 This book that I made is about the Lexington Club, which is sadly no longer with us. It was a lesbian bar here in the city, and when I heard it, I was drawing there, drawing women, before I heard it was closing because that was sort of my line. And then, once it was closing, people started saying thank you for documenting this community, and I thought that's also great. And I started being a lot more intentional about that. And I came to really love the Lexington Club, and now I miss it terribly. So, without further ado, Halloween at the Lexington Club 2014. I confessed that I was planning on drawing at home that night, but my boss came up to me and said, lame, it is Halloween. So I went to the Lexington Club, and I got there super early so that I could draw here. I was drawing at the clubs, and I was wearing a sweater covered in eyeballs, and I also had eyeballs on my hands, like the monster from Hans Labyrinth. It's like the least sexy thing ever. And a woman walked in dressed like Ruth Bader Ginsburg with the Constitution her prop, and then a second Ruth Bader Ginsburg came in. Slowly started to fill up. I met this acquaintance of this lawyer and a cute girl dressed as a cowboy who I really liked. I wanted to be like, you stay, but she went away. And like, my other comic is called Bisexual Trials and Heirs, and I thought if I just keep sitting here, I'm going to have to call it Bisexual Not Even Trying. Oh yeah, I was flirting with this girl as well. And last time I read this, she entered the room right on this slide. People kept offering me free things. Like, would you like some candy or a monopoly money? Yeah, so free things. Then there were plain robin. Anyone? So there were these beautiful fems dancing on the pool table. Very sexy. It looks like that. At this point the lights went off, which I thought was sort of my cue to ask the bartenders to hide my book and go mingle and look for the cowboy. But immediately what I needed to do was pee because everybody had been giving me free drinks. So I pushed myself through the crowd. And when I got there, the person in the stall was taking forever. It's cute that I thought that at the time that it was just one person taking a long time peeing. And then this charming person banged on the door on my behalf saying, it's the artist, like open the door. And they gave me this card with their email on the back. And it said, you're pretty fucking awesome, that is all. So I peed, I came back out, and then I was like, what time is it? And they were like, it's late. If you want to get the barts back to East Bay, you pretty much have to leave right now. But before that happened, we smooched. And this felt really great. This was the first time I had actually kissed a woman after breaking up with my boyfriend of six years. I wasn't sure women might be the wrong word, but not the gendered man. And so I had to go home before the bart curfew, but that was a fun night for me. Like a prayer, some Saturday at the Lex, you're going to see me become more attached to the bar as this goes on. This was Tiana, one of the lovely bartenders. And this was a couple who were engaged to be married. And they were visiting all the way from Canada to see the Lexington Club before it faded from existence. And they said, they expected that it would be bigger. So they read my first comic, which is all about dating and trying to date women. And they said, you like butch girls? I never would have guessed that because you're kind of in between yourself too, like because I have short hair or something. Then they gave me some pro tips. Like, you might not meet your girl at a bar. I met my ex in church. Sometimes it helps to pretend that you don't like the person who you do like. Why not date another artist so you can just mesh? Have you heard of conventions? Be aware that there are a lot of crazy lesbians. Yeah, the ones who immediately worship the ground you walk on, be careful. Yes, those are the crazy ones. And the ones who spent a ton of time dating men. I was like, oh thanks, because I thought they were describing me. This woman walked into the bar briefly and I drew her. But she had never been there before. And then she left. So I imagined her reporting back to her friends. Like, lesbian bars are great. It seems that they just sit and draw in books. Like, who knew? Because that was her one experience at the Lexington Club. So I wonder if the bartenders were sort of annoyed that there were so many patrons who were just there because it was closing. My friends, Declan, Jay and Casey showed up and encouraged me to stop drawing and dance with them. And there was a woman that I was drawing at the moment. So I said, do you want to dance with me? And she said, yes. Excellent. So, blessedly, this song Like a Prayer came on the jukebox. As soon as we stood up, I write this as though I didn't put this in the jukebox. So we were saying all of the words. That's a beautiful song, guys. And she said, that was fun. I remember dancing to that in high school when it came out. I was like, I think I was in the womb when that song came out. She said, sorry, I didn't realize I could have been your mother if I had been a fast teen. So my friends were inquiring like, hey, where's your friend? Where's your new friend? And I was like, she thinks we're generationally inappropriate. They said, shut. That's so hot. Go talk to her more. And so we were dancing to Rihanna, Athena Turner. And what was really great was that I could be drunk and dancing poorly without the unwanted attention of aggressive, creepy men. I had the fortune of really always, except for this one year in sixth grade, feeling very safe about being gay, very supported, never bullied. But I did have a lot of trouble in some circumstances with being female. And that caused me a lot of stress and some danger. So having this very female place was fun and important to me. So I danced awkwardly, I drew well, and I left happy. So now I'm going to share some of the stories of other people with you because it's not just all about me, it turns out. This guy, he said, I turned 21 here. And one time outside the bar, a man walked up to a trans woman and said, hey man, could I have a cigarette? And then she punched him in the face. And everybody defended the trans woman in that situation and said, pronouns. And then this guy told me that he had recently come out as trans, which had been a positive step in his life. And that the guy I had just drawn had really helped him to find himself. Telling his parents had been really hard at first and his mother had been afraid for his safety saying, are you sure you want to be a black man right now? And his dad thought that he was just trying on another hat saying, this just isn't you. But now they're okay with it and they say that this is my son. So taking it one step at a time with them, he was able to take them along the journey of acceptance that he was on. And he said that coming to that bar was really what enabled him to figure out everything between dating, identity, friendships, relationships. And that he loved the bar and he was so sad that it was closing. So he was going to make the most of it while it was around. I'm just going to skip for a little bit. All right, this is Goodnight Lex, this is my closer. So this is the first thing that I wrote when I found out that the bar was closing. And it's a short, simple poem, so I'm going to have you read it with me if you can see it. Goodnight, queers. And Goodnight, beers. Goodnight, jukebox for our ears. Goodnight, San Francisco rules. Goodnight, women playing pool. Goodnight, local art on the walls. Goodnight, drawings all over the stalls. Goodnight, butchers. Goodnight, femmes. Goodnight, folks just being them. Goodnight, cocktails strong and cheap. Goodnight, arcade machines that blink. Goodnight, iconic bar for dykes. We're sad you have to turn off the lights. That's it.