The only lesbian I've ever knowingly and willingly encountered was a chubby girl I dated briefly, so I guess she really wasn't a "true" lesbian. I think she just liked the comfy shoes. But comfy shoes are just one of myriad reasons why I offer a hearty "woop-woop!" to the Lesbian Nation. And this woop-woop I offer isn't a sheepish, halfhearted, one-handed woop-woop, but rather a bold, saucy, two-hands-in-the-air, awww-yeahhh salutation to all of my carpet-munching sisters. I sit high on a craggy mountaintop, squinting my eyes really hard and resting my chin atop my fist, as I ponder lesbianism's rich cultural heritage.

As usual, my mind drifts to the gutter, and there I find a cornucopia of adult films wherein bleached-blonde, artificially tanned white girls whose skin has been liposuctioned into snare-drum tightness loll about on a bed, licking each other's snappers and wishing there was a dude there with them. Lesbian cinema rocks! Hell, lesbians rock! Everyone knows that these "lesbian" gals really crave cock but have failed in their quest to find suitable male partners and thus are driven underground into a seamy, swampy, stinky cesspool of unnatural, ungodly acts. Films such as Girls Only and Strap-on Sweeties empower lesbians and give them the comforting illusion that it's OK to engage in acts which make God and all his cute little angels shudder with disgust. These films' message is simple: It's possible to have sex without a penis, no matter how vile, filthy, tainted, and ultimately punishable such sex may be.

That used to be my perspective on lesbians. That was my "take" on dykes,
if you will. But I've changed. I've grown. I've sprouted. I'm a different man.
A better man. A slightly hairier, paunchier man than I used to be.

Walk with me, fair friend, into the forbidden lair of girl-on-girl physical intimacy. Let us join these overweight, hairy, unpleasant, self-righteous, scowling, bitter human monstrosities as they march for freedom, equal rights, and the stomping, shrieking drive to make everyone else feel guilty that they aren't dykes, too.

THE EVENT: DYKE MARCH

THE DATE: JUNE 15, 2002

THE SPONSOR: LESBIAN AVENGERS

THE LOCATION: DOWNTOWN PORTLAND, BABY!

It all started on a sweet, summery Saturday morning in my cramped, smelly NW P-Town apartment. My friend Dave and I have gathered for the weekly meeting of our NW Friends of Lesbians Group, an organization "dedicated to educating ourselves about the lesbian community with the hopes of exploiting it for laughs." For the time being, Dave and I are the only two members. In the past, the Friends of Lesbians have sponsored such events as Portland's Lesbian Chili Cook-Off, the All-You-Can-Eat Lesbian Lumberjack Flapjack Breakfast and Sausage Feed, the Lesbo Indian Leg Wrestling Tournament, the I'm Down With Dykes Demolition Derby, and our notoriously unsuccessful First Annual Carpet Munch-Off. During most Northwestern gay festivals, Dave and I can also be found in our friendly little booth, serving up our famous Lesbian Sno-Cones.

On this recent Saturday morning, I open the "discussion" segment of our meeting with a burning question: "Hey, Dave--what the hell have we done for the Lesbian Community lately?" Sure, in the past we've done such coalition-building things as sitting on my front porch in our boxer shorts, plastered beyond comprehension on 40-ouncers of Big Bear Malt Liquor, catcalling lesbian passersby in an attempt to make them feel attractive and worthwhile. We've also submitted positive reviews of lesbo porn such as Dorm Dyke Bonanza Part IV, Clit-Hungry Whores, and Fist Me, Myrtle to local magazines such as Just Out, but they never responded.

But beyond such good deeds, I'm drawing blanks. When all is said and done...when the shit hits the fan...when push comes to shove...when all our beans are counted...when the price of tea in China goes up...when the Day of the Rope comes...the sad, misshapen, oddly plump fact is that we've really done nothing for dykes at all.

So there we sit on the porch, wiping our chins free of malt-liquor foam, belching, farting, and pawing at our balls, stricken with a sudden sense of anguish that we haven't done enough to support our sisters who weren't attractive enough to be heterosexual.

As Dave takes a thoughtful tug on his forty-ouncer, I thumb through one of those free weekly local rags that think they're all cool and stuff. "Ships ahoy!" I suddenly exclaim with barely concealed excitement. "This is our chance, Davey boy! Today is the City of Roses Dyke March, sponsored by a group of cool-sounding broads called the Lesbian Avengers! What could possibly be cooler than marching along with them?" Dave smiles, then screams at the top of his lungs, "Let's go as a dyke couple!!!" I shriek back with delight as we clap our hands and jump up and down on my porch like a pair of Girl Scouts on a trampoline. Once we're able to contain our excitement, we gallop into my apartment and began to prepare ourselves for this hallowed event.

I learn quickly that becoming a dyke takes a lot of work. But if I became tired, I was sure that it would be a GOOD kind of tired, the kind of fatigue that comes with a job well-done. I don't mind getting my hands dirty. It doesn't bother me if I have to use a little elbow grease. Portland dykes are worth the trouble. Portland dykes mean that much to me. As we prepare our dyke costumes, Dave and I swear to each other that we'll become the Bosom Buddies of Portland's Female Homosexual Community, even if we risked our careers and reputations in
the process.

Dave prepares himself first. His chosen dyke persona is "Sporty Dyke." He wears a tasteful blue polo shirt, blue soccer shorts, and a snappy beige visor hat. He uses gel to spike his hair in the accepted spiky lesbian fashion. He finishes the ensemble with HOT red lipstick. Now THERE's a "lipstick lesbian" if ever I saw one. Meow!

I choose to be "Butch Dyke." I roll my jean cuffs up to my calves. Keeping with the spike-positive dyke aesthetic, I wear a spiky leather belt. I doff a pair of sensible red tennis shoes, wrap a vulva-pink bandana around my head, and top it off with a red flannel cutoff shirt which teasingly hides my wifebeater T-shirt. In order to ingratiate myself with the lesbian community, I scrawl SHOW ME YOUR TATERS on the wifebeater using Dave's
red lipstick.

We are now the Hottest Lesbian Couple in Portland. We can't wait to mingle with other dykes.

Dave and I pause to chuckle at our outfits, and chuckle we do. But we are also filled with an overwhelming, all-consuming, slightly itchy sense of compassion and understanding for the women out there who were too ugly to snag boyfriends and were thus driven into a life of same-sex debauchery and shame, not to mention an almost-certain afterlife groaning in agony amid hell's deepest pits. Tears nearly well up within our drunken, bloodshot eyes as we mull over all those lonely lesbians who couldn't find dudes! No hot cocks to tap those asses! None of the rewarding feeling that comes with knowing you're healthy and normal instead of some sick pervert who should be dragged into the woods and shot in the head!

As we pull up to the Park Blocks in downtown Portland and catch sight of a bevy of roughly two thousand lesbians grazing on the grass, Dave becomes visibly nervous. Beads of sweat dot his vaguely feminine forehead and begin to drip down on his lipstick, smearing it. Like a typically domineering butch dyke verbally abusing my weaker partner, I begin yelling at Dave for this unfortunate cosmetic mishap that threatens to destroy his skillfully applied lip liner. Suddenly we snap ourselves out of our little domestic squabble and turn our gaze to an eternal, never-ending Sea of Dykes. We behold thousands of hairy sea cows, grunting, snorting, and sunning their behemoth tum-tums. It is the most terrifying vision I've ever seen.

Fear overcomes us. We decide to pound down a few more shots of cheap

liquor in order to loosen up. We first go to a fag bar called Embers. All eyes are on us as we sashay inside. A kindly old queer begins to laugh, breaking the ice. "What the hell are you boys doing?" he lisps behind a yellowy row of semen-stained teeth. We explain our mission and he doubles over in laughter, sympathetic to our cause. He agrees to snap several whimsical shots of us in our dyke gear as we preen and mince outside the bar.

By now, Dave is visibly drunk. My trusted correspondent and co-founder of NW Friends of Lesbians is slowly slipping into an alcoholic coma. He attempts to French-kiss me, planting a wet smooch on my lips at a moment when I am unprepared to fend off his advance. This is all the encouragement I need! With that, we march on down to the Park Blocks, stinking of gin and ready to schmooze the girl-beasts.

We brazenly push our way to the crowd's front, where two fat dykes on Harleys rev their engines and scream incomprehensibly. Dave and I, drunker than twelve Indians, clasp each other's sweaty hands, yelling and chanting along with the ocean of lezzies. A fat, bullhorn-toting female rhinoceros drives the crowd into a spiky-dykey frenzy.

Next thing Dave and I know, we're surrounded by topless dykes. We begin pointing out all the flabby pink taters to each other and pay little attention to the speakers and their boring political rigmarole.

The Portland police escorts, most of whom appear to be dykes themselves, then lead the parade onto Broadway, marshalling an endless procession of sweating, mannish women. The parade's most stunning float is a red convertible featuring an actual bearded lesbian held in captivity. And all along I had thought
the Bearded Lesbians of Madagascar were just an old wives' tale! Dave and I walk slowly together, clutching each other's hands for dear life. "Please don't leave me, Josh!" Dave begs me at one point. We stroll along side-by-side, fearful that at any moment we'll be rat-packed by a swarm of murderous lesbians.

As we make our way past Mary's strip club, the liquor really starts kicking in. Dave and I start our own chant:

2-4-6-8/

Show us your taters--it's not too late!

Dykes scowl at us. Dykes laugh at us. Dykes look at us and then walk away. "Hmm," I think. "So this is what it's like being a dyke. Being a dyke sucks ass!" The dykes march onward, oblivious to our needs, dragging their knuckles, making hog noises, and flashing their fat, sagging jugs to the crowd's horrified delight.

Dyke fists are raised in unison, blocking the sun. Counter to the "lazy, shiftless" stereotypes that Dave and I had gleefully entertained, dykes are actually a well-organized militia, crouching in the bushes and coiled to strike. Wake up to the threat, Portland!

Toward the parade's end, Dave and I feel at home. We drunkenly wave at spectators. I unveil my hairy, ample man-breasts and wag them at the crowd. It's exciting for all of us.

By this point, Dave's bloodstream is saturated with alcohol. Wobbling around, he says he needs to piss. Instead of pissing while he was walking like I suggested, the closet homo insists on pissing in a bar. So we bid a fond adieu to the Portland dyke march. But we are forever changed for the better. We hold Portland's lesbians captive within our hearts and vow to never set them free again.