Connecting Dots

This post is a bit of a departure from all the (uppercase) Gay Pride lately, but I need a diversion and, frankly, my reader could probably use one too.

As you may know, I enjoy the thrill of the vintage hunt, and late last winter I started picking up coffee mugs that had a distinctly 70s or 80s feel to them.  It seems random but don't forget - I had a huge tiki mug collection for like 15 years until I sold it last year.  One day a mug caught my eye, a beige one with a seventies graphic of a cat and the words "Le Chat" on it, which just made me think of "Le Car" and "Le Bag" and the whole "le" trend.  So I snagged it.

I ended up posting it to my Etsy vintage shop, but in the meantime I started using it and really became quite attached, so I was disappointed when it sold all-too-quickly.  It wasn't until later (when I started searching for a replacement) that I deciphered the signature on it and discovered it was part of a series of mugs that came out of a housewares store based in San Francisco in the 70s and 80s called Taylor & Ng.

I know I seem like a cynic most of the time, but when it comes to certain eras I actually get quite caught up, and that period in San Francisco is a real sweet spot for me.  I blame early exposure to the "Tales of the City" books. So I became slightly obsessed with the different mug designs by Taylor & Ng, and once I'd exhausted those Google image searches I tried to learn more about the company. What I learned made me love my lost mug even more.

The company Taylor & Ng was founded by Spaulding Taylor and Win Ng, an openly gay man born and raised in San Francisco's Chinatown.  The company produced housewares featuring whimsical illustrations by Win including mugs, trivets, linens and cookbooks that became enormously popular, and are quite collectible today.  They started with their own small shop and grew into a supplier for Macy's and other major department stores.  Additionally, they are credited with bringing the Chinese wok to the US and making it a common kitchen utensil.  (Those of you of a certain age will remember how popular the wok was when it burst onto the scene in the seventies!)

The company closed their store in 1985.  It is reported that Win spent the period after that focusing on his fine art.  Given that he died of complications from AIDS in 1991 at the age of 55, I'm guessing being diagnosed with HIV led to some rearranging of priorities.

On the one hand this is just another story of a gay man in San Francisco whose life was cut short by AIDS.  There are certainly enough of those.  But I suppose I was struck by the way that my impulse purchase at a thrift store led me to the story of a gay man completely unknown to me who left his gay world just as I was coming into my own gay world. And whose creations - as whimsical as they may be - live on for a new generation to discover.

I'm know I'm reading more into a mere coincidence than is really there, but sometimes I wonder if there isn't something that connects the dots for us, that draws us towards the things we really want to know.  It's certainly a New Age conjecture worthy of 1970s San Francisco.  In this instance, I'm kind of ok with that, because it brought me some knowledge that moved me, and it made me feel connected to an era I love.

And it brought me a different kind of gay pride. A lowercase one.

The Pride Issue

In my last, long-ago post I think I made it sound like I was only going to be happy if I found things in SF that I like in Detroit, and I think anyone knows that would be a mistake.  San Francisco has many great things, and I suppose what I really meant is I needed to find the unique things about SF to enjoy just as I've found so many unique things about Detroit to enjoy.

Once I took a chill pill and just started hanging out, things fell into place.  Without belaboring the issue, I don't think I'll ever be in love with San Francisco like I used to be, the spark is gone.  But it's a really tremendous place and if you want to give me a six-figure job I will move there no problemo.

The first thing that really blew me away this trip was Pride.  I've never been to an SF pride, and I have to say it is mind-boggling how big it is.  I mean HUGE.  Coming from SE Michigan with our pearl necklace of Pride celebrations ... state-wide pride in Lansing, Motor City Pride in (ironically) Ferndale, Hotter than July Black Gay Pride ... it is amazing and scary to witness the sea of humanity that descends on the Civic Center in SF for Pride.  Literally people as far as the eye can see.  I only managed to snag a few pictures, but take a gander:

 We are everywhere. Especially MUNI.

 Hundreds and Thousands.  Just like Bronski Beat predicted.

 What?

Even my mom showed up. 

SF Pride is so big they even have a celebration the day before, Pink Saturday.  My hosts with the mosts threw a Pink Saturday party which was really my first chance to chat extensively with gay locals, nearly all of whom are transplants.

Think Pink!  And Drink!

Ball of Carnation.  That's what the world is today.

People who move to SF *love* SF, so it is always interesting to hear their stories (after reminding them that it is bad form to insult Detroit after I have said I like living there).  One guy who lived in NYC in the 70s and 80s said that what he really liked about San Francisco is that you can still reach out and touch the edge.  That's been lost in a lot of other cities.

Any of us in Detroit can probably relate, in perhaps a more immediate way.  As I said over two years ago after another SF visit:

There will be a time when there will be a Starbucks on every corner and we’ll talk with a dreamy look in our eyes about the great community that thrived at Café de Troit, where it seemed like everyone you met was making something happen in town. Lower Cass will get the Ilitch touch and we’ll laugh about the days of dodging crack whores and roosters on our way to Honest John’s. Corktown will turn into Birmingham and we’ll actually miss all those hipsters and Terry-oke at LJ’s.

As for finding the "spirit of Detroit" in San Francisco, that was kind of a bust.  I did get to meet Bob Mould randomly in a bar, which was awesome, and I saw a drag follow-up to Trannyshack that was literally unwatchable, but it's about the closest thing to a gay underground I found.  I do eagerly await the Detroit arrival of several SF trends:  the small-scale artisinal cocktail lounge, neighborhood chef-driven restaurants (Ann Arbor's contributions notwithstanding) and the Edison lightbulb in hospitality decor.  Maybe even all under one roof.  And sometime this decade.

In the meantime, it's good to have my travels over and finally be back in Detroit where - when I really want to - I can turn around and swim frantically back to touch the edge.

200 Steps

Palm Springs turned out to be Perfectly Splendid, and what a glorious week I had there.  The town is so manageable in size and full of nice things to see and do, how can you not have fun? Of course it's full of elders not youngsters (although the gays still wear Abercrombie & Fitch, even at 80.  Charmant!), but that doesn't stop people from cocktailing or mingling.  It just means it's over by 10pm.


In a day of thrifting through the desert canyon I came across many crazy things, more indicative of a boom time for mediocre home decor stores in the early 90s than the modernist heydey of the 60s.  That doesn't mean I came up empty-handed though, most critically scoring a fantastic i-glass carafe for a measly thirty bones.  Yes, before there was the iPod there was i-glass.  There are no new ideas.


One of the better stores for "cool stuff" was Revivals, the thrift store to benefit the Desert AIDS Project.  I'm talking more kicky little housewares and not modern masterpieces, but they also have a great book selection.  I nabbed a few good ones for the trip up to SF and the few days before my steamer trunk arrived from Detroit.  To really get me in the mood there was a first edition paperback of Babycakes, one in the Tales of the City series by Armistead Maupin.  Nothing like a little old school San Francisco.

[If you've never read any of the series, I can't recommend them highly enough.  More than just a snapshot of a long-gone time, they're a snapshot of a long-gone place.  In the same way New York is a character in "Sex and the City," San Francisco is really the major player in these books.  Well, San Francisco before the dot com boom.  A riveting and thoroughly entertaining read, particularly the first book.]


Now I've been accused of romanticizing San Francisco an excessive amount, and I suppose that is not inaccurate. It has changed so dramatically since the first time I was here, gone from a dynamic but perhaps a touch provincial second-tier city to a wealthy cosmopolitan hotspot, and admittedly I cling a bit to the history of the place.  I don't care if it's tacky to get a drink in the Twin Peaks bar at the corner of Castro & Market.  I just love the fact that I'm sitting in the heart of one of two epicenters of gay triumph and tragedy in the US, and that all these older drunk queens have lived through everything I've spent my adult life reading about (like the Gold Rush.  I kid!)


I haven't come across that much current gay activity that captivates me as much as the history of gay San Francisco.  Prop 8 is being decided in the courts right now, but all I've really heard anyone say about the issue concerns the home for the judge and his partner that is being renovated just up the hill a bit. 


San Francisco may now be rife with impeccably-appointed homes and luxury cars, but the spirit of a city doesn't disappear altogether, whether we're talking about the ascent of San Francisco or the decline of Detroit.  That's why a whole month to get my hands dirty (so to speak) in this city is kind of exciting.  It's a real chance to get out and find the kinds of things that always excite me back home in Detroit.  The secret stuff.  The stuff that made SF so exciting to people in the first place.

There are 200 steps I climb when I walk back from the Castro to my friends' house, and every time I climb them I think that if a tucked-away sliver of old SF beauty like this still exists then the city can't have completely become bland and gentrified.  If it has, well then I guess that's a cautionary tale for Detroit.

We have a winner

Hey! I heard from my friend Rose and her video won that Rand McNally contest!

Yay Rose! I'll be riding "bitch" on that new scooter on my next trip to SF!
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A Friend Indeed

I'm gonna ask all you blog readers to help me help a friend.

My friend Rose is the first person I came out to right after getting to college. She already had a gay friend from high school so I knew it was safe to tell her, and she let me hang in her room and read Maurice by E.M. Forster (before going to see the movie which had just been released, and seeing Barney Frank on the T on the way ... it was my first gay-ish weekend).

You can never really return the favor of someone listening to your stupid coming out angst, but here I am going to try.

Rose and her husband Dan have entered a contest to win a new scooter. The contest entails making a video based on this new microfiber map that Rand McNally came out with called FabMap. The idea is that you have a handy hanky with you all the time and when you get lost you can look at the map on it. They have them for many locations but NOT Detroit. I think the idea is that you use it for walking around, and Detroit is not a real walky place, you may have noticed.

Anyway, they need to get views and (hopefully) good ratings for their video to help them win. If it isn't too much trouble, why don't you watch this fun video about love in the city by the bay. And if you are really awesome, maybe you can register on the site and give the video a good rating! I did (and then promptly unsubscribed from e-mails).

Help me help Rose win a scooter so that karmically we can be equal!

Find more videos like this on I Never Get Lost