Next to sex shop Castle Megastore and its massive silicon molds is my destination: the Wildrose. I cut through Cal Anderson Park, named after Washington state’s first openly gay legislator. … isn’t a zoo and we aren’t your pets” Neighbours, the nearly 40-year-old nightclub institution often targeted by hate crimes.

At the time, the queer bars I pass are sitting silent and shuttered: Pony, whose signage announced in 2014 to a changing neighborhood, “This is a very gay bar.

On a rainy winter day in 2021, Capitol Hill’s rainbow-colored crosswalks stand in stark relief against the steely sky.