Home Sweet Homo: Or, Pardon My Real Estate Pontification

What's in a name?

A lavender-menace worth of demographic and geographic convergence, as it turns out.

When my squeeze the Cheez and I were taking the plunge into homeownership, we must have looked at about fifty different houses. In two weeks.

What can I say, I was trained to shop at Loehmann's, where if you don't snatch up a bargain fast, some other broad will, and won't you be sorry.

In order to remember all those houses, we gave them nicknames.

La Maison des Deux Ages, a 1918 Craftsman Bungalow onto which someone had added a second story (in both senses of the word), replete with 1970s vertical wood paneling, sky lights, oversize fish tank, and let's-get-naked-under-the-stars balcony hot tub.

Russian Survivalist House, which contained enough store-bought Borscht to stock the fallout shelter of two small Soviet satellite nations.
Or perhaps three, depending on whether there would be access to post-Apocalyptic sour cream.

Asparagusless House, where our realtor snapped the last spear of asparagus growing in the garden and ate it. He was sort of a jackass.
Polish Wetnurse House, which contained an illegal mother-in-law unit decorated with several stunning portraits of Pope John Paul II, a huge Polish flag, and an entire deep freeze full of breast milk.
And then there was Dutchboy, as we named it — for its Dutch-style gambrel roof.

We were in love.

We're buying a house called Dutchboy, I told my friend Matt.

Matt, who when he is not busy listening to me discuss my latest major purchases, is a linguist, promptly informed me that Dutchboy is slang for the male equivalent of a fag hag. That is, a guy who hangs out around dykes.
We moved in and, lesbo and behold, discovered that the neighbors on one side were a pair of retired Montana school teachers, very comfortable shoes and Subaru station wagon.

And on the other side, our neighbor was a Rottweiler-wielding, pantsuit-wearing, Hot Flash Dance-attending single Sapphic.

Dutchboy really is a Dutchboy! I told Matt. Surrounded by lesbians on both sides. What are the chances of that?

In Southeast Portland, his boyfriend answered, higher than you might think.

Home Sweet Homo!