Boston 3, or Rainbows, Rainbows Everywhere, and Pantsless Train Riders

Ever since my father got a job in Cambridge, MA, my family has become somewhat migratory. It's almost like a custody arrangement; every other weekend, the Jersey contingent travels up, and every other weekend, the Massachusetts contingent travels down to spend a couple of days together. Most of my time in MA has thus far been spent shadowing my parents, who are in the throes of apartment hunting, and offering appropriate advice and perspective on each place. Mostly, this sounds like me kvetching about the size of the apartment kitchens, and my parents kvetching about the living room views, or lack thereof.

But today we all split up. My sister ran off to visit friends, my parents extracted themselves from our company and went for a walk, and I took the train (here, I have to interject - I love, love, love trains and subways) to the center of town for the Join The Impact Gay Marriage Rally.

Astute readers will again notice that I don't actually like gay marriage, or choose to put a lot of energy into marriage rights. But I noticed that at least one poet was going to be there, and there's only so many hours I can spend on the internet in a day, so I decided to check it out.

It was as successful as any gathering of shouting people waving signs can hope to be a success. I would guess that close to 1,000 people showed up despite the well-below-freezing temperatures. (It is here that I need to interject again - for a New England metropolis, Boston is terrible about ice maintenance. The sidewalks are damn skating rinks.) After I located my friend and fellow poet James Caroline, we stood there, shivered, huddled, and made appropriately supportive or snarky comments through the zillion different speakers.

And then, we marched. We marched probably less than half a mile, but it was an impressive march - we were probably 2 and a half blocks worth of people. The only disappointing part was that there were hardly any people in the streets, hardly any cars in that part of town (it was the business district on a Saturday...). The march culminated in a church that once hosted famous anti-gay activist (and evil, evil woman) Anita Bryant, so it was a nice "Take Back The Church(?)" gesture, I suppose.

Anyway, James was called on to give the poetic benediction, so to speak, and did a few lovely poems. Then there was free coffee, bagels and socialist paraphernalia for everyone.

On the way back to Cambridge, I wandered into the middle of a piece of public art. The Red Line outbound platrform was covered in people without any pants. People in suits, in firefighter uniforms, sweatshirts and every other kind of outfit, just standing around in their underwear and boots. When I asked one young man (wearing the blazer of a prominent private prep school) what was going on, he looked down, as if surprised, shrugged and said, "I don't know, I guess I was in too much of a rush today."

Nevermind that it was Saturday.

More information about pantsless people on the T can be found here.