CHRISTMAS 2023 REMINISCENCES

Les K. Wright

1. What will you do to celebrate this holiday season?

I will be celebrating this Christmas holiday season here in Syracuse, my new home. My plate is already full of social, volunteer, and cultural commitments. I mark the approach of the holiday season with buying Weihnachtsplätzchen (Christmas confections) when they turn up at Aldi’s, then I watch Darlene Love singing “Christmas (Baby, Please Come Home”) on TV. I’ll curl up on the sofa with my cat Schuyler and watch Big Eden, a fairy-tale gay love story of what every small-town gay boy who fled to the big city wishes life in small-town America was really like. And then I put up my Christmas tree—immediately after I get home from Thanksgiving dinner at my cousins’ house. I’ll be singing with the Syracuse Gay and Lesbian Chorus at both our holiday concerts. Christmas Eve I’ll call old friends—in London, Portland (OR), San Francisco, and Honolulu, and attend Christmas Eve service at the tiny church I was baptized in. Christmas Day I’ll get together with my extended biological family for an early dinner. 

2. What do the holidays signify to you?

For many years Christmas was a time of sadness and panic, and sometimes loneliness, for me. As a gay man, Christmas seemed to be the epitome of “family holiday”—something straight people did. I always kept a good 2,000 miles distance between me and my biological family. Sometimes I spent the holiday at an “orphan” dinner with other single gay men. Sometimes I went to a potluck hosted by a fellow member of San Francisco gay AA. One Christmas I spent going to the Castro Theater by myself and seeing You Can’t Take It With You, the wonderful Frank Capra film. I’ve spent other Christmases alone. Nowadays I enjoy sharing in the spirit of “good cheer” leading up to the Big Day and I count my blessings every day. The facts that I am healthy, sane, sober, and pursuing my passions are a whole lot of miracles I am grateful for today. 

3. Do you do anything specifically bear related or queer to mark the holidays?

To mark the holidays as a queer man I publicly celebrate being a long-term (43 years in 2023) HIV/AIDS survivor on World AIDS Day (December 1). I sing with the Syracuse Gay and Lesbian Chorus. I still send out Christmas cards with photos and a thoughtful letter reviewing my fortunes and misfortunes of the year now ending. This is a time when I hold my entire gay, or chosen, family in my heart. 

4. What is one of your favorite holiday memories or traditions?

I do have fond memories of Christmases past. My high school German teacher Frau Klemperer showed several movies on German history and culture. One was the story of “Stille Nacht” (“Silent Night”). One was about holiday customs in Germany. I was enchanted by the Christkindlmarkt (open air Christmas market) in many cities, drinking Glühwein (mulled wine), while perusing the merchandize on sale at the booths in the town square. Of course, it’s an embracingly chilly evening and a light snow is falling. The air is filled with cinnamon, pine, and chocolate smells. I’m happy to report that I have fond memories of such Christmases in the many years I lived in West Germany.

My favorite Christmas memories are of the one I spent in London in 1988. My partner and I went to London for the holidays to visit my best friend Ken, a painter then living in Earls Court, the big gay neighborhood in those days. Ken invited us to go with him up to West Yorkshire to spend the holiday with his biological family. I had done so once before, so I elected that Dennis and I stay in London. Little did I know that all of London shuts down for Christmas, even the Underground. When I found this out, I called Ken, and he put me in touch with some Australian friends of his living in the neighborhood. They—Dorian, Peter, and Jack– invited us to join them for their “orphan holiday party.” They were three flatmates and a few of their friends, all even further away from their homeland than we were. We were all youngish gay men, among the first who self-identified as bears. We were all also living with HIV/AIDS. The height of our get-together was watching the Christmas special of someone I had never heard of—Dame Edna Everage. She was outrageous, she was cunning, baffling, and powerful, in a drag queen Australian housewife sort of way. This was the height of cruel and homophobic Thatcherite Britain. She channeled Thatcher’s hypocritical “care and compassion” with a campy flair, menacingly threatening to unleash that “care and compassion.” She teased Roger Moore (one of the many James Bonds) on camera about the enormous size of his cock (an open secret). She wished everyone “a spooky Christmas” and pelted the studio audience with her signature gladioli.

Within two years Dorian, Peter, and Jack had all died from AIDS. My then boyfriend Dennis is now happily married to another man and still living in San Francisco. His husband is currently nursing him through recovery from major surgery.  Ken is still living and painting in London. We spoke on the phone a couple of weeks ago, and he is thinking of moving back to West Yorkshire to be close to relatives. We are collaborating on an exhibition to feature my photos and his paintings inspired by those photos. If I want to visit him again in London, he urged me, I’d better book soon before he moves away.

5. Any resolutions or goals for the New Year?

I never make resolutions. My goals for the new year are to continue to pursue my passions—bear history, writing, doing my photography, watching quality movies, sharing company with my friends among the Billy community, the Bear Your Soul community, and exploring the local queer communities here in Syracuse. 

6. Social Media tags

#bears, #leather/kink, #soberbears, #hirsute