, all year round.
The Tragic Queen,
Raquel
The Tragic Queen 