My personal relationship with drag began with my aborted Bar Mitzvah in 1961. (This is an opening line that may likely join the ranks of "It was a dark and stormy night" and "It was the best of times, it was the worst of times.")

My father apologized for canceling my Bar Mitzvah (family matters) by taking me to meet his "boyfriend du moment" who was working as a female impersonator at Club 82, an infamous underground nightclub in New York's East Village. His/Her name was Luis/Luisa. The icing on this particular birthday cake was a Monica Lewinsky from a 16-year old drag queen as my father looked on with pride. Was I thinking, "Today, I am a man?" Who remembers? Shabbat Shalom. Today, like many landmarks of gay history, Club 82 is remembered by a dumpster and shuttered gate.

But from that point on drag queens played an important part in my life even through today. As a closeted gay man I was a secret Lady Bunny groupie, a discreet dog walking fixture at every Wigstock through the 1980s. I dated Shequida during her Wendy Mercury days on One Life to Live. You haven't lived until you've sat next to the pool in the Four Season's restaurant and been assaulted by Soap Opera star autograph seekers. I've even spent a night in bed with a gaggle of drag queens--but that's a story for another day.

But every drag queen I've met was already well-established and as old as my great grandmother's bustle. Lady Bunny, Linda Simpson, Flotilla DeBarge, Girlina, Shequida, Hedda Lettuce...the list goes on and on like a case of herpes.

I'd just come to assume that drag credentials like taxi medallions were no longer being issued. It didn't seem to matter since drag queens never die, they just become increasingly pickled.

But I was wrong. In fact, a new taxi medallion has recently been issued to a boy named Garth and I've actually had the honor and privilege of witnessing the birth of a new Manhattan drag queen. Was it a catharsis? An epiphany? A revelation? Was there screaming during the birthing process or was it a silent Scientology birthing like the mythological and non-existent spawn of Tomkat? Difficult to say.

My invitation to walk in her stilettos was the happy ending of an encounter in the Central Park Ramble during one of my customarily innocent and ordinarily uneventful afternoon strolls, walking stick in hand. Garth and I made a date to meet at an anointed hour at his place of transformation.

An unassuming Gap-garbed preppy young man, Garth, who appeared to be just another denizen of Gym Bar or Splash beckoned me to follow him down some steep and treacherous stairs into the basement of one of New York's least trendy gay bars, in fact a true dive, Pieces on Christopher Street. Yes, Christopher Street--what better place to witness the birth of a new drag queen? It was like witnessing the birth of a new religion in Jerusalem.

His--soon to be her-- dressing room had been cobbled together and carved out of a small dank corner between cases of Coors, Rolling Rock and those nasty Goldfish crackers. Apparently drag queens will eat anything. I was taken with the heady aroma of musty vintage clothing, stale urine, mold, dampness and the infant diva's shoplifted makeup. You could actually taste the polyester fibers and foam in the air.

As Garth began to weave his spell and call on the muses of glamor, fabulous and bitch, the air thickened with excitement in this hidden back room where only hours earlier bartenders and bar backs had excited each other. Yes, you could still smell that in the air as well.

A passionate wordsmith, I am often offended by the misuse and abuse of language, especially by gay men. Glamor and fabulous are such words. They are over and mis used with regularity.

The actual and precise definition of "glamor" is "a magic spell." The word originates in association with occult practices. The true meaning of "fabulous" is something resembling or suggesting a fable of an incredible, astonishing or exaggerated nature.

And such is drag.

You bear witness to an authentic act of glamor as you wonder at the supernatural and fabulous transformation of an insecure, awkward 22-year old young gay man into a powerful, self-confident thunderstorm of a bitch of indeterminate age thanks to some powder, glitter and a thrift shop wardrobe worth little more than the "This property is condemned" sign that doubled as her vanity table.

It defies logic and contradicts the laws of natural phenomena, but you feel it as surely as you feel an exploring hand in a darkened cellar of a gay bar. (Garth and I were not alone.)

I fully believe that there's a drag queen in all of us, but few of us have the courage to release her. Garth joins a long line of heroic queers who have accepted and embraced the bitch goddess within. As he cast his spell with mystical Maybelline-ish powders, Revlonish rouges and Mac glitter the aura and energy of Miss Vodka Stinger emerged as surely as the sighs from a newly taken bar back.

Somewhat timidly and in awe of the evolving "possession," I politely probed. I cautiously moved from inquiries about "her" and "she" to "you." "He" becoming "she" subtly slipped from "her" to "I."

Miss Vodka Stinger, fully emerged, shared some history, a long history. The lady in question had been born into the vaudeville world that would later give birth to Broadway and was dropped rather than born like an badly inserted tampon on to the floor of a stage by a harsh and neglectful mother who could not be bothered to interrupt her sword swallowing act--a skill, by the way, that Miss Stinger assures me is one of her many genetic gifts.

It was time to perform. Totally in her sway, I followed this up and coming diva from her inner sanctum of Coors and Goldfish crackers down the tunnel and into the shiny bright disco ball light.

While Miss Stinger has only recently begun hosting and performing on Wednesday nights at Pieces, she will soon celebrate her Centennial in show business, perhaps best known for her character roles on Love Boat, Match Game (sitting in for Betty White,) Murder She Wrote, Who's The Boss and Laverne & Shirley.

Although she rarely discusses it, Miss Stinger is actually quite well known in theatrical circles for having mentored a young teen-aged boy in the late 1930's who had dreams of the stage and later went on to become Elaine Stritch. Miss Stinger will also soon be celebrating another important anniversary: her 30th year of wedded bliss to famous Hollywood Square's center square Martin Mull.

Any drag queen worth her drug habit, has some area of expertise that sets her apart from her peers. In the case of Miss Stinger it's her PHD (Philosopher of Drag) in Broadway. Having been on the Great White Way from its very inception, Miss Stinger's knowledge of the obscure and forgotten is astonishing, and draws an informed and bawdy crowd of chorus boys thirsty to drink at the font of her expertise.

Every Wednesday night the questionable lady in question warms up the crowd with a revival of the classic TV game show, The $25,000 Pyramid which is then followed by a tribute to Broadway that continues through last call. Additionally, she seems to have a gift for coaxing contestants into compromising positions. I don't recall that from the original $25,000 Pyramid but it's a lovely embellishment.

Despite Piece's rather seedy ambiance, Miss Vodka Stinger's expertise and vast wealth of Broadway obscura packs the bar with professional chorus boys lip syncing to the likes of Patty Lupone and Betty Buckley and mimicking the choreography of West Side Story, Chicago and 42nd Street.

It was an evening that would have made Johnny Weir seem more butch than the governor of California. But it was so right and so glamorously and fabulously spun by New York's newest drag queen.

As an aside and because I always have at least one of my toes in the political waters, that night I was considering the differences between a trendy and stylish bar like Vlada vs a neighborhood dive like Pieces and I imagined a police raid circa 1969 and another drag queen from a very different era on Christopher Street and I was certain that the Vlada crowd would be herded like sheep into the street politely phoning their attorneys and hiding their faces. And I imagined the Pieces crowd led by Miss Vodka Stinger screeching in anger and tossing cocktails into the faces of cops.

And I enjoyed yet another insight into our inner drag queens and what a vital and extraordinary role they play in our lives. It was good to see another diva added to their ranks. After all, they are the queer troops that deliver gay shock and awe and hold the forces of darkness at bey.

As our evening drew to a close, Miss Vodka Stinger and I discussed the birth of another new drag queen, a drag queen that shall rise from a mysterious place, shine for a night and then fade quickly away into the dark shadows of gay history. Yes, after all these years, I've finally made the commitment to experience the transformation myself. As Miss Vodka Stinger plays midwife to this fantasy, readers of QueerSighted will be able to share in the experence, a blogosphere reality show so to speak.