38. Driving with Pride

Parents Weekend at the University brought a lot of rides. The more interesting stories were not from the parents or families, though. Most of them were short rides taking them from one party to another or to the big game or to some place for brunch. The main conversation when I had a family in the car was about how attracted the mom was to some friend of their kids or that dad could drink his kid under the table.

So, which ride to share?

There was the young lady from Kansas City who heard Taylor Swift play in my car and went to tell me how Taylor, her favorite singer, dating Travis Kelce, her favorite football player, was like a match made in Heaven for her. She went into great detail. 

But that’s not the ride I want to share.

There was the foreign family I picked up from Golden Corral who got into my car and I could smell ever item they consumed coming out of the pores of their skin and how they shared with each others the wonders of the all you can eat options.

Nah. 

There were the two blind passengers who I helped find the back door handles, which can be tricky with sight on my vehicle, and they said that they appreciated the way I showed them without condescension. Then we talked  sports the whole ride, she’s from Vancouver and loves hockey and was even a goalie when she was young, and he prefers sports without balls like track and field and he was quite the sprinter. 

They were awesome and definitely a good story and came in a close second.

But while it was Parents Weekend, it www also the end of Pride Week. And that’s the story I will share.

I picked up two young ladies in the afternoon from a dive bar downtown. After they got in, one of them put down the window (I originally wrote “rolled down the window” but we don’t do that any more, do we?) so she could scream compliments at a family of bikers on the corner, giving special attention to the father who had long hair, a long greying beard, a leather vest with long fringe, leather chaps, and biker boots.

The girl who called the ride, we’ll call her “Izzy”, was the quieter of the two, but a fun one nevertheless.  Let’s call her “Maddie”. Strictly as an identifier. Maddie asked Izzie about a friend of hers and wondered if that friend would like a full experience of lesbian love. Izzy told her that the friend had a boyfriend she had been with for a long time. This was not a deterrent to Maddie, though, and continued to go on how happy she could make that friend.

We drove past a parade of people going to the big game, all wearing university attire, and the ladies commented about how they reviled the patriarchy and especially the frat boys. They went and listed the classic frat guy names like “Brandon” and “Kyle” and “Taylor” and how they should all be rounded up. I was not in disagreement. 

Maddie talked about how she would love to meet with some of the drunk moms who were running around trying to pick up their kids’ friends. She went into great detail about how she could turn them to her ways. 

As we approached their destination, Maddie questioned Izzy if this was the right place, as it was a park where there didn’t seem to be much happening but a family family picnics. Izzy said this is where she was told the gathering was. 

It was then that I learned they were going to an end of Pride Week festival. But I didn’t see any gathering whatsoever. Honestly, I didn’t even know it was Pride Week until that point.  The whole week had gone by and I had not seen or heard anything about Pride Week in the city. It made me feel like either I lost touch with what was going on in the world or if the world I was in was really out of touch.

As we stopped, Maddie said she was sorry about all her ribald conversation and I told her there was no need to apologize. I totally agreed with them on the patriarchy and especially about frat guys. 

They got out and thanked me for the ride. Maddie looked at the park and told Izzy she didn’t think anything was there and they might have to crash a quinceañera if there was no festival.

She then turned to me and said she may be calling me back in a few minutes because she could not see any fellow lesbians at this park.

I told her I would be happy to drive them again.