LETTERS From CAMP Rehoboth |
Gay 'n Gray: Six Degrees of Separation |
by John Siegfried |
Rebecca Howland in a '95 edition of the Yale Daily News wrote, "Imagine writing the perfect phrase. A phrase that so aptly and succinctly sums up an idea, it becomes a popular culture sound bite, embraced by celebrated pundits, social commentators and journalists, rendered instantly recognizable by hundreds of thousands of people. The phrase is "six degrees of separation"four words to describe the phenomenon of a shrinking world where any random two people can discover a link through a chain of six acquaintances." That phrase served as the title of the 1990 award winning play by Yale Drama School alumnus, John Guare. It's based on the true story of a young black man who scammed an upscale New York couple into believing that he was the son of Sidney Poitier and a classmate of their children. It's also a phrase that mutates often in gay cocktail conversation as men (and I'm sure women too) recite their list of intimates, only to discover that their intimacy is hardly exclusive. "Oh, I had him when he was good," is a common refrain. The mutation evolves (with hand on hip and wrist drooping floor ward) as, "Well dear, in the gay world there's no such thing as six degrees of separation." The implication, and the reality, being that if you scratch the gay surface you'll find an old trick one or two levels down. The destruction of the World Trade Center, made "six degrees of separation" obsolete. I really don't want to write about the tragedy in New York. So much has been written, and written well, that there's nothing left to write. But I have difficulty facing my computer without acknowledging the magnitude of what's happened. Like the starvation in Biafra, the genocide in Rwanda, the pandemic of AIDS, I feel exhausted and drained by the ruthlessness of the twin tower tragedy and the constant in-your-face media exposure. Like Pearl Harbor and the Kennedy assassination I will always remember where I was and what I was doing when I heard the news. The fuzzy forgetfulness of aging will never soften an event etched so starkly in my mind. And it didn't take long after the event to find I had no personal immunity. A highly regarded professional colleague, a woman with whom I worked in Washington, was on the flight from Boston to LA. A young man from Zimbabwe whom I'd never met, but who a year ago served as the best man in the wedding of a friend, was in Tower Two. The melting of the girders that brought down the World Trade Center melted six degrees into one. The aftershocks of what happened in New York are global and inescapable. That "the world will never be the same again" adds new meaning to "trite." Ironically, the destruction intended by those who planned and plotted may ultimately be overtaken by a universal recognition that terrorism is a common enemy and we are one globally in our vulnerability. Russia, China, Europe and the US working together, not without self-interest, but toward a common goal, would have been unthinkable before September 11, and now there are hints that this is a possibility. We're no longer black, white, brown; Christian, Jew, or Muslim; liberal, conservative, or moderate; gay, straight or transgender. We're not even young or old. All of us were in the twin tower tragedy. All of us are the victims of terrorism. There are no degrees of separation in our sorrowno degrees of separation in our loss.John Siegfried, a retired association executive, resides (for now) in Rehoboth Beach and Ft. Lauderdale. |
LETTERS From CAMP Rehoboth, Vol. 11, No. 14, October 19, 2001 |