Are we still the gay caballeros, footloose and fancy free, ensconced in our ghetto, young, beautiful and with money in our pockets? Are we society's grasshoppers, comic relief to a world of ants? These powerful myths have both molded us and influenced the attitudes of the people in power on whom we depend. Yet the times that produced those myths have changed. And we need to change with them.

There's pain in the ghetto in many dimensions. Gay no longer means carefree. We can no longer afford to say "what me plan?" There are unfortunately all too many reasons today why we need to focus deeply through financial and business planning:

• Politically, we're under attack at all levels of government - federal, state, county, and community. And our own leadership has been decimated and is in disarray.
  
• Economically, we're often the first to go in bad times. Downsizing sometimes outs us right onto the street.
  
• Socially, we're hitting both glass ceilings and closet walls - a corporate casket where we are typecast as vampires who can only express our differentness at night.

We came out for many reasons: because our boomers were hitting their stride, because things were loosening up, because of AIDS - or simply because of the momentum we'd started. Psychologically, major realizations are hitting home now that the party is over: we remain clearly a minority, largely invisible - and much of our collective life is enshrouded in illusions, our own and others'. We need alternatives, we need to adjust, we need to act.

When we came out, at least to ourselves, we began to understand that being gay or lesbian can be a plus. We create nontraditional families - mostly without children and nonworking spouses. We tend to have more choices, more discretionary income, and more degrees of freedom. And since we see life at an angle, those of us not intimidated into arch-conformity can perhaps be creative, adventurous, agile, alert - at the cutting edge.

Our creativity and risk-taking might come to naught in today's politically hostile environment if it weren't for a new wave of entrepreneurial spirit in business that may level the playing field for us and other subgroups in the economic sphere.

The 90s give a taste of these times to come. It is ironic that downsizing, computers and worldwide competition may create an opportunity for an equality far beyond gay rights. Can we grab hold of it?

Yes. The first tangible evidence comes in the corporate embrace of diversity. To match increasingly diverse world markets - markets that are anything but WASPy male dominated - business is responding to a wakeup call to diversify and jettison the organization man. Corporate trend setters have replaced their awkward affirmative action mandates with a working philosophy that ideally customizes work, its benefits, and its environment to the market - often at the level of the individual employee. Increasingly, this is the era of the customer, the home office, and telecommuting.

The new work world is based on relationships that are task- and market-oriented. Business now encourages more employees to operate like small businesses through "intrapreneurship" or to spin off and contract back services as entrepreneurs. This is a brave new idea which we may be ideally suited to implement.

We have experience in creating families of choice through networking. We often reject - or are rejected by - the pressure cooker family (personal or corporate). Our concept of family may be better equipped to deal with today's business environment with our resulting lower overhead, quicker response time, and as-needed resources.

We've often provided leadership and perspective as society's outsiders. Many of us come from a long tradition of Merlins, artists, priests, innovators - true shapers of society. If we survive the gauntlet of growing up gay, we're often the experimenters, the trend setters, the first to be available, the first to try - often because we have nothing to lose, because we have to be socially nimble, because we have to make art out of life.

That has perhaps made us far more influential and effective than those sporting the ribbons and traditional medals of the majority. We've been society's prophets, critics, medicine men and change agents for all time. Because we're invisible, behind the scenes, our legacy endures.

For centuries, we've had a seat at the table. Although homosexual acts were singled out by the Church in medieval times, it's only in this century that our gayness came to define our identity as a people. During this century political importance of conformity and mankind's archaic hatred of differences have threatened all minorities with extinction.

But as the identification, objectification and multiplication of minorities everywhere has expanded, we join the increasingly diverse mosaic that society has suddenly become. If the political power of conformity wanes - because of the spread of democracy, the growth of knowledge-based business, the multiplication of communications media, and the ability of computers to manage both diversity and the whole - our place at the table may again become secure.

In this context, how do we plan?

If our earning capacity might be impacted by downsizing, today's economic uncertainties, or the opportunities described above, now is a good time to reconsider, reassess and update our careers, financial plans and goals.

If our forte lies in our different perspective, it makes sense to stop running our lives as a function of what's going on "out there." It's time to reidentify who we uniquely are and where we want our lives to go. If we look closely we probably could muster the time, money, and freedom to get there. The first step is to shift the focus to our own needs and wants.

The second step is to keep our own counsel. Beware of basing plans on mainstream advice such as from Money magazine. Apart from the disturbing fact that these media are biased to their investment advertisers, their market is clearly tilted toward heterosexual families. We have far different discretionary income, mobility, diversity - and problems. Why sell short our lesbian or gay assets?

Why should we have to rely on straight print media when the most effective communication is often nonverbal and face-to-face? It may be far better instead to hook up with a gay or lesbian mentor - an invaluable feature of our ancient Greek heritage. Let's network through the emerging gay & lesbian business groups, hook up through electronic bulletin boards, and join support groups.

These times do not call for traditional passive measures. Apart from saving, the best investment most of us make is in ourselves - not in pinning hopes on the stock market, especially given current conditions. We need to invest not only money but time in ourselves.

Whether overworking or out of work, add skills. Reading books, taking courses, practicing keyboarding, surfing the internet may be better investments than dabbling in the market.

This may be a good time to read books like the Corporate Closet or the 100 Best Companies for Gay Men & Lesbians. The exercise of introspection, reflection, and imagination on future possibilities may be as important as all the hours we spend in the gym trying to hold onto our past youth.

If you want to hit the ground running when you open the corporate closet, pull together a home office now if only to know you can do it. People who work at home are already establishing their independence as a business person. It may not make sense as a deduction but as a practical and symbolic measure it can't be beat. Is there a passion that can become a side business - and source of eventual deductions as well as income and identity?

Entrepreneurship may be the path to expressing ourselves 100% if our corporate lives have become nothing but closets and caskets. In today's economic climate, we can use our corporate experience, contacts, savings - and the work itself - to capitalize our new businesses - producing in the bargain freedom, self-expression, and an income stream of our own making.

The bottom line is that we can do much more in the 90s than simply hang on or dig in. Just like our employers, perhaps now's the time to divest, downsize, refocus our own core concerns and reinvest around what makes us uniquely us.

If corporate America is succeeding in doing it, we certainly can - with the advantage of our mobility, lower fixed costs, experience in handling risk and guerilla life skills. No matter where the check is coming from, welcome to the era of Me-As-I-Really-Am, Inc.