Birth of the Homobile

Lynnee Breedlove — Birth of the Homobile

People are always asking me if I’m a man or a woman. And I always say, ​“What are you asking me for? [audience chuckles] Do I look like I know?” [audience laughter] I don’t say that if it’s a cop. [audience laughter] Like this one night, one rolls right up next to me. He’s staring at me and I know in the dark he’s going to think I’m a guy and then he’s going to look at my license and then it’s going to be an F for female instead of M for male, and then that’s going to tick him off. Because no one likes to be confused, [audience chuckles] especially not a cop. Because it’s troubling, right, to be confused. So, I’m always in trouble. [audience laughter] 

If you can’t trust me to put the right letter in the right box, I mean, how are you going to trust me not to be a man? I mean, everyone’s seen Silence of the Lambs, how we are. People. [audience laughter] ​“Put some lotion in the basket.” [audience laughter] But if my M doesn’t match their F, then I’m a fraud, a fake, a felon. I’m a gender outlaw, basically. I’m scary. I feel like I’m scary. I don’t fit in the gender binary, and so I probably I’m not going to get one of those big fancy tech downtown jobs. So, I just make up stuff to do with my [audience chuckles] peeps. We live in the low rent hood. And we don’t call the cops, we call each other. [audience chuckles] Because if I call the cops, one of three things usually happens.

Either A, they don’t show up and we got to solve stuff ourselves. Or, B, they do show up and then I’m a snitch and I need witness protection. Or, C, they do show up and they decide on the problem and then I go to jail. So, I don’t call the cops. I call my friends. Call my posse. Usually, somebody’s there to grab my hand just as I’m sliding off the edges of society. I always am, because I’m always holding hands with the wrong person or I’m dressed the wrong way or I’m hanging out with the brown people. And that always pisses off the haters, and then I got to hurt them, and then I’m in trouble with the cops, so everybody’s trying to kill me, which is stressful. [audience laughter]

Always looking over my shoulder, and then I would have to take the edge off, so I’d have to drink and then I’d have to eat some ludes, and then I’d have to smoke some trees. Pretty soon, I’m passed out in a corner with what I feel like is a big sign on my back that says ​“Free stuff.” Then I have to wake up, because you can’t take care of yourself when you’re asleep. So, wakey, wakey eggs and bakey better yet, meth, blow, crack. [audience laughter] I’m awake. See, so, I always end up breaking the law, breaking the law. But I’m a changed man now. That’s over. But I still have. Can’t have that bad boy aura. Cops can smell that a mile away. 

So, this cop, he’s pulled up next to me and he’s staring at me. I’m like, ​“Oh boy. I’m going to have to explain to him how I’m not dealing drugs anymore.” [audience laughter] He’s reading the sign on the side of my car. He reads it out loud to me, like I’ve never seen the sign. I freaking put it there. ​“Homomobile. Mo’s getting hos where they needs to gos.” [audience laughter] So, what is that? I go, ​“Well, it’s a volunteer ride service for the LGBT lmnop QRST [audience laughter] community. Drag queens and trans people and gay male homosexuals and babes in short skirts and long hair. Just people that might need a ride but can’t get one and they don’t have to donate, because it’s volunteers.” 

He’s like, ​“Do you have to be gay?” I’m like, ​“No. But every time you take a straight guy to the marina, you got three drag queens standing on a street corner crying.” He’s off. ​“Well, we wouldn’t want that.” Drives away. I’m like, ​“Wait, when did that happen? When did cops get all that sensitivity training? When did I get so helpy?” [audience laughter] Kind of seems like he’s relieved that I’m picking up some of his slack. Does that mean that I’m on the same team now? Does that mean I’m the man? No, I’m Peter Pan, an eternally small boy always played by a middle-aged woman. [audience laughter] With a posse of pirates, babes, and fairies. 

Like, when I was in high school, I’d always get all the homos, I would get all the gay male homosexuals. And normally, here I would say the F word but you can’t because you might get bleeped. So, you have to say gay male homosexuals. So, every time I’m saying gay male homosexuals, I’m saying the F word, which you can’t, but I can, because I’m that and you’re not. [audience chuckles] Probably. Maybe. Anyway, so, I get all the gay male homosexuals and I put them in my dad’s station wagon. We go to the gay male homosexual bar. They would all get drunk and then I would drive them home again, drunk, with one eye closed. Because I had to have my posse, I had to have my gang because I was shy. Because I didn’t have any friends, because I was the only child, so I had to get high, had to have a lot of drugs and alcohol in my system. 

Pretty soon, I had so much drugs and alcohol in my system and didn’t have any more friends, so I had to stop. But I still had to have fun, I still had to have adventure. So, I would create more gangs and more posses. Like, one time, I started an all-girl bike messenger company called Lickety Split. [audience laughter] Means fast. What? Yeah, ride your bike in traffic. No boys allowed. This is before I figured out that I was a boy. Or, maybe, I don’t know. Anyway. And then, how about an all-dyke punk band? Half-naked, playing the chainsaw. Everybody’s scared. It’s good. 

Pretty soon, I’m touring the world and I’m running around, I’m looking for my peeps, and I’m singing a song, telling them a story, and they give me a bed and a sandwich and it’s great. Then one day, when I’m on tour, I get this call and my mom’s had a stroke. Everything changes like overnight. I have to go home. I can’t be on tour, I can’t have adventure, I can’t have my posse, I got to go take care of my mom. It’s hard and it’s sad. She’s slid off the edges of reality, and into a wheelchair and half her mind is gone. She’s mad. I mean, she used to be like this hard edged, kind of faux queen. Now, she’s just mad and she’s frustrated. 

I’m sad. I miss her, because she’s there and not there. I care, but I can’t really cheer her up, because we’re both just bummed. And I’m like, ​“I know what I got to do.” I got to get a hold of my chosen family. I got to find my peeps. I know what to do. Well, she’s got a car, which she’s obviously not going to be driving anytime soon. I know a whole bunch of babes that either work at the bachelor party or the strip joint, etc. [audience laughter] I’ll just pile them babes into mom’s car, and I’ll just drive them around, and I’ll take them to the bachelor party and the strip joint. I’ll be the tough guy. I’ll be like, ​“Hands off the ladies.” And I’ll call it Homomobile. Get it?

So, I don’t really plan it out. I start doing that, and all of a sudden, it’s like turned into this nonstop, no plot, all action, 24 hours, 365 days mobile chosen family reunion. There’s leather daddies and drag mamas, and everybody wants a ride, and then everybody wants to give the rides. Everybody wants to jump in their car and drive around. So, we got the butches and the badass babes and everybody driving the leather and the glitter and the padded hips and the feathers, everything. You’re always finding like a fake fingernail in the back seat at the end of the night. [audience laughter] 

And so, it’s beautiful. It’s a good thing. Everybody that gets in my Homomobile has a story about how they get left in the dust. There’s a cab, and we were flagging it down, but we were holding hands with two guys holding hands and the cab. Zing. They zip right by and then go pick up the straight couple on the street. I know. Sad. [audience laughter] Who doesn’t love boys in love? And the drag queen again. ​“I just had these guys following me down the street,” and I was like, ​“Don’t make me take off this stiletto and put it in your eye because under this dress, I’m still a man. And under this man, I’m still a dress.” [audience laughter]

And God forbid, a cab would stop for her because then he would be saying something too. He’d be like, ​“Hey baby, what’s under the dress?” And then, you wouldn’t want that, because then you would have crashed cabs and dead cabbies with high heels and it wouldn’t be good. Oh, speaking of not cute, there’s this one babe that got roofied and left in the swamp for dead. She crawls out in the morning, she bangs on the first door that she sees and they’re like, ​“Oh, you need an ambulance. Cop, cab, something.” She’s like, ​“No, I had a hard enough night.” They’re like, ​“Oh, call a Homomobile.” She’s still a regular. [audience laughter] But mostly it’s just fun. People call it a portal. They’re all, ​“Send a portal.” 

I’m like, ​“Why do they call it a portal?” Because it’s like transportation. Port. [audience laughter] port. Portal. It’s like a door that you step through into another world, a magic carpet. It’s going to be driven by Robin Hood and Jesse James and Glenda the Good. You’re going to go to a party that’s hosted by Glamamore, Vivianne Forevermore, Juanita Moore. [audience chuckles] Suppository spelling. [audience laughter] It’s going to be fun. It’s going to be good. Except we’re giving more and more and more rides until pretty soon you have to wait longer and longer and longer for a Homomobile. But people do. They want it. They’ll wait. They’ll let millions of cabs fly by. They don’t even care. They’re like, ​“Waiting for my Homomobile.” 

Sometimes cabs will slow down, because they think it’s a lady. They want to slow down for ladies, because you’re a babe. They want their babe in the car, and then they slow down, they’re like, ​“Oh no, that’s a man.” They keep going, ding. They take off. So, I stopped to pick up my passenger who’s been waiting for a very long time, this trans lady. She’s standing in front of this Latina drag bar called Esta Noche, which, by the way, is now closed thanks to gentrification.

So, just a side note. Casey, you aren’t dealing with enough important things to solve immediately. [audience laughter] And she’s like, ​“Are you my Homomobile?” I’m like, ​“Yay, I’m a knight in shining armor.” Fun. Good times. Jump in. She’s a trans woman, which not to be confused with the drag queen. This is a very important, distinguished thing that you have to remember, is that a drag queen is a gay male homosexual, puts on a wig and a dress, and he goes on stage and he does some cute things, and he goes home, he takes off the wig and the dress, and he’s back to being a gay male homosexual. But a trans woman goes homo and she’s still a woman. She lives as a woman day and night. Sometimes trans women will get on stage and sing a song or lip sync. Even at the drag bar, she’s still a trans woman. You got to remember the difference, because if you don’t, handbags will be swung. [audience laughter] 

So, anyway, she gets in the car and she’s like, ​“I just want to tell you thank you so much for caring about us and loving us.” And I’m thinking, ​“Care, love. I’m just trying to have fun.” She’s like, ​“Because so many of us were getting hurt.” I’m like, ​“Yeah, I know about that.” She’s like, ​“I actually want you to call this organization that I’m a member of. It’s like a trans lady organization. They’re Latina, and you should tell them about Homomobile, so you can take care of them.” And I was like, ​“Okay, great.” So, I call up. And the lady’s really great. She’s really nice. And she’s like, ​“Okay, come on. I’ll tell them to be there. Of course, I’m going to have to translate for you, because a lot of them don’t speak English.” And I was like, ​“Cool.” 

She’s going to translate for the trans ladies. [audience laughter] I’m ready. It’s going to be great. They sound super fun. So, I show up. And sure enough, they are having fun, and they’re singing songs in Spanish together, and laughing and talking and having a good time. And then, I walk in. They look at me a little apprehensive, like, I don’t know they don’t speak English. They don’t look like they have a lot of money or maybe jobs or a lot of power in the world. And I wonder if any of them ever feel like. Sometimes they got a sign on their back that says ​“free stuff.” I come up, nod. I’m like, ​“Hey, what’s up?” 

The meeting hasn’t started yet. I see this big, beautiful altar on the wall. I go over, and it’s like Christmas lights and candles and Mary Magdalene in the middle and all these beautiful pictures of all these beautiful Latina trans women on the wall. I walk over there and I look and I’m like, ​“This is so amazing.” I recognize one of the pictures is a picture of the most famous trans woman of all, Gwen Araujo. What’s tragic about why she’s the most famous trans woman is because her killers were confused by her. They didn’t think that her F matched their M, so that made them mad. And then, that made them feel justified to take her life. Because to them, her F didn’t mean anything other than she was a fake, a fraud, and a felon. 

Her family loved her so much that whenever the newspapers wrote about her afterwards, and they would try to give her a male pronoun and refer to her as a man. They’d be like, ​“No, actually, you need to correct that. It’s Gwen. Don’t be confused. Regardless of whatever her body told you, she’s a woman.” And her family made sure that her killers went to prison. Her family actually asked a judge to change her gender designation posthumously, legally. That was the first time that ever happened. That gave us all hope. 

I look at the rest of the women on the wall, and none of them have that kind of justice or protection or love. I look at my sisters in the room, and they’re smiling kind of sweet. But in my mind, I’m thinking, I bet they’re like, ​“Just what do you think you’re going to be able to do for us, wet ol’ white boy?” So, I just say, ​“You know what? You don’t got to speak English. You don’t have to donate any money. You don’t got to give us any gas money. Just text us, and we’ll come and get you and take you where you need to go.” And then, they look at me like maybe I see a couple of glimmers of trust. 

So, now, I stay busy. I’m keeping the streets safe for America, [audience chuckles] and that makes me happy. So, I get to bring a smile home to my mom. Whenever I feel like I’m sliding off the edges of society, I just grab the hand of somebody else who’s sliding, too.