For many years, I thought it was just my own twisted, tortured little gay heart that shunned the pageantry of Pride parades, like a bat's aversion to the sun. Still, I would stand along the parade route surrounded by friends cheering on the drag queens and the dykes on bikes, leering at cute boys and getting drunk, determined that this year, the lavender magic of gay Pride would strike me with such an electrical charge that it would leave me tingling for the rest of the day. Instead, I inevitably end up feeling vaguely woozy and drunk, and what's more, I pang with loneliness. I feel so frustratingly disconnected, even as I am surrounded by throngs of smiling gay faces.

"Oh-Kay, Eleanor Rigby," says a friend when I explain why the Pride parade isn't my favorite thing in the gay universe. "Why do you have to be so God damn negative all the time!"

While I'll admit I've never been one of the shiny-happy people, my disenchantment with the gay Pride parade comes from something so much larger than that.

Ask your average homo why Pride parades have lost their edge and they will almost always blame the mainstreaming of gay culture into straight society. Gay culture is no longer viewed as this mysterious, fringe sub-group, they will sniff indignantly, so it's only logical that our Pride parades barely raise an arched eyebrow in 2002.

Actually, I think the assimilation of gays into mainstream culture has very little to do with why Pride parades rarely fulfill their expectations, why—like New Year's Eve—you feel this immense pressure to have this really amazing experience, but you find that you almost never really do.

Yes, in some ways, gay culture seems a bit watered down after being blended in with the straight world. But the success or failure of Pride celebrations has very little to do with how many gay characters there now are on TV and everything to do with something I first realized last year—a small revelation brought about by the annoying habit I have of lightly bouncing from one foot to the other when I'm restless.

Pride 2001. There's me, observing the festivities per usual, when someone I had just started dating politely asks me, with obvious disdain, if I would quit "hopping around."

I was mortified, to say the least, as this guy probably thought I had to take a whiz or something, which I didn't, and that's when I discovered why I loathe gay Pride parades: You are literally standing there, as everything just passes you by.

Parades are, by their very nature, non-participatory: There goes the flatbed truck with the hunks from Cheetah Gym. Everyone screams in delight. (I hop from one foot to the other.) There go the kids from the About Face Theatre gay youth group. The crowd roars its approval. (Hop-hop.) There goes PFLAG (Parents and Friends of Lesbians and Gays). Everyone points and waves and hugs and cries. (Hop. Hop-hop.)

It finally occurred to me, that the reason I was bouncing from one foot to the other was restlessness—and I was restless because the very essence of gay pride is to be active, instead of passive, to be in motion, to bang a gong, get it on, be heard, be powerful. And all I was doing was standing there, sipping a beer, watching all of it pass me by.

I have a friend, who, every year, will inevitably grab my arm and drag me with him as he walks up and down the entire parade route. He seems so intent, like he's looking for someone or something, but what, exactly? Is he looking for casual friends he hasn't seen for awhile? Ex-boyfriends he wants to check up on? Potential new boyfriends? What? I never know what he's looking for, but I am pretty certain he's never found it.

I think what he is seeking out is a way to be a part of something. Not as a spectator and not as a consumer—neither of which foster anything much to be proud of. Getting involved, volunteering your time, organizing our own pre-or post-Pride celebration for close friends, all of these are of course ways to be active, to be in motion, to not let the Pride festivities pass you by.

Comedienne Margaret Cho has said that some her more cynical gay friends go into a self-imposed exile, a kind of "Hide from Pride," weekend, but even that can be an expression of gay pride, she points out, as it gives them a chance to relax, to time for themselves to contemplate life and what their sexuality means to them.

However I decide to celebrate gay pride, whether I do it alone or with friends, or by volunteering my time, this year I'm gonna do something that makes me feel a hell of a lot more proud than just standing there, hopping from one foot to the other.

More Pride 101:
Events
Guide to the year's biggest party for gays and straights
Do gays and lebsians have anything in common?
Dave Kern ponders the question
Do gays and lebsians have anything in common?
Victoria Stagg Elliott ponders the question

Also by Tony Peregrin

SINGLED, OUT
But our date, our mini-date, has been interrupted by the tinkling of a bell, and in true Pavlovian fashion, the twenty men assembled for Chicago's first gay speed-dating group, immediately shift to the table on their left in the hopes of finding Mr. Right.
(2002-02-07)

NONFICTION REVIEW
The paradoxical premise behind Suzanna Danuta Walters latest survey of pop culture, "All the Rage," is smartly tethered to the book's three-word title.
(2001-11-29)

BUYING POWER
That bright orange door, which for months taunted passers-by eager for a glimpse inside the MTV-manufactured lives of "The Real World" Chicago cast, finally swings open Sunday, as 1,200 individuals, dressed in their Banana Republic, casual-best, sign contracts (no photos allowed) and wait patiently for their turn to pick over—and, if they are so moved—purchase the sheets, vases, sofas, lamps, rugs (basically anything that can be carried out) of the Wicker Park loft.
(2001-11-22)

FICTION REVIEW
An evil pond that uses its vine-covered tentacles to kill; a battle between two neighbors where one decides to use the other as a scarecrow in his cornfield; and an entire set of stories featuring lethal, vengeful animals are just some of the messy, imperfect offerings knotted up in this short-story tangle by Patricia Highsmith, author of such macabre masterpieces as "Strangers on a Train" and "The Talented Mr. Ripley."
(2001-10-11)

LESSONS LEARNED
(2001-06-21)

FACE OFF
(2001-05-31)

OH RIKKI
(2001-03-29)

LAVENDER HAZE
(2001-03-01)

GREAT SEXPECTATIONS
(2001-02-15)

COLD COMFORT
(2001-01-18)

BROTHER'S KEEPER
(2000-12-14)

GOLDEN NUGGET
(2000-12-07)