Denver, Colorado

A funny thing occurred to me on my way to the very gay Diedrichs at the corner of 9th and Downing in the gay Denver neighborhood. Somewhere between 1992 and today, either I’ve become cooler or Denver’s become cooler.

No longer does Denver seem to suck so badly. I think I can actually understand why my pals David and Dennis find Denver so attractive. The city seems to have turned a corner from the blight that I grew up with: it’s bright and vivid and alive-amazingly. In my few days here so far, I’m actually finding it livable.

Back in the day when I used to deliver the New York Times, my favorite part of Denver to deliver newspapers in was, in fact, the area where I am writing this from now-probably because I was subconsciously gay and understood that this was where my kind hung out-and now that I am in tune with being gay and everything that comes with it, I can see that the neighborhood is flaming-and in a good way.

Anyway, my time in Denver is going very well. I do recall doing much on Thursday-Mother and I went to lunch at a dirty windowed, small, and otherwise non-descript Mexican restaurant-in other words, the very best kind. I had an incredibly good chicken burrito. The food was excellent, and, as my mother put it, you have to take it as it comes since there is no way to communicate substitutions without speaking Spanish, something that neither of us do at all. Fortunately this isn’t a problem for me at Mexican restaurants; I wish I could say the same about German food. Thursday afternoon included a brief stop at this café but evidently I was seated too far away from the wifi to make a connection, but I got to listen to a couple of young gay guy talk in that way that they do. It was enjoyable, if not from the eye candy factor.

Friday was a fantastic day-I started out by having breakfast with Eva, the only good thing to come out of my middle school experience. Funny-I have maintained no friendships out of my K-12 educational experience, except for Eva. She was, and still is, an incredible woman, who has just retired from the Denver Public Schools. We had breakfast at Le Peep, wandered the Tattered Cover (Which, by the way, seems not to be nearly as good as it used to be-I wonder if the competition has harmed it beyond belief), and then through some absolutely bizarre stores in the Cherry Creek Mall.

The afternoon was occupied by my brother-we went to have coffee, then over to the Museum of Natural History (the name has changed since I was a kid) where I was looking for a gift for Kirsten, the administrative assistant for D in Germany. I wanted something western in nature, but totally bombed out-fortunately my brother had a guide to galleries in Denver, so we popped back by his placed, did some shopping, and eventually ended up at South by Southwest where I found presents for her. I would tell you what they are, but there is a reasonable chance she will read this before I get back to Jena.

Lastly, the evening was closed out with fireworks. My Mother’s favorite display was last night over Glendale, Colorado-a city wholly contained inside the City of Denver, due to a long forgotten water dispute. The fireworks were fantastic-we met up with my oldest sister and her youngest son. We sat on the grounds of the Greek Temple, surrounded by hundreds of other people who joined us at the same relative position.