If you get the chance, read Loving Mountains Loving Men by Jeff Mann. He’s a professor of something or other somewhere (I forgot), and he recently wrote this book.
It’s a book of prose and poetry by and about the life of a gay Applachian West Virginian man (the author). Even though he’s a white man, he’s a gay white man and an Appalachian white man, and the book reflects that.
He talks about his growing up and his hometown of Hinton, West Virginia. He writes, “Today, as big, mean, beareded, booted, and leather clad as I have become, I feel ill at ease, paranoid when I am in Hinton…” and it’s true. I’ve been to Hinton many many times. Curiously, Hinton is also the world headquarters of the Church of Wicca, and I know the people who run that as well (although they’re not covered in the book, at least as far as I’ve read).
I was just wondering to myself why you edited your original post to bring the guys colour into it. To the best of my knowledge, skin pigmentation and sexuality are not related, so why did you bring it up?
Because being a white man in the US is often thought of as being “on top of the food chain” in as far as how you’re thought of, i.e. it’s better to be a man than a woman and white rather than black. But what I was getting that is that even if you’re a white man, you can still, in many ways, be an “outsider–” whether for geographic origin and sexual orientation or religion or language or whatever. I guess that point wasn’t clear.
Fair enough then Cran I think I can see your point now…
I don’t, in all honesty, think I’ll be reading the book. I already have about six novels lying around the place which I am struggling to find the time for and books by, and about, Gay cowboys are not really my thing.
I meant no offence, of course, but it is late at night here and the little dublin brain is starting to shutdown.
I suppose it would be tricky driving the cattle up and down those mountains, now that you mention it
Well, the word “mountains” is in the thread title, the book title, and other places in this thread, so I can’t figure out how you missed it, but sleep well nonetheless!!
Don’t worry Cran, we’re all cowboys as far as they’re concerned over there. Just kidding.
Actually, before reading your post I instantly thought of the western mountains. I think it’s an association with Brokeback Mountain so seeing “Mountain” set the tone. I even had to double take when you said Appalachian mountains to get it straight. (no pun intended).
you can tell the cattle from Appalachia - they all have shorter legs on one side of their bodies!!!
(DH is from WV and makes jokes about it all the time… lovingly)
I did not know that. It’s interesting how old fashioned, conservative
Mountain mentalities and new-age liberalism seem to easily
cohabitate in Appalachian towns. In NC, Ashville and Boone have
large hippie populations, and more Vegitarian resteraunts than other
NC cities, but remain fairly Republican in voting records. I never
decided if it was the local colleges that bring in the hippies, or if they’re
there because folks moved out there in the 60’s to start communes. I
favor the latter explanation.
I might get around to reading this book, though I have a hard time with
non-fiction for some reason. I once worked with a guy in Charlotte, NC
who was gay, and grew up in WV. His family threw him out when he
came out, and he couldn’t find anywhere in the state that would
accept him (I think he grew up in the 70’s), so after he decided his
bible college wasn’t doing a good job making him straight, he moved
down here to just be himself. His story was sad, but interesting. I’d
kind of like to contrast the life of the author.
Oh. I forgot about Brokeback Mountain. I’ve never read it, but I understand that it is fiction (i.e. it’s a poser), whereas Jeff Mann’s book is real and actual.
At any rate, yes–Hinton, WV is the world headquarters of the Church of Wicca. I’ve been there more than a few times. I also think it’s curious how the very conservative population and the very Wiccan population co-exist like they do.
The whole state of West Virginia is torture for gay people. All the gay folks I know there are either really messed up on drugs adn alcohol (especially one of my former friends, God bless his soul) or are simply insane until they left the state (me). Don’t get me wrong–I love the state itself, but I don’t care for some of the people who live there.
And Appalachians are not cowboys. We’re mountain people.
