NYC Pride Parade

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Near 14th Street in the Village, I saw a woman sobbing as she looked at our synagogue's parade banner and the huge contingent of us, marching along with the Metropolitan Community Church (MCC). She was shaking and tears streamed down her face. Her mascara was getting wrecked.

She was in her early-20s and pretty, with long, wavy, sandy-blond hair. There was a taller, attractive woman, standing behind her, holding her. If I had passed her in, say, the Short Hills Mall, I wouldn't have picked her as a member of the LGBT community, though probably wouldn't have been surprised that she was Jewish. She reminded me of a late-adolescent version of my niece's female classmates.

Excusing myself from my fellow-marchers, including Pat, I walked back over to her. Not yet knowing what I would say to comfort her, I just held out my hand to shake hers.

My sunglasses shaded my eyes and I wished I had removed them, so that we would have made full eye-contact. Still, I found something to say: "I went to a [Modern Orthodox Jewish] day school [and I imagine you must have done so, too]."

"I *teach* at a day school," she said.

Oy, no wonder she was in pain. She was at the parade with her girlfriend, but likely was not able to be herself in all her humanity at the day school because perhaps she feared losing her job if she were.

I held her hand for long enough to feel that mine was warmer from the heat of marching, and that she was glad to have the contact from someone who was openly lesbian and openly Jewish at once.

It's my hope that my face had a compassionate expression when I shook her hand further and said, "Be well. Zay gezunt (Be healthy)."

It would be wonderful if she were moved to say the Shehecheyanu prayer in honor of today, and ultimately could feel peace.

One of the terrific songs that both of our choruses sang together as we marched down Fifth Avenue was, "Od yavo shalom aleinu...v'al kulam (Peace will yet come to us...and to everyone)."

This year, we marched together with MCC, as our rabbi and MCC's reverend both were chosen to be grand marshalls of the parade. The crowd loved our unity. My ears still hear their cheering.

How have you reconciled, or how are you reconciling, elements of your complex identity?