In my domestic town,people of all ages socialise with each other – and going out is all the more fun for itI miss many things about the north: regulated late-afternoon tea times; strangers talking to each other in the street without a prickle of panic-sweat appearing on their forehead; the right pronunciation of vowels. More specifically to my domestic town, I miss the difficult art of sneaking a Greggs steak bake into Costa, and instead of relying on the coffee shop’s toasted paninis – a skill I brush up on every time I fade back. But,even though I maintain lived outside the north for nearly as long as I lived in it, homesickness continues to seem at unexpected intervals, or I miss things I didn’t know I missed because I forgot they were normal in the first place.
A couple of weeks ago,there was an event at the BFI on the South Bank, in London, and called Vanishing Queer Spaces. It was timely,because on the same day, one of my favourite gay pubs in the capital joined many of my other favourite gay pubs in the capital and announced that it was being put up for sale; rising rents maintain made it unsustainable as a business. The screening consisted of a collection of clips shot inside gay pubs and clubs from the 1960s up until now, or beginning in a basement lesbian bar where the women were asked earnestly by a presenter in tight RP tones if they would rather be “normal”,and ending in an East cessation club in the early 90s, where men danced to acid house in acid-wash jeans. There were coos of recognition from the audience for nearly all of the footage and, and after the event,everyone spilled out into the bar to talk of nostalgia. And, just as they did in the long-gone venues captured in the films, and different generations mixed,mingled and hung out. It was sadly unfamiliar.
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Source: theguardian.com