I ended up in Mesa, AZ because of an oil change I'd scheduled earlier in the week when I didn't understand Arizona geography. Couchsurfing had once again come to the rescue and I had made plans to stay with Jade that night. So, with lodging taken care of, I set to work planning out the rest of my day in Phoenix, AZ. With the help of the internet, I found the Arizona Archery Club and the Lesbian Social Network.
Arizona Archery Club
The Arizona Archery Club turned out to be a nice hike up to the north Phoenix metro area 45 minutes away. But, 45 minutes and $11 later ($10 for shooting and $1 for the target), I was on the range shooting for the first time since archery league ended in April. It felt overpriced to shoot at the Arizona Archery Club because it only costs $5 to shoot at BWANA in Little Canada, MN, but I thought it would be interesting to shoot somewhere completely different. I'm pleased to report that range culture seems to be the same in Arizona as it is in Minnesota, unlike the turn signal culture which is almost non-existent in Arizona.
There weren't many people at the range so I set up next to an older man shooting a beautiful Hoyt target bow. Sometimes I feel a strange sense of comradery with other target shooters, but mostly I like to check out their bow setups and admire the beautiful colors. For being a sport filled with gun loving, animal killing, bro men, men really go out of their way to have extremely color coordinated equipment down to their shoes and hats.
I really like archery because there are a hundred things to know and a hundred more things to learn. As such, the man next to me taught me that if you're shooting arrows at one of those compressed foam bales, you can loosen your arrows by giving them a small twist until you hear a click and they come right out! This really worked and I'm surprised I didn't know this, and I've been shooting on compressed foam bales for years! If you ever go to an archery range, don't trust the guys that talk too much and are full of male bravado. The best shooters generally don't say much unless you ask. The quiet guy shooting next to you might well have been a national champ during their heyday.
Jade joined me at the range and I gave her the lowdown on archery. I tried to show off a little but my bow arm was pretty tired by then and my shots weren’t going off as well. I’m not sure how I’m going to get in enough practice to shoot the Vegas tournament next year while traveling around. On top of not having a regular place to practice, paying $10+ a session might price me out of the sport.
A company logo does not a business deduction make
Lesbian Social Network
One of the things I've been doing when entering a new metropolitan area is performing an internet search on the name of the city and some combination of LGBT terms to see if there's anything that comes up. Generally, the hits are for the city's Pride event, which is not particularly helpful since that tends to be a yearly event. However, my search in the Phoenix area yielded several Meetup groups which sounded fairly interesting.
The Lesbian Social Network is a group that advertises a way to meet people outside of the bar scene. It's organized by a woman named Sherrie. She’s been running the group every Friday for the last twelve years. I'm always a little apprehensive about entering queer social spaces probably due to some residual internalized phobia of being gay. But, I was stoked to see what this group had to offer since it was and queer event in a state which tried to pass anti-gay legislation.
Sherrie and I
The group turned out to be fairly mixed (most of the group looked 40+) with myself being on the younger side. We watched the movie Girl Play which is a comedic movie about lesbian relationships. After the movie was over, we sat around and chatted. I really enjoyed talking to the older women and hearing about their experiences being gay in Arizona. The overall sentiment was that they enjoyed hanging out Friday nights because they created a space in which they could just be themselves without any fear, a sentiment I can definitely appreciate and relate to. It's not that most people need to flash rainbows and strut their stuff in public. In fact, you'd never even think these women were gay if you saw them out in public. There's just a sense of relief and freedom that comes with not forcing yourself to hold anything back, even if talking about being gay never comes up in conversation.
At the end of the night, I met a girl named Courtney who told me about many things including West Hollywood Pride in Los Angeles. She told me that it was called WeHo Pride and if you called it anything else, you were clearly an outsider. Hearing about LA Pride started a series of events which I will chronicle in a later post. But, for now, I will tell you that I definitely learned a lot about the queer happenings in the southwest from Courtney.
This was the first night I stayed up much later than my newly assumed bed time of sunset. And, to top the whole night off, I accidentally let Jade's dog out. To my horror, the dog rushed passed me as I was opening the door and started running all around the neighborhood. My stomach dropped when I realized I was not going to be able to lure the dog back without Jade's help. Jade works the graveyard shift and she'd barely gotten any sleep that "night" since she was out at the archery range with me. Thankfully, she was able to coax the dog back almost immediately. Jade was surprisingly very relaxed about the situation and even reprimanded me for not having woken her up sooner. Phew!
