Beyonka

Mother Superior was a complete person even if she was a drag queen. She had her good side...........and she had her bad side.  I stayed on her good side  -- most of the time.  Her moods changed like the winds of a hurricane.  One minute she'd be the life of the party, and the next she'd be sulking or fighting.  Sometimes, she'd go for weeks and months without seeing anyone.  Sometimes, she'd be at the bar every night living it up and sipping her cherry vanilla Dr. Pepper and being a constant barrage ( or cause ) of laughter.  She was never even keeled.  She was one extreme or the other.  If I were a psychiatrist, I would have diagnosed her with bipolar disorder, and I might even consider multiple personality disorder because the change was so dramatic, but I wasn't her psychiatrist.  I grew to become her friend, and it wasn't my duty to diagnose her.  My job was to accept her for whom she was and love her, and I did love Mother.  Part of that love was compassion.  Heck, there were many times when I just flat out felt sorry for her............but tonight was not one of those nights.  Her behavior had frightened me, and made me unsure whether I wanted to be friends or not.  I'd only recently met her, and I really wasn't accostomed to this type of violence or consternation.  I liked people to be predictable, and she was anything but that.  I needed calm in my life, and she couldn't provide that.  I'd have to take her in doses according to her moods.  There were times that I would have to avoid her because of the need of safety and predictability in my personality, but I didn't stop loving her for a second.  I am not talking about erotic love.  I am talking about philos -- the friend type of love.

Mother couldn't drive after her outburst.  The big Bullwinkle balloon in Macy's Thanksgiving day parade had deflated.  She seemed almost catatonic.  Yes, she could still speak, but she just seemed exhausted like she was ready to collapse, so Cora decided to drive us back to Mother's duplex in her Jag  (( yeah, it appeared that Cora had some money  )).  I didn't want to leave Mother's abode immediately because of the alcohol I'd consumed earlier in the evening, so both Cora and I entered Mother's apartment  -- uninvited.............so you KNOW that I took the chance to look around a bit.

It was a celebration of Harvest Gold.  The couch, the armchairs,  the curtains, the carpet were all paying homage to the 80's through Harvest Gold, and she had a thing for amber glassware: compotes, glasses, ashtrays, vases, cups and saucers, plates, bowls, and I could go on and on.  You name any vessel made of glass, and she had it in amber.  And brass, she liked her some brass too: candle sticks, giraffes, pigs, ducks, book ends, geese, butterflies, etc..and it was all shimmery and shiny.  You'd never find any tarnish on her brass.  The living room was so full of furniture, that you'd need lube to squeeze in another piece.  The dining room was small, but elegant with a mahogany drop-leaf, dining table and 6 chairs.  Of course, she had the matching side board and china cabinet too.  This china cabinet was full of Waterford crystal, that was obviously never used because the original seal and stickers were on each piece.  So, I had my impression of her personality.  She liked old things  (( and I'd find out that she preferred older men, too )), and she liked to be surrounded  -- almost crowded, but it was all neat and clean and in order.  Her duplex wasn't large, but every inch of it was occupied with some THING.

None of us really spoke.  Mother sat down in an armchair and exhaled a big sigh then rested her head on the back of the chair.  I felt uncomfortable, and didn't really know what to do or say but took a seat on one end of the couch, and  Cora sat on the other end and was almost instantly asleep and snoring.  Her head bobbed around quite a bit, and a few times I thought that she'd bob forward off of the sofa into the coffee table in front of us, but she'd recover and bob a different direction.  I was looking at both of them thinking what strange and interesting people they were.  I liked them both, but keep in mind that all of this was new and unique to me.  I mean, hell, this drag queen who I barely knew had just nearly killed someone, and this other one  -- who I knew even less  -- had just come in, sat down and fell asleep after all that mess had just happened?  These people in Arkansas were weird.

"So, they are calling it Penny Feathers, now, " Mother suddenly said.  Cora didn't stir  ( but her snoring grew louder as if she subconciously wanted us to know that she was still there ), so I just figured Mother was talking to me even though she did not lift her head up from the back of the armchair.

"What is Penny Feathers?" I was forced to inquire.

"There's been a rumor going around town about a new bar opening up, and some of our best girls have quietly disappeared from our map without saying a word to any of us," Mother's voice was strangely soft and gentle but detached and pensive.  She adjusted herself in the chair and looked at me, but it looked like it took some effort for her to do so.

"Damn, how many drag queens are in this town?" I had to ask missing Mother's main point.

"Gurl, there's a new one born every minute around here, " Mother said, as she waved her right hand in that stereotypical gay way. By the way,  I'd kind of given up reminding Mother that I was a male with no queenly aspirations, because it was just futile.  She was going to call me what she wanted whether I liked it or not.  Like most people who knew her, I had to adjust to her verbage and her desires because she just didn't understand or honor boundaries unless the boundaries were etched deep.  The "gurl" title didn't really bother me that much, so i'd let it slip by, but I'd eventually be forced to dig a trench type boundary for Mother, and she wouldn't like it.  But I'd let her win this time, so like everyone else, I became another "gurl" to Mother.

"They were calling it Brew, last month," Cora awoke and spoke like she'd never been snoring.  Had she just been acting like he was asleep? I asked myself.  This was some crazy shit.

"Brew sounded too lesbian, I guess," Mother said.  "They must have figured out that there weren't enough lesbians in Hot Springs to support a bar just for them.  They're aiming for us, and they'll close us down if we give them a chance,"  Mother continued, and the strange part was that she didn't comment or even acknowledge that Cora had been sleeping through the beginning of this conversation, but her semi-catatonia had disappeared, and she seemed engaged and alert.  The recovery looked kind of miraculous, but I assumed the wheels in her brain had started to turn, and the anxiety that she felt over the threat of a new bar had overtaken her emotional collapse.

"So, what's the big deal about another gay bar in town? It's just another place to dance, drink and meet guys," I said from my point of view.

"This town ain't big enough for two bars, "Mother said emphatically with that you're- stupid  tone that I was beginning to detest.  Yes, she was fully engaged, now and her motor was definitely running.  Personally,  I knew that I wouldn't be able to take that "you're stupid" tone too many more times without telling her about it, and I knew that I'd have to throw a mini-fit, or she'd simply ignore my demands.  This battle would be much more important than the "Gurl" thing.  Sometimes, you have to be rough with rough people, or they simply won't understand your meaning. And, I had learned a long time ago that people would treat me the way I allowed them to treat me.  No one would stand up for me but me, and I loved me.  I had to. No one else did.  My own personal feelings were more important to me than anything else. I'd lived the life of a door mat before, and I'd never allow anyone to wipe their feet on me again.  But, I was also patient, at first, to see just how far the other person would go before I HAD to step in and and set things straight.  It told me a lot about another person to observe just how far they'd go without me setting those boundaries for them.  I  draw a line in the sand, because I refuse to bury my head in the sand.  I draw that line to protect me.

"They won't last long.  How many bars have opened and closed in this town lately?  We don't have anything to worry about," Cora deducted as she answered her own rhetorical question.

"This shit never happened when Tuna was alive, " Mother said with some failure in her tone as if this new bar was somehow her fault.

Uh huh.  I knew what mother meant though she'd never say it.  She was afraid of losing her position in the gay community.  If a new bar opened , she'd have no power there.  If Our House closed down, then mother would lose her identity.  Who would Mother be if she couldn't be Mother?  No one ever used her real name which was Larry.  She was always referred to as the character that she  -- or someone -- had created, and Larry rarely poked his head above Mother's.

"Well, if they have Fiona as their show director, it won't last long," Cora consoled.

"Uh huh," Mother toned with some malice,  "I'd much rather have Fiona up there than Bitch." 

I'd heard so many drag names that I wouldn't have been surprised if someone hadn't named themselves "Bitch", but the disdain in which mother had uttered "Bitch" indicated that she had no affection toward this other queen, so I just had to ask:

"Who is Bitch?" I asked.

In unison, Mother and Cora looked at me and said, but it kind of sounded like they were honking like geese:

"Beyonka."