apó mēchanēs theós

the hero's path

2012-02-04T00:25:00.002-05:00

Earlier today, I had the distinct displeasure of shifting through a catalog of angry anti-gay comments made by Greg Quinlan of Parents and Friends of Ex-Gays made during an open forum on marriage equality in New Jersey. What struck me most were his recollections of the AIDS crises in the 80's wherein he apparently decided the disease was a scourge on the gay community and that caused him to leave with considerable animosity.

It wouldn't be difficult to go back through the accepted history of AIDS, all the way back to the beginning of the last century, but facts tend not to matter to people like Mr. Quinlan and all I can say in response is that while the crisis was devastating on numerous levels, it also generated love and acceptance, and even an occasional beauty of remarkable significance. While listening to Mr Quinlan I kept going back to Joseph Campbell's declaration of the hero's path, "And where we had thought to find an abomination, we shall find God. And where we had thought to slay others, we shall slay ourselves. Where we had thought to travel outward, we shall come to the center of our own existence. And where we had thought to be alone, we shall be with all the world." I felt a deep sadness that these words, or others like them, had apparently been lost on Mr. Quinlan, to the point where he would so energetically condemn his own.

I was an obsessed beach boy in that summer before it all began in earnest, a 'gay' disease that was confounding doctors in New York. I wasn't alone, of course. I had a cadre of friends and we did tend to engage in casual sex with one another. But many times those encounters solidified into lasting relationships, though the Right was oblivious, or scornful, or both. When the sickness began to take its toll, one after the other, it would have been expected that these couples would have broken up, and though some did, most did not. As the year moved into early fall, they disappeared from the beach, either alone, or in pairs, and months later you would run into them at the supermarket, one emaciated and weak, the other rotund as gym bodies gave way to the ice cream and other high caloric foods that were required to keep some weight on the waning partner.

Having been condemned as vain, or only concerned with sex, lacking depth or the ability to love, it was always touching to find these men, dedicated to one another through the ravishment of a terrible disease. On occasion, the shock and brutality were worsened by disapproving parents who carted their sons away from hospital beds in the middle of the night, miles away, to die alone in homes that, early on, they couldn't wait to leave. We were young, late teens, early twenties and at times it seemed liked our cause was dying with us. But nobility was present. Watching my friend Roman, his wonderful body decimated, his handsome, sometimes disdainful, face leper-like with Kaposi's Sarcoma, adjusting his pajamas and robe in the hospital room mirror so that he could meet his parents with more dignity and grace than I had ever seen.

My friend Scott cared for his lover through his rapid decline. Brian was a magnificent man in so many ways, a model, actor, dancer and choreographer, he simply wandered away one October night without any warning. Scott found him sitting on a bench near the Pacific Design Center in West Hollywood, a mile or so from home, not knowing where he was or how he'd gotten there. By January he could only move his right hand. Scott closed his business to care for him and the visiting nurses would remark on how they had never seen such a well-cared for patient.

Scott was my house mate and I spent that winter holding down the fort at home while running errands between the two houses which were only a few miles apart. We had decided that, though no one felt like celebrating, it was important to set up a Christmas tree so I found the best tree in LA and traveled up to old Pasadena to buy new ornaments. It was a hell of a tree and there were several nights where, after getting Brian to bed, Scott would come home for a while and we would sit by the light of that tree, laugh and have a drink. It was a welcome relief and I didn't take that tree down until February.

Scott slept beside Brian every night in a display of devotion and hurt that has never left me. Finally, a friend visiting from New York suggested that perhaps Scott should sleep alone since his presence in the same bed might be making if difficult for Brian to pass. So that night Scott slept on the sofa and when he woke up the next morning, he was in time to see the last of Brian's life ebb away. For reasons I still can't decipher, I had decided to sleep in Scott's room that night and I remember being awakened in the morning by an amazing wind. Looking out the window, I realized that it was only the trees on our property that were blowing over. Then the phone rang and Scott told me that Brian had just died and soon after the wind died away as well.

You would probably say it's silly; that there must be a dozen explanations for that wind. But I have always been comfortable with the thought that it was Brian's soul racing by in joyous wonder and excitement at finally being free of that ruined body. Never, not once, during those few heady minutes did I sense apprehension, but only a feeling of great peace.

How to make sense of it all. Why should I come away with peace and Quinlan come away with wounds that never seem to heal? Is it the man? The God? Foolish circumstance? I think it's acknowledging gratitude that the ones who have gone ahead have shown us the way. That's the Hero's Path that Campbell is talking about. Not gods nor kings nor avatars, but those that we needed the most. I had to go back and look up the opening lines: "We have not even to risk the adventure alone for the heroes of all time have gone before us. The labyrinth is throughly known. We have only to follow the thread..."

Photos for this post by Hedi Slimane from the Spring/Summer 2011 issue of Man About Town. You can find the rest of the layout on Homotography: http://homotography.blogspot.com/2011/05/la-by-hedi-slimane-man-about-town.html

genuflect or die!

2012-01-15T23:01:00.003-05:00

"It is a truism that almost any sect, cult or religion will legislate its creed into law if it acquires the political power to do so, and will follow it by suppressing opposition, subverting all education to seize early the minds of the young and by killing, locking up or driving underground all heretics."

Robert Heinlein - Postscript to Revolt in 2001

Maybe I lived in Europe too long, that godless, socialist haven, but I've never quite adjusted to life back here in the US. I'm sure there are some people who would suggest I go back, but it would be as a way of purging this Holy Land of undesirables like me and I'm not much for playing into the hands of bigots, so I think I'll stick around.

I don't mind conservatism; in many ways, I'm a conservative myself. But I do object to political philosophy wrapped in the sanctimonious cult of religion, especially when me, and people like me, happen to be serving as unwilling scapegoats for same. Let me say here that I don't have a problem with religious people and by that I mean people who follow Jesus' teaching that you should pray in private; people who derive a sense of peace and comfort from their ruminations and try to carry that forward into their daily lives; courage on behalf of those who cannot help themselves.

But the lunacy that is enveloping the coming presidential election is so out of proportion to reality that it takes a reasonable person's breath away. It isn't just the hatred, although that is unsettling in itself. It's the lying and the ignorance that drives the hatred that is astonishing in this day and age. Leviticus, a befuddled goatherd who wandered in the desert, lived in a cave and bit the heads off crickets is exhumed chapter and verse, albeit selectively. The old boy is quoted in order to condemn man on man sex, though taken out of historical and religious context, but his admonitions against slavery, for instance, are conveniently ignored (it's OK to beat your slave so long as he doesn't die from the beating). Jesus' condemnation of homosexuality is also trotted out. It's in the Bible! Well, no, it isn't. Not anywhere. The one passage that stands as the capital New Testament text that unequivocally prohibits homosexual behavior is Romans 1: 26 - 27. Aside from some very serious mistranslations from the Greek, many scholars attribute Paul's condemnation to his Jewish roots, an upbringing often at odds with the body worship so prevalent in the empire. But it doesn't matter. What does matter is twisting, turning, reinterpreting whatever may be necessary to get at what is most effective as a way of gaining and holding power, and that is what, to me, is entirely irreligious.

And I believe there is going to be a stunning backlash. People can only take so much. I'm not advocating violence, make no mistake. Violence escalates violence and that's the last thing we need. But I do believe that sufficient evidence exists that where religion, or the lack of it, is used as an identifier, as a way of determining a person's worth, or their standing in a society, that serious, far reaching often bloody consequences result. And I believe these facts, if they haven't already, are becoming plain to thinking people, because it's now simply impossible to ignore. This is where it must stop, before the US becomes another Northern Ireland, or worse, Bosnia.

This isn't an election between liberal and conservative principals or Keynesian vs Market economics. This is an election between the establishment of a theocracy steeped in superstition and ignorance or the maintenance of a government inclusive of religious freedoms, but reasonably and securely separated from sound secular governance. The consequences of the former are astronomical and singularly unpleasant for gays, women, minorities and anyone not steeped in Christian orthodoxy. The prospective brain drain alone should be enough to give pause unless you're comfortable living in a country where women are judged to be incapable of making decisions about their bodies, homosexuals are imprisoned and perhaps put to death, deregulation obliterates climate and atmosphere, accumulation of personal wealth is the driving principal of an out of control free-market, health care is only for the wealthy and where religious observance of a particular kind is mandated by the state. And if you think I'm exaggerating, you haven't been paying attention. Now, how much is a ticket to France?

The awe-inspiring Alan Carey as photographed by Jeremy Kost... muse, meet creator.

i sound my barbaric yawp...

2012-01-05T22:57:00.002-05:00

There's a Paul Simon song, Lincoln Duncan I think is the title, where he sings, "Couple in the next room, bound to win a prize..." He's referring to their sexual stamina, of course, but I think additional meanings may be applied. Here, in Midtown, Atlanta, my upstairs neighbors could win prizes for throwing things, or maybe each other. Whatever it is they're doing, it's award worthy. Still, I like the place. I can write here. I suppose personal drama sounding from the ceiling is merely an added benefit.

I realized some time ago that I do my best writing in hotel rooms. I finished Neverland By Night at The London in West Hollywood. Consequently, it shouldn't come as any surprise that my flat looks somewhat like a hotel room, although the art is better. The space is important and not just to me. Proust wrote in a cork lined room, because he insisted on absolute quiet... or because his brain was about to explode. Depends on who you talk to. Somerset Maugham acquired a splendid villa on the French Riviera with a massive window in front of his writing desk overlooking the sea. After a few weeks he had the window bricked up, because it was too distracting.

Famously, William Faulkner, stuck in a dusty, loud studio office in Hollywood cranking out screenplays, telephoned the studio's head and asked if he could go home and work, a request that was reluctantly granted. Three days later he received a frantic call from the studio, wondering where he was. "I told you, I was going home to work." Home for him meant Mississippi, something he'd neglected to mention. But that connection to his home, his space, produced gems like this: "Then together they spent the afternoon going quietly and unhurriedly about the grazing meadows and the planting or harvesting fields, and the peaceful woodlands in their dreaming seasonal mutations... the man on his horse and the ticked setter gravely beside him, while the descending evening of their lives drew toward its peaceful close upon the kind land that had bred them both." Sorry, that's sublime. Now, on the other hand, Faulkner also said that the best place for a writer to live was a whorehouse, so there's a chance I don't know what I'm talking about.

Still, Philip Roth built himself a studio, because he thought it was important to work away from where he lived. Robert Ludlum has three rooms in his house for writing. If he can't work in one room, he moves to the next. Truman Capote insisted that he could only write lying down, on his sofa or his bed. The list goes on, but the indication is clear. I suppose for practicality's sake, a writer should be able to write anywhere, typing furiously in the airport lounge, the Green Room, the back of a taxi. Maybe some writers find the frenetic energy of those places stimulating, but I don't know of any... Burroughs, perhaps, but then he had a habit of hurling sliced pages of his work furiously in the air so his muse could order them correctly. And Hitchens, of course, but he was as mad a Burroughs.

I haven't a muse. Thinking back, the time I wrote least was my time with JP. My best work has been produced while single and alone. And there's a reason for this. I won't even budge the idea that only miserable artists produce great work. No. When I write, the time comes when I start to hear the characters talking in my head. This is disconcerting for boyfriends, especially when you insist they quiet down so you don't miss anything. So is jumping out of bed at 3:00AM, because that line you've been struggling with all day suddenly crystalized and if you don't write it down immediately you'll forget it. As the work progresses, the characters take over completely, dictating word and phrase, telling me what they will do and what they won't. I don't think that's a muse; that's simply writing. After 70,000 words, Dodge is as real to me as JP. I know how he moves and how he thinks, that he's bold, but also cowardly and I know how his cool tongue feels in a mouth on a warm, dark night. Spooky, you're thinking, but it's not.

Here's my favorite passage about Dodge, wrung during that long stay in the large, cool rooms at The London: "And Dodge found himself hating in the red. He slammed into Hunt, throwing all his rage against him, his tears flowing scarlet, sobbing as though his heart would break. Hunt, with his ego and lofty attitude, should have been enraged at the assault, but he saw, perhaps for the first time, the damage he had done. With Dodge smashing into him, a blizzard of tears, blond hair and fists, it was something he could not ignore. He had belittled and embarrassed once too often the one who loved him most and driven him to this. And though it would have been obvious to any of us, to Hunt it was an epiphany, moving the rusty machinery of his care just enough to prevent him slaughtering the boy. So, instead of crushing him, as was his want, he used his size and strength to ease Dodge away from him. The ruckus had brought the Lost Boys rushing in and Hunt placed the now wretched, gasping Dodge gently into their arms and without a word to anyone or a look back, he left." Brazen, I know, to put my work on the same page as Faulkner's, but you might as well have something to work towards.

The link to Neverland By Night is at the bottom of the page. Don't be shy.

Photos by Francois Rousseau for Sensitif # 63 ala A Cause Des Garcons: http://www.acausedesgarcons.com/2011/11/françois-rousseau-a-lhonneur-dans-le-nouveau-sensitif.html

glad did i live and glad do i die

2011-12-28T20:50:00.004-05:00

Dragging myself around YouTube the other night... Have I mentioned what a damn bloody wasteland the week between Christmas and New Years is? The Holiday misery of a workaholic... Anyway, YouTube. I came across a video that's not quite gone viral, more like a bad cold. It's of a guy who claims to have been in a terrible automobile accident. He was dragged from the wreckage and rushed to a hospital, but they were unable to save him. Certainly, his face and head show signs of some rough treatment and he seems earnest enough. After he died he found himself in a seriously claustrophobic space with millions of others, facing a stern and irritated God who passed judgement on him and then sent him to hell where he was chosen, after 15 minutes, to return to this life and share the message of his condemnation. I'm not sure what this guy was going through, but I can't quite get my head around the idea that God would choose to communicate with the world through the walking wounded on YouTube.

Why is this stuff always so damn grim? The comments were of the usual bible quoting, hell and damnation, earnest, though lunatic, fundie booster variety, but then there was this one guy who suddenly put forward something different. He asked how it was that anyone could believe that a just and forgiving God could sentence someone to infinite punishment for finite offense? Personally, I don't believe in hell, because it doesn't make any sense to me, but if I did, this is a question I'd have to be asking myself over and over again... and hopefully not having it shot down in a matter of moments by some smug asshole with a condescending smile on his face.

I'll leave it to you to go look up the history of hell in detail. The short version, as I understand it, is that our modern idea of hell came from Dante and his Inferno, and this was co-opted by the Catholic Church to terrify its parishioners into not only believing, but also not questioning... doubting... wondering. And this is why hell doesn't make sense to me. What kind of God needs a hell to threaten people into believing in Him? And I guess the answer to that would be one that has any number of piss-poor belief systems watching His back. Not that I think God gives a damn whether we believe in Him or not, it just seems to me that a bountiful, glorious, loving and forgiving God would rely on just that... and his manifestation of that divinity through the wonder of life.

I'm so tired of being told that I need to be afraid. That if I'm not Born Again, I will go to hell forever. I'm not buying it. I think things got whacked around something terrible at some point... probably about 23 seconds after Christ died on the cross... if, indeed, he did die... there are compelling arguments that he survived. Look 'em up, if only for another point of view. And it does seem to me that if things hadn't happened that way, if the human lust for power hadn't gotten in the way, that we'd be in a very different place right now. Because if you look at Christianity before the Council of Nicea, there was brotherhood, equality of the sexes, compassion, forgiveness and simplicity of message. So, yeah, it's no fucking wonder that had to be stopped. We couldn't allow that message to get out, for fuck's sake.

Just for kicks, I went back and looked up some last words of famous people. Granted, who knows what these folks were experiencing, but I do think it's interesting to look at the body of evidence:

Steve Jobs: OH WOW! OH WOW! OH WOW!

Thomas Edison: It is very beautiful over there.

Stonewall Jackson: Let us cross the river and sit in the shade of the trees.

Ed Gwenn: Yes, dying's tough, but not as tough as doing comedy.

At no point in my search did I come across anyone yelling out, "Oh man, would you look at that! I am so fucked!" Or something similar. By way of a disclaimer I will point out that 99% of the examples I looked at were by people who died in their beds, surrounded by loved ones and not being dragged into the woods by bears. My point here is that for just a minute, today, I'd like to think that dying is a sublime release, a joyous reconciliation and that maybe, just maybe, we all are God and that by dying we are rejoining a beautiful and wondrous communion. How great would that be? And there'd be pop-tarts.

So, my thoughts this cold and windy 28-December-2011. Take them for what they're worth.

PS 29-Dec-11: I just watched the Ben Breedlove videos. Check them out. Maybe God does speak to us through YouTube!

Photography by Josh McNey, most from his essay, The Secret Prince. www.joshmcney.com

papa jollies and sugar plum spice

2011-12-19T18:36:00.004-05:00

"When I was little, Christmas was a time of great confusion to me. The Holy Land had two kings: God and Uncle Raymond; I never knew who's birthday we were celebrating."

Eleanor of Aquitaine

Yes. Although it had nothing to do with the Holy Land. For me it was my father, or who at the time I thought was my father, calming down a bit and enjoying The Season. For him it was cooking, which was exactly what he needed, because he was a tense man. He hadn't always been that way, but when The Goddess came up pregnant with me and he realized that he had been cuckolded by the local parish priest his attitude apparently diminished considerably.

There wasn't much he could do as a devout Catholic. Both divorce and abortion were out of the question, so he had to play along. You can be sure he was overjoyed at the sight of me during our 18 years together, I stumbling around in a bewildered fashion wondering why he hated me so... which only pissed him off all the more. To make matters worse, the priest was almost always over on Friday nights. I'm sure it was great fun for the old man. I have tried feeling something for him, but he was a coward, you see, and the priest and my mother were bullies, so it's hardly a time I remember fondly. I think it might have worked out better if he'd put his foot down and limited these visits to once every few months, or at least when he wasn't at home. But that was out of the question for him. He couldn't even order the parish priest out of the house where the holy man had fucked his wife. It was an unsolvable circular reference for him. So he smacked the shit out of me instead and that's what made him a coward to me.

So he cooked to take his mind off it. He was something of a gourmet and since everyone worked, and since my sister was a terrible chef, he taught me to cook the evening meals so he could dine in a manner to which he was accustomed. I'm sure there was also a bit of satisfaction in consigning the 'boy', as he insisted on calling me, to the scullery, a position his mother was forced to accept after she was fucked silly by his patrician father. They had to marry, but the family didn't have to accept her, so she worked as a maid in her own home.

Being totally clueless of any of this and, of course, wanting to find some way of connecting with daddy between the smack downs, when he cooked I would join him under the auspices of learning from him. Actually, I was much better at it than he was... no, I'm sure of it; it's not just conceit... but he knew a lot of tricks, especially when working with fish (the impossible Coulibiac of Bass), so that was good. Having come from French-speaking Canada he also knew a lot about French country cooking, a cuisine I enjoy to this day, and it was from him that I learned the secrets of roasting a chicken to perfection or the best way to assemble a Hachis Parmentier.

His talents also extended to pastries, pies and cakes. Each Christmas morning brought a freshly baked cinnamon ring garnished with cherries and almonds, apple pies made entirely from scratch and Parker House rolls for dinner. I'm very good at making pies, but it isn't easy for me. As for the rest, he beat me hands down, though I could never agree with the old adage of cold hands/warm heart.

After the heart surgery and at an age where maintaining any kind of waistline is a constant battle, I don't eat the old dishes much, maybe once a year. My tolerance for butter is confined to the occasional piece of toast. But I still do some cooking at Christmas time and I do still think of him as I work, though never fondly. I remember him mostly as a tragic teacher, not as a father. Once I had absorbed all I could from him, I left and only cooked for my friends. You'd think that with all the joy I get from cooking, there'd be something of him in it, but there isn't. He was merely a means to an end.

In honor of Christmas, some photos of a very special St. Nick collected from around the web.

mood swings and chomping newbies

2011-12-15T13:46:00.005-05:00

The definition of insanity is repeating the same action over and over again while expecting a different result. We'll get to that later; right now I'm in a mood. "MOOD" for me is something I can't control, it just is. Without having finished my morning coffee, I've taken the stove apart, cleaned it and put it back together paying particular attention to the burners being level... did I mention it's an electric stove? Man has never devised a more wretched device than the electric stove, recommended by second class chefs who need the money from the endorsements. I'm tired of trying to second guess when the damn thing is hot enough or cool enough so my life is full of underdone stir fry and scorched dish towels.

I also noted that the microwave had a spot in the cooking compartment. Of course, this required scouring out the whole thing and washing every moving part with the same devotion to detail as St. Augustine devising theology. I don't know why I do it. Something just overtakes me and I'm off, along for the ride. It will wear off after I've changed the bed, rewoven the sheets and taken a toothbrush to the bed stand. If it happens in the morning, it's not too bad, but in the afternoon or evening it can be deadly. Making Bloody Mary's can take hours, because I insist on distilling the vodka.

Moving on to insanity... and yes, I am aware of the irony in that statement after the previous two paragraphs... I have met someone. I could say all kinds of nice things about him, but let's just cut to the chase... a furtherance of my 'mood' this morning. He's a couple decades younger than me. Now, one would think that, looking back over the flotsam and jetsam of my previous May/December romances... and let me just say here that whomever came up with that insipid, Hallmark card reference needs to be sewn into a canvas sack with a rapid dog, a frenzied baboon and a poisonous snake, rolled down a hill and off a cliff... that I would, upon even a moment's reflection, avoid these types of romances, but I find that I am a slave to my erections. Oh, and stop being smug. So are all of you.

I am not alone in this attraction, given the number of books written on the subject... just check the libraries and bookshops, large and small, not to mention art galleries and museums... and that it has been prevalent since before the Emperor Hadrian spied the beautiful Antinous walking around Bithynion-Claudiopolis, I shouldn't be so concerned. But I am. The fact is, I'm a damn train wreck when it comes to romance. I'm impatient, imperious, vain and uncommunicative. J/P, bless his exceptional young Gallic heart, got around it, because, as he said, I was simply behaving like a Frenchman. But he's not here. And I don't want to do any more damage on my way out.

But after thinking about it, I have decided to abide by the words of that famous Southern philosopher and writer, Merry Noel Blake from the film 'Rich and Famous': "You let that boy stick around until your thighs turn to stone if that's what he wants to do!" I can always say he knew the job was dangerous when he took it.

Photos from the promotion for PAG - A Fragrance for all Creatures. There is a stunning video for the campaign at Homotography: http://homotography.blogspot.com/2011/12/pag-fragrance-for-all-creatures.html#more

whose to say we stood our ground or ran away

2011-12-10T23:44:00.002-05:00

They made the odd pair. I'd defy anyone to say they knew a man better looking than Thom, a Southern aristocrat of poise, wit and charm. Kenny, on the other hand, was tall and lanky, and homely as a mule. But the man could belt out a song like Len Cariou and move like James Cagney, and he was funny in a way that was so different from Thom, but they complimented one another somehow. Their flat was a shrine to Stephen Sondheim and Noel Coward. There was a piano, but no television; an old record player, but no refrigerator. On week-ends the food and the conversation and the people were none of them 'top-drawer', but the Algonquin Roundtable wouldn't have been able to keep up, I can tell you.

That all stopped when Kenny got too sick to stand up. They moved to San Francisco for reasons I don't recall, but it was there that I walked onto the ward one afternoon to find Elizabeth Taylor reading to a dozen boys. Their rapt attention put their pain aside for a while each day. No one knew Liz did this except her rapt listeners. She never took any credit for it. But that's what it was like in the early years of plague when AIDS was a death sentence. We were fighting a war and loosing. I didn't understand yet that it was a war, regardless.

When there wasn't anything else they could do they sent Kenny home. Thom took care of him and I came up from LA when I could. Then that terrible night. Kenny had two tumors growing at incredible speed, one in his brain and one in his throat. If the brain tumor grew faster, he'd loose consciousness and die peacefully. If the tumor wrapped around his throat won the race, he'd slowly strangle over 8 to 12 hours. The doctor came by and left a harpoon with a lethal dose of morphine then drove away without comment. I left the room when the time was right to leave them to their last minutes. An hour or so later Thom came out and called the doctor to tell him Kenny was dead. I never saw the syringe again and I never asked about it. Something things are better left to God and the dead, where there are no recriminations.

I moved Thom down to my house in Long Beach. I remember coming home one day and was he crying as though his heart would break. "I miss him so much," he told me through the tears. I envied him that intimacy. I didn't think I'd ever be able to open up enough to miss someone like that.

But then I met JP. He was much younger than me, but it wasn't like I fell in love with him because he was a safe bet or anything. The night of his motorcycle accident, after he was cleaned up from looking like a war casualty and put to bed, the blood suddenly started pouring out of him for no reason, and we were applying pillows and bed sheets trying to make it stop until the medics ran in and threw us out. I stood in the hallway with my lover's blood on my hands and clothes, and I thought it doesn't get any worse/better than this. How could we ever be closer?

But three months later when they cracked me open like a lobster to fix my leaky valve he disappeared and didn't re-emerge for 3 months when I was back in the US thinking I was going to die every time I sneezed or took a step. I never felt any bitterness, though I was tempted to say that it smacked of cowardice in the face of the enemy. I'd done what I'd done and he'd did what he did, and that was that. We're all prisoners of our character, I suppose, and I couldn't blame him for not doing something that he wasn't capable of. But he'd been afraid he was going to loose me and he did anyway. There's an example of irony if you ever need one.

I don't know if there's time to be worthy of that intimacy again; either of us. It seems a bit of a shame when I look back. Both Thom and I dealt with lovers dying because of blood, one way or another, and weren't we courageous? You don't think you'll be dealing with their war wounds when you meet. You forget how brutal life can be in the midst of taking them for granted. But when they're strangling or bleeding to death, it comes home to you like the feel of a mallet smacking you on the side of the head. But you can't hang onto it; it fades away.

I know this, because when I think of JP I don't think about that night at the hospital. I think of him standing on that platform at the Metro station in Lyon months before the accident. We'd been to the best restaurant in town and he was in a purple shirt with a dark purple tie, a black suit and overcoat. It was the first time I realized that he was taller than me. Every detail is crisp, down to the smell of the creme in his hair and the color of his socks. I even remember the imprint in the material his tie was made from; the stitching on his shirt collar. I remember him this way, because at that moment he was perfect. And then, without either of us realizing it, the moment passed and his perfection began to fade.

It's gentler, anyway, than war.

The portion of the Teamm8 Athletic Collection as shot by James Demitri

Sorority Girls From Hell

2011-12-08T16:53:00.001-05:00

When I was in college... back before the flood... I remember getting so stoned one night I could barely move. The TV was on, I was alone, and it was around 1:00am. A logo popped up on the screen, two crossed rifles, and the proud caption read "Winchester Productions". To my addled brain this made sense, because the music accompanying the logo was somewhat patriotic/western in nature, so I settled back to mellow out with an old cowboy movie.

Two seconds later, quasi cowboy music changed abruptly to screeching, high pitched, 50's sci-fi music and the fuzzy B&W screen informs me that I'm actually about to be subjected to "The Thing From Another World" ala 1951. Though it rattled the hell out of me at the time... no, I was REALLY stoned... it has since become one of my favorite films. Produced by Howard Hawks in a rare foray away from Westerns, the film is remarkable for its underplayed, natural dialogue where people talk over one another and don't always finish sentences. What's also remarkable is the work of a young Dewey Martin, one of the handsomest guys you'll ever see, even by today's standards, who left the movies abruptly after a string of forgettable titles that were shot primarily to show off his lean, toned physique.

Hawks produced the film, and some insist directed it as well, to see if the 50's sci-fi craze had legs. He subsequently decided it was all just a fad and went back to producing Westerns, which is a shame, because the film is a rare gem, though James Arness as the green, over-the-top vampire carrot doesn't shine... or even glow. It was his first film role and legend has it that Hawks was driving him to the studio in make-up for a screen test when he stopped at a traffic signal on Wilshire and Beverly. A woman in the next car turned and saw Arness, screamed and fainted. This was enough validation for Hawks and the killer carrot was born.

I had the pleasure of working with Arness a couple of times as I bounced around Hollywood trying to figure out what I wanted to do. He steadfastly refused to acknowledge even being in the film, insisting that it was someone else entirely, though his name remains in the credits. The film's final moments where the monster is French fried remains troubling as the 7' tall Arness is gradually reduced to a pile of smoke and ash, with the help of a Little Person who was hired to play the half-way fried monster. I don't know who they got to play the final pile of greasy ash.

Watching the film again the other night, and still enjoying it, I was reminded of a spoof by Lois Bromfield called 'Sorority Girls From Hell' that owes something to films like 'The Thing'... and probably a whole lot more to Mystery Science Theatre 3000. You can still find it on YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YmH5K9SI--0. Watch it with someone you love.

I punctuated this rather mundane recollection with some shots of my favorite Ibiza Boy, River Viiperi in a photo essay by Justin Wu called "Paris Under Fire" which appeared in the January, 2010 issue of Vanity Teen. And if you're disappointed that River's not showing any skin...

...well, don't say I never gave you anything.

Neverland by Night

2011-12-05T22:14:00.002-05:00

I wanted to tell you that I haven't posted anything new over the last few days because I was finishing the book. It's now available at the Amazon Kindle store, to my absolute terror. I've included an excerpt below, so you can take a look and decide for yourself if I should write another one or just hang myself now and save the mob the trouble. The Amazon link is: http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=search-alias%3Dstripbooks&field-keywords=Neverland+by+Night&x=12&y=13

1: Prometheus Twilight

THE BOY

The gloom ruined while the Boy watched the Sids leave the beach one by one. Their mood was grim. Behind them, near the wreck of some human concern, was the concrete wedge where those who erred, or would not be saved, met the sun face to face with no questions asked about the outcome. Chained to that wedge was a powerful Sid. A prince. It bode ill that one of such eminence could be so casually exterminated. If there were trouble at the top, then the shit would eventually roll down hill. The bigger the trouble, the mores the shit and as this one was about as high up as could be, the wall of turds tumbling their way would be impressive, no doubt about it.

The Boy stayed on the wind-swept bluffs well behind the coast road until the last immortal… that was a laugh… reached the wrinkled ribbon of weed strewn pavement that stretched from beyond here all the way to there, wherever that was. Then he broke into a run. The wind swept back his heavy chestnut hair and blew his shirt off his shoulders, revealing a smooth tan chest, lean and sculpted, like an athletic boy of 17, though he was far, far older.

At the bottom of the bluff a drunken chain link fence separated the rise from the road, but he vaulted over this effortlessly and as he rose he couldn’t resist the urge to turn a somersault or two. He landed squarely in front of the Sid, startling him out of his wits. Boys falling out of the sky, almost on top of them, doesn’t happen to Sids very often, so he wound up irritated and difficult to deal with.

“What’s going on?” asked the Boy, as though he had just arrived on a summer’s day looking for a ball game or a BBQ. His tone and question were so out of place that the Sid frowned, sniffed the air, growled and tossed his head to and fro. "What the fuck?” he finally sputtered.

The Boy tugged his shirt back in place and shoved the hair out of his eyes. He studied the Sid, a young Asian male not more than 20 when he was made, and not a good deal older since. The Sid glared back, a combination of warning and menace, but it was a pose. He could neither sniff out this Boy or even sense him, though he was clearly there. He looked like a suburban brat, the kind he hated, even when he was alive, but there was no substance to him. He stared deep into the Boy’s grey, wolfish eyes and was glued where he stood. A boy like this was not in his experience. “Who are you?” he finally gasped.

“A curious bystander’s all,” the Boy replied, again glancing toward the beach. “I was wondering who you had on the block down there.” The Boy looked back at him expectantly, but when the Sid didn’t answer a wind kicked up and a large clump of dry grass bounced off his head. The Boy grinned for a moment like it was all a joke, then became deadly serious. “Well?”

“The brother’s name is Hunt.”

HUNT

Hunt sprawled across the massive bed indifferent to the silk sheets Vail had taken weeks to scrounge. His johnnies had searched by day and at night, if no silk was found, tasty meals were laid, patience not being a Sid virtue or even one to be cultivated. Nobody made silk anymore; not even the Chinese. In the famines that had followed the war, silk worms had gone to soup and stews like everything else.

He looked down his gray haired, muscled torso as Vail finished lighting the 100 candles in the room, though with his preternatural speed, he finished lighting the last one almost as soon as the first one sputtered to life, the flickering light playing off his smooth, pale skin. Hunt was remotely moved. He noted the deep curve of the boy’s back where it met his ass, his finely formed puppy feet, his perfect chest and abs. Not bad for a toy. He had stumbled over him, literally, in the drudge of the ghetto and was mildly amazed that he had found him before some dolt had decided to serve him up, stripped and washed and struggling, for a banquet organized for no other reason than to relieve the boredom.

Vail finished with the candles and turned back toward Hunt, impressively hard now, anxious for sex and blood lust. He dove across the bed and landed on top of Hunt, his fangs extended, growling with arousal. Hunt threw him off and pinned him to the bed, running his fangs over the boy’s nipples, grinding their groins together until they both squirmed and moaned, lost in fantasies of bondage and forced sex.

In moments, the hard-found sheets were torn and stained with blood. Hunt gave into his lust quicker than usual and with what might be called grace, effortlessly tossed Vail over on his stomach, expertly spread his butt cheeks and entered him in one quick motion. Vail clawed at what remained of the sheets and pushed back against his hairy lover’s thrusts. As Hunt reached climax, Vail suddenly wrenched free, twisted over and drew Hunt’s face to his.

“Look me in the eyes, Hunt! Look at me! I love you! Whatever happens, remember that I love you!”

Or some such drek.

Then the candles blew out and in the one terrifying moment before they fell on him, Hunt cried out for Dodge.

DODGE

The young man was waiting in an examination room belonging to a simple hospital on a small tropical island. The moon had only just risen, so the sea shown silver through the room’s window, not black, as you might imagine a lonely sea at night.

The doctor was immediately taken by the eyes, liquid eyes of a blue that was nearly luminous. He motioned to the guard who had followed him in to take his place in front of the door and then he nodded to the boy. He opened one of the files he carried under his arm. “Ah… Dodge, is it? A rather unusual name.”

The boy smiled a wan smile and the doctor began a cursory examination. “How are you feeling, Dodge?”

“Alright, I reckon.” A melodic voice with a strong Bristol accent, so it came out, “A‘right.”

You reckon? Nine days adrift and ‘you reckon’ you’re all right? You better get undressed.”

The boy sloughed out of his clothes without hesitation or embarrassment. The doctor was decidedly heterosexual, but he couldn’t help but be faintly aroused. The boy was 18, maybe 19, not tall, with a smooth, lean torso, thick blond hair and a sketchy goatee that was so light as to be nearly invisible. He was, frankly, one of the handsomest men the medic had ever seen.

“Will I be able to stay here, do you think?” Dodge asked.

“There aren’t a lot of other places to go…” The doctor pulled out his stethoscope. “Turn around, please. Where were you headed?”

The boy spoke as he turned. “We’d heard there were islands to the south that were still safe. We paid the captain a lot of money…” An ugly gash ran down the youngster’s right shoulder.

“Here, what’s this?” The doctor put his stethoscope back in his pocket.

“What’s what?”

“You have a nasty cut here.”

“I made a wreck of it getting into the life boat… when we left the ship. It was dark.”

“No, this is fresh. Did you hurt yourself coming ashore?”

“I didn’t think so.”

“Well, apparently you did. Wait just a moment…”

The doctor unlocked a small metal cabinet and drew out antiseptic and cotton pads. He didn’t notice the boy watching him over his shoulder and, once, licking his thin pale lips. The doctor returned and applying antiseptic to a pad paused before starting to clean the wound. “This is going to sting.” He began gently working, but the boy didn’t move or flinch. “You’ve been through a startling experience, Dodge. I don’t want you to worry about your staying here. I know we’re isolated, but we’re not savages… won’t need stitches.”

Dodge raised his eyebrows and glanced at the malevolent guard who only smiled tightly and nodded his head in a fashion more menacing than solicitous.

“Don’t worry about him,” the doctor replied to the glance. “It’s only a precaution. We’re safe and sound, and want to keep it that way.” He took a step back and looked the boy up and down. “Why aren’t you sunburned?”

“There was canvas and wood in the boat. We built a shelter.”

“Yes. I’m sorry about your friends. It must have been terrible watching them… well, it must have been terrible.”

“Y-y-yes. They sustained me. When they were all dead I didn’t know what I was going to do. But then I saw your island.”

“You had no idea when you boarded that ship that the crew was vampires?”

"Sids.”

“What? I’m sorry?”

“They’re called Sids. I mean, that’s what they called themselves… on the ship.”

“Oh yes, I do seem to recall something about their calling themselves Sids. Rather silly, wouldn’t you agree?”

The boy suddenly spun around, grabbing the doctor by his lab coat. “The rest of them are still out there! Some of us figured out what was going on. We tried to warn them, but they didn’t believe us…” The words caught in the boy’s throat and he suddenly buried his face in the doctor’s shoulder letting out a sob.

The man hesitantly pulled the boy close, shrugging at the guard in indecisive dismay, letting his hands slide down the boy’s naked back. He was so cold. He rubbed his hands briskly over the boy in an attempt to warm him. Absently, he also noticed that he had no scent. You’d think that after 9 days adrift… Where had that gash gone?

The boy pulled away. “Isn’t there’s anything we can do? You don’t know what’s happening to them!”

The doctor felt the sharp edge of anxiety blot out his own questions. He couldn’t even imagine. “No. Nothing. Even if there was anything still resembling a navy out there, I’m afraid all they’d be able to do is sink her. Poor devils.”

“Yes. Afraid. Are you ever afraid?”

“It’s a luxury I can’t afford.”

“I can help you with that.” In an instant, the boy smashed his hand into the medic’s mouth and grabbed hold of his tongue. The man fell back against the wall, tearing at the boy’s arm, but it was like stone. “Rather silly. Wouldn't you agree?” whispered Dodge.

Through his tears, the doctor could just make out the fangs when the young man smiled. The guard, in the room for just such an emergency, moved his mouth like a codfish once or twice and then fainted.

Somewhere at the back of the doctor’s brain, in a dark place free of the pain and fear that was running riot over the rest of his consciousness, he became aware of the boy’s image starting to dim. At first he thought this was because he was dying and so his eyesight was failing. But his eyesight wasn’t failing. The boy was fading away. He could clearly see the wall behind him now, with its charts and medical diagrams. At the same time he was also aware that he was filling up, becoming bloated, too tight for his skin. Somehow the boy was inside him.

Resolved into a mist that blasted through the pores of the man’s tongue, Dodge struck out in a thousand different directions. He was now made up of millions of tiny suction cups that were siphoning off the doctor’s life. There was no pain, but there was terror. With his precise knowledge of the human body, the man knew exactly what was happening to him, centimeter by centimeter. As he became weaker, he reached out for the examination table to steady himself and saw that his hands had resolved to claws of flesh and bone.

His head began to slip into the collar of his shirt, because his neck was collapsing. He was having difficulty breathing. As his hips disappeared, his pants and under shorts slid to the ground, piling up around his ankles. Finally, his eyesight began to dim, for real this time. Certainly this was the last thing he had expected.

He clinically judged himself to be delirious just before he collapsed to the floor like a dried out corn stalk, because he realized that he was laughing out loud. How they’d thought all this would pass them by. And now, in a week, their island would be a graveyard. What a joke that was!

Dodge escaped the ruined body and reassembled himself, a bit greasy, but that would soon dissipate. He reached over and ran his hand down his right shoulder. The gash was completely gone now. He had had to re-open it more than a few times while he waited for the doctor, but it had been necessary to distract him. If he'd used his stethoscope, he wouldn't have found a heartbeat. He casually snapped the guard’s neck and then reached for his clothes.

As he did so, he felt a kick to his middle that doubled him over and almost knocked him to the floor. Through the pain, he could hear his name being called, frantically, and for the first time since being made, he was afraid. Suddenly he realized that the voice calling to him was Hunt’s. What was that son of a bitch doing in his head?

A second blow came and this time through the haze he could see Hunt. He was naked, covered in blood. Johnnies had strewn him with garlic and lassoed his ankles together. They were dragging him away. And in the shadows he could make out Vail washing the blood out of his ass and grinning like the Cheshire Cat.

copyright © 2011 by T.E. Tondreault

ruffians and goldfish

2011-11-27T22:18:00.008-05:00

" I was just out of college. I was broke. It's the oldest story in the world. Boy meets girl, boy wants girl to do dominatrix film. Girl says, 'Naked?' Boy says, 'Yeah". Girl says, 'Forget it!' Boy says, 'OK, then wear this rubber dress and beat the old guy with a scrub brush!' Girl says, 'How hard?'"
Karen Walker

That particular scenario never entered the picture. I'm not even sure that's the kind of regret I've been feeling lately. Certainly, if it wasn't a scrub brush, it was something else. But those thoughts don't leave me feeling good or bad one way or the other. Guilt doesn't enter the picture at all. A man I respected terribly once told me that guilt is what we put ourselves through to make it OK to do it again. That struck home for me like a cymbal. I never thought that God was offended by what I did. It just seemed that any deity who could create the universe couldn't be much offended by my piddling offenses. He had Pol Pot, after all.

No, my thoughts keep going back to the one that got away, the one I let get away, the one to whom I never gave a sidelong glance. Even a smile. It was such a mash-up, really. On the one hand, I tried to be good, not to just see people or potential partners as objects. Usually, I tried to identify some moral compass. I won't sleep with him, because he has a partner. I'll win his respect. We never speak now, years later. Seldom see one another. I should have slept with him and been done with it. Could it have turned out any worse?

Then there are the ones I inexplicably let slip away. The boy at the gym who adored me. When the moment of truth came, I walked away. Fear of intimacy. Arrested development. Cowardice in the face of the possible love interest. There have been enough films and television dramas written about this that I can't possibly be alone in these dilemmas. Still, they come back to haunt me, usually when I least suspect... taking a walk, drinking a coffee, sitting with friends. Of late, I even vent my regret out loud without realizing it." Leave me alone, damn it!" "How stupid I was." (Uh-oh. Mother's back in the bunkhouse. Better take her wine away.) I'm becoming a doddering old fool before my very eyes, but I'm still sharp as ever and I'm hardly old.

When I was in the theatre, I did a play called "The Ruffian on the Stair" by Joe Orton. It's an intimate piece, only 3 characters... 4 if you count the goldfish. In short, a young man, Wilson, makes love to the wife of the assassin who murdered his older brother, Frank. He does this, because the brother was also his lover, and since he's a good Catholic boy who can't commit suicide to join his twisted beloved, he arranges to be in bed with the wife when the killer comes home and in a rage kills him, thus enabling blessed release. Orton did go over the top every now and again.

It's also a challenging piece for an actor. From an emotional perspective there's no place to hide. The boy stands naked on stage and reveals all to the clueless wife and the audience. I played Wilson, by the way, just in case that escaped you. The director was a brilliant woman named Cynthia Gallis, long since passed, unfortunately, as she was an incredible director. She never let me waver, never let me divert around the moment. Instead she she insisted that I play it right down the middle, head on, like meeting a goddamn train. Night after night we went over it again and again. She was uncompromising in every respect. I hated her more than I can say. But it was the best performance I ever gave.

I do hope that I have one more crack at this love thing. Sometimes, I think that my number has run out. That there's some infinite lottery and when it's done, it's done. But if there is one number left, I plan to go right down the middle, just like Cynthia insisted. I'm tired of the regret and I'd like something else to focus on.

(Oh, and in case you were wondering, when Wilson is shot, the killer fires two bullets. The second one kills Wilson while the first one shatters a fish bowl and leaves the poor fish dead on the carpet. And between the two, it's the fish whom the vacuous wife mourns. Orton had the same contempt for regret that I do.)

Via Homotography (http://homotography.blogspot.com) photographer Mikael Jansson delights us with a bathhouse-themed editorial in the February 2011 issue of Interview magazine. Styled by Karl Templer, the steamy 'Elegant Tailoring' features models Ethan James, Mathias Bergh, Bastiaan Van Gaalen, John Pearson, Lawrence Thomas, Ian Mellencamp and Breton.

if you see Taylor Lautner here, kill me

2011-11-25T19:39:00.005-05:00

It's the Friday after Thanksgiving here in the US and the day has a feeling all its own. Every gay boy from Los Angeles to New York is out running today, like mail carriers, in rain, snow, sleet and dark of night. This is because in a state delirium brought on by waiting hours for the damn turkey to roast with nothing but tastefully arranged crudites to ward off starvation, they ate carbs yesterday and now they must be excised before they settle in... a moment on the lips, a life time on the hips.

It is true that there are gay men who don't eat carbs on Thanksgiving... for the uninitiated, Thanksgiving dinner is practically all carbs, soaked in butter if done in the traditional way... but not everyone wants to go to mom's house whacked out of their minds on meth. It's a personal choice.

Black Friday (also known as Lizard Brain Friday), started at midnight. To date, there's only been one report of a shopper pepper spraying fellow shoppers in what authorities called "competitive shopping", like it's a valid strategy or something. And only one riot seems to have broken out, this because there were too many people who really, really wanted a $2 waffle iron, but not enough appliances to go around. Thank God, free market strategy has finally made its way down to the common folk. I saw the video... it looked like a scene from Spartacus: The Pastry Wars. At least no one's been trampled to death like last year. We have so much to be thankful for.

I was up at 8:30, went out and bought a plunger (toilet's backed up), a mouse pad and some groceries. It got a bit tense around the hot food area, but to the best of my knowledge everyone escaped without even minor injuries. I know, I'm being elitist. It's the smug conceit of having clawed my way to the middle. I'm also responsible for Star Trek having been cancelled. Let's not have secrets from one another.

During a lurid skype conversation... is there any other kind?... my friend Maxine let on that after the dinner she attended, everyone got naked and played charades. Why am I never invited to these outings? It is true that none of you know anything about Maxine, so a picture of Max and her friends playing charades in the nude could either be sublime or something from the 9th circle of hell. Be assured it's the former. They're all dancers in their prime, 3 girls and 4 boys. I'll leave it to you, dear readers, to conjure up that scene. It does make one consider how much nude fun goes on at Thanksgiving. Considering that dicks and hot cookers are always a dangerous combination, one would think not much.

And so life will go on through the week-end. By tomorrow night, every Italian and Mexican restaurant in America will be full up. Anything to get the taste of turkey, stuffing and cranberry sauce in all its guises out of one's mouth before the advent of the turkey soup, turkey hash, turkey tarts and turkey chopped liver. But none of this negates the rapture of having cold pumpkin pie for breakfast... don't try and deny it. You know who you are.

A photo essay of UK diving champion Tom Delay... I bet he eats carbs... ala A Cause des Garcons

(http://www.acausedesgarcons.com/2011/04/tom-daley-le-surdoue-des-plongeoirs.html)

Nesting With Wolves

2011-11-23T20:30:00.003-05:00

It's cold and windy here in Atlanta this Thanksgiving. In Midtown, the trees are all turning and the cross-breezes sweep wind devils down the street and past the sign that marks where the Union lines were in August, 1864. Johnny Cash is singing "I Hurt Myself Today" in the background. There's an open bottle of Jack Daniels on the counter and on this Thanksgiving, I'm in my own flat for the first time in six years.

I was going to say that there's nobody special around these days, but actually there're a lot of special people around, I'm just not sleeping with any of them. Since I wrote last, there's been a 24 year old Marine, rugged, handsome, lean and mean, who likes to relax in women's clothes; a 26 year old Chinese millionaire surfer; a 30 year old Russian gangster and an 18 year old landscaper who went mad one night for reasons no one seems to understand. I just can't seem to settle down.

Also since my last visit here, I've been to Danville, Virginia; Los Angeles, California; Houston, Texas; Macau, China and Hong Kong SAR. Hong Kong and Macau were the best. There wasn't a day went by that I didn't meet someone amazing, worldly, and utterly beautiful. So, yes, my life remains as surreal as ever.

But it's utterly peaceful now. After all the travel, projects, alcohol, men, boys and being cracked open like a lobster, there's a tremendous calm in looking back on it all. It's not over. But it has changed. I'm older now and I don't care much what people think. My temper's quicker, but so's my wit. I tend to stare down people who look at me disapprovingly. I never did that before. It's been that way since the surgery, like they flipped a switch while they were in there. It's enormously satisfying. The people who know me well can see it coming and they yank me into alleys or vacant store fronts so I can vent to the concrete. They don't get it; but they will.

I'm also gentler than I ever was before. Walking into a particular bar for a night cap, a young patron starred me down and wondered aloud why they let old people in after their bedtime. I just finished my drink instead of tossing him into traffic as I might have done a couple of years ago. On my way out, I stopped and put my arm around him and told him he'd be there soon enough and bought him a drink. He told me to fuck off. I told him that was alright and let him keep his teeth.

The book's done. I'll finish the final edit tonight and get it off on Friday. Here's the cover:

Thanks to all of you who kept checking back. Wherever you are when you read this, I hope you're safe and warm, and that someone beautiful and mysterious is staring at you over the top of his newspaper.

Happy Thanksgiving.

The rather mysterious Philip Ellis as shot by Damon Baker via Homotography

hotels and other conceits

2011-08-27T14:15:00.001-04:00

I find that I do my best work when I write in a hotel. I have no idea why that is. I am a hotel snob and am very particular about where I stay. I use to think this was because I'm elitist, but now I'm not so sure. Maybe I choose particular hotels because I know sub-consciously that they're the best places for me to write. Burroughs had his muse, I have my hotels.

I'm also aware that all of the hotels I frequent are also familiar to rent boys. I'm not sure if this is an extension of my hotel damon or if it's simply a coincidence of economics. Whatever it is, it's convenient.

Anyway, the book, for better or worse, is one chapter away from being finished. It is what it is, but I'm pretty happy with it. If nothing else, I wrote a book. And I think that's quite an accomplishment. Even if it's a bad book... which it isn't.

http://nlbn.pandamian.com if you'd like to give it a go.

Sami Alliot photographed by Sylvain Norget for Encore.

fear and loathing in los angeles

2011-04-17T15:36:00.001-04:00

Greetings from Los Angeles... at least for now.

I guess the link to the book hasn't been working, probably because the Tumblr site really wasn't what I needed to move it along the way I intended and when I found the new site I fucked up the link. Haste makes waste, as they say. The link for the book site is:

http://nlbn.pandamian.com

And, yes, this is where I've been hurling all my energies... frightening, isn't it? Otherwise, nothing's going according to plan, which was the plan all along... I guess.

Do you know how much I miss you guys??

watson... what have you done?

2011-02-24T16:36:00.002-05:00

Whether we like it or not, nothing is constant and that's probably for the best. Otherwise, life invariably becomes too comfortable and we stop growing. I know that as people get older, change becomes more and more unsettling, but the way to deal with that is to embrace the change rather than resist it, difficult as that may be, and I have some embracing to do, no doubt about it.

For me, with few exceptions, the last 10 years have been quite plush with lots of adventures and plenty of love, food and drink. And then, of course, the heart surgery which was a singular journey in itself, one that given a choice I don't think I would have missed. And through it all, there was a blog in one form or another, this current one being the one I enjoyed the most and learned from the most.

But now it's pretty evident that it's time for a shift that may be overdue, or not, I don't know, but I do know that everything around me has changed and these events are pulling me along with them. It's also evident that about 90% of the life processes I learned growing up are no longer workable, or even valued, and I've started looking at new ways of doing things, new ways of thinking about things, and I'm excited about that.

There are two writing projects that have been sitting on the back burner for the last 5 years or so while I engaged heavily in wine, boys, song and work, not necessarily in that order, and now I find that a lot of people are pushing me to finish them and I guess that's what I'm going to do, which means that this blog will go fallow for a while, maybe permanently, but I wanted to thank all of you who read and commented, especially the latter. I have opened a new blog on padamian.com (nlbn.padamian.com) which will concentrate on one of the writing projects, so if you'd like to catch a whiff of what I'm working on, check it out.

I keep hearing that blogging is dead, which is nothing more than a conceit, but it is changing and I want to try some new things and experiment and I'm looking forward to that and I hope you are as well.

All the best,

Tim in the City of Angles

LA Coffee Rapture

2011-02-17T17:28:00.004-05:00

I’m sitting in an upscale coffee house (a pound of coffee runs about $20… that’s upscale, right?) near downtown LA. A lot of guys in expensive t-shirts, cardigans, loafers w/o socks. And dogs, and not one is a pound rescue, I can tell you. It’s not that an upscale coffee house in LA needs to be gay, but it needs to have a pretty good mix of gay, if you know what I mean, all the baristas from the REALLY gay coffee houses west of here, slumming. Either way, from where I’m sitting I can only see two women. The other 10 people are all guys, as discussed.

Now, not to put too fine a point on it, I am attracted to young men. Not Catholic priest young men, but, say, age 20 to 30 in other words. Legal. I wouldn’t bring this up, because it’s probably TMI for most of you, but it is integral to the post, so there’s that. Anyway, just in front of me is a fine looking guy, maybe 22, and he’s alternately staring at the screen of his Mac workbook pro and staring at me. He thinks he’s being surreptitious, but he might as well be sending up flares. I have this effect on young men, hence the attraction.

The place isn’t that crowded. It’s a popular place, but at 5:18pm on a Tuesday there are plenty of empty tables. And this guy we’re discussing is sitting at the end of a bench that runs at a perfect right angle to the table where I’m sitting, maybe 10 feet away. And as our cruising is reaching a quiet crescendo, this Holden Caulfield look-a-like comes and sits in the exact center of the bench, interrupting the flow of pheromones like the Grand Coolie Dam.

The place is practically empty! You could fire a cannon through the place and not hit… well, okay, the lesbians at table 12 would have to move a little to their right… but otherwise, the projectile would just bounce harmlessly onto Sunset Blvd, and he chooses this place to sit?? I’m at a loss, I really am, and… and… I hate him. I can see Boy Wonder trying to reestablish contact through the pomade holding this guy’s hair in, well, in a shape not found in nature, I can tell you, but there’s just too much interference. True, he could get up and re-establish contact at another table, or simply walk over and drop his telephone number on me, but there are pretty strict rules governing these situations, in case you didn’t know.

Now, this guy doesn’t know I hate him. He’s not expecting that, because 1) he’s as observant to what’s going on around him as a fire hydrant and, 2) you just don’t walk into an upscale coffee house, sit down and expect to be hated… but, really, this guy should get out more, because his social awareness is about as dense as a black hole and this is LA after all. And it strikes me that this is really pretty funny, that there’s this whole turbulent cruising/hating/May-December lust scenario going on in the ether around us on this peaceful Tuesday evening and I wonder what else the ether is holding, the love, hate, joy, despair, ennui that makes up the daily existence of an upscale coffee house in LA.

And now my guy is packing up and he’s gotten a phone call from some long lost love, or at least like, and whatever moment we were having is gone now and we’re all moving on to the next moment. And I wonder what would happen if we could grab at least one of these moments each day and hold it in place longer than was ever intended. Would it change anything? Or would the ether crack and spill out a million battling emotions that would inundate us and sweep us away in some great catharsis of zeitgeist, past and present, and Ami Mann would be singing, “It Ain’t Gonna Stop ‘Til You Wise Up” in the background. Yeah. The tempo of the music running counter to the deluge… like on Hill Street Blues…

Ok, skip it.

And my guy’s walking out now. I make one last attempt at eye-contact, but he glides by, iphone stuck to his ear like a surgical implant, eyes straight ahead. And even as I go for that final ocular grab, I’m thinking, he’s not as hot as I thought… and I go back to my book.

So, Cal and his blog moved on to another post and I brought the guest post here along with the photos I'd wanted to post with it. The coffee mugs are a 17 oz design by Chaiyut Plypetch for Propaganda out of Thailand.

The more interesting snaps are from the first issue of Supplementaire (February, 2010), a quarterly that can be visited on-line or acquired as a COFFEE-table book (in case you were wondering what he had to do with freshly brewed java... it's a reach, I know). The model Mason B. is photographed by Kemuel Valdes.

exodus for a day

2011-02-16T13:10:00.000-05:00

I was invited by my friend Cal to do a guest post for his blog. If you can't live without me, you can find it at: http://calvinminushobbes.blogspot.com. There're no photos... He doesn't do photos on his blog. Try and muddle through as best you can.

wrestling @ The Pines

2011-02-03T14:59:00.005-05:00

The view of the city from the top of The Pines looks like a matte shot from any Harryhausen film. At that distance time crawls and the sunlight works its magic on the landscape. LA is famous for its smog and always has been. The first Spanish settlers along Alvera Street remarked over stories told by the Gabrielino/Tongva Indians of the mysterious mists that clung to the gullies and canyons. In the summer it can be brutal, but even then, and more so in the winter, the ionized particles reflect back the sunlight in a peculiar way so that near dusk the cities to the west, Century, Santa Monica, Marina del Rey, are shillouted against the haze and the sea glows pink and orange. To the east it's not so magical. Downtown LA has always reminded me of The Emerald City, but with the smog, it's the Wizard of Oz rendered in sepia that refuses to stay between the lines. Regardless, today I can see 30 miles.

Runyon Canyon Park, as The Pines is now called, is made up of two steep trails. To the west, it's a tolerable climb, mostly paved. The eastern slope is where people go to die. That slope goes straight up, carved into the dirt a dozen years ago and left to rut and ruin with each new rain. Usually LA gets 6" of rain per year, but this year we've had 26", so the eastern slope is a mini- Eiger. The state doesn't have the funds to make repairs, so you take your chances, running up the eastern slope. Even coming down is arduous with abrupt drops and unstable, gutted shoulders. In the cup formed by the two slopes sits the ruined foundations of the Huntington Hartford estate, razed by a developer in 1978 to avoid paying taxes on the structures. The name "The Pines" is still carved into the main gate at the bottom of the hill. Angelenos run and play in the ruins of their former glory.

Coming here is good for me, because it helps me throw off the anxieties that have slowly roasted me all night. I pick up work where I can, but I have applied to 22 companies since coming here in late December, some of them with 20, even 30, positions open, but I haven't heard so much as a whisper from any of them. Since there's a small glut of people like me on the market, I network with friends who have applied at the same companies, but for different positions, and their stories are the same: nothing. Two months; three months. I know people working at some of these companies, who are happy to recommend me, but in the meantime they tell me stories of teams going crazy, because essential positions are going unfilled for weeks and weeks while the ubiquitous Human Resource departments grind along doing only they know what. You can telephone, of course, or even drop by, but then people of limited experience and low hourly wage can excoriate you for not waiting quietly in limbo until they're ready.

But you can wait only so long and the question comes up day after day, should I take something low paying, something to tide me over? Forest Lawn is hiring... a crematory manager... ashes to ashes, dust to dust. And I picture myself with a clip board leaning over corpses in cardboard coffins, "Will that be gas today or charcoal?" But in the end, these places won't hire you anyway, because they can sense when someone shows up who doesn't intend to stay. You buy your interview suit from the charity shops to throw them off. Borrow a friend's 1992 Grand Am and leave the special edition Mini at home in the driveway. And in the meantime, you remember what you once had and try not to let that interfere with your self worth as you contemplate dumpster diving for dinner.

Thanks to the vicious eastern Runyon climb I have a bruised left knee, an aching lower back and metatarsalgia in my right foot. I throb and contemplate whether at 48 I'm too old to be climbing around these hills, or whether I'm getting all the bad karma out of the way at the same time. Either way, a doctor's out of the question, because there's no health insurance. Here in the US we deny health care to the members of our society who fall within a certain pay grade or are without steady work. We are the new Rome, you see. Survival of the fittest, the soft, pink and fat, mostly, is tantamount. American Exceptionalism at its most burnished and unworkable. Ayn Rand is quoted often, usually by people who have no idea who she is, so we know what we're striving for.

I'm lucky, because I still have money, occasional work, decent places to stay as I travel around the country chasing jobs that go unfilled day in and day out. Those who are employed can do the work of 2, maybe 5, and if they don't, there's plenty others to take their place. Welcome to the mines. That this system slowly saps strength and spirit is ignored. We excel at mediocrity. So, I remind myself that nothing lasts forever and that this too shall pass... and the pricks will get theirs... while I bind up my bruised foot and pull a brace over my purple/violet knee to exorcise my demons into the chewed up slopes of The Pines.

Following last year's Living Dance, photographer Yang Wang captures dancers Aurélien Charrier, Carlos Ferreira Da Silva and Liam Warren in a dynamic new session.

is horticulture sacred?

2011-01-24T02:17:00.003-05:00

"You have to get over Pete," she said. "You were doing just fine, but when you met him you made a left hand turn and you've never recovered." She knows me pretty well, but in the case of Pete she doesn't know what she's talking about. Actually, that's not exactly true, she knows a bit, but she's also jealous of him, by her own admission.

She thinks I was her boyfriend's best friend, but actually I was his lover... yes, I went through a period where I fell exclusively for straight men. Batteries of psychologists, yes, and priests. To no avail. The fact remains that two out of the three great loves of my life so far were with men who ultimately wound up marrying women of the strong, determined, one might even say pioneer spirit, variety.

Theories abound, but I am reasonably sure that we're too hung up on labels and we're simply sexual and sometimes that need is filled by a man and sometimes by a women, at least where the thinking set is concerned. Sometimes for a week, sometimes for life, the trick is not to trap one another and then pummel the shit out of ourselves. In the end, Pete wanted a blood family and I couldn't give him one. We still love one another, he just put me up at his house for 10 months, after all. The aspects swirl around us like fireflies. Ultimately, I'd say that the rules that influence our behavior, and especially our sexual behavior, are evidently becoming inadequate. We continue to evolve. And, as Pierre Teilhard de Chardin postulated, our continuing evolution moves us closer to God... of course, they locked him up somewhere out in upstate New York, I think, and threw away the key. So this line of inquiry is not without its consequences.

It seems to me that much of man's struggle has been brought about by his clashes with institutions that want him to remain the same: dull, frightened, easy to control. I wonder if that's the real story of Adam and Eve, but we got the inverted version. I don't reach for the apple (apricot... pomegranate... whatever) as often as I used to, but I wonder if I shouldn't try and regain my former curiosity. It's difficult, of course, since so many others like not being curious.

But it's been suggested before. Somerset Maugham's "The Razor's Edge". Robert Heinlein's "Stranger In A Strange Land", Joseph Campbell's interviews and essays on "The Power of Myth"... Burning Man. There are examples even before these, but those people wound up on pikes with all their limbs broken which made it difficult to write down any realizations they might have had.

At a party one evening, Dorothy Parker overheard a man of letters declare that journalists were not writers. Parker challenged the gentleman's statement and he, to prove his point, demanded that she use the word 'horticulture' in a sentence. A simple, safe determination with any one of a hundred competent replies. But Parker turned the whole comfortable outcome on its head by replying, "You can lead a whore to culture, but you can't make her think". The trick, as I see it, is getting someone to demand I use 'horticulture' in a sentence.

"The Emperor" by McKenzie James featuring CoverModel Hans and illustrations by Andrew Coimbra for Photographer&Muse.

cello wet dreams

2011-01-13T02:39:00.001-05:00

I'd been thinking about you on and off for several days, but you came in a dream last night. It was easier than I had thought it would be; the affection more natural. Kissing you was like quenching my thirst. I could look into those dark brown eyes and know exactly what you were thinking. You told me that you loved me.

I was late in arriving. It was cold and I sat in the car in the driveway watching you through the lighted windows of the house, the naturalness of you caught unawares. Dinner smells wafted across the yard and you were setting the table with flowers and candles, obviously happy, and I wondered if life could always be like this. In watching you, I saw my life reflected in your movements and attitudes, the pull of your shirt tucked neatly into your trousers; the twisting sinews of your forearms. Somehow we had become the same essence without our even realizing it, though the aspects of us remained entirely different.

It seemed that there had been a great uneasiness before, but that by coming together, things were as they should be. You held my hand and we drove to all the places I had told you about. Heads would turn as we passed. I knew they were looking at you, but you would smile and insist they were looking at both of us. Did I mention that we were wealthy, though I couldn't tell you how it had come to that. We had built ourselves such a world and I had the feeling we wanted for nothing.

You were lying across the bed in some warm and stately room, shirt open, feet bare. I leaned over and kissed you, because I couldn't imagine doing anything else. You pulled me close. I can still pick out your scent, fresh even after being out all day, with undertones of musk and bergamot. I could feel the slight chafe on the back of your neck where your starched collar scratched you over dinner. I made you a gift of silver, a fob and chain, sure only you would appreciate such an anachronism...

The sawing and hammering from the construction next door crashed into us and I lost you in the cold, mist and light of a dull morning. Being with you made the bleakness of the day difficult to crawl out from under. I don't believe dreams are windows to the future or speak to us in code or metaphor. I was cold and lonely, and my brain concocted something out of some flotsam of experience and imagination. As I get out more, meet more people, find work, re-build my life, you will fade, I think, along with the isolation and the frustration.

But I will miss you so.

Christopher Landon is photographed by Mariano Vivanco for Dolce & Gabbana's Uomini.

in the face of overwhelming numbers

2011-01-04T01:57:00.000-05:00

My friend Tom isn't what you'd call butch. He's a slight, Chris Colferish type of man, quiet, elegant in an odd sort of way in that his choice of clothes tends to be, I don't know, Martian? But he comes from money so whatever he chooses is always of the highest quality and that's where the elegant part comes in. Otherwise, cars honk at him when he's crossing the street, even if there's a signal, and if it were 1950 guys would be kicking sand in his face.

We met some years ago when I was just realizing that I was falling in love with opera. It was just one more blow to the Catholic picture I had of myself, already in tatters: first homosexuality and now OPERA?? So, I was sneaking off to the Music Center on Sunday afternoons, arriving back just in time for jeans, t-shirts and beer bust. Wobbling pitchers of $1 brew and blaring rock n roll juxtaposed themselves against Nessum Dorma and Largo al factotum. Overtime, I became aware of a slight young man, like a well-dressed fly on the wall, also in attendance each Sunday, and so we became casual friends and then close. Immersed in his strange habits, it seemed natural that after a while he'd take my arm as we walked. Odd, sometimes enraged, glances passed our way as people assumed too much. And that's when I learned about Tom's unyielding resistance to all things disapproving. He was Alec Guinness in "Bridge On The River Kwai", my very own Horatio at the bridge.

His parents had sent him to Fordham to study music. An excellent violinist, he had happily left for New York, but more to get away from hearth and home than to become the next Fodor Sandor. Tom loves his parents deeply and I understand he tried to explain to them what he was going through and where he was headed, but they knew best. $200,000 later, Tom's working for one of the largest floral shops in New York and Mums and Dads are furious that Sonny effortlessly ignored them. He comes west every winter to work on the Rose Parade and so it was we found ourselves at dinner Sunday night after long absence.

He's thinner now, which I wouldn't have thought possible, but the running battles with his parents and the staggering amount of business he has brought to his employer have left a hard streak of confidence in the man. It's evident this wasn't in the plan, but the wisdom of knowing what's best for yourself is also evident and I'm reminded that I took a similar route, back before the flood, my parents livid that I chose a life in the theatre rather than, well, anything. Looking at the rail-thin man/boy sitting across from me, I realize that appearances are, indeed, deceiving.

It's a wonderful evening, full of crisp conversation punctuated with warm laughter, his razor sharp intellect leaving me scrambling for citations. It's a good work out and a reminder of how isolated I've been and the toll that's taken. Half way through the meal I realize how much I've missed this man and how much I love him. When I mention Joseph Campbell and his admonition to "follow your bliss" his face glows and his body relaxes even further into his chair like I had brought up an old love for whom the flame still burned bright. "Have you seen "The King's Speech," he asks, taking my arm as we leave the restaurant. "It's playing just up the street. It will remind you of us." And he steers me out into the rain.

Model Stanny M. photographed by Jason Hetherington... for no particular reason, as near as I can tell.

not to waste a life

2010-12-30T18:09:00.005-05:00

So, today is the one year anniversary of my surgery. I don't want to dwell too much on that as it's probably only important to me. I sent an e-mail to the surgeon who performed the procedure and he wrote back a touching note. After a difficult operation, he lost a patient today, the first one in several months. Considering that he performs anywhere from 12 to 15 surgeries a week, it's a remarkable average, about 3%. The Italian state runs all things medical, so Italian doctors practice their craft out of passion rather than to become rich. Passion is not a word I come in contact with much these days. I suppose it's difficult to have passion for poisoned derivatives and AAA rated bonds that actually aren't worth the paper they're printed on.

I'd have to say that I have followed my passions most of my life. My problem is that my passions change frequency about as often as I change socks. This has led to a lot of wreckage left in my wake. Not something I'm proud of, but I've made a point of curbing that lately. I don't suppose that I'm any worse than anyone else, but I still have to look at myself every morning and I want to know when I gaze into those steely blue eyes that I've at least tried to maintain an acceptable standard.

My success has been mixed. I suppose my relationship with JP was my last great achievement in terms of passion, but his unquestioning acceptance of me had a lot to do with it. Still, I was determined not to be afraid and I wasn't. We loved hard, fought hard and in the end he lost me, because he was afraid of losing me. But we experienced passion, physically, mentally, and there was enough left over to forgive the rage that came from suddenly being left vulnerable and alone, in threatening that we could manage without the other.

When I look around with the clarity that comes from having your heart sit on a table while a group of doctors snip and sew, I can't escape the conclusion that there has to be something else, beyond the accumulation of wealth or just trying to make it from day to day without being smashed up too much. And I think that has got to be the people in my life, real and imagined, who deserve my attention, my honesty, my anger and that passion we've been talking about.

Hegel argued that we only experience being free by being recognized as such by others who we recognize in turn. Hegel’s belief turns on revealing how human independence is held in place and made possible by complementary structures of dependence. In his “Philosophy of Right,” he suggests that we experience our loved ones not as limits on our freedoms, but as what makes them possible. We can only be truly free and so truly independent in being harmoniously joined; we each recognize the other as endowing our life with meaning and value. Hegel doesn't mention anything about passion in this regard, but how can it not be understood? How can something so vital to our well-being, to ardour, not include passion?

In the meantime, where do I go from here, I wonder?

Bram Vercamer And Francesca Frame photographed by Kalle Gustafsson for "Storia d'Amore" in Shufti Magazine.

many happy returns of the season

2010-12-23T13:23:00.003-05:00

I want to take this opportunity to wish all of you a Happy Festivus! The airing of grievances (feel free to comment; all moderation and review tools have been removed) will begin momentarily followed closely by the feats of strength.

If you are not a follower of Festivus, or you've never hard of it, pity that. I'm happy to defer to the Holiday standby of Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.

If that tender old wish for peace and happiness is some how offensive, then I'm willing to wish you Happy Holidays.

If you're still not satisfied, how 'bout, Have a Nice Week-End.

Still unhappy, offended, displeased, irritated? Then how about Get A Life?

I think that covers it.

One final note, I'll be moving back to LA after Christmas. My time in the Deep South has been well spent and I'll be returning here often, but fortunes for the time being reside in Los Angeles and so must I!

Holiday eye candy this post courtesy of Tetu.com. Jesse was voted Mr. Gay in the November issue with 40% of the vote. And lest we fall prey to envy or licentiousness let's remember that no matter how good he looks here, someone, somewhere, is tired of putting up with his shit.

Bye for now!

the descending evening of our lives

2010-12-18T21:23:00.003-05:00

I look around the room that's more familiar to me than my family home. I've been coming here for 30 years. There's a formal name for the place, but to me it's always been 'The Ranch", 180 pristine acres in the mountains on the far side of Lake Arrowhead, about 100 miles east of Los Angeles. It's so secluded that I still get lost when I haven't been here for a while. When I'm serious about someone, I don't bring them home, I bring them here. Of the original 10 or 12 guys who were regulars most week-ends, only the owner Pat and I are left.

Others have come to take their place, men just as cherished and dedicated to the upkeep of the place as we were when we were building it. There are more dogs now than I ever remember being on the property, seven by my count. They seem to know they'll find a home here, like all the rest of us. I'm nervous about being with everyone again. Most of them haven't seen me in years, let alone since the surgery. I'm 30 pounds lighter, grayer, a far cry from the party boy I was right up until August of last year when JP and I stayed out all night drinking. I should be dead, but here I am.

For reasons no one seems able to explain, somebody decided it would be a great idea to get a whole pig and a dozen ducks, wrap them in palm leaves and bury them in a hole in the ground over a bed of hot coals and leave them there for a couple of days. And now there are about 40 of us marching down a slick, frozen hillside to dig up the pig and the ducks, and take them back to the house. 30 years ago, we all would have been naked. but we're older now and it's been snowing for 3 days. Coming down from the house we see a family of deer near the pit, but they move off when they smell the dogs. One of the newbies worries that bears might have come during the night and stolen our feast, but then someone reminds him that bears hibernate during the winter. "Good thing she's pretty," Pat comments stonily.

All and all it's a wonderful meal, succulent roast pork, crispy duck, ranch beans, potato salad, cole slaw, fresh baked bread. Someone has brought a gigantic box of See's candies, nuts and chews I think, and though everybody turns their noses up at it, by the end of the night the box is empty. Some of the West Hollywood crowd insist on wine, the rest of us drink beer, wrestle with the dogs, catch up with old friends. Everyone has mellowed, either, because of the excellent meal or because no one wants to remember a grudge or a slight on a night like this. One of the cutest newbies asks to see my scar. I acquiesce, but resist a quid pro quo. I'm the only one who knows that the ranch is mortgaged to the hilt.

When it's time to go, I resist the urge to ask for a ride down to the gate where my car is parked, about 3/4's of a mile away. The clouds have blown off and an icy wind whistles through the pine and cypress trees surrounding the property, but this could be the last time I walk this road and I want to remember it. The sky is a whirlpool of stars and they provide barely enough light to navigate. I can just make out the split rail fence that separates the road from a grazing meadow. We put it in when Pat decided he wanted to raise cattle. Goddamn cows wound up all over the place.

Jeff and I built that fence 25 years ago over a long summer week-end. He died in 1992. Johnny and I use to lay on a blanket out in the middle of the grass on warm spring nights after Pat gave up and had all the cattle sold. John was the best of us. He'd been molested by his parish priest when he was 14, but he never let on, not even to me, his most ardent admirer. I had noticed scars on his wrist during a long night of love making. He told me he had tried to kill himself when he was 17 and realized he was gay. He left out the rest. We'd look at the stars and plan for the future, but at some point he decided it was more important to finish the work he'd started on his wrists 5 or 6 years earlier.

Pat's partner of 35 years died last summer after being diagnosed with a brain tumor. He'd been crusty and unreasonable for years. Most of us thought he was an ass, but we overlooked it, because we all loved Pat. Seems there was a little more to it. There usually is, I guess. One year he'd made Pat run 1000 feet of extension cords out to the middle of the pasture when he decided he wanted a Christmas tree standing alone in the middle of nowhere. Pat groused the whole time, but the effect was stunning. Most of the others died during the years of plague in the 80's; a few others drifted away. But they're all still here: in the kind land, the trees, the wind whipping through the wet and trampled grass. And in a moment of crystal clarity, I understand that I am not my body.

As I close the last 100 yards to the gate, a strange thudding sound suddenly comes up around me. At first I think it's the gay flag Pat has posted on the flagpole. The flag is flapping, but the sound it makes is completely different. I stop and listen, and the sound is getting louder, stronger, but I can't tell where it's coming from. An instant later a full grown buck crashes through the brush and stops a few feet in front of me, its antlers magnificent, its nostrils flaring. He stares at me for what seems a long time and I stare back at him. Then he crashes through the brush on the opposite side of the road and he's gone. It's a fine exclamation point to the day.

Willy Vanderperre photographs the editorial July 19/20 2009 for the October, 2009 issue of Arena Homme+ magazine.

turducken? or would you prefer eel?

2010-12-07T22:56:00.003-05:00

So, yeah, Thanksgiving was a blast! I did the honors for about 18 people. Tidying up took about a week... ok, we only have the one maid and we made a real mess, so, yeah, it took her about a week. But she's legal and we pay above minimum wage so let's get that out in the open right up front.

For those of you not familiar with Thanksgiving as observed in the US, it was instituted by Abraham Lincoln as a day of remembrance and thanks for an end to the carnage of the Civil War. A noble and noteworthy observance. Since then, it has somehow gotten twisted into an orgy of food, drink and football with some nonsense about the meal being an almost actual recreation of the meal the American Indians and Jamestown colonists ate to celebrate the end of the settlement's first winter wherein everybody in Jamestown would have starved/frozen to death without the Indian's help.

In appreciation, once they were back up to snuff, the settlers slaughtered every Indian they could lay their hands on thus initiating 300 years of Indian Wars, so I'm not quite sure how the whole Indian/Settler Feast thing got started and overshadowed the Civil War, but it did and now it's all just too confusing to give a damn about. I will point out that at the end of the Indian Wars the US government concluded that they had cost $1M US dollars per Indian killed, so if any of you were wondering why we're in Afghanistan, we're just trying to break that record, because, you know, it's important that we stay Number One... at least at slaughtering indigenous tribal populations. It's all we've got since the Chinese have got hold of everything else including our parking meters.

Christmas has gotten so watered down, because, you know, we have to be so fucking politically correct that if Martins settled here we'd be celebrating Glaxnock in December along with everything else. This is all because the Christians co-opted December 25th from the Romans and then made up some myth about Jesus being born on that date in a stable and now everyone's sensitive as hell about it. The fact remains that the actual December holiday was Saturnalia and I think we'd all be a lot better off if we'd just go back to that, because now the two greatest holidays in the USA are both based on complete fabrications, but then so's most of our news reporting so I guess this shouldn't come as a surprise to anyone. And, yes, Christmas trees are a pagan tradition, angles sitting a-top them notwithstanding.

Anyway, because Christmas is like picking at a boil, everybody goes all out for Thanksgiving, because it's somewhat secular and everyone can get behind it without any fear of being blown up or something as equally expressive. You know we're very big on forgive and forget in this country which is why every Good Friday many of us spend a lot of time in church commemorating the Jews goading the Romans into crucifying some poor son of a bitch who suggested that everyone give peace a chance. But there're no hard feelings and if you don't believe me just remember that we're backing down (again) and letting the Israelis build settlements all over the goddamn place, pushing the Palestinians into oblivion even though they've been there since about 136 AD. But, you know how gracious we are over here.

So, research indicates that the original Thanksgiving feast enjoyed by the Indians and the colonists probably included roasted eels, popcorn, cranberries, baked yams and perhaps a sweetened corn pudding. This has somehow translated into roast turkey stuffed with anyone of a variety of regional stuffing recipes, green bean casserole, mashed potatoes, gravy, cranberry sauce and pumpkin pie. Accuracy is everything to us here in the US. To be fair, you can add/substitute baked yams and we should note that substantial changes have been made to the menu over the years, the most significant being the elimination of Jell-O molds served with mayonnaise dressing. These died out with grandma, which made the old girls' passing a lot more tolerable, not like it would have been if they had served, you know, Pop-Tarts or something like that.

Here in the South we have a regional Thanksgiving dish called a "Turducken". This is a chicken stuffed inside a duck which is then stuffed inside a turkey. Any wiggle room is taken up with bread dressing, meat dressing and cornbread dressing, respectively. The entire conglomeration is then deep fat fried in peanut oil in specially made vats. Afterwards, everyone sits around watching football and listening to their aortas turning into hockey pucks. This is one instance where I don't think red wine would help.

We can all rest assured that Guillaume Trullemans as featured here has never been anywhere near a Turducken, let alone feasted on one. Photographed by Martin Bing in Studio Ballaer.

my secret shame

2010-11-21T12:36:00.009-05:00

So, I like show tunes... no, that's not exactly correct. To be perfectly on point, I LOVE show tunes. When I watch Glee, I blubber like a school girl, but only when they perform show tunes... or Queen. I have no idea what that link is, but there you are. I sing them in the shower, "On the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe" being a favorite, during long drives to the country, when I cook, when I clean. I know all the words... and if any of you think I include even one note from the High School Musical series in this screed, I will put out your eyes. You must suffer the likes of Justin Bieber as I am tarnished by Zac Efron. At least Zac is fun to look at:

For a good long while I courted and then lived with a beautiful young man who had been a ghost writer for Stephen Sondheim, writing bridges and segues for him, as well as incidental music. We rented a piano and would spend many an evening signing selections from our favorite stage shows, elevating some to singular status (Send in the Clowns) while debunking others (anything from Oklahoma!). After we broke up, he returned to NYC to work with Sondheim, but we remained close friends. I distinctly remember the afternoon he telephoned me and in a rush disclosed that the cast recording of "Sweeny Todd" had been quietly released on the west cost that morning. I dropped everything and drove pell mell to the nearest music store to snatch their only copy, not that this was much of a challenge as no one outside of a small circle of NY theatre cognoscenti knew or cared about the Demon Barber of Fleet Street. I spent the rest of the day lost in the heady rush of Sweeny butchering his neighbors and Mrs. Lovett baking them into meat pies.

It was during these musical days that I learned the hows and the whys of musical numbers in musicals: they came into play when the emotions of the character were so strong that they could no longer be expressed in words. This explanation resonated with me. Being a young, masculine repressed homosexual male, these emotions were substituting for my own and the connection was made, inexorably. Whether the crisp, precision of Sondheim or the schmaltz of Andrew Lloyd Weber, I was hooked.

As my friends moved on to more complex and contemporary musical groups, I did too, of a sort, finding new solace in The Rocky Horror Show, Rent and Jekyll & Hyde. I supposed that the live aspect of theatre, musical or otherwise, had something to do with it, but the emotions weren't diminished by radio or YouTube. So a parallel course developed until I discovered opera and went completely off the rails. Now my friends listen to Lady Gaga and Vampire Weekend while I explore the sublime subtleties of "Les Pecheurs de Pereles" and "Sous le dome epais".

I'm not taking anything away from the Gaga lady. I understand the sublime is where you find it. But I am aware of a certain egg-head judgement cast over me, because I am clueless as to what the latest is from Hot Chip or Cruise Armada... and don't think there is some saving grace in that I am at least aware of these groups. I pilfered them from London Preppy's blog knowing I couldn't go wrong with that arbiter of cool's musical tastes. I simply trust that if LP is listening to these groups, they must be the most, the hip, the must have... although I do seriously question his taste in socks...

So that's it. I have laid myself bare. I could go on regarding my other sins: Edith Piaf, Judy Garland (like that's a surprise), Bette Midler... I suppose being a Madonna fan is something of a saving grace, but not in some circles. It will, of course, be my luck that when I stumble over my next great love, he will be completely immersed in the latest Silver Chair retrospective and have every album Black Sabbath ever made. That is the way of the world; opposites attract. But remember that he will be able to play his music at full volume, out in the open, while I will be consigned to a cork lined room lest the ears of the neighbors be polluted with "Nessum Dorma". I'm prepared for this. But if, on some sultry summer night, you come across the seductive strains of "Quando m'en vo'soletta" or even Edith Piaf singing "L'Etranger" then think of me and when you do, be kind.

And speaking of sublime, Jeremy Young photographed by Simon Harris for the 2nd issue of Seventh Man magazine... not sure how that photo of Zac got in here...

no really... 4 days ago

2010-11-18T20:00:00.000-05:00

"Your CV isn't being noticed, that's the problem..."

"I stapled a fried egg to it."

" It needs... I know! Photos! You need to add some photos to it... "

"Photos?'

"...like here. This one (indicates project for a major European auto manufacturer). THAT needs a photo!"

"I do point out that I saved them $1.5M."

"Who's going to read that?"

"erm... the recruiter?"

"You're dreaming. Words. That's all CV's are these days. Words, words, words. Words are boring!"

"So you think photos..."

"And colored text!"

"Excuse me?"

"You could also add colored text!"

"Along side the pictures?"

"Yes! That would make it stand out, wouldn't it?"

"Maybe I can find a Circus font."

"That would really include everything, don't you think?"

"Except for the 24 shallow graves I have in the crawl space."

"I'd say that's the way to get your foot in the door."

"With your company?"

"Oh no. I wouldn't hire you. You're over qualified, you see. But make those suggestions and you'll get noticed alright... 24, what?"

"Skip it. Should I wear the floppy shoes with the clown suit or...?"

"Eh?"

"I said, I welcome the arrival of our alien overlords."

"Oh. Yes, that will be good, won't it?"

scare crow jesus

2010-11-11T06:55:00.004-05:00

So, as you may know, we had mid-term elections here in the US a week ago Tuesday. Without going into the excruciating details of the US political process... herding cats may be an apt analogy... the conservative wing of the political spectrum was thrust back into power and in some cases it was the ultra-conservatives who gained an upper hand. This isn't to say that conservatives of any stripe have come back into fashion, it's more because a lot of people wanted to punish Obama, which to me is like punishing your dick, because you masturbate. Anyway, in the ensuing days the amount of anti-gay sentiment seems to have ratcheted up quite a bit and that always makes me wonder.

It's no secret that legislating morality is easy to accomplish and makes it look like you're doing something when actually you're not, and nobody's touting the Right's legislative plan, because there isn't one, so distracting the populace with fag-baiting makes sense. Also, a lot of people on the Right make a very good living on the gay condemnation gravy train, so there's that to consider as well. Historically, homosexuality was taken off the list of mental illnesses by the American Psychiatric Association in 1975 and in 1994 it followed up with the rather gentle remark that homosexuality is merely the way a portion of the population expresses love and sexual orientation. They also noted that it wasn't a choice or a moral depravity, but why spoil the beauty of a six figure income with the truth of it all? Regardless, science, especially the constantly debunked pseudo-science of gay rehabilitation, comes up as a pretty weak premise to hang your hatred on, so something more substantial is required to make it appear that you're someone other than a bigot and this is where religion comes in.

Now, in the first decade of the 21st Century, some of you might have difficulty getting your heads around the extraordinary hatred that can still be attributed to a bronze age sky god who preached only love and tolerance, but you can't argue with someone who's invisible and can condemn you to hell just by batting an eye-lash. If you believe Michael Baigent, Richard Leigh, Henry Lincoln and even Dan Brown, then it's pretty plain that the teachings of Jesus Christ were co-opted almost immediately after his death by men intent on grabbing and keeping power, which isn't much different than it is today. To paraphrase Voltaire, if gay people didn't exist, it would be necessary to invent them!

I'm not going to go into Sodom and Gomorrah or Leviticus, because the theological canon is all over the place regarding the interpretation of these passages and it's pretty clear that Paul of Tarsus co-opted what good remained in Jesus's teachings with his many letters condemning women, gays, equality and things that go bump in the night. But we can take a look at Jesus, perhaps a controversial look, at this man/god who reportedly died for our sins. Nowhere in any of the gospels does Jesus condemn homosexuality... maybe he thought it too icky to contemplate, but I doubt it. We're talking about god, after all, and considering what's been done in his name expressing my love for my same-sex partner through fellatio or a slow, meaningful fuck seems awfully tame... Yeah, I know, an ABOMINATION! Well, you can bite me. It's no more of an abomination than spending millions in secret donations to questionable political organizations while people who have lost everything go hungry.

In contrast, there does exist a likelihood that Jesus blessed a gay relationship, that being the story in the gospels of both Matthew and Luke of the Roman centurion who approached Jesus to heal his sick "servant", the word used in the Greek text being "pais". There are numerous examples in Greek literature to attest that the idiomatic use of the word "pais" should actually be translated as "beloved" and generally applied to same sex partners. It is also inescapable history that Cesar Augustus banned heterosexual marriage for serving Roman soldiers before the birth of Christ, so... well, what's a centurion to do?? In any event, I think you all know the story: the centurion asks Jesus to heal his sick... whatever he was. Jesus agrees to accompany him, but the centurion says he is not worthy of Jesus entering his house and tells him that he believes Jesus can perform his miracle from where he's standing. And when Jesus hears this he reportedly turns to the people around him and says, "I tell you, I have not found such great faith, no, not in Israel." And then Jesus tells the centurion to go home, that his "pais" is healed.

Granted this is only one example, but I know that mentioning it is going to make some people's teeth fall out. But this isn't something that can be swept under the rug in the name of theological consistency, i.e. god hates fags. Rather, it seems to demonstrate that what's important is faith, not who you love. But the bigotry that is currently being expressed has to be validated, you see, if not by science, then by Jesus so the avatar's message is again co-opted to serve the purposes of the powerful just as it was 2000 years ago. We keep crucifying this guy over and over for our own ends... that's gotta be leaving a mark. Certainly, there are individuals who are pursuing this course because of cold stone fuck hatred disguised as moral outrage. But there are others so engaged who privately bear us no animus. To them, our persecution is merely a means to an end, a way of maintaining power through fear and loathing. I don't know which is worse.

In "1984" O'Brian lectures Winston Smith on the heady maintenance of power for power's own sake, "If you want a picture of the future, imagine a boot stomping on a human face... for ever." And I do believe that this is what these people ultimately want, covered by a ragged, mis-used, scare crow Jesus that they drag through the mud, adding things like beastiality and pedophilia along the way for good measure. But experience tells us that these exercises in hubris can't last, though they may go on for quite a while destroying thousands or millions of lives in the process and if that doesn't highlight what should be important to us, I don't know what does. One thing I am sure about, though, Jesus is coming... and he's pissed.

I realize he's not "classicly" handsome, but I've always had a soft spot for Jamie Bell. Did he really pass on the role of Kenny in "A Single Man"? Wouldn't that have added a different spin on Mr. Ford's work. One of the great "what if's" of Hollywood.

praying for art; overrun by pedestrians

2010-11-04T20:02:00.002-04:00

So, I'm a huge fan of Lewis Black, the angry, erudite comedian that seems to be everywhere these days and deservedly so. Lately, I watched a clip from his Broadway show where he was very clear in his opinion that blogging isn't writing. And by 'very clear' I mean that he was magnificent in the fury of his indignation.

If you're taking a precise view of the tools a writer uses in the practice of his craft: plot, character development, motivation, subtext, irony... he's right. Very, very few of the blogs I read regularly utilize these devices. And to that point I find myself reading fewer and fewer blogs outside of a select list of political blogs I enjoy, primarily for their opinions and, at times, their outrage. But, like everything else in life, blogging isn't as black and white as Mr. Black would have us believe. Admittedly, out of everything I have read I can only think of two blogs that rise above the normal "rants to strangers" that seem to typify blogs these days. It's a safe place; you can always ignore strangers.

London Preppy (http://www.londonpreppy.blogspot.com) was unusual from the start and was certainly detectable as fiction... no one could possibly be as self-centered and obtuse as LP. The blog is largely fallow now as its author has gone on to write his first short story, published by Glasshouse Books in an anthology titled "Boys + Girls". The story in question is titled "Exit Through The Wound". LP's first full length novel will be published in September of 2011, also by Glasshouse and also titled "Exit Through the Wound". Following the transition from blog to literary work has been utterly fascinating.

Secondly, there is A Bristol Novella (http://www.abristolnovella.blogspot.com). Unfortunately, this blog also seems to have gone into hibernation, although there is a treasure trove of past posts to shift through if you're so inclined. ABN is quite a different work from London Preppy, more poetic and mysterious, though it didn't start out that way. Overtime it has become sublime, consisting of many subtle layers that can take considerable thought to unravel. I suppose one could say that the satire of LP arose out of the near debilitating ennui of the gay club-class and A Bristol Novella developed from a clash over the lure of the pub and the lure of the monastic romantic. Both are rich in their depth and certainly worth reading. To my knowledge, ABN doesn't have a book in the works, but we can hope.

I wish I could say that I am in some way an inheritor of these works, but I'm not. Though I enjoy blogging, I've never actually been able to make up my mind what I'm blogging about, so I drift from topic to topic like a ship-wrecked sailor, without purpose or clarity of intent. But it does serve to keep me sane, so I'll give it that. I am working on a novel whose subject matter my editors refused to take seriously until I convinced them (you know, begged) to read a few pages. To Mr. Black's point, the two processes are entirely different, one the wild, wild west and the other Aristotelian, regardless of the subject matter. I guess the point is to appreciate the effort of the former and the art of the latter.

Supermodel and Karl Lagerfeld muse Babtiste Giabiconi graces the pages of Tetu magazine, circa 2007 and, in the last photo, Numero 2 Magazine, though I can't find a citation for the year. But as most things get better with age...

anne frank, anne frank, the soldiers are gone come out and play...

2010-10-27T22:23:00.004-04:00

So, I'm sitting in a club called Coffee Sucks... who thinks this shit up anyway... watching a boy do a strip on the bar. It's late and I'm one of only a few people in the place, because I'm only working now and then, and I enjoy staying up late. No one's paying much attention, which is kinda amazing to me, because the kid looks remarkably like Matthew Lawrence. I doubt it is Matthew Lawrence, because Disney doesn't usually allow their talent to do strips on bars at 2:00am, but what do I know? Maybe he's got a generous contract. NEway, he started out wearing deck shoes, brown corduroy pants and a t-shirt, and now he's down to just the pants. I don't know if he works at the place or if he's just, you know, exuberant. Anyway, every time he swings by, I stuff a buck into his pants pocket, which gets me a grin and a nod, and once he even stuffs my hand farther down his pocket so I can feel his cock, which isn't hard at all, by the way.

And as he makes his way to the other side of the bar, I think that for all its unknowns, life isn't half bad right now. There's some money coming in, not a lot, not what I'm use to, but enough to pay the bills... stuff bucks into cute boy's pockets... buy groceries. My health's pretty good, which is okay considering that the US is so fucked up right now that if it wasn't I'd prolly be dead, but hey, that would be my own fault for not taking responsibility for myself in this free market paradise I'm living in... fucking morons.

The boy swings back my way. His pants are unbuttoned now and he's pulled his white boxers down far enough so that I can just see the top of his pubes. He's totally hot... did I mention that? And I stuff another buck in his pocket, the back one this time so I can feel his ass moving under my hand. He bends over and smiles, asks my name. I tell him and he smiles again and nods, moves on down the bar. So where was I? Oh. yeah, life. It's funny but with everything going pretty good, starting to get better, I still find ways to torture myself. Maybe everybody does that, I don't know.

Earlier this week, I was pretty sure I was dying of congestive heart failure. Week before that, it was leprosy. I think before that it was, I don't know, lycanthropy or something. I was wrong on all three counts, of course, but that's what I do. I keep telling myself I should just fucking relax, but it's like I'm waiting for something. I know it's there, but I don't know what it is. And I'm so bent up waiting for it that I get all anxious and that translates into me thinking I've caught ebola or something. Fucking crazy.

The boy swings by again and this time I don't put any bucks on him, but I tell him that one more lap and he'll get the checkered flag. He thinks this is pretty funny. I don't, but he's happy with it and he jumps down off the bar and starts putting his clothes back on. He's Myke, he tells me, with a "y". I ask him if he wants a drink. "A beer," he tells me, so that's what I get him. Turns out he's almost 30, which kinda blows me away, because I thought he was about 20, so I don't know, good genes, clean living or something. Up close he's better looking than he was only a few feet away, like standing here next to me has pulled him into focus. When he talks he looks me right in the eye and it's fucking unnerving. And I notice that his eye's aren't brown, like I first thought, but are made up of flecks of green and blue and brown.

He asks me if I'm from Atlanta, you know the usual chit-chat. He's not pushy or anything, actually kinda shy, in spite of the bar antics and when I tell him that, he says, "Well, there's shy and there's SHY. Ya know?" And I do know, sure. I know exactly what he means. And then he leans in and kisses me.

To be continued...

pale pink ribbons

2010-10-21T19:08:00.005-04:00

The forested paths here are either short, dense and extremely hilly or long and gently undulating, opening up to the sky above Longleaf and 3 Needled pine. With the former, you can get quite an intense work out. With the latter, like a swimmer in deep water, you can go for hours, but it never seems like you're getting anywhere. When I first came here, these were the paths I most dreaded. They took you such a long way out and it took so long to get back to the safety of home. Safe, because there were people there.

When they tell you your heart is going to explode, it's easy to pretend like it never happened. It takes a while to get your head around it. If you're symptom free, like I was, you feel pretty much like you always did. But when you wake up in intensive care with a ventilator shoved down your throat it becomes much more real. Then that 12 inch gash down your sternum held together with metal staples drives the reality point home with the force of a freight train.

Now, after 10 months, I can just make it out. A pale pink ribbon etched on my chest like I'd been leaning against a door jam or a bed frame. Something that will go away after a while. And those deep water paths don't matter the way they use to. But before, they were the places I faced my mortality in a way I never understood until I went through it. When I first came home from the hospital, it took me 3 stops to get up the stairs to my room. Now I run or hike miles. In between those two extremes, I was waiting for something to go wrong, the sutures to break, the valve to smash through my chest like the Alien. They tell you it won't happen and it won't, of course, but you're back at disbelief, only now in a dark way. You know better. You know it will all break down with the next step. Or the next one. Or the one after that. There will be a pop or a bang and it will all go black and then you'll have all the answers... or you'll be in hell... or all consciousness will cease and you'll be nothing. Worse is the fear that death harbors something terrible you've never thought of, something not taught anywhere. You stare into the unknown waiting for it to snatch you up. The trepidation and anxiety are palpable. But you force yourself to keep going, because you don't want to spend the rest of your life, sedentary, living in fear, whether it's for 5 minutes or 30 years.

A few months and you're still alive, and now you're daring something to go wrong. You push yourself farther up that hill with the 45 degree slope and demand that something go wrong. You want to get it over with. Stop drawing it out. Make it break. But the whole set-up proves more resilient than you and your thinking gradually switches from "damaged goods" to "better than new". You still don't know what will happen to you after you die, but now it doesn't matter so much. You don't care, because you've looked it in the face and realized that there's nothing you can do about it. The fear fades and you start concentrating on life. Maybe you even eat a hot dog.

And I still marvel that I went through all of this alone. The bleakness of those frosty Venice canals, knowing JP was gone for good, those moments are etched in my mind in stone, but I won't be repeating them. The people I know, or hope to know, are more important than they ever were and I suppose I make a fool of myself at times with my pronouncements, but I don't care about that anymore either. I've made a remarkable journey and I'm much changed by it. People told me I was amazing and all the while I thought I was deeply flawed. Either way, I'd like to share what remains with someone who doesn't care about a pale pink ribbon on someone's chest.

My next boyfriend, Ian Somerhalder, in the latest issue of Vanity Faire/France. Half the fun of winter is making your way through all those layers of fur and wool to cool, smooth skin... go meditate on that and call me in the morning.

killer queen

2010-10-16T17:30:00.002-04:00

Before we get started, I'd like to let you know that I believe that this is a near perfect man...

Probably not what you were expecting... or maybe you were, since I don't make a habit of publishing images of any of my bf's on here. But to open the window slightly, I'll give you a well-croped shot of JP's abs...

The rest of him was just as splendid, although, for a smallish man, he had huge feet. Somehow, I managed to work around that.

Otherwise, my tastes tend to run toward the boyishly good-looking...

And of course...

If I haven't actually been with any of these men... well, with the exception of JP... I've at least been with someone pretty similar, making me something of a pig, if not a prolific one. But, of course, one picture is never worth a thousand words as any one of these guys, though lovely to look at, could be a complete bore, if not totally reprehensible. I've known many men who, on the occasion of our meeting were throughly unimpressive, but who, over time, due to a generous nature and a good heart, became immensely attractive to me. And, of course, the same can be said for the reverse. Regardless, I'm a sucker for a pretty face as anyone who knows me will attest...

Like Popeye, I am what I am.

fuck 'em. stay alive.

2010-10-02T12:22:00.006-04:00

If you are a LGBTQ youth in need of help for any reason, do not give up! Call one of the 24 hour, toll free numbers listed below and stay alive.

If there is an emergency, call 911

The Trevor Project - (866) 488-7386

(http://www.thetrevorproject.org)

Project Life Vest - (510) 725-1408

(http://www.projectlifevest.org)

Or consult the suicide.org website for additional numbers and
information: http://www.suicide.org/index.html

Remember, it does get better. Trust me on this.

life safety 101

2010-09-29T12:37:00.000-04:00

I haven't felt safe in a while. Not for years, I think. I do remember what it was like. I remember the feeling of waking up and realizing there wasn't anything to worry about. Walking into the gym and laughing because I wouldn't be cruising anyone that day. Going out with friends and enjoying myself totally, because I knew he'd be home waiting up for me. But what I remember the clearest was being in bed, after making love, talking quietly. And eventually I'd not be able to keep my eyes open, and I'd snuggle up to him, his smell would be all over me and it was intoxicating, that sense of belonging. And I'd sleep all night and into the next day. I haven't slept like that in ages.

It wasn't that I was always going to be taken care of or that the rent was always going to be paid. Rather, it was a feeling of certainty that everything was going the way it was suppose to. I fearlessly passed open windows; I pushed sharp objects aside. I was building a life out of experiences that were without blemish. Magic happened. Now, nothing happens. I'm a dandy in aspic.

I think it's because people stop seeing you. How can you be safe if no one sees you? They won't notice you're in trouble. Heads don't turn. When I was 35, a beautiful boy tried to pick me up outside a bar. It was the Memorial day week-end and his name was Mark. He was a terrible liar, but we became lovers anyway. Then he was gone, to Boston? I think that was it. But it didn't matter, because I knew he'd be back. That was the way my life worked. And a few years later I was in a terrifically crowded restaurant on a Friday night. Mark was at the bar and I was in the dinning room, but we saw one another at the same time. And as we walked toward each other the whole place stopped. He was still young, but a man now. I was 37. We met in the middle of the room, embraced and kissed with the ease of old lovers. The room went wild. Now I don't think anyone would notice.

I'm trying to remember if there was anyone after him... One I remember. A boy at the gym. Gold's gym in Hollywood. He was stunning. When he talked with his friends he was funny and full and life, but when he saw me he would go cold and pale and our eyes would lock. He had green eyes. After months of maneuvering, he showed up and everything was perfect, the time of night, few people around, I could have waked right up and touched him, but instead I walked away. I still have no idea why I did that. The same thing happened with the waiter in Berlin, the bank manager in Sydney.

There was JP, of course. With him the magic was back for a while, but not as perfectly as it had been before. Then he ran and hid while they cracked me open like a lobster. Now, I don't know if I'll ever experience that sense of safety again. I do with Pete, but he's married to Dorry now. Our snuggling days are over, but there's a whisper of it when we're together. And this is all tied up in love, trust and vulnerability, things I believe we're born with, pure and unblemished then, but as we grow and take our knocks we eventually get weighed down in distrust like Morley's ghost. And I guess I'm looking now for someone who can help me out of that.

Isaac and Manu By Gorka Postigo on Homotography

life among the ruins

2010-09-26T17:58:00.000-04:00

And it came to pass that there was a holy man residing in the city of Atlanta, in the state of Georgia and this man spoke to the people of damning homosexuals or torturing them into giving up their lives and so great was the people's gratitude that they showered him with riches and Bentleys and private jets. And the people believed that the Lord rejoiced in the works of his servant, especially smiting the homosexual scourge part, and that he looked down on the riches bestowed in reward and saw that it was good and even tax deductible. And so great were the rewards that Satan became jealous and, on a Thursday, sent a young man, one of the shaman's Spiritual Sons, to condemn him and accuse him of un-rightous acts, like wanking him off and taking his penis unto his mouth and other iky stuff we don't even want to think about. And the next day, the evil one sent two more of his off-spring to vex the shaman and on Saturday yet another until there were four vexers... erm, vexees... vexing, ah, ers... Well, there were four of them anyway.

And soon the shaman was so vexed that he fell upon his knees before his congregation and offered up his resignation unto God, but then reconsidered on the advice of his attorneys so as not to give any indication of guilt and his congregation praised him and offered up more riches in thanks. But it came to pass that Lucifer put into the hands of the unrightous photographs of the holy man in muscle shirts and other unholy dress that were found in e-mails the shaman had visited upon his oppressors, and these they caused to be given to heralds who gave them forth to the people crying, "Behold! The shaman frequents International Male and 2xist and other sinful coutures! And the people hung their heads in shame.

And behold! It soon came to pass that another holy man in another land and who was called Ted of Haggard, he of rent-boys and Tina, exclaimed to the people, "Do not fear! These images are false and merely demonstrate the healthfulness of sport and clean living in the eyes of the Lord and were given over to these shameful youths as examples of the shaman's rightousness!' And the people heard the words of Ted of Haggard and they rejoiced and proclaimed "unbelievable!". And so great was the holy man's thanks, that he could not find words to express his gratitude, or even mention the name of Ted of Haggard, ever. Not even in private or on a secure line.

And the shaman's oppressors fell to the ground, wailed and gnashed their teeth, for so great was the shaman in the eyes of his people that they could not harm him. And they were reminded that the shaman kept a good and holy book, written by the Lord God himself... or a bunch of guys with any number of personal agendas and axes to grind, and the shaman could use this book to condemn them or forgive them or even justify their destruction depending on the circumstances. And the oppressors had no such book, only truth, reason, common cause and grievous hurt. But these were merely pebbles cast at the shaman and his great empire and the shaman declared, "A free market economy is greater in the eyes of God than any damage to these whelps of Satan", and the people rejoiced in the words of the Lord and then returned to their labors so that the holy man could buy more jets, Rolex watches, houses and cars.

And the oppressors bided their time and waited...

21 year old Matthieu Charneau. Mr. Gay in the September issue of Tetu.com... just to remind you what we're fighting for.

tea and blasphemy

2010-09-15T23:14:00.012-04:00

And this guy should have been perfect. Blond, blue eyed surfer, like the California ideal if you need some sort of classification... a Mitch Hewer Class destroyer. Anyone who reads this blog knows that I date younger men, so yeah, he should have been perfect. But he wasn't. And that's because he wasn't who I wanted him to be. Someone that I already know, prefer and happen to adore, but for so many reasons am unable to move forward with... you know, just like in real life. So, yes, I'm holding out for: Premature. Unlikely. Against all odds. And this intransigence should shake my conviction, but it doesn't and it won't until this marvel is in my bed or safely and securely tucked up with someone else. So, this boy didn't stand a chance and why postpone the inevitable?

I suppose I should prescribe to "one in the hand is worth two in the bush", but I've always loathed being pedestrian. I tend to hold out for the unlikely. It seldom happens, but when it does... So this boy was well in hand, but too young. Legal, of course, but too green, too mom, too American. I wasn't hasty. But over the course of our days together I did not find him invading my dreams, ruining my sleep or stealing into my thoughts while I made out shopping lists or watered the lawn. In fact, not seeing him was something of a relief.

Campsite Rule. That's what was on my mind the day I determined to tell him I wasn't interested. For those of you unaware, the Campsite Rule was developed by Dan Savage in response to those of his readers engaged in relationships marked by a wide age disparity. The rule states, simply, that "at the end of the relationship, the elder partner should leave the younger in better shape than they found them. This includes no diseases, no fertilized eggs, no undue emotional trauma, and whatever education that can be provided". Egad, how noble of me. So imagine my surprise when Incred-a-boy handed me my head. As God is my judge, I wasn't condescending, dismissive or insufferable... which I often am, but not this time. And since then, I have found myself bashed on his blog, on his Stickam page, his Facebook page and probably on his Twitter, but, really, I couldn't bear knowing everything.

And this brings me to the flip side of the Campsite Rule, and that is the Tea and Sympathy Rule. Also developed by Dan Savage, the T&S Rule is a reference to a line from the play/movie of the same name in which a much older woman states to a high-school-age boy just before having sex with him: "Years from now, when you talk about this — and you will — be kind." Alright, it hasn't been years, it was like, I don't know, hours maybe, but I submit that the tone of the rule is still applicable.

So, lighten up, you little shit! (this falls under the "whatever education can be provided" part).

Nicholas Hoult is pictured, only because I couldn't bring myself to post anything of Mitch Hewer.

la dolce vita, η γλυκιά ζωή, -ħelu tal-ħajja, the sweet life

2010-09-07T23:09:00.005-04:00

There is a time of day that seems distinctly Italian to me. It only happens on those days when I'm in the kitchen from morning to late afternoon cooking and baking. And it doesn't have to be Italian food (but it helps!)

At about 4:30, just as the heat starts to ebb, I gather up bits and pieces left over from whatever I'm cooking and take it outside to the garden, the back porch, the lanai, whatever. It might be home made corn tortillas and fresh salsa, or a crusty baugette and saucisson, and wine, of course, or beer (Doritos and bottled salsa don't cut it... or anything involving Cheeze Whiz, just so you know). Today it's fresh anise root, extra virgin olive oil, scraps of uncooked fillet mignon, crumbles of Parma Romano cheese along with chunks of Bermuda onion, freshly ground sea salt and pepper. Along side is a bottle of Chateau La Papeterie 1995.

After being in the kitchen all day, it feels good to sit in the sunlight filtering through the trees, enjoying what I guess you'd call an antipasto lunch and a bottle of wine, surrounded by friends. The enjoyment isn't just the food or the company, but the civility of it. What the Italians call La Dolce Vita, The Sweet Life. Maybe you can only truly enjoy moments like this if you're living in a country that has given up all pretense of empire, but we're willing to give it a try. All we need now is a coliseum, preferably one starting to show its age.

It is said that the slow food movement (http://www.slowfood.com) began over just such a lunch. A group of Roman chefs were sitting at a cafe at the base of the Spanish Steps enjoying the late afternoon quiet before returning to their restaurants for the dinner rush. Across the square a McDonalds was under construction. "What are they building over there?" one of the chefs asked. "It's a Mc Donalds," one of the others answered. "A McDonalds? What's that?" "Fast food." "Oh. Well, if they can have fast food, can we have slow food?" Considering how Italians love a good story, it is entirely possible that this one is apocryphal, but why spoil the beauty of it with the truth of it all?

Maybe good food and wine can only be truly savored among the ruins, or at least someplace that would be inspiring if ruined. But on this late summer's afternoon, surrounded by The Sweet Life, it really doesn't matter. We're all lost in the moment, in the civility, the way it was meant to be.

This Calvin and Hobbs moment is brought to you by Jeremy Kost photographing Max Emerson and his stuffed tiger for his new book "Love... Hate... Nature..."

Is PETA going to come after me for this??

deplorable catholic tastes

2010-08-30T22:38:00.011-04:00

In Tennessee William's first novel, "The Roman Summer of Mrs. Stone", the Contessa, an Italian woman of noble birth who has been reduced to pimping beautiful young men to rich, older expatriate women, sums it all up: "What is youth? It is like snow in April. Stunning! But then the sun comes out..." Or something like that. Anyway, for me the sun has been out for a long, long time, not that I have a problem with that. But I am still enamored of younger men, always have been, and I am wondering about that.

I came out in Laguna Beach, California in the early 70's, where the age difference of many couples was 15 to 20 years or more. It was a heady time. I was young and beautiful, as were all my friends, and we were surrounded by the love and security of older men in a catharsis of arrested development. I'm sure I've romanticized it somewhat, but not too much. These men saved my life, helping me to turn away from the condemnation of the Church and the guilt and darkness I was meant to inherit, bringing instead culture and conversation... updated from Tea and Sympathy, I guess. I lost my virginity, experienced joy, learned patience, came to understand forgiveness.

One of these men was a famous sports coach in his early 60's. His lover was 18, a hockey player from Canada named Bobby, one of those guys you immediately adore, personable without being obnoxious, cute rather than handsome, open, funny, built for the win and totally, unapologetically in love. When Coach lost all of his money in a bad investment, everyone expected Bobby to break camp and move on, but instead he worked two jobs, taking care of them both. And when Coach was back on his feet a few years later, he cut him loose. Bobby was destroyed. I was there the morning he got in the car that Coach had bought for him and tearfully drove away. And when I asked why, all Coach could say was, "I was holding him back." So...

I wonder sometimes is it the best way? Is it the responsible thing? This May/December romance... a term I loath, by the way. Yes, the older man brings wisdom... hopefully... and security. The younger man brings fresh outlooks, motivation to try new things and youth, of course. Beauty is optional. And having sat through "Maurice" a dozen times, I understand the whole Greek ideal, ethos, myth, whatever you want to call it. But does it serve the two men in a useful and experiential way? Isn't the younger man better served in a relationship where the ages of the partners are comparable and they can grow together? And what about terminal illness? Ever decreasing mobility? Life style differences (you're up at the crack of dawn, he wants to sleep til noon)? And there is a part of me that begins to understand why Coach sent Bobby away.

Because he was a fucking moron. Aren't all those lofty thoughts just condescending as hell? After 40 years, I can't escape the fact that Coach was too stuck on himself to share the pain of his embarrassment and loss of power with his partner. He threw love away in order to be nobel, an over-rated virtue if there ever was one. And Bobby caved. I wonder what would have happened if he had told Coach to fuck off. That he was going to stick around until the old man's thighs turned to stone. This is where the strengths of the age difference become the greatest weakness; some would call it self-sacrifice, but it's intimacy denied. I think that we as older men, you know, the ones "in charge" (that's a laugh) forget that our younger, less experienced partners are with us by choice. And I think we need to give them more credit for that. "A Single Man" illustrates this idea quite eloquently. Kenny wants to be with George; he isn't going away. In the end, Kenny is the the courageous beloved. George is merely pedantic.

And maybe that's what I've been missing in the equation: courage. That thing required of all relationships, even normal ones. It's the great leveler that brings everything into perspective. It can be noted that in physics, all relationships can be stated. This has never been the case between two humans and that's what makes us remarkable in our diversity and vulnerability.

Ok, I'm better now.

Ricardo Meneses graces the screen in "O Fantasma"... un film cru sur l'obsession sexuelle!

running from didi and gogo

2010-08-20T17:29:00.003-04:00

So, there's this play called "Waiting for Godot". Ever hear of it? The piece was written by an Irishman named Samuel Beckett ( no relation to the saint, so far as I know) who was living in France after the war. It premiered in Paris in January, 1953 and since then has enjoyed regular revivals usually with top name talent, the latest being in London with Sir Ian.

In the play, the two protagonists, Vladimir and Estragon wait for Godot. Hence the title. Beckett was nothing if not forthright. Anyway, I'd love to tell you there's more to it than that, but there isn't. Vladimir and Estragon, who call each other by the pet names of Didi and Gogo, wait. For days. They readily admit that they don't know Godot, don't know what he looks like, are not sure what they want from him or even if they're in the right spot for the meeting (near a tree and there is a tree nearby). Regardless, this meeting seems important and they are apparently prepared to wait for several days and it is entirely possible that they have already waited several days before we come on the scene.

While they wait, they eat, pee, talk, hurl insults at one another, speculate, decide to hang themselves (along with several audience members) and spend some time with a cruel land owner (Pozzo) and his hapless slave (Lucky), the most demeaned and brutalized of slaves, but he takes it all in distinctly grim resolve in order to convince his master not to sell him. And that's about it. At one point, Estragon mumbles, "nothing to be done", but it is clear from their actions that nothing is actually something and that they are determined to do it, no matter how long it takes. From time to time one or the other of them suggests that they leave, but the other always comes up with a reason to stay. Finally, at the end of the first act, a boy enters and announces that Godot will not be able to come that day, but will surely come the next. You'd think that this would clear up some anxiety regarding this being the meeting place, but they seem more interested in the fact that the boy is a goatherd than in having nailed down the meeting place. Go figure. The same boy arrives at the end of the next day with the same message.

Since its premier, debate has raged over the meaning of the play. Beckett, once secretary to James Joyce where he evidently learned the finer points of being obtuse, was never very forthcoming. He did shoot down rather quickly the idea that Godot is God and that Didi and Gogo are awaiting redemption... somewhat regular and trite, but perhaps not in 1953. He apparently also scoffed at the idea that the play was an allegory for the French resistance during WWII, the Cold War or even homosexuality (Didi and Gogo have apparently been together for decades and one of them waxes fondly about their unrealized desire to honeymoon at the Eiffel Tower). So we are left to our own devices, which is probably best.

Though I've squirmed and prevaricated over it, to me the play is about how we enslave ourselves, or rather how we allow fear to enslave us. Vladimir and Estragon can leave at any time, but they don't. Their excuses are flimsy and waiting may even be dangerous (Vladimir queries Estragon as to whether he was beaten by thugs the night before, the inference being that this is a common occurrence), but even so, their current reality is preferable to one that is unknown. Lucky leads a life of misery and despair, but that's preferable to being sold. But we all do it. We stay in the miserable job, with the selfish partner, in the part of town that becomes more disreputable by the day.

And so I wonder if it wouldn't be better to leave Pete and Dorry's and strike out... somewhere. Rather than wait for my very own Godot to show up. The situation here isn't ideal, but at least I've got a roof over my head. But it's also become comfortable, maybe too comfortable, and I don't want to spend the rest of my life playing Mr. Belvedere. So, I've decided to take a trip to LA this fall to see if I can shake something loose in regards to work and also to visit someplace less bucolic. Just to shake things up a bit and do SOMETHING, even if it's wrong. Also, I can't abide the idea of having to find a lover named either Didi or Gogo.

Snaps of River Viiperi to keep you occupied, just in case you don't find the correlation between the Theatre of the Absurd and your own life relevant.

sailing along...

2010-08-11T15:34:00.003-04:00

So, we're enjoying an infestation of rattle snakes in our rural burg. "Remember, one dead snake means 10 live rodents. One dead spider means countless live mosquitos." Is this what they mean by The Song of the South? Regardless, since none of them are very cuddly, I'm not inclined to lean one way or the other. But the spiders are worth considering. They nest in the trees and have bodies the size of my fist. At that size, their webs show enormous detail and you can see that the thickness of the strands vary, sometimes considerably so. I guess beauty and fascination are where you find them. On the down side, our lake has been despoiled by red algae blooms, about as far from beauty/fascination as you can get. We've gone from lush paradise to isle of the damned in less than a month. Are man eating vines what comes next?

Dorry, bless her heart, takes in every stray that comes along, and by that I mean children. The count this week has reached nine. If I ever get my hands on the son of a bitch who decided that summer break should be 3 months long, I'll break every bone in his over-romanticized body and leave him for the ants, not that I feel strongly about it or anything. Tending to the kitchen is like working in a MASH unit during a war that we're loosing. The dishwasher runs 3 times a day; the washer and dryer are in therapy. Pete wonders why the electric bill is sky high. My concession is not running the A/C downstairs until after 8:00pm. Thank God for ceiling fans... I've installed 37 of them. Seems like false economy to me.

When I lived in Italy, where the climate isn't that much different from here, I'd marvel at the photographs of bygone imperial splendor, women in corsets, bustles and lace opera gloves; men in their heavy, gold braided uniforms and plumbed hats. Speaking with a local historian, he insisted it was cooler then without auto exhaust and square miles of asphalt, concrete and glass. To test his theory, I did some digging and found what temperatures were like during the battle of Gettysburg. At the height of the battle, the day of Pickett's charge, July 4, 1863, the temperature was 87 degrees with 50 to 60% humidity. That is somewhat cooler than it has been, but then I'm in t-shirt, shorts and flip-flops, they were in 3 piece wool uniforms, boots, gauntlets and God knows what types of undergarments. I still don't understand how they did it. Talk about form trumping function...

Work is proceeding at a snail's pace with the occasional spike up to, oh, I don't know, +2? But it promises to pick up after August, which won't be too much of a challenge since 1 x 1 = 1. What work is peeking around the corner would involve some travel, as I mentioned last time, with China looming to date as the prime location/destination. I'm about as ready for China as Pompeii was for lava. But I will do what I must to help get the engines of commerce, and my bank account, up and running again... the fact that the work in China would involve several young, hot male dancers has nothing to do with my re-emerging work ethic... well, not too much at any rate. What's Chinese for "daddy"?

Otherwise, our orb spins serenely on, seemingly oblivious to all us dickwads trying to inhabit it and usually finding we're mediocre at it. An instruction manual would have proved handy and been appreciated, but that wasn't in the cards, so I continue to feel that this reality is just one big cosmic sitcom and everyone is in on the joke but us. So, I try not to take things too seriously, though some days just getting out of bed seems like a major victory. The answers to this and life's other questions are, I'm sure, just out of my reach, but after 47 years of stumbling around... soon to be 48... my inexorable journey toward the guillotine blade of 50 continues unabated... I really can't be bothered. The chore of empire is too much of a strain and I do wish the whole tottering edifice would finally crumble so we could all get on with our lives. Until that time there are hot male dancers to mentor, not to mention waiters, bartenders, rentboys, bellhops, students, geeks, freaks...

True Blood's hot new shape-shifter Marshall Allman graces our sordid pages this time around. I wonder if he's as unaffected as he seems to be. If he is, I'm in love... at least until Ian Somerhalder re-appears in September on the Vampire Diaries... I'm so fickle. Story of my life.

wave as teh gay

2010-08-05T13:25:00.005-04:00

So, in his book "At Swim, Two Boys", Jamie O'Neill postulates that homosexuality is actually a third gender, as distinct and well-formed as either male or female and as such, being gay is in no way an unnatural deviation from the norm, but, rather, is normative on its own account. By the way, if you've not read this book, do. The patois is a bit difficult at first, because O'Neill writes in a broad Irish brogue that takes some getting use to, but once you get use to the rhythm it is as moving a love story as has ever been written.

And I'm a great believer in reincarnation. This belief system has developed in me over the years from many different sources and if you believe that this life is simply a path in the long road of our development as enlightened beings, it makes sense that these sources might converge to aid in such a realization. The most sublime expression of reincarnation came to me from a Buddhist monk and teacher named Thich Nhat Hanh in his book, "The Heart Of The Buddha's Teaching: Transforming Suffering Into Peace, Joy and Liberation":

"When we look at the ocean, we see that each wave has a beginning and an end. A wave can be compared with other waves, and we can call it more or less beautiful, higher or lower, longer lasting or less long lasting. But if we look more deeply, we see that a wave is made of water. While living the life of a wave, the wave also lives the life of water. It would be sad if the wave did not know that it is water. It would think, 'Some day I will have to die. This period of time is my life span, and when I arrive at the shore, I will return to nonbeing.

These notions will cause the wave fear and anguish. A wave can be recognized by signs -- beginning or ending, high or low, beautiful or ugly. In the world of the wave, the world of relative truth, the wave feels happy as she swells, and she feels sad as she falls. She may think, 'I am high!' or 'I am low!' and develop superiority or inferiority complexes, but in the world of the water there are no signs, and when the wave touches her true nature -- which is water -- all of her complexes will cease, and she will transcend birth and death."

I guess it's no secret that I've got a lot of time on my hands, not that I mull over my past lives every morning while I'm brushing my teeth. But I do mull, maybe more than I should, but there are times when sights and sounds flash into my head, usually from some place, which is the same time and place, and I wonder if, only for an instant, I'm seeing my life backwards... that, or I've completely slipped my leash, one or the other. And yesterday the thought struck me, what if O'Neill is right and gay people are a gender unto themselves? And what if, as we move through our lives, we're always gay? And this opened up a whole new world to me, one full of wonder at the role gay people play in this world, one which is also fraught with distractions and danger for us to overcome and consider.

And that thought is still with me, vague and unformed, but resolute nonetheless and I thought I'd share it with you to see if it strikes any cords, because I'd love to hear if it does.

I know I've posted him a lot, but I couldn't think of anyone better for this post than the beautiful Alan Carey.

summer fun

2010-08-01T20:32:00.000-04:00

So, it's like 105... I think that's 40 to the rest of the world. Dorry's niece is visiting. She's 12. 6' tall. A great candidate for breast reduction surgery. Some other kid arrived this afternoon for a week's visit. There are 6 of them now. And with the high temperatures outside, they stay indoors all day. Cabin fever on juice. I'm in hell.

I got out for a few days, is the problem. I tasted freedom. Raleigh, Chapel Hill, Greensboro, where you don't have to drive for 45 minutes to find a stylish bistro or a friendly tavern. Don't get me wrong. I enjoyed coming home, but now we're packed in like the poor, 3 to a bed. Actually, I'm the only one that has a room to himself, but why spoil such a beautiful whine with the truth? Anyway, there's no end in sight.

And we're not the only ones. There's a bit of shell shock everywhere. The beginning of school is still 4 weeks away. Summer holiday has been going on since early June. We spend our time rushing from one air conditioned space to the other, dragging the tinies along like distracted native bearers. Then everyone winds up with the sniffles, because of the cold, hot, cold cycle. As for the heat, there's no end in sight for that either. You can sometimes catch a faint, very brief wiff of autumn in the breezes that blow across certain forested ridges in the early morning. But it's obliterated by 9:00.

There is the pool or the lake, and we do take some advantage of them. But the preparation is not unlike moving the 4th Hessian Mercenaries across inhospitable terrain. The average child under 10 requires at least 6 kilos of supplies including bottled water, ice, fruit pops, chips, salsa, sandwiches and nuclear fissionable materials of various sizes and destructive capabilities. Once there, the conversation drifts from which cleaner works best on the oven to the whispered confidence that so-and-so's husband isn't coming home in the evenings anymore. Working late... wink, wink, nudge, nudge. And so we cruise through life pushing all sharp objects aside.

But more work is on the way and possibilities are beginning to materialize: Seattle, San Francisco, Phoenix, Miami. I try not to think about it. People in my trade are notoriously superstitious being close cousins of the theatre and I don't want to jinx anything lest I wind up having to bury a cut up spud in a graveyard during the next full moon. I could break this stalemate in a heart beat. All have to do is buy a car, lease an apartment, any of those things I didn't want to do, because I kept being told I was going to go to one or the other places mentioned above. So, as soon as I shell out cash for something major, I'll be moved cross country the next day, requiring a garage to keep snakes from nesting in my engine block and an armed guard to keep squatters from building fires on the floor of my empty apartment. It's the way life works. Luckily, I'm as stubborn as it is.

Truth be told, once I do move, I'll probably miss it all. The Stockholm Syndrome applies in these situations, no doubt about it. So does Absolution.

British rock group McFly graces the cover of Attitude Magazine

feed your head

2010-07-24T19:58:00.001-04:00

So, I've always had this aversion to taking pills. Not to swallowing... erm, pills, but having to rely on something outside of myself that I need to take daily to function properly, more or less. I remember going to visit my grandparents when I was growing up and going to the bathroom was like visiting a pharmacy. The drainboard around the bathroom sink was littered with ubiquitous bottles of pills and powders, and I remember thinking that my life would never be tied to brown plastic. I was going to do everything differently and live forever. And now, at 47, the rot has set in.

In spite of what my health insurance company tells me (a nice woman who was hired strictly for her prattling ability), I'm actually in much better shape than I was before the surgery, stronger, more vital and not prone to having my heart explode. To me, that's a distinct improvement. But since I've been cracked open like a lobster, even though for the better, my warranty has been violated, I guess, and I'm ready for the trash bin. I guess I should have had "no customer serviceable parts inside" tattooed on my chest. But no one ever said the US health insurance industry was based on any type of logic. It's a for-profit system not a for-health system and their rising profits (absent the body count) shows that this philosophy is ftw.

When I left the hospital last December I was taking 9 or 10 medications. Now I take 3, not counting the low dose aspirin most people my age take which thins the blood a bit and guards against blood clots. Of the three, one is to keep my cholesterol at an acceptable level which must be working since I fall somewhere in the bottom half of the scale, but that could also be because of diet. The remaining two are for blood pressure which keep me in the 115/70 range, but I like to think that my diet (again) and daily work outs help. These last two can make me pretty dizzy from time to time and I wonder if I'll ever get use to the floating feeling that accompanies them.

The doctors tell me I'll be taking these 4 pills everyday for the rest of my life and that just pisses me off. But I have to be careful here, because I suppose there is a slight chance that my doctors are smarter than I am and I do feel pretty good most days. A lot of days I even feel excellent. But on those occasional off days I stagger around like a zombie, so there's that Voice of Liberty playing in my head: better to stop putting poison in your body and live life as a free and defiant man than start that slide down the slippery slope of daily medication.

Then last week, because of work and a dozen other distractions, I completely forgot to take my pills Wednesday night and then again Thursday morning. And I felt great! No dizziness, no floating. I made a mental count of the number of friends I had who had started down this same road, stopped taking their meds and were doing just fine... so far as I knew. By Friday night my blood pressure was up, not seriously, but near the top of the normal range if not a bit over and my pulse was in the 80's. Again, within normal range, but not what I'm use to (usually around 62). I felt anxious and fidgety, and I couldn't sit still to save my life.

And it occurred to me that this really was a crap shoot, and that I had a choice between being occasionally woozy or occasionally anxious and fidgety with a side of possibly fucking up that beautiful aortic valve I bought myself for Christmas. So, I'm back on the meds. I'll keep working out and eating right and maybe we'll revisit this in about 6 months, and who knows, I might just be med free by Christmas. And in the meantime is each day a wonderful gift for which I'm ever thankful? No. That would be a Hallmark card. And we all know how shallow they can be.

Our distraction this post: "In love with Joshua" by Britta Leuermann.

when the thermometer goes way up

2010-07-15T23:28:00.001-04:00

So, it's 9:18pm and it's 90 degrees outside, thats 32 degrees for our continental friends... and, well, everybody else for that matter. That's about 10 degrees hotter than it was at noon. It's still as a moonscape outside and the air's like bathwater. If I didn't know better, I'd say there was a thunder storm on the way, but that's not what the weather report says. The weather report says that it's miserable and that it's going to stay miserable, so you might as well get use to it. No, really, that's what it says.

For reason's I cannot explain, I started craving macadamia nuts about 3:30 yesterday afternoon. Given our isolated locale in the heart of the Georgia back country, I might as well be craving yak. Like everything else, the available choice of nut meats is somewhat limited: peanuts, boiled peanuts (Who in the fuck decided it was a great idea to boil peanuts? I mean, how fucking bored do you have to be?), spicy peanuts, butter toffee peanuts, dry roasted peanuts and almonds. I'm not sure how the almonds made it through, but whoever ordered them has probably been sacked.

The one good thing about the sweltering temperatures is that Pete refuses to wear pants... and usually a shirt. Or socks, even. I should mention that Pete has been on a mission this year to look like any cast member from the TV show "Spartacus", and he's damn close to achieving his goal. I would ask if it's wrong to lust after your married host/roommate and former boytoy, but I doubt any of you would advise a visit to the confessional. I'm only human and I have to assume that a man who wanders around the house in nothing but black Calvins wants to be gawked at and I have no problem obliging.

Otherwise, it's too hot to sleep. Pete's trying to break his addiction to diet Coke, so he's drinking down San Pellegrino like it was... erm, water. Dorry's spending every waking minute on Google learning about guinea pigs... Did I mention the guinea pigs? Damn. I hate it when this happens... like my father telling a joke... 'Did I tell you the priest was wearing a bathrobe?' Pathetic. Anyway, we now have two guinea pigs. And a pit bull. You wanna know how much pit bulls are attracted to small, scurrying, furry quadrupeds? Like rum to coke. Like butter to waffles. So, yeah, it's a great combination and if we don't have a guinea drop dead from heart failure, because this massive triangle head is snarling at him, it won't be because we didn't fucking try. Not that I feel strongly about it or anything. And they're not cute, they are beady-eyed little rodents and it's only a matter of time before Pixar has some princess sleep with one of them.

And me? I'm writing this nonsense and watching 'Friday Night Lights', so I can learn how to talk Southern so people here will understand what I'm talking about and waiting for the temperature to drop somewhere down below 'Death Valley' so I can think about getting some sleep tonight. If I were back in Italy, I'd be sitting at a table on the piazza with a few friends, drinking wine and watching boys, and we'd be heading home around 4am with the rest of the town. Here, the sidewalks (if we had sidewalks) roll up by 7:30 and you could shoot a cannon down our street and not hit anybody and I haven't seen a hot boy since I met Nick, but he's nuttier that squirrel crap, and that's just the way it is.

Damn it.

And just to raise the temperature a few more degrees, the snaps are of Taylor Kitsch from "Friday Night Lights' and my dreams.

Dodging Boo Radley

2010-07-10T13:54:00.002-04:00

So, I've been living here in the Deep South of the United States for 4 months now and the feeling of enchanting, mystic gulag is definitely wearing off. Whatever surface effects I initially noticed upon my arrival have given way to a much more complex understanding of the people here, why they sometimes go mad and why the neighbors pretend not to notice. Certainly, it gets more beautiful here every day. Our rural neighborhood is dense with trees of pine, willow, oak and elm, their branches weighed to the sodden ground with abundant foliage. Everywhere, plants are in bloom and the sky visible between the tree tops is a soft, velvety blue laced with clouds. There are more birds, squirrels and chipmunks than even a Disney character could deal with and in the evening the air is full of the sounds of cicadas, owls and crickets.

But like that other Garden of Eden, ours also comes at a price. Breathing is one... or the inability to do so, if you want to be exact. The air becomes so heavy that you can feel it wearing down on you. It rings in your ears and makes your head ache. Going out is like being hit in the face with warmed peanut butter. The hot, moist air invades your lungs and stays there, so you move slowly, deliberately. That's why life becomes so "slow" here in the summertime and why so many southern authors write about the "long, hot summer". When the weight of the air becomes nearly unbearable, it fills with electricity and rushes up in turbulent plumes, forming dark, bullying clouds that flash and belch and then pour rain down for 30 minutes or so. When it all blows away there's no relief; the ground sends up steam and the cycle starts again. In the meantime, everything rots in the damp.

There isn't much to do. No one goes outside, because it's too hot and you never know when a storm will rush in. Some people go down to the river, which is fine if you don't mind the mosquitos, snapping turtles and water snakes. The men head off to work and stay and stay late into the evening, while the women put together house parties with punch, coffee, apple pie, peach cake and gossip. Everyone knows everyone's elses business, believe me, and it is talked about either like a horse race or a sacrilege. We have the usual supply of lesbian mothers, inebriated churchmen, crumbling marriages, closeted homosexuals, secret encounters, mildly retarded children and many other whispers. Over time you pray for relief from the closeness. Of any kind. And after a while madness seems as good as any other.

Our mad woman lives down the street in a fine old house with gigantic sun flowers painted on the mail box, like van Gogh. I suspect she'll cut off her ear any day now. Her husband is a dashing, well put together man who does everything around the house, including all the cooking and cleaning. It's his way of dealing with the ennui, leaving her with little else to do but talk to birds, mix paint with her feet and commune with Confederate war dead, which she often does. The rumor is she achieved this pinnacle through drink. Maybe vice would have helped forestall the inevitable, but there's no mention of it and she's not a pretty woman, not that it ever did Blanche DuBois any good.

As for me, I'm getting more and more work so that keeps me busy. Otherwise, I understand that I am a sought after guest at afternoon parties (I seldom attend) and in the evenings I visit the cosmopolitan couple next door and their gay son. We drink wine, eat chocolate and have dangling conversations about life, love and politics. But not the neighbors. There are other venues for that and it's a relief to discuss something other than humidity and mad ladies. God knows there's enough of that around here already.

remembering the time of plague

2010-07-02T11:54:00.002-04:00

I was 20 when the AIDS epidemic hit in 1982. The phone calls would come at a staggering pace, sometimes two or three a day. Nobody knew what the killer was, but it was a terrible, painful, wasting death. Sometimes it was very fast; Jimmy, Jeff, Tim were all dead in 6 months after just one encounter (Our new incentive program; one mistake and you're through...) Others we knew had the virus, but never showed any symptoms. It was all very confusing and scary as hell. I remember one boy who went to my gym, a stunning guy, if not a bit arrogant. I saw him months after he stopped showing up for his work out coming out of the AIDS clinic near my office, half his face rotting away with KC. I stopped to greet him and was happy to find him as arrogant and flippant as ever. I admired his courage.

We were a beach crowd; West Street Beach in Laguna Beach, CA. In the early 80's there was still a remnant of the 60's beach culture left in the air. Still a way of life that seemed clean and youthful. But AIDS cut a swath through that. Buddy, so young and beautiful, so full of life that first summer, disappeared before the second. Gone home to Connecticut, meaning he had gone home to die. Many others went home. Rudy, Sam, Mike all decamped for Europe, thinking it would be safer there. I never heard from them again. There were all kinds of rumors: it was created in a lab, in monkeys, in bats, in Haitians. Our humor ran black and cold. (What's the toughest thing about having AIDS? Trying to convince your parents that you're Haitian.)

Most moving were the handsome boys who became handsome couples. One by one they disappeared as well and you would hear that one or the other of them had fallen sick. Later you might catch sight of them, at the pharmacy or the market. One emaciated, barely able the walk, the skin stretched tight over a barely recognizable skeletal face, the other smiling, tired, but happy to see someone who wasn't sick. Beach bodies gave way to the ice cream, mashed potatoes and lasagna dying partners required to keep their weight up. I always found it poignant that during a time of plague where the pundits were condemning gays en masse for their wonton life style, these men gave up their lives to care for the people they loved.

I remember my best friend Brian plopping down next to me at a party and pointedly shoveling a fistful of pills into his mouth. As good a way as any to let me know that now he was on the list. I was so angry with him, I didn't speak to him for a month. But he called me and we talked it out. "Haven't you ever driven drunk?" He knew I had. To me it had been an acceptable risk. It had been for him, too. I stayed with him until he was forced to move back in with his mom, then reluctantly made the decision to move to a hospice near the beach we loved so much. I wasn't there when he died. I'd had enough. His mother gave me leave and I went to the beach, too heartbroken to do anything else but look out over the water and see if I could sense his spirit in the waves. (I still can.)

We were the first American generation to see our friends decimated at a very early age outside of war. Not everyone was valiant and sacrificing, but many, many were. For several years I declined to go out on New Years Eve choosing instead to stay at home and remember. Remembering was hard, but I wanted some part of them kept alive, because they were a part of me. I write this on the 6 month anniversary of my surgery to remind myself that though I keep dodging the bullet I need to always pay closer attention, to the day, the people who love me and whom I love, and to remind myself what's important.

The photos this post are from Paris-based photographer Yang Wang's Living Dance Project, set to open in October. I've included them here, because for me they demonstrate the sheer joy of life, of movement, of humanity. I hope they do the same for you.

druids and other news

2010-06-23T22:47:00.015-04:00

So, the barely tolerable client mentioned in last week's post is lumbering around trying to find a firm to replace the one I work for, and for the same price. Good luck. It couldn't last, and when he demanded 10 new renderings and equipment lists, but still refused to pay us or sign the contract he'd had for over a month, we bid him a fond farewell. We don't walk away from projects very often, only when we work our asses off for 4 months without getting paid. I understand he's getting some great quotes, 5 or 6 times higher than what we were offering. In the meantime he can't believe we left him in the lurch. I really do wonder what makes people like that tick.

Pete's been working his tail off and Dorry's near selling the kids to Somalian pirates, so yesterday, for reasons surpassing understanding, I volunteered to take the kids to their swim meet, the 18 to 22 y/o coaching staff notwithstanding... Coach Ricky could induce lycanthropy in an altar boy btw... but I'm nothing if not self-sacrificing. Now, let's remember that this is Georgia in the summer. So it's hot here, in the 90's (upper 30's for our readers outside the US) and humid as hell, 60 to 70%. So, hanging out by the pool with a couple hundred kids for 4 hours is like being sprayed with Coca-Cola and then wandering through a sauna. So, about 2 hours into the meet the sky went nearly black and there was enough thunder and lightening that the power went out and the rain came down in whatever metaphor you prefer. And while we waited to see if the storm would pass in the regulation 20 minutes the meet can be paused without being canceled, the kids all went kinda Druid.

I'm not great with kids. I'm a crusty old sailor with a mouth to match and my patience at the best of times is brittle. But I do occasionally click with them and usually It's because they haven't learned inhibitions, haven't been ruined by the mores and taboos of our tribe. And so yesterday, with the rain smashing down around us, the kids were totally into weather worship, and that's what made it so incredible. While all of us adults crammed under tents and awnings, the kids stayed in the open screaming, dancing, wrestling, flinging their arms in the air. And for just a moment there was a glimmer of ancient tribes. Freaky holiday. All that was missing were drums and feathers. And then the window closed. And I really envied them that moment, those minutes of complete abandon to something totally beyond their control and I understood a little better where religion came from, but I still prefer thunder and rain. It's purer.

Otherwise, those temperatures I mentioned earlier go up a notch nearly every day and it's only June. Wandering through a store yesterday an employee who had been scrubbing the front walk slogged in complaining about how hot it was. A big ol' boy nearby shouted out, "Y'all stop it now! That's why you live in the South, because of the heat." And here I thought it was because of Pete, Dorry and hot boys. What was I thinking? I don't know what it is about Southern boys. Nick's not from around here, he's from Brooklyn and when he's excited can sound just like Bugs Bunny. But Michael's from here and like most of the boys I've met he has the whitest teeth and the clearest skin I've ever seen. Not to mention wildly polite. The LA boys could learn a bunch from these guys. But I pine for France and a hot ticket from Lyon... who's traveling so we haven't talked much.

And maybe it is the heat. Everyone I know showers twice a day. Harper Lee alluded to it in "To Kill A Mockingbird": 'Ladies bathed before noon, after their three-o'clock naps, and by nightfall were like soft teacakes with frostings of sweat and sweet talcum.' So the boys are cool and squeaky clean. Nobody get's excited, because it'll just make you sweat more. You move more slowly. None of this explains why they're all so damn good looking, though. Maybe I'm lowering my standards as I get older, but I don't think so. Maybe I'm just more randy than usual what with the heat and humidity. I reckon there's a mystery in it.

Selections from NAME Magazine as photographed by Kai Z Feng

a man of wealth and style... nearly

2010-06-17T20:14:00.018-04:00

So, I thought this was pretty funny...

And in other news, Dorry has developed a raw food obsession. I'm a bit interested in raw food, but I still like the occasional BBQ. The odd Mongolian Beef. But Dorry is going all out and what I didn't realize, or Pete either for that matter, is that a raw food binge includes all things dehydrated so now we have a dehydrator. Room for 9 racks. So, I guess this is the Cadillac of dehydrators... is this usage of Cadillac passe? Don't remember the last time I even saw a Cadillac. So, maybe we have the Hummer of dehydrators? The Porche? BMW?

Anyway, she dehydrates apples, kiwis, ah, the fruit not the bird, strawberries and tonight she's drying something that is both sweet and a bit off... like dirty gym socks. Something that was black and gooey, like the filling of a Fig Newton, but without the nitrates. And I wonder if this is how we were meant to eat. Did the hunter/gather types have dehydrators? Were the Indians waiting on the docks with one to greet the Mayflower? Jerky? Oh. Yeah. I'll stay with chicken, thanks.

In the meantime, I'm working with a client I hate, but he's a bit of a cash cow as well as a pain in the ass. And he has a million + project right here in Atlanta and I'd really like to make some major cash and move into my own space and somehow I'm 20 again trying to get away from the 'rents. Still, the guy's worth millions, but today I had to write him a 4 page memo, because he doesn't know what the word "fabrication" means. Fuck, get a dictionary. So, I'm wondering if Trader Joe's is hiring.

And it's true that life is unsettled and anxious right now. I'm working with a company out of Vegas and we're doing okay, but now we're on the verge of landing 3 major projects and landing them would take us from okay to fucking stellar. And of the three, one client's a dream and the other two are problems who insist on hiring us and then ignoring us, putting the cart before the horse each and every possible way. And this is, of course, our fault. And at what moment, at what point in the cosmos, were these guys lucid enough to become multi-millionaires? Cuz they're crazier than cat-crap now. And it was only the other night that I realized that after 30 years, I don't want to do this anymore. Maybe getting cracked open like a lobster brought me to my senses.

So, I met a guy... did I tell you this? I think I mentioned him. Twenty-four. University student. Hot. Insecure. Subject to anxiety attacks trying to decide what to have for breakfast. And I passed. I don't want to do that anymore, either. And I could go back to JP. That's been made clear. Live near the water. Write. Find comfort in his arms, in his smile. In his lithe, powerful body. But I'm here now. And after only 3 months so close to making a life here and I don't want to give that up. I've worked hard at it. Ignored the fears of falling over dead if my heart rate get's above 85. And I'm so close to being back at it again. A master of my craft. And now he beckons. And I'm sick of being a master of my craft.

I hate it when this happens.

Christ, I lost this guy's name. What an classic blunder on my part! Anyway, he's Austrian, A&F guy (duh!) If I remember it, or find it, I'll let you know. (Moritz Mitterbauer!!!!) I could have just put up Zac Efron's new pics, but they're everywhere. BTW, the site got a bit of a face lift, did you notice? Anyone? A show of hands?

Faulkner and Me

2010-06-01T22:19:00.022-04:00

It seems a southern belle is invited to a gracious dinner party in New York. Seated at table, surrounded by strangers, but remembering her manners, she smiles and asks, "So, where y'all from?" "Well," comes the disdainful reply from the woman sitting across from her, "I'm from a place where we don't end sentences with prepositions." "Oh," says the belle demurely. "In that case, where y'all from, bitch."

"Funny, I never thought of Atlanta as the Deep South," I say to my new friend Nick. He takes a quick turn off the highway and within minutes we're in The Heat of the Night, with narrow streets of broken asphalt shaded by trees the size of moon rockets. Moss hangs down, just like in the pictures. Stumbled row houses line each side of the road with hand-painted signs advertising watermelon, honey and antiques. At the Dekalb Farmer's Market, ancient ebony grandmothers supported on canes buy up fish, ham and rice for Purloo and Limpin' Susan. They argue with the countermen over the best way to clean pig intestines and how to keep cracklin' bread from being too greasy.

Some part of my heart has always been in The South, though I'd never gotten closer to it than southern California. As a boy, for reason's I still don't understand, I eschewed Yankees John Wayne and William Holden in Horse Soldiers for the ruthless, grungy CSA officer Richard Widmark and his band of dingy Confederate raiders in Alvarez Kelly. I watched Steel Magnolias so many times my friends despaired of me. I read a story where WIlliam Faulkner, tired of cranking out scripts in stuffy offices at this Hollywood studio or that, asked if he could go home to work. He was given leave and the next morning studio exec's were stunned to learn he had decamped for Mississippi. I'm just beginning to understand the appeal. In college, we produced one Tennessee Williams play after another, drenching the casts with glycerin so they'd look appropriately humidified and from that heady atmosphere The South took on a dramatic, mysterious Hush Hush Sweet Charlotte air.

Anne Rice, Harper Lee and John Berendt, among others, introduced me to the more lurid landscapes of The South, above and beyond poor Charlotte finding her married lover chopped to pieces in the summer house. Somehow, kudzu and high humidity lead to mayhem. Stanley Kowalski screaming, "STELLA!" into the thick "Nawlins" night. Jim Williams gunning down the beautiful Danny Hansford. Miss Dubois strung out on morphine. Catharine Holly driven mad by Sebastian's gruesome finish. Lestat and Louise, Damon and Stefan, leaving vampire snack wrappers from Louisiana to Virginia. My God, who would want to live here?

I stand on my porch after another violent thunderstorm, the humidity hanging in the air like confectioner's glaze, the ground damp and moldy, with fire flies darting from here to there and back again, and I must confess I do not feel the urge to commit violence. My sanity seems intact. While Dorry assures me that the ghosts of slaughtered Confederate soldiers haunt these woods, I don't feel it. All I see is a lushness unimaginable in my native SoCal where we comment on the various shades of brown and rust that is our landscape. The greens twirl up from the ground and into the sky; they intoxicate me. The damp, rotting atmosphere invigorates me. Maybe the craziness is absorbed through the skin and I just need to be here longer. In the meantime, I'll go and watch the glossy black rat snakes make their way through our yard to the lake and some succulent turtle eggs... I'm sure it's all harmless.

Ian Somerhalder, of course. A fine example of Southern manhood, born and bred in Covington, Louisiana.

a story of two bottles

2010-05-26T21:46:00.014-04:00

I bought two bottles of vodka. And bloody expensive bottles they were. I bought them for a friend, someone I consider a friend, who lives in another country and I should say here that this particular vodka is only available in the U.S. and in Slovakia. For those of you who do not drink vodka... and what gay boy doesn't drink vodka... but just in case, let me just say that there is vodka, then there is premium vodka and occasionally there is an ultra premium vodka and that's what I bought. Sipping vodka, if you will. Not to be mixed. Drunk with, perhaps, a rind of lemon or lime.

Unfortunately, bureaucrats are of an ilk that must either obtain a pound of flesh from as many individuals as possible or, barring that, control their actions as closely as possible. So, in spite of several attempts to ship these crystal beauties, e-mails to the distillery, schemes, plots and general skullduggery, in the end there was nothing to be done. So, the bottles wound up packed away in my room and my friend gave up hope, but to his credit, avoided despair, so far as I know.

Time passed. And it was only recently that Pete and Dorry invited me to join them at the birthday party of a close friend of theirs, who is also a passing acquaintance of mine. And life being what it is, at the time we were ready to go, they realized they had no gift. Options were considered and discarded, and finally Dorry asked if it might be possible for them to purchase one of my vodka beauties. A box and jolly packaging were produced and in a short while we were off to the party, Pete and Dorry assuring me all the while that our host would love and treasure his gift as nearly as I had.

The host was indeed impressed when we described the package's contents, and he immediately shut it away in a hall closet saying that he didn't want it for the other guests, but for himself alone, and I was greatly relieved. Then he went on to say that in the morning he knew a place that squeezed fresh orange juice and he would pick some up to enjoy with the vodka. Everyone smiled. And after the party was in full swing, I slipped away to a liquor store down the street, purchased a bottle of Smirnoff, slipped into the closet and in that dark, musty place I carefully replaced my vodka with the Smirnoff. And I'm sure he'll enjoy it.

I haven't asked Pete and Dorry to pay me for the vodka, and if they offer it, I'll politely decline, telling them how gracious they have been to me and to please accept it as a gift... a contribution, as it were. And the bottle is once again safely snugged away in my room beside its twin and I am scheduled to fly to my friend's country in August where I will present him with one of the bottles, because I know he would never be so crass as to drink one of my beauties with a mixer, even fresh squeezed orange juice, reducing it to a... cocktail.

The End.

From Homotography (http://homotography.blogspot.com), six nudes presenting six masculine scents. Photography by Karl Simone, casting and fragrance editing (??) by John Tan, grooming by Rebecca Plymate.

From the top: Michael Klein/The One by Dolce and Gabbana; Neils Raabe/Gucci by Gucci; Fredrik Ferrie/Dior Homme Sport; Chris Pillman/The Beat by Burberry; Niclas Gillis/Prada Infusion d'Homme and lastly, Nils Lawton/Euphoria by Calvin Klein.

My favorite: #5 Niclas Gillis. Which is yours?

River Viiperi, I love you! At least until Thursday.

2010-05-23T13:49:00.016-04:00

I had spent an evening a while ago, back before the flood, debating a workable definition of love. This was over dinner with friends at an overly stylish, now gone, restaurant in southern California. I put forward Robert Heinlein's from "Stranger In A Strange Land" that love is where another person's happiness is essential to your own. This definition works for me, though you need to look to the comment's sub-text rather than its face value. One of the diners was emphatically opposed to it, because he saw it as an abrogation of self reliance (very Ayn Rand). Another was ambivalent. The third was offended that I would bring up anything from a misogynist like Heinlein, a position which I considered questionable at the time and still do. Regardless, no one was able to come up with anything better, well, maybe Eric Fromm, but who can read the guy, you know?

Last night I spent quite a bit of time on skype with my friend Jeff. Jeff is a sweet, tender guy who lives in Calgary, Canada and supports himself doing naked j/o shows. I had hired him once upon a time, but we very soon became close friends and spent way more time talking about life than more prurient pursuits. Jeff is amazingly handsome in a rugged, masculine sort of way and his fans are rapidly devoted to him, mostly gay men, though Jeff is decidedly straight. I suppose Jeff does his shows because, aside from the easy money, he's a very lonely man who wants nothing more than to fall in love and work at something steady, like being an electrician, but he's a lousy picker and his past is strewn with the wreckage of a dozen disastrous relationships.

Last night he talked about a client of his who is quite wealthy and who wants Jeff to come and live with him. He will put him through school, put him up in his own suite of rooms, give him a generous allowance and allow him to sleep with whomever he wants with the exception of two nights a month where Jeff must commit to his client's bed. Though Jeff finds the offer tempting, he seriously doubts that he could ever have sex with a man, even something as passive as lying back and getting head. His client purports to be totally in love with him, but given the Heinlein definition above, I tend to doubt it.

So now, the client has offered to have a sex change operation if Jeff will come and live with him. And this really wierds me out, but I'm stunned to find that Jeff is very touched by the offer (like I said, he's a lousy picker). I insist that this is all just talk, but Jeff tells me he's totally sincere. Being a realist (I use to call myself a cynic, but then I realized that there is no such thing) I'd like to fly up to Calgary and simply slap the shit out of Jeff, but I've long since given up saving people. And I'm thinking, maybe Heinlein was wrong. Maybe love doesn't have anything to do with loyalty or sacrifice or safety at all, but is just an obsession we've come to accept as the lesser of all evils. It wouldn't be the first time I realized that something holy is actually profane. Maybe they're just totally fucked up. Maybe we all are.

And because of all this frustration, I'm really curious as to who thought this all up, because I'd really like to punch his lights out.

River Viiperi from around the web. Nudes by Jeffrey Cohen. Find River's blog at: http://riverdelfin.blogspot.com

random occurrences and the rules of acquisition

2010-05-20T21:42:00.019-04:00

Busy, busy, busy.

Our company phone number must have been written on a wall out at Hartfield International, because everybody's telephoning and they all want something 5 minutes ago. Happily, there are riches to be made in chaos, as I recently wrote to a mysterious young man who I know is wildly talented and I suspect is handsome. But it's true all the same.

Otherwise, a random selection of happenstance in no particular order:

I've started looking for a place to live, if business doesn't pull me off east or west in the next few weeks. If it doesn't, I've settled on Decatur, GA or someplace along that fashionable corridor east of downtown beginning with Mid-Town. But then I discovered that Decatur is where they shoot the "Vampire Diaries" and I'm not sure I want to be domiciled in a place where roughnecks are breaking down lighting rigs at 3:00am, Ian Somerhalder notwithstanding.

A 19 y/o yoga instructor has moved in down the road with his mother, also a yoga instructor. I came home from working out to find them both deposited on our sofa in the uncanny postures these people assume. As life would have it, the 19 y/o, named Alexander, is gay and would like me to show him around... "We could find a spot and have a meal with OUR PEOPLE..." he said, like we're expatriated Russian royalists or something. He's nice, but not my type, if you're wondering. But then someone only just mentioned to me that people who aren't our type, usually are. How metaphysical is that!!?? But I have no time for metaphysics. If he wants me, he can follow me to Decatur.

For reasons surpassing understanding, I volunteered to watch all of the kids so Pete and Dorry could slip away for an afternoon. Gore Vidal posited once that no one should have children ever again, and now I agree with him. I won't bore you with the details... and my psychologist has warned me of the damage I could cause myself re-living it, but one aspect of the day sticks in my mind... how can a 1 1/2 y/o weighing a few scant pounds produce a turd the size of an atomic submarine? It's beyond physics. I know others have touched on this subject, but the loaf the kid pitched was truly extraordinary.

For you Ayn Rand freaks out there...

I don't want to turn this into a political blog; there are so many wonderful political blogs that there's probably too many. But I can't get a story out of my mind, an occurrence in Maine during the recent GOP caucus there. The GOP threw out their usual platform and replaced it with a 4 page e-mail from the state Tea Party demonstrating an ignorance that is astounding in this day and age. I really can't see the logic in any of these peoples' positions, other than abject selfishness, but then I graduated high school. Anyway, one plank of the platform drew my attention: "Health care isn't a right. It's a service". And I despair of this country, because we're all Ferengi now.

The incomparable Alan Carey...

sondheim prolly has a song about this

2010-05-09T11:50:00.010-04:00

So, I started living alone while I was still in college. One of my professors warned me that once I made that move, I'd never want to live with another person again until I fell I love. My problem was that even after I fell in love, I wasn't really up for it. I lead an orderly life. I like coming home from a stressful job to a neat and tidy place. My penchant for young men tends to preclude that. They have other priorities and that's actually good for me, but it doesn't happen often.

I've been living with Pete and Dorry and their 4 kids for almost 3 months now. I've scouted out a place to live not too far away and work continues to come galumphing in. I suspect that by this time next month the damn will have broken and I'll be on the move quite a lot. Still, learning to live with 4 kids and a semi-hysterical mom has left me wondering about my sanity at times. It's too bad the CIA never stumbled onto this. There have been moments where I would have confessed to just about anything to make the nightmare end.

But the other night I dropped by Pete and Dorry's bedroom on some household business. I guess I should point out that Dorry's 29 and, after 4 kids, she's gotten heavy, though she's still an extremely beautiful woman. And taking care of 4 kids takes its toll, especially when you add in all the extra-cirricular stuff. Chocolate and full milk coffees are her placebos. Pete is 35, looks 25, an extraordinarily handsome man. He works out 4 to 5 times a week and is, in a word, stunning. We've been extremely close since he was 22 and I've never seen him look better.

And on this particular evening, with the kids in bed and the house quiet in the way a place is quiet after a full day of running, screaming and shouting, they were cuddling on their bed. And I couldn't help but be envious. They've been together for 11 years. Their quarrels are epic. But the love they bear one another was palpable. He has been on the road a lot lately, but as soon as he comes home, well, the blush in Dorry's cheeks the next morning and her sunny attitude testify to Pete's devotion. It's touching, if not foreign.

So being here does have its lessons, as I've always known it would. I've seldom been loved like that, but then, I've seldom loved like that. Immersed in it, not holding anything back. And though I've supped with kings and advised heads of state, I've never had that kind of courage. But I'd like to.

Just stuff from around the net.

we have met the enemy and they are us

2010-05-04T10:49:00.023-04:00

So, now that I'm back and have this new plumbing to look after, I've been looking at health insurance quotes. HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA! Anyway, most are between $500 and $700 a month, 'cept for Kaiser. I can get a policy from them for only $288! 'Course, that's with a $10,000 deductible. At this rate, it would be cheaper to fly back to Italy every couple of months and get my check-ups there. (How ridiculous does this have to get, btw?) My former company is obliged to insure me for one year after the end of my employment so I have health insurance in the EU until December. Thank God, we have a free market economy here in the US and not some socialist clap-trap where everyone is taken care of. What a blow that would be to the sterling image of the United States of America... btw, according to Bad Medicine Columnist Chris Wanjek:

"The United States has by far the highest level of health spending per capita in the world: 15.4 percent of the GDP, according the World Health Organization. Scandinavian countries, with their universal healthcare coverage, pay less than half of this. Yet the United States has one of the lowest life expectancies among developed nations, at about 78 years, which is lower than Cuba and Bosnia but marginally beats Slovenia, according to United Nation’s figures."

Something to be proud of.

Also, based on mortality data from the National Center for Health Statistics and population data from the U.S. Census Bureau between 1959 and 2001, that life expectancy figure may have peaked and is actually in decline: "The findings are troublesome, the researchers said, because life expectancy, along with infant mortality, is a major indicator of the health of a nation. A decline in life expectancy, as is seen during turmoil such as war and famine, is a sign that health and social systems are failing."

But according to John Boehner, House Minority Leader, we have the best health care system in the world. So, he's either lying or a he's a moron. I'll be charitable and opt for the latter.

I was reading a column, I don't know, somewhere, and it advocated skipping insurance and simply paying run of the mill medical costs out of pocket, because it's cheaper. And that's what I'm doing. A doctor visit is $130, more or less, and if I need blood work or an echocardiogram, that's between $200 and $400. The eco would be, maybe, every 6 months, so... yeah. Not cheaper so much as simply reality. And we're the wealthiest nation in the world? Oh wait, that was before Wall Street went from championing investments that advanced technology and production and started advocating virtual reality investments designed to fail that they could short sale and make stupid amounts of money while destroying the life savings of millions of people! Hey, that's progress you can see! Going down. But it is living on the edge, this insurance thing. If you're in an accident or something you'd be bankrupt, but then, even with insurance you'd be bankrupt so, gosh, the choices here are kinda like, "would you prefer crucifixion or disembowlment?" And I'm relatively healthy after the surgery. I wonder how many people are out there who aren't healthy, but can't afford insurance. It's gotta be hell.

And I was away for 'bout 5 years and I'm wondering when the free market switched from excelling at producing exceptional products to simply grabbing as much as you can from whomever you can. My first car was a 1968 Ford Mustang that I bought from my parents. It was an amazing vehicle and is probably responsible for a love of the road that continues to this day. But I wouldn't buy a Ford at this point if my life depended on it. I'd opt for something that hones your driving skills rather than something you just sit in. And, yeah, it would have a manual transmission.

I don't know where I'm going with this. I'm just frustrated, I guess. Depressed. Maybe I'm not getting enough corn syrup.

And in memory of beautiful Italia, the snaps are screen captures of Gabriele Rossi in "Tutti Pazzi Per Amore 2" (Something About Love 2)

rubbernecking

2010-04-29T12:32:00.007-04:00

So, you may not be aware, or maybe you are, that an important blog went down last Friday and the wreckage is only now starting to drift ashore. The blog was written, or maybe not, by a young man whose nom de plume was "Mikey" and he presented himself as a gay 17 y/o hockey fanatic high schooler somewhere in the vast wilderness we call Minnesota. I found out about the blog through Towleroad who had picked it up off Outsports.com. Mikey had become something of a cause celebre by that time. His humor, sincerity and distinctive writing style (a sever text message script that became as much a character on his blog as he was) attracted a considerable following of young, closeted athletes struggling with their sexuality in the face of a mostly unforgiving sports world. He was interviewed, given free blog space, sought out and finally became the epicenter of an on-line forum called MikeyNation.com. Then on Friday it all came tumbling down, leaving behind a lot of disillusioned young people and not a little mystery.

Shifting through the detritus the last few days, I'm unable to get a clear picture of what exactly happened. There seem to be 2 theories at the top of the heap. The first is that it all became too much for Mikey and that he was ultimately scared off by an encroaching limelight or an individual who was threatening to out him for no other reason than because he could. The second theory centers around the accusation that Mikey was actually a 40-something who scammed and conned his way into the lives of countless young gay athletes, but to what end no one can say for sure.

I have heard vague accusations that Mikey befriended certain of his followers and offered to trade nude pics with them, but only a few. The photos Mikey sent were apparently lifted from various porn sites; to date I don't know of any boys who sent Mikey anything too revealing, but the shame and humiliation of being conned could well be keeping them from speaking out. I lost interest in the blog early on for whatever reason and stopped reading, but he apparently struck a cord with many of his readers and through him they found a place to voice their fears, desires and frustrations. A noble enterprise, now horribly tainted and, according to his detractors, basely betrayed.

I listened to one of his podcasts (http://www.bendave.com/saywhat/2010/01/episode-29-sherlock-homos.html) and there was no doubt in my mind that I was listening to a 17 or 18 y/o. I suppose he could have been a hired gun. There are accusations that the 40-something utilized software to soften and raise the tremor of his voice to that of a much younger man. And this all seems so very contrived and so immaculately thought out and executed that I find myself incredulous. Still, if it was an elaborate hoax designed to meet and seduce young athletes, it would be damnable if not seemingly unworkable. Once a youngster discovered his true identity, did he really expect them to simply shrug it off and succumb to his carnal suggestions? A serious derangement. But there's no evidence that this was the case, so the question of Why? remains.

There is, of course, the question of why no one took the time to verify that Mikey was for real and I wonder why some effort wasn't made. Perhaps the idealism of the adults in charge was overwhelming. Here was a young man who was a beacon, providing a much needed platform for discussion and hope. But now, of course, the damage is extraordinary. The owners who hosted the blog are being pressed to investigate... well, something. But there doesn't seem much for them to do other than be defensive about their good intentions, with which, the wag tells us, the road to hell is paved. And apparently this time the wags were right.

So, on the one hand, we have a frightened, talented kid, wary of an ever widening spotlight who, perhaps being threatened with exposure and condemnation, lost his nerve and headed back into the dark, slamming and bolting the door securely behind him. All traces of Mikey have either disappeared or are being systematically eradicated.

On the other hand, we have a seemingly brilliant, much disturbed 40 y/o who was able to not only pull the wool over the eyes of the adults who sponsored him, but also the 15, 16 and 17 y/o's who worshipped him, a nearly impossible task, here pulled off with amazing charm and aplomb. Arrested development for the Ages. One can only imagine the terror of fading youth and desire, the isolation, that fed such a plan, not to mention the time and adherence to the orthodoxy maintained. You'd think that someone that clever would have recognized the unsustainability of what he was doing... or at least read Death in Venice.

And as with all good mysteries, we may never know the whole story. With a few exceptions, some say questionable exceptions, most of the known players are running to ground or keeping their council, a good idea given the fallout. I'm not saying this is a gay story, but it is certainly a human one where compassion for everyone involved will go a long way. When I was just coming out, an older, more worldly friend cautioned me: "Gay people eat their young". And then, as I grew older, the pendulum swung the other way, "We'd really prefer if you'd stay out of sight" a cold beauty quipped one night, an over the shoulder to my friends and I, all over 40. With the wreck of MikeyNation, these two themes have collided with awful consequences. And we continue to live and learn.

dumb monsters and things that wammer in the night

2010-04-22T20:48:00.017-04:00

So, I don't believe in ghosts. Or conspiracy theories. Or God, as defined by just about everybody. But, as humans, I think we seek more complex answers to what befalls us than chance, fate or even luck. And considering some of the foolishness that comes down, who can blame us? I had a friend who pulled his two tours in Iraq without a scratch. A week after he came home he was hit by a bus and killed. I suppose that according to chaos theory, there is nothing unusual about this, but we're led to believe we live in an orderly universe, so we ask ourselves how this could happen. And all I can say is, I don't know, but it wasn't ghosts or conspiracies or the hand of God... prolly gonna get slammed for that one, but whatever.

And it turns out that one of the kids here, the oldest, if you'd like to know, goes a bit bat fuck some week nights, because she thinks she sees monsters, or hears them, or whatever. These monsters are pretty stock stuff: they lurk in the closet, under the bed, hide in a dark corner. And as kids since time immemorial have been seeing monsters in these exact same places you can reach two conclusions: 1) either the monsters exist, but are as unimaginative as a sack of hammers, so what's to be afraid of, or 2) Binkley's Anxiety Closet is more than just something Berke Breathed dreamed up. And, of course, I vote for the latter.

I've been here two months now and, not to put too fine a point on it, we live in the woods. And I don't mean some landscaper's wet dream, I mean THE WOODS. Like Hansel and Gretel type woods. So, in addition to the usual gashlycrumb terrors kids experience, there are branches scraping, animals scratching and an assortment of grunts, sniffs and snorts. So, yeah, some nights the kid in question get's the piss scared outta her. Kinda watching this develop, I noticed that it never happens on the week-ends, on holidays and I don't remember it ever happening over Christmas. So i deduce that what the kid is feeling is normal anxiety, but she doesn't know what anxiety is so she translates it into any one or all of the perennial kid fears and so were digging through the closet at 4:30am looking for monsters... I know... there are SO many ways I could take this, but let's just keep to the... erm., straight and narrow. That's what put most of us in the closet in the first place... sorry! Really sorry. Couldn't be helped. Knee-jerk type of thing...

ANYWAY, I mention all of this to Dorry who I think is a good mother, just a bit scattered... Ok, a whole lot scattered, but a good mom nonetheless. And after laying this all out in admirable clarity, Dorry proceeds to thank me for my very interesting hypothesis and then she tells me that she thinks her kid is an Adept and is picking up the spirits of dead Confederate soldiers that drift through the woods some nights. And suddenly I understand why the kid is having nightmares.

I so need to get out of here.

The balm for our fevered brows this post is model Nikolaus Fuhrhauser as shot by Kosmas Pavlos.

And you're not getting any more Tim Urban, so you can forget it. It's for your own good. Really.

Like there's even a comparrison...