My high school English teacher was a poet. My favorite line from one of her poems is, "I am not so old that what my students teach, I cannot learn". I always read that line from a student's perspective. Until last night, that is. All joking about old coots aside, there has been nothing in my life to age me. Not in a real sense. I have no children. My life has always been free. No alarm clocks, no nine to five. No looming retirement. I've moved so much I don't even have any old friends. Well, I have old friends, but like my old furniture, they were already old when I met them.

Last night, I had the honor of performing at an awards dinner for a local New York chapter of GLSEN, the Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network. There were a dozen or so high school kids there, along with teachers, GLSEN board members and allies. Four awards were given out to community allies.

One of the award recipients said something that stuck with me. She said, "I'm honored to receive this award, but saddened that an award needs to be given to anyone for being an ally of LGBT youth." She was right of course, but I couldn't see it that way. I am indeed old enough to remember when there were no gay/straight alliances, no GLSEN's, no discussions, no community centers, no support. I wanted to give everyone in the room an award just for being there.

When I was in high school, gay was not an option. I didn't really even know any gay people until I was living in New York and went to my first gay bar. We weren't really a community, we were just a bunch of individual gay people who managed to find each other. Sometimes we were just lesbians or just gay men, and more often than not, the two groups did not intermingle. Much of the time we were separated and some of the time, we were separatists. We didn't know better. There were girl bars and boy bars, but I don't remember any T's or Q's or B's. With the exception of my own biological sisters, I don't recall having any straight allies.

I sat next to a young woman in her twenties last night. I asked her to explain her definition of "queer" to me. She said, "Queer just means different. Some queers are gay, some are gender fluid, some aren't sure exactly what they are, but they're not straight. Queer is just different, you know, whatever. We just want whatever to be OK."

I looked around the room and I saw some gay, some straight, some old, some young, some feminine, some masculine, some gender fluid and some taking gender and bending it like a pretzel. We were all together in one room.

At my table was a woman who looked to me to be in her late fifties or early sixties. I assumed she was straight. She seemed straight. She looked straight. I even worried a bit when I told a mildly racy gay joke at the table, wondering if I had made her uncomfortable.

My girlfriend who had been seated next to that woman, corrected me this morning. It seems that my new straight friend had been married for a long time, divorced her husband and was now in a relationship with her former neighbor, another woman who had also divorced her husband. They did not leave their husbands to be together. That happened later. It just happened. So, I was wrong. Whatever.

For me, last night was an awakening. For the first time I understood what the queer community was. There were sixty of us in that room. Some straight, some gay, some whatever. We were all a little bit queer and it was delightful.

Forgive this old gay coot for not understanding. I'm a bit set in my ways but I am trying. "I am not so old that what my students teach, I cannot learn". That was the last line in a poem my English teacher wrote for me thirty years ago. I now understand fully what it means.

On a personal note, I have grown to love you wonderful Queersighted readers. That's not easy for an old gay coot to say. You have made me laugh (and think) with your comments. God knows, a good laugh is hard to find. I look forward to getting to know you all better. Now, off with you, dagnabit!
(The Fairy Lady) Susan Norfleet