Yesterday was the second-to-last
local Pride event for the year: the
Tacoma Pride Festival! This now makes the
fourth year in a row that I have gone, and the third year I have kept up a tradition with Tracy, who brought her sister and their cousin in 2024, but came just by herself last year and this year. Cindy, her sister, apparently had this year's festival marked on her calendar but wound up taking a work shift instead.
I suppose I might more accurately call this a "regional" Pride event, given that it was in Tacoma and not Seattle. But, Tacoma is like 30 miles from Seattle—specifically, Wright Park is 35 miles from 4th & Union in downtown Seattle, where Laney and Ivan and I (and Shobhit, very briefly) watched the Seattle Pride Parade. Tacoma doesn't do a parade; they just do a festival—and, among the four times I have now gone, two were in downtown Tacoma and two were at Wright Park, a quick light rail ride from a few blocks from there. Tracy noted yesterday that it had "a more farmers market feel" downtown, which was fairly accurate. Plus downtown had far less shade. I do think Wright Park is a much better spot for it, with tons of vendor booths along both sides of the main footpaths, and plenty of picnic tables and grassy areas between large, shading trees.
It's lovely. And it's also, honestly, a little same-y. I'm glad to go every year, but it doesn't seem to have the same kind of variety year to year as Seattle Pride does—which is saying something, because Seattle Pride has far less of it year to year as it used to. But, Tacoma Pride is clearly
very popular for local Tacomans, many of whom I presume do not bother going all the way to Seattle for Pride at the end of June. I did have to hold myself back from cracking up audibly when Tracy and I were waiting for the light rail back to downtown, and a large, middle-aged woman sitting on a bench said, "This is so much better than Seattle Pride!" She then added, "There's just one nice stage, it's not too loud. Seattle is so loud I can't hear myself think!"
Okay, lady. Maybe do better at finding a place from which to watch the parade, or to move through PrideFest at Seattle Center? It's not super loud
everywhere. To be fair, I'm in a hugely privileged position now, since we were able to watch the parade in Seattle from the comfort of the PCC Central Office kitchen. I have a feeling I'll be watching from there for many years to come, as long as the office is still located there.
Just as we did last year, Tracy and I made plans to meet up at 1:00—knowing this year to meet at Wright Park and not downtown. I scheduled my itinerary so that I would reach the park via Tacoma's light rail T line at 1:06, figuring Tracy would arrive after that. I was certainly right, because she got so delayed, between spilling onto her outfit and then dealing with multiple construction reroutes, that she didn't get there until about 1:50. And I had gone down to 9th & Stewart to catch the Sound Transit #594 bus to Tacoma at 11:45. That bus got delayed several minutes due to a wheelchair user needing to use the side-entrance lifts that takes some time to do, but in the end all it meant was I barely caught the connecting light rail train in downtown Tacoma, which was on time, rather than wait the 10 minutes the original itinerary indicated. I actually did reach the park station right at 1:06.
I killed some time first by finding a spot in the park to sit in the grass and apply some sunblock. I'm very glad I did. In spite of the shade available, I might still have gotten sunburned otherwise. I then wandered some of the booths while waiting for Tracy. Lots of them sell fun earrings anymore, but the offerings tend to be the same and I'm waiting for something to jump out at me saying I must have it. I don't need to be buying earrings willy-nilly. It would be fun if I could find some cool ones at any of the Pride Markets in Amsterdam, though.
Anyway, Tracy eventually arrived, and one of the first things she told me was that she opted not to wear her wainbow straw had because it made her look like "an auntie." I hate to break it to her, but between her black and white checkered, long skirt; the glasses she's apparently having to wear because of allergies; and her short-cropped, curly haircut, she already looked like "an auntie." The Doja Cat T-shirt she wore to tie the outfit together did little to change that. I didn't tell her any of this.
We basically went through the festival the same as we did last year: strolling through
all of the booths, stopping here and there; then sitting a while to watch the entertainment on the main stage. At the time we did this, mostly between 3:00 and 3:30, the performances were all local drag queens—and
one drag king—doing lip sync numbers (though the drag king actually sang). After that a DJ got onstage and just played dance music for a while. I said I was going to lay down for a while, and Tracy did the same; we lay on the grass next to each other for a pretty good while, actually.
That was kind of all there was too it, and a bt after 4:00 we were both talking about how hungry we were getting, and we agreed that, like last year, we'd be better off finding a place to eat downtown that at one of the food trucks in the park. This year we went to a place called The Matador, a clearly very popular Mexican restaurant but at least we got seated immediately. We both got nachos, just like we both had last year at The Office; the difference was this year I was able to add Beyond ground (veggie) meat to mine,
and it was on the Happy Hour menu. I had no idea it would be so huge, though; we could easily have split one plate, but this way Tracy could get regular meat and sour cream on hers. I also had a
watermelon margarita that was quite good.
When we were about ready to finish, our waiter, who was straight, asked us if we had plans to "party" that evening. I laughed and said, "No, we don't party. We're just going home." He said it had gotten pretty "wild" there not that much earlier than when we were there, with a party having gotten so drunk and rowdy that they were asked to leave. It was pretty chill the whole time we were there, though.
Anyway, Tracy and I walked together down to Commerce Street where I could wait for the #594 bus and, a block further south, she could wait for a light rail train to take her back to where she had parked at Tacoma Dome Station. My bus was delayed 8 minutes and drove up literally right behind the train Tracy was to get on. That was around 6:20 maybe, and I read my library book for part of the bus ride back to downtown Seattle. I decided to get off on 4th Avenue instead of going all the way to Howell and walking the rest of the way, because a #10 was coming in just a few minutes and I went to catch that. There was a World Cup game watch party happening at Westlake Park as I got off the bus and there was a huge cheer from the crowd, I think maybe when Argentina won?
It was just a few minutes before 7:00 when I got home. Shobhit was sleep on the couch and didn't even wake up when I came in. I was in the bedroom when he texted me,
How far? which cracked me up.
[posted 1:20pm]
