Category: essays

Feliz Davidad

And so it was Christmas.

I have to say this weekend has been quite lovely thus far. I’m getting work on the book done, I am getting things done, and I am somehow remaining relatively relaxed and sane while I accomplish things, which has been quite nice. I am sleeping very well and sleeping in every day, which is going to require some adjustments when Monday rolls around again, sadly. I feel remarkably well-rested and refreshed this morning, which is also nice as I sip my coffee and think about what to have for breakfast; probably yogurt and fresh berries, before they go bad. I am going to make pulled turkey today for the holiday in the slow cooker, so dinner’s already sorted for me, which is also kind of nice. I am intending to clean out the refrigerator today as part of my chores for the day; Paul is going to work out with his trainer this morning and I am not sure what his plans for the rest of this holiday might be. I need to write a chapter of the book today, which shouldn’t be terribly hard–I’ve written some really dreadful chapters over the last few days–and should probably spend some time with Vivien Chien’s Death by Dumpling today; I had hoped to have it finished before today so I could spend the day with the most recent Donna Andrews novel; but I may just make that my New Year’s Day reading, to close out the holiday season (even though Carnival will be starting on Twelfth Night, which is even sooner than one might think).

I also found an essay I’d been looking for; I, like Paul, have an obsessive side to my personality that I try to combat and not give into when it takes hold of my brain; often to no avail, sadly: when my brain goes into obsessive mode, there’s really not much else I can do rather than either ride it out (not easy) or give in to it. This most recent obsessive conduct had to do with an essay I had written; the other day I remembered it and started looking for it, despite the fact that I couldn’t remember what the file was named. I had been asked to write a letter to myself at age sixteen the summer we went to Italy; I started writing it before we left for the trip but had never finished it. I eventually finished it, as I recalled vaguely the other day, on the trip to Venice from Florence; I wrote it on the train, saved the file, and hit send. I could not find it anywhere; and obsessed about it all day yesterday as I dug through electronic files (which are in much worse condition as far as organization than I even feared, which I will have to do something about at some point). After Paul got home, I talked to him about it and as I spoke to him it hit me: I had emailed the story in, maybe it was in my ancient sent email folder. And sure enough, there it was; and doing a second search by the title proved that it was saved nowhere in my files; I am not sure how that could have happened, but my biggest fear about my electronic files has now proven true: there are things that have disappeared from them over the years.

But this Christmas miracle is worth enjoying; a piece I’d feared had disappeared forever (the website where it was posted no longer exists; so much for the Internet is forever) has been retrieved, and it can be the opening piece in my collection of personal essays, should I ever decide how to do that and how to pull it all together.

If 2021 was the year of finishing things–Bury Me in Shadows and #shedeservedit having been in progress for years, even decades–I think that mentality needs to continue forward in 2022: finish things. I do want to finish the novellas, the short story collection, and potentially the essay collection; I also want to finish Chlorine, and possibly something else. I’ve also spent some time going over my blog from the earlier part of 2021, to try to remember things I watched and books I read; my memory is even faultier than I remembered it being in the first place. But it’s also kind of fun seeing what I was reading and watching earlier this year–the impact of HBO MAX’s It’s a Sin combined with my sixtieth birthday this year had me revisiting and thinking about the past a lot, for example, and forced me to process a lot of things I had never processed before, which may have had something to do with a lot of my own issues: never deal with it, just keep moving forward may not have been the most mentally healthy plan for me to get through my life, but it was also necessary for survival, and I will not/shall not judge my younger self for whatever coping mechanisms and skills I may have developed in order to get through everything I had to deal with in this my life.

And on that note, I think I am going to finish this, eat my breakfast, and head into the spice mines for a little visit. Have a lovely Christmas, Constant Reader, even if it’s just another Saturday to you.

The Night Before Christmas

It is now Christmas Eve–how lovely for everyone–and I do hope that everyone has the kind of holiday experience they want to have; whether it’s with actual family, chosen family, or just all alone and by yourself, may you have yourself the kind of day that will make you happy and relaxed and chilled out completely. I have to write again today–the joys of impending deadline–but that’s actually okay; I enjoy writing, so what better way for me to spend Christmas Eve? I’ll probably treat myself to a celebratory cocktail of some sort this evening; martini or margarita or Bloody Mary. I think Paul is going into the office for a few hours this afternoon anyway, so I can spend that time organizing and writing and cleaning and all of that fun stuff I get to do when Paul’s not home but I am. I was very creative last night, too–writing all kinds of notes about potential future projects and just letting my mind run a little wild; but that’s what happens when I allow my mind free rein to free-associate and start thinking of ideas. I even came up with a first last night; an idea for a gay romance called A Better Man, which might actually be fun to write. I also came up with a crime story about obsession (Missing White Woman, title gacked from Kellye Garrett on Twitter), and The Ones Who Walked Away, which is a title that could go in several different directions as far as length (short story, novel, novella) as well as what it’s about.

It’s actually kind of fun when I have the time to sit and think and come up with ideas and thoughts and so forth. The manuscript-in-progress is going to be a lot more fun now that I’ve taken some time to put some serious thought into it.

I am also taking a break from Blatant Self-Promotion because of the holiday. No one–well, certainly not me at any rate–wants Blatant Self-Promotion on Christmas Eve; hence a break from me, a respite as a holiday gift from me to you, Constant Reader (although making that decision has immediately caused that wretched little voice in my head to whisper this is why you don’t have a bigger career).

Well, to be fair it’s also a respite for me, since I hate doing it unless I can find a way to make it interesting.

And as the year winds down, I generally start looking back over the past year and thinking about the things I enjoyed, the things I didn’t, the progress made and the progress thwarted. But the pandemic years all seem to have run together somehow in my fevered brain; I don’t remember when I read a particular book or watched a particular movie or television show from the last two years. I also read so many damned good books and watched so much great entertainment (series and films) on my television that my picking some as highlights for the year would be incredibly, incredibly difficult–AND I would undoubtedly miss some. It’s also difficult for me to pick out a favorite (except Ted Lasso) of anything; I enjoyed so many different things for so many different reasons.

Although it would be interesting to go back and reread my blog entries from this same time last year. I know I was trying to get Bury Me in Shadows ready for submission at this time last year–one accomplishment of this past year was getting two books finished and turned in for publication, which was a big step past the previous year; my last book, Royal Street Reveillon, was released in the fall of 2019, so there was literally nothing from me in 2020 other than short stories here and there–and I cannot remember which ones, where and when, for that matter, either; I keep thinking, for example, that “The Dreadful Scott Decision” came out in The Faking of the President earlier this year, but it was actually last year. I think my Sherlock Holmes story and some others came out this past year, but it’s not something I’d be willing to testify about under oath, either. I do hate when that happens.

I’ve also been obsessively trying to locate two things (it’s actually more, but I am grouping many into one): several years back, while going through boxes, I found my old journals from back in the day, which actually inspired me to buy another one and start carrying one with me again (which has been wonderful), but I also don’t remember what I did with them so I’ve been trying to find them again. The other thing I am trying to find is a copy of an essay I wrote on the train from Florence to Venice (or vice versa). It was one of those “letters to myself at age sixteen”, and the other day I was trying to get a better handle on all the essays I’ve written over the years so I can compile them all into one (or more) collections; the fitness columns and essays on writing alone could probably be their own collections. Anyway, I remember having to write it on my laptop on the train–either to or from Venice, I honestly don’t remember, but I do think it was on the way–and it got a lot of engagement on social media, I do remember that but I can’t find a copy of the essay itself anywhere. It’s entirely possible it is one of those things that got lost over the years, and I also don’t remember what I called the file; but I am sure I saved it somewhere….only now I can’t find it and have been obsessively searching for it and realizing at the same time how messy and sloppy my computer files and all the back-ups actually are. I mean, neither thing (journals or essay) are particularly imperative that I put my hands on them immediately, but at the same time it’s really annoying and frustrating and I feel the obsessive side of my personality trying to come out.

So, I will probably spend some time looking for both at some point today–most likely when I am stuck on the book while writing.

And on that note, I am going to head into the spice mines. Have a lovely Christmas Eve, Constant Reader, whatever you are celebrating or not celebrating, and I will speak with you tomorrow.

Christmas Won’t Be The Same Without You

I did not want to get up this morning.

A quick look at today’s temperature–it is currently forty-eight degrees–explains it. It is chilly in the Lost Apartment this morning, and my heavy blankets felt all too marvelous for me to want to get out from underneath them when the alarm began it’s insistent cacophony far too early this morning for my tastes, quite frankly. The first day of winter looms nigh this week–perhaps even today or tomorrow–and then we’re in for the cold spells of winter in southeastern Louisiana, I would presume.

It’s weird–since Christmas is this weekend I only have my three days of work in the office this week, and then I have a four-day holiday. The holiday will be spent, of course, trying to get back on schedule with everything–I had a semi-productive day yesterday, and that productivity needs to continue today–but as my coffee kicks in I am also not tired, I am finding; more like I was groggy and didn’t want to come fully awake just yet. The stiff soreness in my shoulders also isn’t there this morning, so perhaps after work tomorrow I can actually return to the gym and start easing my way back into working out again. Yay? Yay.

I spent some time with Vivien Chien’s delightful Death by Dumpling yesterday, which is also an immersive experience into an Asian business center in Cleveland; which is interesting. I know we have a rather nice-sized Asian immigrant community in New Orleans–there was a section along Canal Street that was once our Chinatown–and there are a lot of Vietnamese families in New Orleans East (Poppy Z. Brite’s Exquisite Corpse explored the New Orleans Vietnamese community)–yet another part of New Orleans’ rich and varied culture/community/history I’ve never touched on in my work. The lovely thing about New Orleans is you can never ever run out of things to research, explore and write about here; the sad thing about New Orleans is realizing there is so much that it’s incredibly humbling; I always kind of laugh to myself when I hear myself being described as a “New Orleans expert”–please. There’s so little that I actually do know as opposed to the actuality; I am always realizing how little I do know about the city and its history and culture.

I also spent some time writing on the book yesterday, and it is beginning to really take shape nicely. If I can maintain a decent schedule on it, I should be able to finish on time–which will be just in time to head to New York next month, barring the trip getting canceled for one reason or another (please please please let that not happen again). I also managed to get the promo recordings done–I hate, as I have mentioned, hearing and seeing myself on recordings, so I can’t rewatch them to see if they are any good or not–but maybe I should start recording myself doing readings from my books and stories as promotional materials? I don’t know, it’s hard for me to imagine that succeeding, but…is that part of the self-destructive mentality that is rooted in my deeply felt Imposter Syndrome, or is that a valid critique of me, my attempts to promote myself and my career, and that very really sense that no one cares whether you do or you don’t?

Heavy thoughts this morning on my second cup of coffee, right?

But at least I got an email this morning from one of the places I recorded a video for–a brief read of “The Affair of the Purloined Rentboy”, from The Only One in the World–and Narrelle Harris, the very kind editor, seemed to have really liked it, so there’s that part going for me this morning. Yay, I think?

I also got the cover artwork for one of these anthologies I have a story in–Cupid Shot Me, Valentine’s Day gay crime stories, and that is the book that “This Thing of Darkness” is going to be revised/edited for (I made a note on my list of stories/manuscripts due this morning to note that this is the one due on January 10th)–and it’s pretty cool. I do love landing short stories, wherever I can. I hate that the short story market isn’t as strong as it used to be; even writing gay erotica was a nice supplemental income back in the days before everyone began truly using the internet to scratch their porn itches…remember the days of porn videos, either renting or buying for the exorbitant price of $89.95? The bargain bins of gay porn videos that had been remaindered? I’ve never pretended not to have written gay porn (or erotica, whichever makes you feel better about it), but it has been a hot minute since I’ve actually written or read any. That doesn’t mean I won’t ever again–there’s some gay noir I want to do that needs to be lusty, sweaty and erotic–but for now…it’s certainly not in my immediate future or in my plans for what I need to get done over the next two months.

And on that note, tis perhaps time for me to head into ye olde spice mines. There’s a lot I have to get done before the holidays this weekend.

Have an awesome Monday, Constant Reader!

Do You Hear What I Hear?

It’s hard to believe that Christmas will be all over one week from today, but there it is. It’s been humid and in the eighties here in New Orleans the last few days, which is about as un-Christmas like as one can imagine. I don’t mind the heat, to be honest, but wouldn’t mind a slight temperature dip to recognize the holiday–a slight one. Not even a fan of it going much lower than sixty-five, and will inevitably whine when and if it does.

Yesterday was, all in all, a lovely day. I managed to get my chapters done yesterday, as I had hoped–the book is turning out nicely, and I am most pleased with how it’s going, even if I am behind schedule (as always)–and I managed to not make a complete fool of myself on the ZOOM promotion thing I did last night (well, at least I don’t think so). I slept deeply and well last night, managed to get a lot of cleaning up done around here and some organizing, and hopefully today the writing will go well yet again. I also am hopeful that I’ll have the energy to also get other things done around here today. I wasn’t as tired yesterday as I had been the previous two days, which had a lot, I would imagine, to do with sleeping well the way I have the last two nights. I probably need to run to the grocery store today, but I think I might actually wait and go on the way home from work tomorrow. We shall see, I suppose.

And I still need to figure out when things are due and what all I have agreed to do–which means at some point today I need to make A List, which is never really a bad thing to do at any time, really. I do feel a little overwhelmed with deadlines, and A List is precisely the thing I need for right now. All I want to do right now is actually go sit in my easy chair with my coffee and read Vivien Chien’s book, but that’s undoubtedly the part of my brain that always throws up roadblocks and tries to keep me from succeeding, which is the part of my brain I should also never listen to at any time.

Yet here we are.

I’ve also been abstractedly thinking in the macro sense about next year already, and what I want to get done. I had wanted to do another Scotty book this year (the book I am currently writing supplanted it in the schedule), but with so many odds and ends hanging out in my files…I think that after I get all the short stories that are promised out of the way in January, I am going to spend February writing Chlorine while working on the Bouchercon anthology, which I would love to have finished and out of the way by the end of February (while being aware that I probably won’t get Chlorine finished in that same period of time, most likely), and then I want to get all these novellas and short story collections and potential essays finished and out of the way before I dive into another Scotty book. I know what that Scotty book is going to be–which is a lot more than I usually know going into a Scotty book, other than the title, which this time around is Mississippi River Mischief–but I doubt that’s going to make it any easier to write for me, either.

I also have to bear in mind that Crooked Lane may want another book in this series, too, which I would have to carve out time for.

It never ends–and I hope that it literally never does, frankly; I never want to stop writing and publishing, ever. Even if I stop publishing traditionally, I would probably keep writing and might go the indie route, to be honest. I’ve always written, and will always write as long as I can sit in my desk chair and move my fingers across the keyboard.

There’s also another Corinth County book I want to write, and more Corinth County stories to work on as well.

It’s gray outside this morning, which means clouds and that inevitably means rain at some point. There’s no condensation on my windows so it’s not humid–or not terribly so, at any rate, outside.

Nightmare Alley and the new Spider-Man movie both opened this weekend, and I actually would like to see both films, but am not entirely comfortable going to sit in a movie theater at this point in time. I do love the original Tyrone Power version of Nightmare Alley, and I love the darkness of the book (which was recommended to me by my friend Megan); it’s one of those I would like to have the time to reread at some point. Spider-Man is making bank at the box office, as one would expect it to, and I do love Tom Holland–I think he’s adorable, charismatic, and a good actor–but as much as I think this spectacle probably would work best on a big screen, this current variant situation has me reluctant to go see anything in the theater. I mean, why take chances? And since I am in close contact with people every day I see clients at the office, why push my luck this way? Hopefully both will wind up on a streaming service relatively soon, and I’m not in any huge rush to see either film. There aren’t many films I absolutely have to see immediately right now cannot wait for them to stream these days.

We’re still watching the OG Gossip Girl, which is still fun even if the characters create drama by doing things that have always failed before, which makes it very definitely a soap opera. We’re up to season four now, with only two left once we get through this run, and I suspect our Christmas day is going to be nothing more than a massive Gossip Girl binge watch. There certainly are other shows now piling up on our “must-watch” list, so this lengthy visit with the Gossip Girl gang is certainly allowing us to bank up a lot of shows to watch in reserve–which hopefully means not running out of anything to watch for a good long time.

And on that note, I think I am going to retire to my chair for an hour or so with Vivien Chien before diving into the book for today. Wish me luck, Constant Reader! I’ll check in with you again tomorrow.

Jingle Bells

I was tired all day yesterday–very low energy for most of the day, too tired to deal with a lot of anything. I spent the day making condom packs and watching a strange reality show on HBO MAX–Finding Magic Mike–and it really wasn’t what I was expecting, to be honest. I was thinking it was going to be an excellent piece of camp; Bravo had tried this with the trashy Manhunt, which was about casting a male strip review in Las Vegas. But this was…different. This was about helping the contestants “find their magic” by gaining confidence in themselves by learning how to perform for women while taking their clothes off. “I don’t feel like the main character in my life story anymore,” one of them says in the first episode, and many of the others echo the same kind of discontent and dissatisfaction with their lives. The process of the show was kind of interesting, and the contestants were actually kind of likable? (One was incredibly arrogant, but the editors did a really nice job of softening his edges by showing other sides of him, interacting with the others and helping them? He was the closest thing to a villain the show had, and I was actually kind of glad the editing didn’t try to fit the contestants into the boxes you usually see on competition shows.) It was actually kind of nice to see, particularly as the contestants bonded with each other.

So, while I was kind of disappointed in it, at the same time I was rather glad I watched. It did make me think about a lot of this “cultural war” stuff; like how “men aren’t men anymore”–but I would posit that men never used to be men, either; it was all a facade because of societal expectations placed on men to be “tough” or “strong” or “big boys don’t cry” and make them emotionally distant and disconnected from everyone in their lives. Societal norms and expectations when it comes to gender roles are quite damaging, I think–and while of course there are those who bemoan the breakdowns of those cultural norms. I do think/feel/believe that that the breaking down of gender roles and the redefinitions coming in their wake will make for a stronger society in the long run. I found male gender roles to be terribly confining and revolted against them most of my life; which means–in theory, at any rate–that my life has been subversive.

Which, while a cheery thought, is also kind of sad.

And I certainly didn’t expect a reality show where guys learned how to strip like Vegas professionals to lead me down a brain wormhole of examining masculinity roles and expectations. So, well done, HBO MAX and producer Channing Tatum. Well done, indeed.

I am going to work on the book as much as I can today, while cleaning and organizing; I have to do a live reading and panel thing this afternoon–which means turning on the camera in the computer, which means people can see the kitchen behind me, which means it can’t be in the condition it currently is in–and I am also supposed to record some promo videos. Sigh. I really hate being on camera and I really hate the sound of my own voice. But I agreed to do all of this, like it or not, and so I really need to commit and get it all done. I also need to figure out when all the things I’ve agreed to do are actually due, because the first quarter of 2022 looks to be booking up with all kinds of things that need to get taken care of and I need to pay attention to, or else I am going to be horribly frantic in the first few months of the next year.

And one thing I really need to get done is this book. I need to make enough progress into it so that I am not feeling stress about it–good luck with that, right?–because that stress will shorten my fuse and make me start snapping at people, and that’s not a good thing on any level. For anyone. I need to plan and make lists and get organized.

Last night I dipped into Death by Dumpling by Vivien Chien, and it’s absolutely charming. I also found my copy of Johnny Tremain and read the first chapter again–which is so dramatically different from the film that I am now wondering how much of what I remember of the book is actually from the film? Paul is going to be gone most of the day–he has Wacky Russian in the morning and then he is going into the office–so I am going to try to get as much writing done as I can before three my time, which is when I need to start rehearsing my reading for the panel at 4 central time. I also have to do a promo video for #shedeservedit, and I also have to record a short reading from “The Affair of the Purloined Rentboy,” which I am dreading. I’ve never liked seeing recordings of myself, am usually not terribly fond of photos of myself either (until years have passed), and I absolutely hate the sound of my voice. I am not sure what that is–a lack of confidence in myself? More deep-rooted self-loathing? Not feeling like the main character in the story of my life? (Damn you, Finding Magic Mike, for triggering all these self-questioning self-examinations in my head!)

I also finished reading Nightwing: Leaping into the Light, and it was, as I expected it would be, truly wonderful. I also started evaluating Nightwing as a character and why I connect with him so much; which will inevitably the blog entry/review of the book, no doubt–and possibly another essay at some point as well. (Honestly. I have so many essay ideas…maybe make that a part of the new year’s goals; finish the essays.)

I did make a list yesterday of all the writing that I have to get done by the end of the year, or by the end of January, and it’s staring at me from my notebook. I am resisting the urge to flip it over and not look at it, but I really do need to know and I really do need to get to work on all of these things. Ass in chair, fingers on keyboard is what is absolutely called for here, and focus.

So, on that note, I am heading back into the spice mines. Have a lovely Saturday before Christmas, Constant Reader, and I will talk to you tomorrow.

Johnny Are You Queer?

I have been wanting to rewatch Johnny Tremain for quite some time now.

When Disney Plus went live, the first thing I did (after subscribing) was search for it there; I did this at least once every two weeks since the service launched, to no avail. I would look for it on Amazon Prime, Netflix, everywhere; whenever I would sign up for yet another streaming service I would look for it. I never quite understood–and still don’t–why Disney Plus doesn’t have it; but the other day at work I realized I hadn’t looked for it for a while, so signed into Disney Plus on my browser: nope. Oh might as well give Amazon Prime a try, I thought, although Disney not having one of its own properties while another streaming service had it was, I thought, highly unlikely.

And yet, there it was: to rent or buy. I didn’t want to buy it, and I really hate paying to rent to stream something when I already pay for far too many streaming services (I really need to get past the mentality of subscribing when I want to watch something when it’s far cheaper in the long run to merely rent the movie or show), but I’v been wanting to rewatch this movie for years and there it finally was; so I did, and rewatched it yesterday whilst making my daily allotment of condom packs.

I also remembered, when I found the film, that Johnny Tremain was my gateway drug to not only my lifelong interest in American history–which eventually led to an interest in history in general. We had an assembly at my elementary school to watch the movie, and I saw it again when it aired on The Wonderful World of Disney (it may even have still been Disney’s Wonderful World of Color). I eventually read the book, which I got from a Scholastic Book Fair, and it became a treasured favorite. I also recognized, before rewatching the movie as a sixty-year-old, that it was a Disney film aimed for kids made in the 1950’s during the Red Scare when we were all living under the shadow of the mushroom cloud; Walt himself was, among many other things, a deeply conservative pro-America anti-Communist homophobe, and given all those things, it was going to most likely be–if looked at with a cold, judgmental, independent eye–a barely disguised propaganda film. (I am also curious to reread the book; since it was published in 1943, during the height of the second world war, it was also probably pro-American propaganda, when all the country needed to be united to believe that we were fighting evil to make the world a better place, and since American democracy was the be-all end-all…you see what I mean?)

I mean, once you recognize and identify Lost Cause mythology as an ideation to perpetrate and protect white supremacy, it’s also relatively easy to start reexamining all of American history and see the mythology that has been built up around the founding and creation of the country, as well as the deification of the Founding Fathers.

But while I was researching the book and movie the other day, I also came across a paper–queer theory–by Dr. Frank Henderson at Furman University that essentially reexamines the text of the novel from a queer perspective looking for subtext: the piece is titled “Could Johnny Tremain Be Gay? Reinterpretation as a Subversive Act” and was published in the Journal of Homosexuality (I read the abstract, and an article about it, rather than paying $40 to access the actual paper and read it; seriously, how do academics research if this stuff is so expensive? I will probably try to track a copy down through the library; which I guess, actually, is what academics do), and it gave me some pause for thought. I do remember that Johnny was more bratty and selfish in the book than he was in the movie (I remember being startled by this when I read the book the first time) and he literally had nothing but disdain for Cilla or any other girl in the book (which, at the time, was part and parcel of that weird societal norm or belief that prepubescent boys think girls are icky and don’t like them or want anything to do with them–again, very odd in a heteronormative culture) but when he becomes friends with Rab, an older boy involved with the Sons of Liberty, he almost idol-worships the older boy and allows himself to forget his innate selfishness and get involved with something bigger than himself–the revolutionary thinking that led Boston to revolt in the first place. That can be read, as Dr. Henderson states, as a queer relationship between the boys, and that Johnny could be read as queer. I seriously doubt that was what Esther Forbes was thinking when she wrote the book–the book was meant for boys and there was, as I said, that weird “boys don’t like girls” norm for a very long time (it certainly was a consistent theme in Disney productions aimed at boys; same with the Hardy Boys book and other mystery/adventure series aimed at boys from the time). This was in theory erased from the film…but I’m not entirely sure it was.

First of all, there’s absolutely no question that Hal Stalmaster, who played Johnny but never really worked much afterwards, mostly guesting on television shows, was a stunningly beautiful young man.

He also wasn’t a very good actor, but the heavy-handed direction of any Disney live-action film aimed at kids for a very long time didn’t inspire the best work from the cast (Mary Poppins, of course, being an exception).

The young actor who played Rab was also ridiculously good looking–and turned out to be a younger Richard Beymer (billed as Dick) who would go on to play Tony in West Side Story and later, Twin Peaks–and they certainly had more chemistry together than Johnny had with Cilla, who was turned into a love interest of sorts, with him giving her a quick peck on the cheek (their only intimacy) as he runs through the streets of Boston with the news that the British would be leaving Boston “by sea”.

The movie was very typical Americana–so yes, propaganda–which sterilized and cleaned up the period in Boston before the outbreak of the war, with rather stiff pronouncements about ideals and principles and freedom and the rights of man and liberties and tyranny–all the patriotic buzzwords cast about by people who want to silence those who don’t agree with them–without any real explanation of what that means.

And yet, as oversimplified and “cleaned up” as this is made to be in the movie, it’s still effective–it’s very stirring to think about the nerve of the American rebels, doing something practically unheard of in history–not just defying their king (there was a long history of rebellions against the worst abuses of kingship throughout the centuries; just the century before the British actually beheaded their king and did without one for eleven or so years; 150 years before Louis XVI went to the guillotine in Paris) but defying the might of the most powerful and richest empire the world had ever seen. It’s hard not to think about–although everyone in this movie is a revolutionary, all Bostonians except for the villains, and the villainous American loyalists are actually worse than the British military themselves–what that period must have been like to live through; the divided loyalties, the betrayal of neighbor by neighbor, spies and treachery and murders. (I’d love to write a historical mystery set in Boston during this period, actually.)

It’s not a bad movie, but it’s also not a great one; and it certainly does its part in upholding the mythology created about the American revolution.

And yes, this could easily be yet another essay.

Christmas Alphabet

Thursday and working at home today. Huzzah!

I got some very good work done yesterday on the book, as well as an invitation to write a story for a tribute anthology, which meant it was a very good day. Today I am working at home, and am also very excited because finally, at long last, I have found Johnny Tremain on a streaming service! And while it disturbs me to no end to actually have to pay to rent it, but I’ve been wanting to see it again for a very long time, and I think I can cough up the couple of bucks to pay for it.

I’ve long wondered where my interest in history came from, and when I saw Johnny Tremain available to stream at long last on Amazon Prime the other day, it hit me: when I was in the first grade, at Eli Whitney Elementary School in Chicago, one afternoon we all gathered in the auditorium and they screened the movie for us. It was my first time seeing anything to do with American history–at that point, I was aware of the Civil War (I was from the South and lived in Chicago; of course I did) and who Washington and Lincoln were, but it was watching this movie–about a teenager in Boston during the period leading up to the American Revolution, that triggered my interest. This was when I started looking for books on American history at the library instead of ones about dinosaurs, and I was in the fourth grade when I finally got a copy of the book (I didn’t know it was a book first) from the Scholastic Book Fair, and it remained a favorite of mine for the rest of my life. I’ve always, always, remembered watching that movie and wanted to see it again; but it wasn’t until recently that I realized that it was the trigger that led me to my interest in American history, and from there to history in general. I am sure, since it’s a Disney picture made in the 1950’s, that it’s very rah-rah patriotic–there’s a thirty minute clip from it on Disney Plus that I tried to watch out of context, but it was so…hit you over the head with AMERICANA and FREEDOM and LIBERTY that I couldn’t really watch all of it; I am hoping that the entire movie won’t be such blatant propaganda, but then again, it was during the height of the Red Scare and it probably was intended to indoctrinate (white) children with a pro-America mentality; patriotism to the nth degree.

So, we’ll see how that goes, won’t we?

I got some good work on the book done last night, after which I was very tired, so I climbed into the easy chair (with a sleeping purr-kitty in my lap) and finished reading A Caribbean Mystery. (More on that later.) I also started reading Nightwing: Leaping into the Light (based on a recommendation from my friend Alex, who always knows whereof he speaks) and it reminded me (again) of why Nightwing is and always has been my favorite super-hero ever since I was a teenager (since he evolved from Robin into Nightwing); and it also finally hit me last night precisely why that was the case; it should make for an interesting blog entry when I get to it. I have so much writing to do–and fortunately I am in a creative state of mind these days, which needs to be more laser-focused. I am pretty confident I will get the book finished in time now, as well as everything else I need to do. We need to make a Costco run at some point, and of course there’s always mail to pick up, dishes to do, floors to clean, and laundry. I also have condoms to pack, and so much reading to do. I inevitably always have more than enough books on hand so that I will never run out of things to read–and that’s not even taking into consideration the ebooks loaded into all the reading apps on my iPad. I slept really well last night–a lovely side effect to being exhausted yesterday–and my shoulder is starting to feel better–at least I can move my arm without feeling a stab of pain, but I do want to keep resting it for another few days before attempting the gym again. I think tonight I might also walk around the Garden District taking pictures of Christmas decorations, which is always a lovely thing to do; one of the many things I love about this city is how it dresses itself up for any and every holiday, which makes it always seem so festive here.

I also have all my Christmas shopping done, and I actually did my Christmas cards last night as well. Now if only my house weren’t such a mess, I could claim I was winning at life!

Paul and I have decided that 2022 is going to be a year dedicated to living our best lives, and we’re thinking about taking another jaunt to Europe (pandemic permitting); but Amsterdam and Berlin will be our destinations. I’ve always wanted to visit both–there’s really nowhere in Europe I don’t want to visit, really–and the appeal of the art museums in both, plus Amsterdam is primarily a walking city, is a hard pull to resist. I’m thinking we might even take the occasional weekend getaway to a panhandle beach, why not? I have to do some traveling for my career (pandemic willing), and I am sure Paul will want to come to Minneapolis with me for Bouchercon, since we both lived there (he lived there much longer than I did; I only lasted eight months, and only agreed to live there on the guarantee it would be eight months and then we would move to New Orleans–other than the weather I really liked it there) it makes sense for him to come with. He works so hard, and he really does deserve to have down time where he can just relax and have fun.

Yesterday at the office I was walking out of our cubicle area to a testing room because one of my clients had arrived. I had noticed that the Crescent Care shirt I was wearing fit rather nicely; I have three of them in purple (one for every clinic day) and one of them, for some reason, fits better than the others and looks more flattering when I wear it. I actually had just thought about it again when I stood up from my desk (“hey, my pecs looks HUGE in this shirt”) and as I walked out, our nurse (hired in July) was sitting at the front desk and she said, “You know Greg, I can see the potential that you were fine when you were younger.” Fifty year old me would have been offended (“what? I look old and tired now?”) but sixty year old me accepted it in the spirit it was intended–a compliment–so I just laughed and replied, “thank you, I was.” Like I said, ten years ago I would have let that hurt my feelings; now I saw it as a compliment–if worded a bit bluntly–and it amused me. Even thinking about it, I am smiling about it.

I do wish I hadn’t been so insecure and self-conscious when I was younger. I also wish I could transfer this very mentality to my writing. I don’t get Imposter Syndrome as much as I used to–more maturity of age, perhaps?–but I do worry about whether people will get what i am trying to do when I write. I worry about unintentionally offending people more than I ever used to before (trust me, if I am trying to offend you, it’s pretty fucking clear); and I am trying to be kinder, more aware, and to exercise empathy as my default rather than getting offended myself. I don’t know how well I am succeeding, but I certainly don’t have my Julia Sugarbaker tirades are regularly as I used to.

Interesting.

Maturity, or just tired?

And on that note, tis off to the spice mines with me.

The Christmas Song

Wednesday and yet another Pay-the-Bills Day. Huzzah? HUZZAH.

Yesterday I was tired. I slept better on Monday night than I had on Sunday night, yet somehow by the afternoon I was far more tired than I had been the afternoon before. I really didn’t want to go to the gym after I got home from work, but I did, and I also wrote a (shitty) chapter of the book before Paul got home. I felt really great after the gym, and I slept amazingly well last night. (The first time I woke up in the night–I did so twice–was to find a purring Scooter curled up next to me, which he never does; he always sleeps on the other side of Paul rather than in between us…and never underestimate the power of a purring cat to help you sleep.) It’s taking me a hot minute to wake up completely this morning–it’s also raining, which also makes me feel drowsy and is not helpful to the waking up process–but I feel very well rested, which bodes well for the rest of the day. I do have some bills to pay today, and lots and lots of emails to answer.

Ah, the sisyphean task of answering all the emails.

It’s funny, but the other day I was cleaning out/organizing electronic files and came across an essay I started writing several years ago as the introduction to an essay collection I was thinking about putting together (which I promptly forgot about; and didn’t remember when the idea occurred again earlier this year–so this year’s idea of an essay collection wasn’t even original!) and I opened it and started reading…hilariously, as mentioned parenthetically above, it was a reflection on getting older. Apparently, there’s no such thing with me as an original idea during this pandemic, because I had these ideas already and before. I keep saying that aging has never really bothered me but sixty kind of shook me up to my core, but there it was, an essay at age fifty-seven, triggered by me noticing (for the first time) that the skin under my chin/jawline was loose. (Yes, yes, it’s probably been loose for years, but I really don’t spend much time looking in mirrors; usually when I am shaving and I have to take my glasses off and so can’t really see anything but blur.) But it was interesting to revisit how I felt about confronting my age (in my head I am forever stuck at 35–even though my eldest niece is now in her forties, which makes it harder to keep that delusion going. Although I think I have finally pushed that deception out of my subconscious and have embraced being sixty…at least can say it without shuddering.)

So tonight when I get off work I am going to head directly home, methinks; home to clean the kitchen/office, perhaps the living room; do some laundry; write another chapter of the book; and hopefully spend some more time with A Caribbean Mystery. I was reading an article about Christie’s enduring popularity last night, and this book was mentioned (along with two others) as one whose title had to be changed because of racist implications in the title; which I didn’t remember (And Then There Were None had the most notorious original title; which was corrected to something considered less offensive but then became offensive, and hopefully its latest title in the UK–Ten Little Soldiers–will stick for the rest of its history), and so I looked it up. It did always have the same title, although its entirely possible that the offensive content was inside the book–I’d already marked some questionable content regarding the locals on St. Honoré–and will have to do some more research into the book and its history to see if it was, indeed, the content and if the edition I am reading is one where the content had been cleaned up.

It was foggy last night when I walked to the gym, and since I now generally go after dark, I’ve been taking pictures of Christmas decorations. The foggy night gave some of the pictures a more eerie feel, which was pretty cool, and so I think tomorrow night after the gym I might detour through the Garden District on my walk home–fabulous decorations on the houses there, of course–and I would like to head down to the Quarter at some point to see how it’s decked out for the holidays; it’s really such a lovely time of the year to do this sort of thing. It’s also helping me feel reconnected to the city in a way I’ve not really felt since our office moved, since I no longer work one block outside the Quarter anymore. I do miss that, and now that I am writing another book about New Orleans I really need to feel more of a connection to the city than I have in a while. I’ve really felt disconnected from everything, really, since this pandemic began, but am starting to feel much better about everything the more time passes and the more things slowly start coming back to some sort of what passed as normal in the before time.

I guess we’ll see how everything goes, won’t we?

And on that note, tis off to the spice mines with me. Have a lovely Wednesday, Constant Reader!

Sweet Summer Blue and Gold

WEDNESDAY!

It’s hard for me to wrap my mind around the idea that I only have another two work days left before I am on vacation yet again; maybe that’s why I was so rested and full of energy yesterday as opposed to tired, worn, and old the way I usually feel on Tuesdays. I guess how this day will play out remains to be seen. I also managed to get caught up with reviewing the books I read whilst on my trip–I would have done this sooner, but my wireless keyboard stopped functioning (writing on a laptop is difficult for me; I’ve always used a separate keyboard) and so I ordered another one yesterday that will hopefully arrive before it’s time to go to Kentucky so I can take it with me so I can actually get work done while I am there.

And I am behind, as always, on everything.

But I am making progress, which is always pleasant and a relief of sorts. My book-buying compulsion is getting out of hand again, so I am going to have to do some more serious pruning of the books-on-hand this weekend and over the next few evenings, so I can drop off some boxes to the library sale this weekend. Yay! And I have some of my stuff-to-do more under control now than I did before, so again, it’s always lovely to make some progress as each day passes. It’s hard to believe next week is Thanksgiving; it kind of shook me up when I realized it on Monday that I only have a week between trips–and will be traveling again in mid-January (New York again) and will most likely be heading to Left Coast Crime in April as well (I think it’s in Albuquerque?)–barring another variant and another spike or wave of COVID infections. We got caught up on The Morning Show last night, just as the pandemic is beginning to break in the US–yay for reliving that horror, but they are doing a really good job with it, and I am not sure how I feel about their take on “cancel culture”–as someone who the right tried to cancel, back before it was called cancel culture, and yes, I do need to write about that at some point–but there is something to what they are saying, I think; I’m not sure. I don’t consider myself a moral authority on anything; I just think about things and try to learn and try to be better myself than the person I used to be. Life is about nothing if it’s not a constant learning and growing process, and we can always do better, be better, and grow, right? The people I feel bad for are those who actually stop growing and learning, stagnate and fossilize their beliefs and values, and think they don’t have anything else to learn, no need to grow. To me, that’s just sad and tragic.

I didn’t make it to the gym last night after I got off work because I wound up staying later than I usually do–I didn’t leave the office until after five, and thus got stuck in rush hour traffic going through the CBD on the way home (although they finally fixed the lights at Poydras and Loyola, so it wasn’t the nightmare getting through there that it has been since Ida, thank you Lord) and then I did some things around the house when I got home–things that needed doing–before Paul got home. I’ve also been listening to Red (Taylor’s Version), which is I think my favorite Taylor Swift record (yes, I am a sixty-year-old Swiftie, don’t you dare try to shame me for it), which is also quite good. I was a little brain-fried when I got home, but I am hoping to get back to reading Barbara Ross’ Shucked Away, so I can move on to Leslie Budewitz’ Guilty as Cinnamon. I think I am going to simply take cozies with me to Kentucky; I really enjoy reading them and I also should spend more time reading them–it’s so hard to decide what to read all the time, and there are so many different books and styles of books that I want to read, and it’s not a bad idea to get away from the darker stuff for a while…

I also noted that there are new episodes of both Foundation and The Lost Symbol for me to catch up while condom packing on my work-at-home days, and I also have some data entry to do (almost caught up at last, huzzah!). I also have to figure out what audio books I want to take for the ride both ways–eleven hours; I listened to A Game of Thrones on the way up last time and End of Watch by Stephen King on the way home; perhaps this would be a good time to listen to one of the Stephen King novels I haven’t gotten to–The Outsider or 11/22/63 or Dr. Sleep or Black House–so many choices! Or perhaps it would be fun to listen to cozies on the way up? I get too much pleasure from actually reading Donna Andrews to give that up to listen to one; but maybe there’s another one of my favorite cozy series I can listen to; who knows? But I have all weekend to figure that out since I am not leaving until Monday morning.

I am going to try to not spend all day Saturday in my chair watching college football all day–at least not until I get the writing done that I need to get done–and hopefully will be able to read while the games are one when I finally do sit in my chair and relax.

And on that note, I am heading into the spice mines. Have a lovely Wednesday, Constant Reader.

Make Me Smile (Come Up and See Me)

New York!

It really is a wonderful place, and I love it here. The energy, the rapid pace, the mobs of people everywhere–comparatively speaking, of course–it is all quite exhilarating, frankly. It usually wears me out being here–the constant activity of rushing from one meeting to the next; walking around slow walkers, hearing all the different languages and accents and voices; clambering down the steps to the subway and remembering my age as I climb back up at my stop, the towering buildings, the light show that is Times Square…it’s really quite marvelous, all of it. This time, though, I am not worn to a nub the way I usually feel when I am in the city. My sleep–never great when I travel–has actually not been so bad this time around; I wake up periodically during the night but for the most part I am actually getting some decent sleep, so I feel rested. Last night I did kind of hit a wall, though; I was very exhausted when I managed to make it back to my room and collapse onto the bed, too tired to read or think or much of anything, so I turned on the massive television here (which has Netflix) and it suggested that I watch Glee–soon to be leaving the service–and I hesitated for a moment before starting. I remember loving Glee in the beginning, but it became so bad and off the rails in later seasons that it went from “love it” to “what the fuck” to “hate watching” to “life is too short to watch bad television.” And there’s some weird curse on the show, too–several stars have died, Lea Michele turned out to be a bigger monster in real life than Rachel Berry (which is saying something–although to be fair, I already knew she was awful because I knew someone who went to Yale with her), and of course, Glee is the show that truly launched Ryan Murphy as a television production conglomerate. (His previous shows, Nip/Tuck and Popular were cult favorites; Glee’s huge success is what made him golden). It was interesting to watch it again, and see how subversive the show was for its time: a closeted gay teenager slowly making his way out of the closet, although terrified to admit it because he was already being bullied for being different; the absolute mockery of Chastity Clubs for teenagers; and while the show would probably have difficulties were it a new show starting to air today–playing off bullying for laughs, for one thing–it was still groundbreaking for the time.

It’s so interesting how things change so quickly, isn’t it? Over the course of my lengthy lifetime there has been so much change that things that were groundbreaking and transgressive at the time are now problematic; I’ve been thinking about this a lot lately, particularly in the wake of rewatching both Pillow Talk and The Rocky Horror Picture Show (which may be the first time those two films have ever been linked together in this manner–any manner, really; they are actually quite different films but…at their core they both challenged the status quo of their time), and especially now having rewatched the first few episodes of Glee.

And, as always, there’s probably an essay in there. I used to think about how much the world changed over the course of my grandmother’s life–she was born in 1910, during the Taft administration, and died during the Clinton–and all the changes she must have seen over the course of her lifetime, although in remote rural Alabama she might not have been terribly aware of those changes; she wasn’t able to get a telephone line until the early 1980’s–but now that I am past the sixty mark and no matter how much I want to believe otherwise, I cannot deny that I am on the downward side of the mountain of life I also marvel at how different the world is now than it was when I was a child. You never hear anything anymore about nuclear disarmament or the threat or potential of a full-blown nuclear war that could take civilization back into the dark ages again…but I also remember learning very young about atomic weapons and the damage they could do; I remember air raid drills when I was in elementary school and that there was a very large bomb shelter below the basement level of my school–you never forget seeing those triangular symbols on the wall over the staircase down. The right still drags out that cold-war era trope of communists! Communists! that they used to bleat about endlessly; I just saw it from moronic state legislator from Arizona on Twitter just the other day; and to this day they conflate socialism with communism as a scare tactic to drum up the base…who seem to think living as wage serfs from paycheck to paycheck, one medical bill or car accident away from bankruptcy and homelessness is better than any government assistance to ease their lives in any way–because there is nobility in suffering? But then, that also goes hand-in-hand with their embrace of a version of Christianity that tells them the more the suffer in this life the more wealth they will have in Heaven, which is weird. (I’ve never understood why they despise socialism and communism when in fact their ideation of heaven and the afterlife is…socialism.)

I’ve started reading Rachel Howzell Hall’s These Toxic Things, which is also quite marvelous. I am a bit behind on my reading of Hall’s canon; this is her release from last year and I also have her release from this year in the TBR pile as well; and I really want to go back and finish reading her Lou Norton series. The opening chapters of this are quite excellent, and I know what I’ll be reading on the train to Boston tomorrow. (One of the reasons I enjoy traveling as much as I do is because the uninterrupted reading time it gives me…I probably won’t finish all the books I brought with me on this trip–there are two others I’ve been meaning to read for quite some time; I love having time where I have nothing to do but read, although I suppose I could actually try to write on the train….nah. I may write in my journal instead if the mood hits me.)

I guess I should wrap this up so I can start getting ready to head out for my day. Don’t know if I will have time before my train to post in the morning tomorrow, but will definitely check in at some point–it’s weird to not being posting daily this week!

Happy Thursday, Constant Reader, and a shout out to all veterans on this Veterans’ Day as well!