READ
April 2003
I Miss QEII
by Joann Rames
Which
venue do you miss the most? Let us know.
SEE ALSO: I Miss the QE2, Damnit. by Bill Ketzer.
I miss QEII more than I ever thought possible. I miss the music. I miss the scene. I miss my friends. I miss my candle-lit home away from home.
To be part of QEII was to live a dual life. Very often I'd be somewhere getting coffee, or stuck in some inane conversation at work when the topic of "that freak club downtown" would come up. Sometimes the stories would be so out of whack with what it was really like to be there, dance there, go to shows there, that I had a hard time initially knowing that the club of discussion was my one and only, my beloved Q.
Generic Office Worker A:
"Y'know, they all have these piercings, and I heard they have sex in the bathrooms."
Office Employee B:
"No way! Eww! That's so dis-GUST-ing!!"
My mind would wander back to my own bathroom escapades where it was proven to me that both bathrooms were not just unisex, but bisexual, transgendered, and transsexual. I'd have to check my purse to see if my panties were still in there or if I had just flat-out lost them and I'd think quietly to myself, "Oh, no, if you only knew what I went through this weekend." Or last weekend or a month of weekends for that matter. In the thick of my double life, I was writing for BUZZ Magazine, had a Sex Punk in my bed, and girlfriends behind the bar who knew what I wanted in my glass sometimes even before I did.
I crawled from job to job during the day to finance all of this nightlife and my penance was enduring conversation after conversation by the proverbial watercooler in pained (and sleep-deprived) silence.
With QEII, most people will remember a great place to hang out, listen to new music, see a new play, read poetry and dance. On the surface it was all of these things. But beneath that it was a surprise retreat from nasty, strange men who could chase me in off of Central Avenue at any time of the night, only to be faced with 3 guys sporting Mohawks, combat boots and knives, (my friends at the time,) as I ran into the bar and screamed, "Safety!" silently to myself.
It was the first and last stop to a wild night out: if I didn't meet up with
my girlfriends at 9 or 10 pm, I could stop in later and surely there would be
someone to get into trouble with by 12 or 1 am. The Q was a message center before
the rise of cell phones. I could walk in on a sunny
afternoon and who ever was tending bar would say, "He's not here, yet.' Or
'He's in the back.' Information about my life was my constant greeting by being
a regular at the club.
It was like "Cheers," but so incredibly not.
Sometimes I was in trouble before I even entered the bar. One night, with my friend John, we'd dropped acid before we left our apartment and made it to the Q just as it kicked. While sitting on my (very own) barstool, it occurred to me that I hadn't eaten yet that day, I was enduring my "special time of the month," and was now clutching a Rolling Rock and lime as if my life depended on it. All of these thoughts transpired just before they went cloudy. I leaned into John and told him my body was rejecting the acid, and he, in his supportive manner, told me to sit down, shut up and enjoy.
That was the last I remember.
I hit my head pretty hard on the black and white tiled floor as I went down.
Upon waking, I heard the bartender scream, "Does she need an ambulance?" My partner nonchalantly replied no, no ambulance, but that he'd take me home. Three people helped me to stand, and one of my close friends asked what I was on and dragged me off to the dungeon known as "Ladies."
I do recall thinking from beyond the black fog, "What if I really do need an ambulance?" and "No! Not home! We only just got here!!" somewhat simultaneously.
Substance abuse was not really my strong point; it was more of an aside. Watching others frolic within their own abuse was far more interesting.
People made up new dances nightly. People passed out in the dance cage. If I stayed at a show long enough to see the last set, Stevie R. would declare with slurred certainty that I was the mmmmost beautiful woman he'd ever seen in his life. "I just wanted you to know that." Never mind that the following weekend, my sister would be the most beautiful woman, or that her gay, bald roommate would, in turn, also be the most beautiful woman. Perhaps the beer on tap was simply called, "Most Beautiful Woman," drink enough of it and you'll be standing next to her.
Most of all, QEII was a point of cultural reference with no need for
introduction to those of us who grew up worshipping loud guitars and Andy Warhol.
On the outside, meaning anywhere else in Albany, I could be made fun of for listening
to the music I loved, wearing shredded black skirts and having burgundy hair.
Once inside the club, no one cared. Or if they cared, it was only to complement
me on my ensemble or to attempt to out class me with a rival costume. And at least
I could comprehend that kind of rivalry, unlike the unseemly, mainstream goal
of obtaining a house in Halfmoon. Inside the Q, Charlene's cobwebs and monsters
weren't nearly as terrifying as aspirations to a lifetime spent keeping up with
the Joneses, (a lifetime shortened by an untimely death caused, no doubt, by abject
boredom.) The same night Charlene closed the club, I swear there were bats flapping
in the air above the White Castle marquee asking each other, "Well, Damien,
where shall we dance now?"