Open and outgoing

Dawn Chomitsch is one of the two women who own and run West Side Stories. When I first walked into the front doors of the video store Chomitsch was there with a smile on her face. She dressed casually in a sweater and jeans. I noticed her earrings right away. Chomitsch has a short haircut so her large silver hoops were easy to see. The gauges of the holes are large indicating to me that she has a style of her own. Her style is also reflected in the store…neat and original. When you enter the store you notice that the movies are stacked neatly on shelves outlining the walls. Chomitsch also decorated the stores with unique pieces of art. The plants in the store are planted in pots that resemble old-school theatre popcorn containers.

While interviewing Chomitsch I learnt not just about the subject I’m discussing, but I bit about Chomitsch’s experience with being a lesbian in Ontario. Chomitsch was living in London, ON with her partner for one year where she endured a lot of homophobia through verbal abuse.

She premises this story with how obviously this is one persons opinion and she is not trying to generalize a personal situation.

“I was scared to walk outside of my home (while in London) and hear someone not just utter something like ‘oh you fucking dyke’ that’s the usual in a town like that maybe, but to hear ‘we want to kill you’ – that kind of thing is scary to me,” Chomitsch explained.

While living in London she also had to call the police on her upstairs neighbours for pissing on their porch and yelling things like “ya fucking dyke” at three in the morning . It was heartbreaking for me to hear how much adversity Chomitsch dealt with in a place only a two hour drive away from what she calls “queer friendly” Toronto. I grew up in Toronto so stories of intolerance makes me upset to no end. You would think that Chomitsch would be standoffish due to her past experiences, but she is actually the exact opposite. She is both friendly and outgoing.

I asked to take a picture of her and I was happy with the result. She stood in front of me with a smile on her face and her hands in her pockets. The smile really said it all. She is proud of her store and happy with her life and that is spread all across her face. Also her hands are in her pocket leaving her upper body open. This to me expresses openness and an inviting personality, which is definitely Chomitsch. She wore a black and white sweater with what looked like a perfectly pressed white dress shirt underneath. The shirt expressed Chomitsch’s neatness and the sweater over illustrates style.

The interview with Chomitsch was fun and eye-opening. She originally seemed intimidated by my marantz deck, but once she got used to it being in front of her, her true personality came out. She even joked about burping into the microphone and killing my ears. Such an open and outgoing person deserves some spotlight and I am glad to give that to her.