At first I thought, get me out of here. There is no way I am spending the one Saturday night when my parents are away listening to Liza Minnelli. And there is double-no-way that I would ever let a bunch of people I barely know play Bette Midler and Barbra Streisand full-blast while Laurie and I keep making everybody Long Island Iced Teas.
They’re gone now — except Laurie of course. She’s in my “real” bedroom upstairs asleep. I still up, sitting in the little room making tapes from the Liza, Bette and Barbra albums Chris let me borrow.
Those guys tonight were his friends. I know them a bit from the bar, and from going to drag shows sometimes on Sundays. When he asked if he could bring them, I said fine, but never thought they’d trek out to the suburbs.
I know Todd a bit, too. He (she?) is the local Empress. I went with Chris and Laurie to the drag queen ball last year and have seen him (her?) perform a few times, too. So Todd was here and started the whole thing when he put that Liza record on and lip-synced along. Then it was Bette and by the time Barbra was playing, everyone was drunk and singing along.
I had no idea I knew all the words to so many of those songs. I have a terrible voice, but nobody cared and nobody trashed anything. My parents will never know anyone but Laurie was ever here.
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Image: Liza Minnelli, photographed for Revlon, Vogue, October 1987.
Welcome to the Little Room is a series of 250-word re-imagined vignettes from my ’80s youth with a focus on music and style. It appears weekly on periodicult.com.
