Dripping with Pride
Last week was Pride week for Boston and it (more or less) concluded with the big parade. The Boston Globe has reported that this event is now Boston’s largest after First Night. In fact, I recently read that it surpasses the Southie Saint Patrick’s Day Parade in attendance (upwards of 500,000 people or more).
It most certainly does attract quite the crowd. And unlike the other parades, this one has the mayor and governor marching. Pretty impressive to get such high level politicians participating when you think that 40 years ago this was considered scandalous. This year, unfortunately, the forecast was for cloudy weather with showers likely later in the afternoon on Saturday (the day of the parade). Sunday was supposed to be the wetter of the two days.
LIARS!
The minute we left the house it was drizzling. As we stood along Charles Street during the early portions of the parade (just after noon), it drizzled a bit more heavily. Half way through the parade? Flooding. Seriously, among the empty water bottles and mardi gras beads flowing in the rivers along the edges of the street, I swear I saw Noah’s Ark pass by.
There were four of us in our group and only two umbrellas. Needless to say, we got soaked. Well, some more than others. Chris and Kate (who held the umbrellas ) only got wet feet. Me, who cuddled up intimately with Chris under the tiny umbrella, managed to get one shoulder wet. Poor Randy, who was also attempted to photograph the parade while sharing an umbrella with Kate, managed to get soaked. The back of his shirt was so wet you could ring it out and fill a glass of water.
But after close to a half hour of rain it let up enough to enjoy the rest of the parade under drizzle (and dripping trees). I felt sorriest for the parade participants who still marched, soaked to the core. Some floats (decorated with tissue paper) were essentially destroyed down to the chicken wire holding them together. But they still marched along with big smiles (and wet clothes).
But it was still fun.
That night, we saw Randy Roberts, a female impersonator, perform at the Regent Theatre in Arlington (just walking distance from home). I’m not sure how or why she performs there of all places, but I’m glad she did. It was quite fun. Surprisingly, the audience consisted almost exclusively of 60, 70, and 80 year old straight-married couples from the suburbs (Arlington, Westford, Belmont, etc…). Maybe they have seasons tickets or something because I wouldn’t have expected this to be their type of show. But they laughed their asses off, even as one of their own was pulled on stage to sing “I Got You, Babe” during the Cher portion of the show.
On Sunday, the alleged “rainy” day of the weekend…when not a drop of rain fell…we went into the North End for lunch, cannoli, and sightseeing.
So, despite that inconsistent weather, I’m “proud” to say we had a mighty fine weekend.
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