Preacher Victoria by Samuel Cole

As a small girl, she practically lived in a tree house even higher than the top of her real house, playing church service with her six favorite dolls. She healed the sick; fed the hungry; clothed the naked; forgave sins; served communion; taught the choir how to sing. Everything she did was a great big success. Whatever she touched turned out better than alright, but glory to God on high.

“You shall call me Preacher Victoria.” She sounded prophetic, pointing to each doll as if to say, don’t ever call me anything else for I am this and nothing else.

But sometimes, stupid weekends, she had to climb down the ladder and eat turkey and green peas with her turkey-and-green-peas-obsessed parents, leaving the spiritually nurtured dolls in the ever-watchful eye of the Lord.

“Someone is always watching,” she told the dolls. “Don’t ever try something.”

“Have you practiced your ballet?” her mother asked, removing some of the green peas from her plate. “You’ll never be any good at it if you don’t try.”

So the girl tried, but she wasn’t any good at ballet, or soccer, hula dancing, chess, synchronized swimming, horseback riding, knitting, or even reading books about wild horses knitting at the ballet.

“You must never give up,” she told the dolls during a lengthy afternoon sermon, titled, Let’s Keep It Going. “You must stay the course. You must fight the good fight.” But the dolls seemed unimpressed with her homily, each one falling over in laughter, and then, as if turning rebellious and wanting to do things their own way, they became sick, hungry, bare, and unforgiving. They refused to take communion. They wouldn’t move their lips one ounce during choir rehearsal.

But sometimes the girl snuck in food at night, not turkey or green peas, but stolen milk duds, whoppers, and dill pickle potato chips by Frito-lay. “Eat up, ladies. You mustn’t lose your strength.”

But the dolls were losing strength. Little by little, things like eyesight, hairlines, and cheekbones were growing so thin, so fast, none of them had enough strength for an appetite at all, not even to eat milk duds, their once favorite snack of all.

“These dolls look disgusting,” her mother said, scooping them up and stuffing them into a trash bag. Her mother walked around the tree house, and the girl, pointing out everything that must go. “Honestly, this is no place for a lady.”

The next day, watching her father from the bedroom window removing the tree house piece by piece, she decided to stop talking altogether, figuring she had nothing important left to say to anyone.

Years later, out for a quiet jog, she heard a little girl’s voice preaching salvation high up in a tree house. Running in place, she smiled whenever the girl yelled Amen and wept when the girl climbed down the ladder and ran toward her mother who was waiting with open arms, as if welcoming her back home from a long, perilous journey.

© 2012 Samuel Cole

Samuel Cole loves to run, photograph old lanterns, play piano, hang with friends, and of course, write. Often, his eardrums pop from so much creative thinking. You can read more about him at www.maneuverableword.com

It’s Worth Exploring by Samuel Cole

It was the first openly gay restaurant in downtown Minneapolis aptly named GAY RESTAURANT, located across the street from the two largest gay bars in Minnesota. I mean, the Chinese have theirs. Mexicans. Italians. Germans. Polish. Vietnamese. Jews. Ethiopians. Even one Senor Frog. As an openly gay entrepreneur, I felt time had come to reach out and feed all the fabulous foodie fags like me and their tag-a-long-hags like mine. The neon sign blinking over the front door proudly announced straights are welcome too. It was that kind of place.

The grand opening coincided with the annual PRIDE festival in Loring Park, well within walking distance. The Minneapolis Star and Tribune wrote, “In name alone, it is lecherously cliché, but the food is delightful and the serving staff, creatively named after gay icons, is a hoot and a half.”

We served up fun appetizers: Twinkie fries, husky bear claws, hot-top monster dogs, bottomless boneless wings, and the colossal onion laser peel served on an oversized Botox coupon, buy one pint get another pint free at Laser Peels, Inc. The large portion lunch and dinner entrees included: The Out & Proud (served on pumpernickel if sourdough sounded homophobic); The Here, Queer, So Delicious Reuben; The finger-snapping-salmon; The Cher-broiled Chicken Linguini; The RuPaul Bunyan Brisket; The Elton Smelting John; and The Right-to-Wed Waldorf Astoria salad accompanied by our bartenders’ greatest creations: The Pink Triangle-tini; The Same Sex on the Beach; Cocks between the Sheets; The Quadruple Screaming Orgasm; The Cosmo Climax; and The Woo Woo Waterloo.

The introductory TV commercial touted, “Leave nobody out. Bring everyone in. Flirt a little bit if you want to, it’s fun.” I felt like the perfect spokesman.

On the back of the rainbow-colored menu housed a smorgasbord of informational tidbits for anyone interested in light reading before or after mealtime: where to get tested, open and affirming churches, and the history of Stonewall. Every individual, gay, straight, or somewhere in between, were welcome: Calling all demographics. We’re talking Uber-inclusive stuff. Totally bi-partisan. Friday night comics. Tuesday afternoon balloonists. Thursday evening karaoke. Sunday poetry brunch-fest.

But the gay community took insult. They hated it in fact. One gay rights activist wrote in a local gay rights magazine, “Please respectfully refuse to patron an establishment so utterly stereotypical and blatantly offensive as to call us out for profit, purchase, and parody.”

A spokesman for OutFront Midwest told three news anchors, “This restaurant typifies the shallow greed of one clueless individual who seeks to exploit an already exploited group of people.”

The Minnesota HRC Chairman told a food critic at Minnesota Mindset Magazine, “To serve moderately tasty food on the broken backs of the GLBT community, GAY RESTAURANT shines as a flaming beacon of what never to do, or say, or be.”

And then they wonder why no one takes us seriously.

© 2011 Samuel Cole

Samuel Cole loves to run, photograph old lanterns, play piano, hang with friends, and of course, write. Often, his eardrums pop from so much creative thinking. You can read more about him at www.maneuverableword.com