Really, how was there ever any doubt about my sexuality?
Well, there probably wasn’t, but I still live with the illusion that people didn’t know. It makes me happy, okay? Allow me my delusions, thank you.
I think the first time I ever danced was at a school dance when I was a sophomore. I don’t remember what the dance was for, but that was it. A friend of mine asked me to dance, and I replied, “I don’t know how” (which was true), and she laughed at me, saying, “all you have to do is move” and showed me a basic back and forth step with swinging arms that was pretty simple. “Just stay on the beat,” she advised, and I found myself losing myself on the dance floor, getting into the music, and improvising…and for the first time in my life got compliments for something. This happened again when we moved to Kansas and at my first dance there–girls couldn’t believe what a good dancer I was, and they all wanted to dance with me.
Granted, most guys were not fun to dance with, usually doing some kind of weird shuffling kind of movement that was always off-beat and looked almost painful to do. But I basically figured out the trick–moving your hips and shoulders on different beats of the music instead of together. And the more I did it, the more I loved it. Guys were also not supposed to enjoy dancing, as it wasn’t ‘manly’ or something; I don’t know, there was a lot of idiotic bullshit like that for boys when I was one. My love of dancing continued on through my twenties–there weren’t any really good clubs for dancing, gay or straight, back then–and it really wasn’t until I moved to Tampa and started going to a gay bar in Ybor City called Tracks that I really found my place in the community.
Oh, not right away. I would dance when I’d go out, but not much; I was very self-conscious, and dancing made me sweat–a lot. My hair (what was left anyway) would plaster to my scalp with sweat, my socks and shirt would be soaked through, and I really really believed I was unattractive. But when I was out on the dance floor, I didn’t really care about how I looked or if anyone was looking at me or anything other than the driving beat and cutting loose on the dance floor. I never felt tired or sore the next morning either–I always felt good after dancing all night…
….and then I lost weight and discovered the gay bars in New Orleans.
I also discovered Ecstasy, but that’s probably best handled at a different time.
Oh, how I loved coming to New Orleans to dance the night away! That was the one thing I always hated, everywhere else that I lived or visited; the night always ended with last call, sometime after midnight and always no later than three. In New Orleans, the evening ended when you were too tired and sweaty and exhausted to dance any more. I used to go dancing at least three nights per week when I lived in Tampa (Friday, Saturday, Sunday), which also continued in New Orleans. I also spent a lot of evenings in gay neighborhood bars while in Tampa–didn’t really do much of that after moving here.
There’s something about being in an altered state (of whatever kind) out on the dance floor in a sea of shirtless gay men, all dancing and having a great time, while killer music plays through the speakers, the constant thumping of the bass getting into your nervous system. There would also be a light show during the dancing, and mist sprayed down into the crowd (in the older days before I lived here, I used to think they put poppers in the mist because you could smell it…although now I’m not sure that wasn’t just from how many people were using them on the dance floor), whistles and bells and there was always some older gay hippie, shirtless with long gray hair, shaking a tambourine out there. Everyone was friendly on the dance floor, smiling and grinning and flirting and grind-dancing, and the loud music just got into your soul, making it an almost out of body experience.
I always hated that the mixes you heard in clubs were so hard to find in record shops.
And the divas we sang along to–Deborah Cox and Madonna and Celine Dion and Martha Wash and Whitney Houston and Mariah Cary, among many nameless others–I was always lip syncing when I danced, really doing drag without the make-up and costumes and wigs–music I could just get lost in for hours. On the dance floor, everything was okay and everything was going to be better and this insular all-gay world was a place where I was at peace, where I was happy, and where nothing could ever bother me.
I miss dancing, but I also am older and can’t stay up late enough to go out dancing, let alone dance for even a few hours. But dancing has always been an integral part of my gay identity, even if I don’t do it anymore. I still listen to the music I can find on Spotify or Youtube, and believe me, there’s nothing like blasting gay dance music for cleaning the house. I used to have deejays make me tapes for my aerobics classes–and the attendees always loved the music.
Are gay bars still community hubs? I honestly don’t know–but all the young gay men I work with go out to clubs, so I guess so. Maybe not as integral as when going to one actually put you at risk of being arrested, but still important.
Tuesday morning and trying to get awake fully; my mind is awake and my body is, but I still feel a bit groggy. I slept well, which was absolutely lovely, and am sitting here swilling coffee and getting mentally prepared to face the day. I have to run errands tonight after work (prescriptions, mail, gym), and then I am going to come home and just chill for the evening, maybe do a little writing. I didn’t do any last night, because I wanted to watch the regional final (LSU lost in extra innings to the fourth ranked team in the country and could have won), after which I didn’t do much of anything just puttered around the kitchen doing chores until it was time for bed.
The LSU loss was disappointing, of course, but the Tigers made a helluva run in the post season. Just three weeks ago, no one thought they’d even make the post season, let alone get to a regional final. But then they had their amazing run in the SEC tournament, eliminating top ten teams left and right before giving Tennessee a run for their money in the final. So, well done, guys! Sure, another world series run would have been fun this year, but not having one does in no way diminish or undermine how magical last season was, or make it any less wonderful to remember. GEAUX TIGERS, and we’ll see you again next spring….and now it’s time to start gearing up for football season, which isn’t that far off. Woo-hoo!
I’ve been posting my Gay Moments in Greg’s Life entries, which has been kind of fun doing. Right now, I have several drafts in progress about dancing in gay bars, circuit parties, and body culture–which all will be interesting to write–and of course at some point I will probably write about HIV/AIDS. I enjoyed writing my Pride entry and the ones about The Other and Starsky and Hutch; probably will do Robby Benson, Playgirl, and Gordon Merrick at some point, too. I also will probably do some others, but right now I can’t think of what they might be. I’ve also started posting these longer form posts to Substack, too–if you’re reading them here, I don’t imagine there’s any need to read them there–but I think I need to start building up things; I don’t know if social media numbers or Substack followers or anything like that will matter in the long run in publishing. No one ever really knows what publishers are looking for or want; their criteria is ever changing but what isn’t is that the accountants also have their thumb on the scale. It is to my everlasting disappointment that my career started right when the industry began to substantially change from what it had been since the Depression to the disheveled mess it is now. At any rate, I think Substack is the place for me to post my personal essays, which is much easier than trying to find a place to publish any of them. Set a goal of perhaps one per week after the Great Moments in Greg’s Gay Life, or my pride celebratory posts are completed.
Something to consider, any way.
I know Substack is evil, but isn’t everything nowadays? The glory days of social media are, I think, finally past us; Twitter (fuck you, Musk) and Facebook aren’t nearly as much fun as they were over a decade ago, and kind of feel like some pointless obligation and reflex activity that really isn’t what’s cracked up to be anymore. It never really was, to be honest, and it was a horrible waste of time more than anything else, really. It also creates a bizarre illusory reality that bares no resemblance to real life. How many times have I been excited to meet someone because we’ve had a lot of fun interactions on-line, only for them to be like “who are you?” I noticed this early on, back in the days of Livejournal’s heyday when everyone blogged (and here I am, twenty years later–this blog will turn 20 on 12/26/24); you don’t really know someone from on-line social media interactions, and you’re certainly not friends. Needless to say, it was a learning experience (I never have really understood friendship, in all honesty; what I think it is clearly is not what other people think it is, and maybe that’s a me problem–which is why I always have so many walls I can withdraw behind, so many masks I can slip on; when you grow up queer in a homophobic society, you develop lots of coping mechanisms), and I always now just say “we know each other on-line” instead of “oh I love her! We’re friends”.
Now that social media has turned into what it is, I am not on it as much and…I don’t really miss it? And it’s very noticeable how much time I used to waste on it.
And on that note, I am heading into the spice mines. Hope you have a lovely Tuesday and who knows? I may be back later.
So, in honor of Pride Month, I’ve decided to do things a little bit differently than I usually do when it rolls around every year. Usually, I’ll share book covers by queer authors that I either enjoyed or influenced me, either personally or professionally, in some way–or could be used for that hoary old cliché this made me gay. In a way, it’s a trip down memory lane for me, going back to my childhood, my teens, and twenties; places I am currently revisiting as I plan out The Summer of Lost Boys.
Thomas Tryon’s debut novel, The Other, is often heralded as one of the books (the others being The Exorcist and Rosemary’s Baby) that kicked off the horror craze of the 80’s and 90’s; Stephen King’s Carrie was released in 1974 and shifted the craze into four-wheel drive. I read this book when I was in the seventh grade, and it resonated with me in ways I didn’t fully understand or comprehend at the time. It drew me in, and fascinated me in ways I’d never been fascinated with a book before. Part of it was the transition I was making from reading kid’s books to more adult fare; I was already reading at a collegiate level by the seventh grade. (The Ken Holt series also resonated with me, as did the Rick Brant–which are getting their own entries.)
I wouldn’t learn until years later that Tryon was gay–although I should have known, were I more mature and gay wasn’t one of those things people didn’t talk about when I was a kid; it’s certainly there in his books–and then it made even more sense to me why the book resonated so much with me, why it intrigued me so much, and why I identified with it so much. Niles Perry, the point of view character, is a shy, reticent boy who mostly lives in his own head and world and doesn’t really interact a lot with people. He’s a nice kid who is always worried about getting in trouble and doing the wrong thing; his identical twin brother, Holland, is more of what we would now call a sociopath. But Holland has no fear, has no dread of consequence, and is more outgoing and adventurous; he’s more of a troublemaker and relishes getting revenge on people who’ve done him, in his mind, grievous wrongs. Niles loves his brother–adores him, wants to be like him, wants to be less timid–but is also afraid of him. He knows all Holland’s secrets and he knows everything that Holland does, and often he figures out Holland’s schemes and even tries to stop him…but Holland always outsmarts him, and leaves Niles to clean up his mess.
This brotherly dynamic–the closeness and the dominant/submissive relationship between the twins spoke to me. I saw myself as more of a Niles type than a Holland; shy and quiet and mostly keeping to myself–and always being drawn to flashier, more outgoing types as friends, to whom I was both devoted but also jealous of–a pattern I followed for most of my life. This is the same reason certain books drew me in as a teenager in most cases; A Separate Peace has that same underlying relationship theme–the flashier more outgoing more popular friend, and the quiet best friend content to live in his shadow but also being a bit resentful and jealous.
And then about two-thirds of the way through the book comes a plot twist that changes everything you’ve already read and processed and you have to see the book in an entirely new way–every time I reread it (which is every year or so since I got a hardcover copy off eBay), I try to find the clues to the twist in the first two-thirds, and they are there, but cleverly disguised so you don’t put it together until it’s literally revealed in such an incredibly powerful scene that just thinking about it–and its creepy conclusion–makes the hairs on my arm tingle a bit.
I didn’t have a brother, so I wasn’t sure about the brother dynamic Tryon explored so beautifully in the book; is that the way things work in real life between brothers? Probably not, as every set of brothers is different, of course. (I’ve rarely written about brothers, now that I think about it. Chanse has one who turned up in a short story and Scotty has Storm) But the relationship interested me, and it’s a trope that is often used in every style of fiction; two people, either siblings or close friends, one is more outgoing and daring and likes to take risks while the other is more nervous and afraid and namby-pamby, and that weird combination of love/jealousy that can often get involved in those stories.
It’s also a strong dynamic that can play out within gay couples, as well.
The Other is also written in a lyrical, beautiful, dream-like style; that lovely sense of remembering the past nostalgically, when everything was magic and the world seemed full of wonder.
I was paging through the book the other day and I began to realize that it’s impacted and influenced me as a writer far more than I had ever realized.
Monday morning, and back up before dawn to get ready to head into the office. Huzzah! I slept really well last night, and had no trouble getting up this morning, which I was a bit concerned about given how much sleep I was getting over the weekend. But I feel awake and conscious and good this morning, so that’s very promising.
LSU won both games yesterday (13-6 over Wofford; 8-4 over North Carolina) which puts them in the regional final, winner take all. I flipped between the games and whatever we were watching yesterday (we finished Anthracite, and caught up on Interview with the Vampire), which was nerve-wracking as always whenever LSU plays (I don’t stress or get anxiety over the games anymore–thank you, new meds–so I can enjoy it more, but yesterday I couldn’t bear the tension). I”m not entirely sure I am going to watch tonight’s game, either; I guess it depends on when it is. I also spent some time yesterday reading (The Rival Queens) and writing. I managed to get two or three blog entries posted yesterday, too, and I like that I am doing this “Great Gay Moments in Greg’s Life” type thing. I did Starsky and Hutch and an overall, general “meaning of Pride” post, and I feel pretty good about both of those this morning. I also worked on the prologue to The Summer of Lost Boys, which I will try to get more work done on that today.
The weekend was good, to be honest; I felt good all weekend (if lazy–the thunderstorms had something to do with that, and yes, we had them yesterday too), and while I didn’t get everything done that I would have liked to, I’m pretty okay with it. Today is forecast to be cloudy but without rain, which hopefully will make it cooler–or at least not feel as hot. I spent most of yesterday under my blanket in a chair, which was marvelous. When Sparky wasn’t being Demon Kitty he would sleep in my lap, which was very sweet. It won’t take me long to catch up on my emails, either–I’m doing a pretty good job of staying on top of those, too–and I’m pretty much caught up on my day job duties, too. I’m behind already on the writing schedule I set for myself this year–but the beauty of that is that it’s my deadlines, and no one else’s, so missing them isn’t affecting anyone other than myself.
I also scribbled in my journal a lot this weekend, which is very cool to be doing again. Overall, I am feeling good again these days, which is great. I’m starting to feel connected to my writing again, and remembering that I don’t have to kill myself to get some done is not a bad thing, either.
This morning’s coffee is quite tasty, too, I might add.
All right, it’s time for me to get cleaned up and head into the office. Have a lovely Monday, Constant Reader, and I’ll most likely be back later. If not, GEAUX TIGERS!
As I have been reviewing things that helped confirm to myself as a child that I was a big old homo (for my book The Summer of Lost Boys), I found myself remembering a lot of things, memories from the darkest dusty and cobwebbed chasms of my memory banks.
But as a kid, realizing that I was drawn to men more than women was difficult and weird, and not in the least because I didn’t understand what women saw in men; their sex symbols, to me, left a lot to be desired. I grew up on the cusp of some societal and cultural changes, and not the least of which was the fact that in the 1970s, men finally began being sexualized and held to a kind of male beauty standard that gradually changed that standard–which for a burgeoning young gay boy, was perfect timing. I never understood, for example, what girls saw in teen idols–sure, Bobby Sherman and Davy Jones and David Cassidy were cute…but I didn’t think of them as sexy or sexualized; the Tiger Beat crowd was very into guys who were not sexually threatening–these weren’t guys they wanted to fuck but rather ones they wanted to hold hands with and go on dates to malt shops and movies with, and chastely kiss good night. I never really got the sense that women ever wanted to fuck their sex symbols, either–there was an odd chasteness to women (the old madonna/whore paradigm) in their fandoms. You never heard a woman saying she wanted to fuck Paul Newman or Robert Redford or Burt Reynolds; there was more to it than just sexual energy.
But “Women’s Lib” began taking flight in the 1970s, as did queer rights, and a gradual shift in the paradigm of what is sexy in a man and what isn’t began changing. It was the decade Playgirl launched (more on that later), Jim Palmer began doing underwear ads, and the poster of Mark Spitz and his gold medals wearing a speedo sold like cheap beer on a payday.
And it also began the rise of the himbo shows; the male equivalent of all those jiggle shows with big breasted girls without a bra jumping up and down; those shows were almost guaranteed ratings in the Top Ten. Starksy and Hutch was the first real himbo show that I can remember; David Soul and Paul Michael Glaser were very good looking with great bodies that were very masculine as well–and the show showed them shirtless as much as possible, or in towels, or–you get the idea. They drove a fast car with an odd but distinctive paint job (cars were also stars that decade) and the show also not only was a hit but a part of the zeitgeist, too. I watched every week–as did my sister and almost every girl I knew–but it being a macho cop show, it was okay for men to watch, too.
And if there was an Internet and fan fic, a lot of people would have been writing erotic romances about the two of them.
Their closeness as characters as well as their chemistry, and their willingness to appear half-naked at the drop of a hat certainly made the show popular with gay men–and the stars also didn’t mind playing into the gay interest in the show, as you can see by the picture of them running hand in hand on the beach.
They also did a lot of those kinds of promo photo shoots.
Glaser’s wife later contracted AIDS from a blood tranfusion, and the two of them spent a lot of their time and energy working for AIDS treatment, education, and a cure.
That M People song was released in the mid-1990’s, and has become kind of a queer anthem in the time since. It was used in the original American adaptation of Queer as Folk, and it gets played a lot during Pride Month. I loved the M People; I have one of their CD’s and they were prominent on my dance soundtrack of 1994-1996 (“Sight for Sore Eyes” is still a great song I have on Spotify playlists today), which is also a time I am writing about (sidebar: maybe “Never Kiss a Stranger” is a novel not a novella), so it stays fresh in my head.
Pride is a direct response to shame–because so many of us were forced to live in shame about who we are and just existing for so fucking long, we now choose to come out and be proud rather than ashamed of who and what we are, despite the bigots who continue to try to legalize oppression of us while all we really want is to be left alone to live our lives in peace. I will never be made to feel ashamed of myself for who I am any more. And no, I’m not sorry that my existence bothers some people because you know what? Their existence bothers me–-but the primary difference is I am not trying to force them to stop existing or even to like queer people.
Pride is of course one of the seven deadly sins for Christians—Proverbs 16-18: Pride goeth before destruction, And a haughty spirit before a fall. Better it is to be of a lowly spirit with the poor, than to divide the spoil with the proud.
So, the use of the way “pride” for our month of celebration inevitably brings out the faux-christians, screaming about sin and…but as I said, our pride is the opposite of shame, and we are reclaiming ourselves and refusing to be shamed for who we are anymore. And yes, the shaming always comes from christians cishets (I prefer the French pronunciation shah-SHAY) —you know, the ones who are supposed to love without question? And ultimately, my life and my sins are between me and God—and none of your fucking business.
But this post is for those of you who stubbornly refuse to get it: my sexuality doesn’t impact you AT ALL.
Why do they need a whole month? Veterans only get a day is one of my absolute favorites. First, the use of “they”, while politer and not quite as insulting, is really no different from the ever-popular bigoted “you people”; so I guess props are in order for being slightly more polite (although I suppose if they knew it was politer they’d use you people, or to be grammatically correct, those people)? As for veterans only getting a day while we get a month, well, I don’t seem to recall legislation being passed on any level of government legalizing discrimination against veterans. (Although the way our government treats its veterans is disgraceful–and as always, the war hawks who love to send young men and women to risk their lives, mental health, and limbs for a foreign policy predicated on ensuring corporations make as much money as humanly possible will always vote to cut or eliminate veterans’ benefits while waving Support the troops! banners and flags–because they are nothing if not craven, vile, and completely soulless.) The combined efforts of government and medical science were applied for years to criminalize and stamp out the existence of queer people. Homosexuality was still considered a mental illness (!!!!) until I was twelve years old. How precisely does one grow up well-balanced mentally and emotionally when you are repeatedly told that what you are is actually insane? (And coming from a family where mental health issues are genetic…and knowing that I had my own mental health issues already wasn’t helpful; I thought for a long time the two were connected.)
And for the record, May is Military Appreciation Month, and the fact they don’t know this makes a mockery of their religion, their intelligences, and their feigned concern for the military.
If the cishets had to put up with, for one day–a mere twenty-four hours–what queer people do every day, they’d become homicidal.
And telling people they cannot legally discriminate against a fellow American citizen is not forcing them to accept and/or like queer people; it’s merely telling them they must treat queer people with the same respect they’d treat anyone (oh, the horror). The entire point of this country, from its beginning (although it has often failed to live up to that ideal) is that every citizen is equal in the eyes of the law–regardless of anything that might make them slightly different, especially when the difference is so slight as to not be noticeable. I don’t know why this is so hard for people, I really don’t. (And yes the convictions of Greg Stillson last week affirmed this guiding principle for the nation and his worshippers choosing to not accept that is more example of their utter contempt for this country, period. Some ‘patriots’.)
And if you don’t want to be compared to Nazis, then stop coming for marginalized groups and scapegoating them. Your dishonesty is not only un-Christian, but inhuman. It is not for other humans to judge sin; that is, per your own Holy Book and what you theoretically believe, reserved for a God who is very jealous about what is His and what is not. I believe in Christianity as a game-plan or road map to being a good person and doing good things in my life; I do not believe in talking snakes or trumpets so loud they can make walls collapse or that having heatstroke on the road to Damascus was actually divine intervention. I do not believe Paul had visions of Jesus, so anything written by him in the New Testament is suspect and not gospel.
I am also willing to account for that, if need be, if there ever actually is a Judgment Day. But what I believe is between me and God. To paraphrase Cher, I account to three people: myself, Paul, and God.
What I do know is that if there is a God and such a thing as a heaven, going to church three times a week while acting like a hateful piece of trash the rest of the week ain’t getting your ass into your heaven. You’re literally doing the bare fucking minimum, and those three hours or so you’re spending in church are just a waste of your time because you aren’t learning anything or striving to be better.
And any heaven that welcomes people like Phyllis Schlafly, Anita Bryant, Maggie Gallagher et al is not my idea of heaven; spending eternity with those people would be Hell.
This year, Pride seems all the more important–certainly more than it has in years. I haven’t been to Pride in a very long time–I’ve been to a lot of Prides over the years–and probably won’t attend this year either; it’s too hot for one, and the older I get the less I like being hot, sweating, and tired in crowds.
I hate to break it to the homophobic trash, but nothing you say is original or something we haven’t heard a gazillion times before. I’ve said it before and will say it again: fuck all the way off. Miss me with your concerns about “the children” when you aren’t concerned, for example, about the need to teach kindergartners what to do if there’s an active shooter in their school. Miss me with your concerns about “the children” when the states passing the worst anti-queer laws are the same ones where child beauty pageants are the most popular. Where is the outrage about sexualizing children in that instance, Moms for Liberty? Yes, painting a six-year-old’s face like she’s a streetwalker and dressing her provocatively for a chance at a sash and a trophy is absolutely one-hundred-percent okay with you? These are also the same states that allow underage marriage and have almost complete abortion bans.
Moms for Liberty is just another incarnation of the hate group One Million Moms (who never ever had more than fifty thousand members); which is why I always say queers can never completely trust a lot of straight white women. (Let’s never forget that straight white women gave us President Donald Trump. Ever. This should be their everlasting shame.)
It’s also going to be interesting to see what companies and corporations will be making a play for queer dollars during Pride Month, while donating money to anti-queer politicians and stay silent when all these horrendous laws are being passed. Target? Anheuser Busch? Miss me with the rainbows and pride statements this year. You have a chance to stand up when it mattered and instead you turned into pathetic sniveling cowards waving a white flag–proving that your so-called “commitment” to equality and my community was nothing more than a disgusting, shameless attempt to attract queer dollars and the money of our allies. Shame on you both. I don’t drink beer, but when I did I drank a lot of Bud Light in gay bars because of their support of the queer community. But when they had an opportunity to take a principled stand for equality and against bigotry, they crumbled like a finely aged feta. Same with Target, which was even sadder because they had been so supportive. But I will never step inside another Target and I will never order from their website. My Target credit card will get paid off as quickly as possible so they make as little money from me in the future as possible, and I have already cut it up because I will never support that shitty, backstabbing, cowardly piece of shit company again.
I’ve always kind of had an issue with the corporatization of Pride over the years. Yes, I get it; they are usually non-profit organizations who need to raise money to pay expenses and put the show on. You need donors for that–as every nonprofit does–and so the swing to wooing businesses and multi-billion dollar corporations began…as well as the complaints about the merchandizing of Pride. But Pride was, and always has been, an event to celebrate every color in our rainbow and to show the world that we’re here and we aren’t going anywhere; we are not ashamed nor will we be shamed. We aren’t going back into the closet for anyone. Period.
It’s always amused me to listen to people complain about Pride, with the leathermen and the kink fetishists and the drag queens. “I don’t want my kids to see that!” Then keep your fucking kids at home. Any Pride that turns it back on any part of the community is notPride. I’m tired of being penalized because other people have had children—your children are NOT my responsibility.
I already pay taxes to educate them.
I also hate the shaming of kink; the attempt to remove drag queens and the leathermen and so forth from Pride celebrations because that makes the straights uncomfortable frankly disgusts me. Just because some queers have issues with kink—well, that’s their problem, and if anything, we all should be grateful to them. The leathermen and drag queens were out and proud when a lot of their current critics cowered in their closets, while the kinksters and queens were out fighting for the rights of the cowards, creating a community and a world in which they were free to come out…only to want to drive the people responsible for that freedom and community out of Pride. “I want to bring my kids to Pride but I don’t want them to see that.”
What the fuck, people? Don’t you understand that the only reason you can be queer in public with your kids is becauseof the very people you don’t want your children to see? It’s bad enough the straight use “the children” to try to take away our rights; it’s even worse when people within our community try the same tactics. I don’t know, maybe reexamine your own internalized homophobia rather than trying to reshape the community?
The original Prides were protests, and the original parades were protest marches. Seeing how Pride has, over the years, sold its soul and meaning to corporate sponsors saddens me. Those sponsors are mostly interested in queer dollars only (see: Target and Budweiser) and not in actually supporting the community and our rights (see: Target and Budweiser); you can tell by how quickly they back down when the Christofascists have a problem with their support of our community (see: Target and Budweiser).
That shallow support is unwelcomed and unwanted and very transparent.
Learn your history, queers. It wasn’t that long ago—during my own lifetime—that our sexuality stopped being considered mental illness. We’ve come pretty far in those fifty years, but we have a long way to go and the fight is not over. So, come out to Pride, and celebrate our hard-won freedoms. Be visible; because that visibility might help someone else come out and stop feeling shame. Create and live and love and vote and above all else, maintain queer joy in your life.
Because all of those things? Well, they’re also victories.
Sunday morning, after a gloomy rainy day (marvelous thunder and downpours off and on all day) where I pretty much just stayed indoors. I walked over to get the dry cleaning in the morning, and by the time I got back it was starting to sprinkle, and shortly after I came inside the floodgates opened. I curled up in my chair and read The Rival Queens for a while, then Paul got up and we finished watching Bodkin, which I enjoyed but didn’t care for the ending too much, after which we watched LSU lose to North Carolina (fourth ranked; LSU is number 24 and was only ranked after the SEC tournament, so no disgrace there, and they play to stay in the regional again today, against Wofford again. After the game we started Anthracite, a new French show on Netflix that is kind of off-kilter and very interesting. I did some writing in my journal, and I did do some chores around the house so it wasn’t a wash of a day, and really, who cares if it was? I really need to stop being so down on myself and recognize that sometimes I need downtime just like everyone else. I do want to do some things today, though–the whole day can’t be downtime, for sure. I also slept really well last night, for ten hours, which is insane. I am sleeping a lot lately and getting very good sleep, which has been lovely.
I have decided to do the occasional Pride blog post, about “things that made me realize I was gay” growing up, or things that I appreciated that probably were indicative of my sexual orientation from a very early age. Revisiting that dark closeted teenage space for this book hasn’t been terrific, but I think it will also help me deal with it, frankly. The 1970s are also an interesting time to go back to, as well, trying to dredge up memories that are long lost in the dark dusty recesses of my brain. I started a couple of said pride posts yesterday–one about The Other and one about Starsky and Hutch (which was really the first modern himbo show; more on that later)–and am thinking about other ones. My favorite gay anthems? I don’t know. But this year it seems very important to celebrate Pride–and shove it down the throats of the MAGA traitors and their evangelical cosplay Christian allies (looking at you, Mike the Self-righteous Johnson). After all, I can’t go anywhere without having a fucking cross shoved in my face.
Hey “christians”–more teaching by example and less demonstration of how Christian you are not, what do you think? Maybe then people will stop deserting your houses of worship, because they see the lies, self-righteousness, and utter hypocrisy that masquerades as faith in your befouled churches of blasphemy and apostasy.
It looks sunny outside this morning, so I think perhaps the rains of the last three days have now passed. That’s good, because I do want to go to the gym today to continue my rehabbing of my left arm. I am going to try this morning to get this and at least one other of the Pride posts done today; some writing and some chores, and when that’s all wrapped up I’ll head over to the gym for some rehab, come home and get cleaned up, and then read some more. I think I may stay away from LSU’s games today; if they beat Wofford again they face North Carolina again at six pm, for two games in one day, which is rough–and much as I love my Tigers, I can’t spend the day watching baseball, either.
And I am excited about writing again. It’s a lovely feeling. I’m not sure entirely what all I want to accomplish at this point other than trying to get the work done, but I definitely can get it all done if I keep my nose to the grindstone and keep working. I’m on my own schedule, so the only person being hurt if I take a day or so off from writing is me.
And on that note, I am heading into the spice mines. Have a lovely Sunday, Constant Reader, and I’ll probably see you again later today.
Today is two things–the start of hurricane season and the start of Pride Month. I have a Pride post that I definitely want to finish and post at some point, and I’ve not really decided what kind of entries I want to do–social media and here–to mark the month. I still think the thirty-four convictions of Greg Stillson was the best gift for Pride American queers have ever been given, to be honest, and I still am a little in shock that it happened–trial and verdict. And of course the traitors have all lost their treasonous little minds, too–my personal favorite is “if they can do this to him they can do it to anyone!”
Um yes, that’s precisely how laws and the judicial system work–no one is above the law in the United States.
Period.
I way overslept this morning, but we stayed up super late last night watching Bodkin (we only have two episodes left to go, and it’s really interesting; much more complex and clever than I’d originally given it credit for) but I wound up not getting into bed until midnight, and I didn’t get up until about nine thirty this morning. While I wanted to sleep in, I didn’t want to sleep in that late; I feel discombobulated and like I won’t be able to get the things done this morning I wanted to get done–but that’s just loser talk, methinks, and a way to give myself excuses for not taking the books to the library sale or washing the car or picking up the mail and dry cleaning or go to the gym. But now that my coffee is kicking in, I’m feeling more alive and awake and like fuck yeah I can get that shit done, get out of my way.
Always nice.
Yesterday was a good day. I worked at home, got all that done while laundering the bed linens, and ran my errands, did some cleaning around the house and later in the day we had a massive and marvelous thunderstorm. I grabbed The Rival Queens (my current nonfiction read) and spent some marvelous time with it in my easy chair. I do love that period of time, and I’ve always wanted to write about an adventurous fictional woman who was a member of Catherine de Medici’s Flying Squadron; an accomplished seductress spy, navigating the complicated politics of France during the Wars of Religion and the decline of the Valois dynasty. It was truly a fascinating period, not only in France, but throughout Europe. My next non-fiction read will probably be The King’s Assassin, the book on which Mary & George was based, and that’s another fun period I would like to write about. Someday. There really was nothing like the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries for upheaval and Game of Thrones-like cutthroat politics.
I also watched LSU’s thrilling baseball win over Wofford in the regionals yesterday, and they play again today at 4. GEAUX TIGERS!
I also looked at the submissions call for the story I am working on–thinking the deadline was May 31 only to discover it was actually June 1, which means I can let the story sit a while longer before revising it one more time to see if I can make it stronger. I am very pleased with how it’s going so far, and looking forward to getting some more writing done today. I am a little behind on my schedule thus far (the one I made earlier this week, remember?), but the deadline being later certainly has made that a bit simpler and easier to navigate without feeling pressure.
And on that note, I am going to get another cup of coffee and head into the spice mines. I’ll most likely be back later–that pride entry I want to write–and I also need to think about what kind of entries to do for Pride Month. Anyway, have a lovely Saturday, and I’ll check in with you again later, okay?
Work at home Friday, and the weekend is nigh. Huzzah! Yesterday was a gloomy day with rains off and on, with a flash flood warning and everything. It was the kind of day that makes you feel lazy, you know? When the air conditioning inside has been going for days and then all that damp gets into the cold air? All I want to do is curl up with a book and a blanket. Alas, it was not to be as I was at work. Sigh. Why can’t these marvelous thunderstorms strike when I’m at home and can do just that very thing? (I was woken up by another amazing one this morning at around three; the thunder was so loud and close I kind of figured I’d wake up to no power.) But I slept well last night, have only a couple of things to do outside the house today–pharmacy, mail, gym–and am hoping for a really productive day.
I heard the news about the verdict (verdicts?) in the first criminal trial of a former president of the United States in history–well, he did say he was going to have a historic presidency, and he certainly has achieved a lot of firsts–first president to be impeached twice, first president to be criminally charged and convicted, and every time he seems to appear in court, he loses again–all that winning he promised the American people, who knew the winning was going to be done by prosecutors? I did dip into Twitter a few times to see the predictable meltdowns, and who knows what this means? He could still win the election, if people are nasty and hateful enough to still vote for him, and the absolute moral collapse of evangelical Christianity (they never had any high ground; they have always been abominations and apostates in the eyes of their God and the world they think he created)–now they are committing blasphemy and driving even more people away from Christianity–which has always needed the enforcement arm of the State throughout History to gain converts–they do not follow the ministry of Jesus, to whom they pay lip service and drape themselves in the symbols of their faith, but that is merely hollow pageantry, since their souls are blackened and shrunken with hate and pride and everything else forbidden in the Holy Book they love to thump but not read.
And yes, as much as I personally am enjoying all of this, it also saddens me, as someone who, despite its flaws (and there are many), loves his country. The very idea that someone could have been elected to the highest office in the land who was never anything more than a braggadosio; a liar and a rapist and a bigot and a psychopath, with no loyalty to our system, our Constitution, and the law of our land; only to himself and enriching his family at the expense of the taxpayers. He used the power of the position to commit crimes, and he had to commit crimes in order to get elected in the first place. I have always suspected there was more election interference in 2016 than we know about. Hey, if they can deny the results of 2020, why can’t we question the 2016 election? It was never properly investigated, was it, thanks to his enabling traitor acolytes in Congress; the cancer that is Mitch McConnell saw to that. I just hope more people see that the right is “party first” rather than “country first,” which means they definitely betray their oaths to protect and defend the Constitution, like the power-hungry corrupt trash they are.
Our country has been tarnished forever by electing fool’s gold and embarrassing us on the international stage, a sideshow freak hawking snake oil who’s never accomplished anything other than being a “fake” businessman on a reality show and stealing an election.
Needless to say, any plans to write last night were completely derailed by the news–I spent most of the night watching the news on MSNBC, I mean, it was historic (although I am growing very tired of witnessing history, seriously) and therefore should be paid attention to, but it also put me in mind of all the major changes and historic events I’ve witnessed: a man walking on the moon; Watergate; the end of the Vietnam War; the hostage situation at the Munich Olympics; the Bicentennial; the Iranian hostages; the Gulf War; 9/11; a president being impeached for a blow job; the endless wars that followed 9/11; the first female presidential candidate from either major party; and now…this national disgrace. In all honesty, given the evidence I’d seen, I didn’t see how the jury could not convict…but…the gravity of convicting a former president had me wondering if the jury would take the job that seriously and remove the aura of the Oval Office and see him as he actually is: a petty criminal who grifted his way in the public consciousness…and for the record, I’ve despised him and his family since he first started turning up in infotainment news. I cheered every bankruptcy and public embarrassment/failure, hoping that each would be the last time we ever heard that benighted name again.
And from 2015 on, he always reminded me of Greg Stillson from The Dead Zone.
I’ve also tried very hard to never talk about him on here, because I didn’t want the foul stench stinking up my blog…but how can I not mention the convictions, probably the biggest new story in years?
I do apologize to you, Constant Reader, for bringing him up here. Seriously, if a genie offered me three wishes, the first would be to never see or hear of him or his wretched excuse for a family ever again.
And on that grim note, I am heading into the spice mines. I feel very good and rested, and hope for a very productive day. I might be back later; one never knows, and tomorrow is the start of Pride Month, so I’m sure I’ll have quite a bit to say on that score all month long.
Someone really needs to do one of those music-themed crime anthologies built around either big band music, or the music of the Andrews Sisters; and In the Mood would be a great title for it, wouldn’t it? Don’t @ me, I’m not interesting in doing another anthology, thank you very much, praise Jesus and hope the creek don’t rise.
I was right; I got very mentally fatigued yesterday afternoon, and last night after we finished watching the second season of Euphoria, I was basically falling asleep in my chair. I’d swear we watched something else, too; oh yes, a stand-up comic special on Netflix, but I can’t remember the name of the comedian. I feel much more awake and alive today, which is a very good thing. I also feel a little bit behind this morning, and I am–not sure what that is about, but I am a bit off, too, I think, which is weird. But I enjoyed finishing the show–not sure if it’s coming back again or not, but the second season finale definitely wrapped everything up, so if it doesn’t the stories are pretty much finished for the most part. Zendaya was terrific–the whole cast, really; Paul and I were amused that the most level, centered and likable character on the show was Fez the drug dealer. Jacob Elordi is also memorable as sociopath Nate–casting beautiful people as monsters is genius, really.
I also didn’t write yesterday–the brain fatigue thing again, but at least this time it wasn’t the fog, you know? I do think I am starting to get back to normal, or what passes for it at any rate. It’s normal to be tired after not sleeping well. It’s normal to feel off after finally getting a good night’s sleep again. I was very tired when I got home, wasn’t I? I have some errands to run tonight, too–and tomorrow I am taking workout clothes for me to change into at work so I can go to the gym afterwards, see if this theory of changing at work and going directly there afterwards will work–we shall see, shan’t we?
One thing that I’ve been doing lately is submersing myself in the music of the 1970s, to help get myself more into the right space to write this book when I am ready to get started on it, and frankly, Top Forty music of the period–with a few exceptions–was awful and cheesy and terrible. So many novelty songs (“The Streak” by Ray Stevens jumps to mind, and there were so many others), so much cheese (Tony Orlando & Dawn, and so many other offenders), and some frankly terrible recordings surrounding the few gems that I don’t know how I listened to it growing up. But we did; both my sister and I always had our radios tuned into either WLS or WCFL for hours every day. I am trying to get the prologue to this finished this week, as well as revising another short story whose deadline is this weekend, and still really trying to get everything organized and sorted. I put some short story anthology call deadlines on my calendar yesterday, which was a nice start to get better organized, and I think, besides this book I want to finish, I am going to spend a lot of this summer trying to do more short stories. I also want to get the introduction to the short story collection finished by Monday, and a first chapter of the new Scotty done.
But my immersion in music of the early 1970’s–and other pop culture aspects of the time; television was also mostly garbage back then, too; thanks censors–also led me back around to listen to the eponymous first album by Boston in the car over the last two years, and it still holds up. It’s quite excellent, although I suppose it would be considered excessive nowadays; as rock music pushed boundaries in that decade and became more orchestral, especially in the second half of the decade. There’s not a song on that album that’s not a bop (in modern parlance), and it also put me in mind of other favorite albums from throughout my life–and making a list of them. I’ve always had a soundtrack album for my life, and revisiting music always brings back a lot of memories. Listening to the Billboard Top 100 of 1973 (awful as it was) made me remember other things–like Romper Room, Captain Kangaroo, Bozo’s Circus, and Ray Raynor’s show; the Saturday morning cartoons; and the horrible variety shows that were everywhere back then and finally died out in the early 1980’s. I really want this book to be good, and I’m going to have to go to a very dark place to write this book, too, and make it as real as possible…which is why I am immersing myself in the early 1970s. I am also reminding myself I can change things in the suburb to fit my writing needs; it doesn’t have to be exact, just as Bury Me in Shadows didn’t have to be correct about the homeplace. (My mind can be very annoying at times.)
But I feel good this morning, both mentally and physically. After work tonight I need to get the mail and make some groceries (not much, just a replace some things run) and then it’s home to write, possibly make dinner, and finish some chores. I am going to head into the spice mines now, so have a lovely Wednesday, Constant Reader, and I will be back probably later.
Queer and Loathing in America 