Rainbows are Magic

Rainbows are magic. I know there is scientific explanation for their appearance (which I do understand), but I prefer to think of them as simply magic. Appearing after it rains, just as the sun is coming out like, well, magic. Rainbows always make me smile. Rainbows are just happy things—a little present from nature.

June is Pride month. A month awash in rainbows and, of course, rainbow flags. The original “gay” rainbow flag was created back in 1978, back when I was in high school and Jimmy Carter was president. That long ago. At the time, gay rights were considered by many to be kind of a fringe movement. The Stonewall Riots had happened only nine years earlier. The AIDS crisis was still on the horizon. Same-sex marriage would not be recognized in all 50 states until 37 (yes, 37) years in the future. It is a flag that has seen an awful lot of progress and change in attitudes over the years. I doubt if anyone involved in creating the original rainbow flag could have foreseen its widespread use (a neighbor of mine has a small one hanging outside his front door) and omnipresence all those years later.

Designed by Gilbert Baker, the first two flags were hand-dyed and stitched by a group of volunteers and flown at the San Francisco Gay Freedom Day Parade celebration that year. The original flag design had eight stripes with a specific meaning assigned to each of the colors. No longer hand-dyed and sewn, the flag we know today with 6 stripes (red, orange, yellow, green, blue and purple) appeared once the flags went into “mass” production with the hot pink and teal stripes eliminated (fabric in those colors was just not standard inventory for flag makers).

Until recently, both original flags were believed lost. According to this story in Smithsonian, Baker rescued a 10- by 28-foot segment of the one of the flags. It was passed to his sister after his death. In 2020, a flag expert confirmed it was part of one of the original rainbow flags. Now exhibited at the GLBT Historical Society in San Francisco, it is part of “Performance, Protest and Politics: The Art of Gilbert Baker and on permanent display.

So apparently rainbow flags, like rainbows, are also magic. Even when you think they have disappeared, they make a new appearance once the is sun shining and the rain has passed.