Baltimanual :: Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgendered

Navigating your way through gay Baltimore "society" can be as easy or as difficult as you make it. After all, this is the city that John Waters and literary giants James Baldwin and Gertrude Stein have each called home, so no matter which flag you fly, from freak to conservative, from leather to Lycra, there's a clique, a clan, or a tribe with your name on it. But if you don't find what you're looking for, it's easy enough to raise your own flag and see who gathers around.

Above: Partiers at a Guerrilla Gay Bar night; Left: The city's annual Gay Pride parade in Mount Vernon.

While Mount Vernon is typically considered the homo-epicenter of Baltimore, the simple truth is we are everywhere. True, Mount Vernon is where a majority of the gay bars are and home to many young-ish gay men, but Baltimore is a city of many gay-friendly neighborhoods, so don't limit yourself.

If you want to find out what's going on in town, Baltimore has two newspapers for the LGBT community. Both Baltimore OutLoud (baltimoreoutloud.com) and Baltimore Gay Life (baltimoregaylife.com) include social calendars and theater listings, plus LGBT-friendly advertisers to help you find everything from a real estate agent to a church.

When you're ready to hit the town to mingle with the natives, you've got options. There's Club Hippo (1 W. Eager St., [410] 547-0069, clubhippo.com) for dancing on Saturday night, drag on Fridays, and bingo on Wednesdays. Its chief rival for your affection is across the street: Grand Central (1001-3 N. Charles St., [410] 752-7133, grandcentralpub.com) has dancing, karaoke, and a women's night, and is the must-be-seen place late Friday nights. Leather? There's the Baltimore Eagle (2022 N. Charles St., [443] 524-3333, thebaltimoreeagle.com). Leon's (870 Park Ave, [410] 539-4993, leonsbaltimore.tripod.com) is Baltimore's oldest gay bar, and the Sunday evening two-for-one happy hour is infamously popular. Coconuts Café (311 W. Madison St., [410] 383-6064) and Port in a Storm (4330 E. Lombard St., [410]-534-0014, myspace.com/atportinastorm) are where the girls are (also try Sappho's as part of the Grand Central experience). Jay's on Read Street (225 W. Read St., [410]-225-0188, jaysonread.biz) is an intimate piano bar. Club 1722 (1722 North Charles St., [410]-547-8423, club1722.com) offers after-hours dancing and mischief. Club Bunns (608 W. Lexington St., [410] 234-2866, myspace.com/theallnewclubbunns ) features dancing and drag for a predominantly African-American crowd. Still can't find a barstool to call home? There's also the Drinkery, Blue Parrot, Club Phoenix, Quest, the Gallery, or Rowan Tree.

And as if that wasn't enough, the first Friday of every month, Guerilla Gay Bar Baltimore takes over a "straight" bar to make it ever so fabulous. The location is announced the Wednesday before at GGB-Baltimore.com.

If you're not the barfly type, you might want to check out the R-Group and Charm City Kitty Club for alternative social outings. R-Group brings together men and women for both social and charitable events (find them on Yahoo Groups under "R-Group"). The Kitty Club (charmcitykittyclub.com) is a quarterly, cabaret-style show that celebrates the diversity in just about everything.

You can express your creative side with the Baltimore Men's Chorus (baltimoremenschorus.com), which has been active for 25 years, or the New Wave Singers (newwavesingers.org), an LGBT mixed chorus. Or if you think you can dance, try the Chesapeake Squares (chesapeakesquares.org), a square-dancing club for hoofers of all levels.

Annual events to look out for include Baltimore Pride (baltimorepride.org), a weekend celebration of music, drinking, drag, and giant turkey legs. Dining Out for Life in the fall raises money for Moveable Feast so it can feed people who are living with HIV. The state's LGBT civil-rights organization, Equality Maryland (equalitymaryland.org), hosts Night Out for Equality (this past year's event featured Cynthia Nixon) and a jazz brunch. The TransModern Festival (transmodernfestival.org) features the art and performance work of women, ethnic minorities, gays and lesbians, and "the radical subculture."

Baltimore is home to several volunteer-driven organizations including the Gay and Lesbian Community Center of Baltimore (241 W. Chase St., [410]-837-5445, glccb.org), which not only puts on Baltimore's Pride celebration, but also hosts a slew of support programs and offers HIV/STD testing. The Portal (2419 Greenmount Ave., [410]-235-5241, theportalbmore.org), a community center for same-gender-loving people of color, offers support programs including a peer group for black youths and a support group for trans-women.

Other organizations to consider getting involved with include AIDS Action Baltimore (aidsactionbaltimore.org), which provides assistance to people with HIV/AIDS through direct financial assistance and program support, and Chase Brexton Health Services (chasebrexton.org), which started as a gay men's clinic in the heat of the AIDS crisis and has now become a statewide healthcare provider with four clinics offering a full-range of health services (HIV testing, yes; dental care, yes; mental health services, yeppers).