Featherette's 3

When Kenny Alton picked me up that Sunday morning neither one of us was sure what to expect. We got to Rodgers apartment and he had a breakfast spread for us to eat! Maybe drag wasn’t so bad. Being it was Sunday places didn’t open until after noon back then so we sat and chatted. Rodger told was he was married at one time and had a son. I nearly choked on my bagel when I heard that! Rodger was the most fem guy I had ever met. “How did it happen?” I asked a little curiously. Rodger acted like he didn’t know why I would be shocked that he was married with a son, Tyson. He told us how Tyson comes to visit in the summer. This was all new and a little too much for me to comprehend. “What do you do with all the gay pictures and drag stuff?”
Rodgers apartment was very “gay friendly” with men kissing art work and “Wizard of Oz” memorabilia, he also had a full walk in closet one side was men’s clothes and the other side was woman.
“I’m very honest with Tyson and I explain things to him.” Rodger stated without an apology. I think that is when I really bonded with Rodger. I had never met anyone who just accepted the lifestyle. Some people fought for the lifestyle, others hid from the lifestyle but no one had just let it be. Some always apologized, like being gay was wrong and you had to say “I’m sorry” just for being. The butchest guys were never man enough to be themselves. I admired Rodger for being himself and living life. Rodger would look at people as if there was something wrong with them for not being accepting. Rodger never showed any fear. I was always afraid; afraid of being gay, afraid of being alone, afraid of being found out.
He would always say “I’m too old to be someone else.” And he was old! He had turned 40 when we met and he was the oldest friend I had made! Norman, who dated the old men and gave them, ex-lax to keep them from going too far, was in his thirties. I remember my mom asking why old men were calling me, my poor mom. Wait until you hear what happens after we actually set the show…
Rodger took to me and Kenny Alton and led us to the living room to listen to some of the Andrews Sister’s songs and choose one to do for the show. “I don’t want to choose a song that will make you feel uncomfortable.” Alton and I giggled, we didn’t care what song we sang- hell we weren’t even singing-it was a record!
Records back in those days we didn’t have i-pods, or CD’s we have 45 records and LP’s. The problem with records and albums were that they skipped. So we would record the song a cassette tapes and rehearse with them and save the LP for performance night.
When he started playing the songs I could not stop laughing. They were the most ridiculous songs I had ever heard! “Boogie, Woogie Bugle Boy”,” Bei Mir Bistu Shein”, “Beer Barrel Polka” were just a few of the gems Rodger played. We listened and choose “Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy” being it was a third of July show. “We also need an encore song” Rodger informed us. “Encore? We’ll be lucky to survive one song!” Alton giggled. The encore would be “Bei Mir Bistu Shein….and familiarize yourself with the polka song –just in case.”
Next was wardrobe. As I had mentioned half of Rodgers closet was woman’s clothes. I had never seen anything like this! I have three sisters and none of them ever wore clothes like Rodger had in his closet. Rodger threw out-fit after outfit on the bed trying to find three matching out-fits befitting the Andrew Sisters. After an hour he decided we had to go out and look in stores. Kenny Alton and I flipped! We could not go in public and look for girls clothes! No matter what Rodger said we were adamant that we were not trying on girls clothes in public! Rodgers solution was that he would make the outfits we just had to go to a flea market and get accessories. We agreed on that.
Rodger bought six yards of the ugliest red, white and blue material I had ever seen! Kenny Alton was great at comments under his breath and used to keep me laughing…actually he always got me in trouble with his comments. When I tried to whisper back a comment everyone always heard them and I got in trouble! Rodger decided that we should each accessory in a color and have hair nets, bracelets, pearls in that color; I was blue, Alton was Red and Rodger was white.
Shopping was done and we went home to put things together, but not before Kenny Alton stopped to admire a package of fake nails. He bought them and fell in love with those damn nails! I hated the glue and the mess and, well….
Till tomorrow, Be Kind…