The Other Side of the Mirror

2005-03-08T18:46:00.000-05:00

and again...

2005-03-08T18:44:00.000-05:00

What's with all the tits on local television lately? Don't men with stuffed crotches deserve equal time?

2005-03-08T18:31:00.000-05:00

Yo, dawg........

Gay Like Me - Installment 6

2005-03-03T23:04:00.000-05:00

The lessons I learned from George were varied and many and they all came very quickly. I guess that it wasn’t that we was really teaching me anything, only that I was becoming aware of what I already knew and was just living up to the knowledge. It was a very short relationship but the lessons were very large and what I already knew was this: that we are a product of a our personalities, regardless of our sexual orientation, and what we do with our actions and our lives, makes us the people that we are. But gay life that he was living was not the gay life that I wanted. He had mentioned to me on a number of occasions that, "I really feel sorry for you for the things that you'll have to go through in your new gay life." The thing was, I was no child, I understood the road that was ahead of me.

And so it was, that I had arrived at another bar, on another day, to see another person, a simple friend. And fate carries us down the road. I had felt uncomfortable on this night and was ready to leave when the young man that I had met in the other bar arrived. He walked in and didn’t immediately see me. He sat down and then recognized me and motioned an admission that he knew me. It wasn’t really welcoming. It was an acknowledgement, none the less.

Relief. I had a reason to get up from where I was and move, to escape this uncomfortable situation at hand. I made my way to him. "So what are you doing here?" he asked.

"Well, as a matter fact, I was just getting ready to leave. But you’ve saved me,” as I pointed to my undesirable prior bar partner. “Would you like a drink?"

He hesitated but a little and then said, "OK. "

Eddie came over and made us drinks. I can't even remember what we talked about on that day, the first real opportunity that we had a chance to talk. I just remember how pleasant and natural the whole conversation became. Here, I was speaking to a real individual. There was no pretension. He was a real person. We sat there for hours, telling jokes, laughing, and just having regular down to earth conversations. The conversation was natural and unstrained. There were no awkward silences. There were no wandering eyes, searching to quench boredom, to move on to another place or another person. Our backgrounds, however, were very much different.

This young man was small of stature, nothing like George. He stood about 5 foot 7, had light brown hair, clear, warm gray-green eyes and he was very quick to smile or laugh. He weighed about one hundred twenty pounds dripping wet, his build was slim but wiry, and lithe. He had a small dark mustache that I believe had been grown to camouflage his youth since the rest of his face was so smooth without any hair growth even though he told me he was 22. His eyes sparkled when he spoke, belying the devil within. His name was Michael.

He had grown up on the west side of the city. He came from a large family. His mother had died when he was quite young, and his father had raised the family of five sisters and a half brother following her death.

His father had thrown him out of the house when he was 17 because he had admitted to him that he was gay. I would later learn that his half brother had disowned him as well because of his sexuality. The rift between him and his father had disappeared some years later when the sensitivity of that admission had softened. His father, an old European who immigrated to the U.S. in his childhood, had started the family when he was in his forties, was now of retirement age, and had left the kids to fend for themselves, all of whom were now adults. His father had moved to Florida where he felt the weather was more conducive to the comfort of his aching bones and because of his solidly developed hate of the cold.

Michael, having understood that he could have a base of operations by living near his father had followed his father to Florida. There, he had met another young man with which he had established a relationship. His partner was a person who was much like George, a young gay man who was a fashion model for a fragrance company and was leading a fast, frivolous life. He had moved back from Florida were he had just ended that relationship. As we spoke, I learned that that relationship had gone on for three years and had failed for the same basic reasons. That is not a failing of being gay; it is a failing of character by those who happen to be gay.

So there we were, cracking jokes and having fun. It slowly became clear that there was a certain attraction, an almost animal magnetism. We had made a connection. And as we sat and laughed and talked, I looked at him more seriously, more wantingly. It finally became apparent that the end of this evening was coming to a close. He was small and Teddy Bearish and I really had a longing to just throw my arms around him and hold them. It wasn't even in a sexual way, but somehow I felt it was also an obligation among gay men that the next question was to ask about sharing physical intimacy. What to do? I quietly asked him, "So what do you say? You want to go to my house and spend the evening?" I never even considered that he would give me any answer other than, "Yes, of course I’ll go home with you. "

But that, in fact, that is not what happened. He said, "No."

"No, I won't go home with you. I don't really know you. And given the circumstances, with George and all, I don't think it would be appropriate."

I was actually sort of shocked. I stood up behind him, he was still seated at a stool at the bar and I did what actually even surprised me. He was wearing a button down shirt with the top couple buttons undone, and I stood up and reached inside his shirt from behind and just placed my hand on his chest and hugged him. The touch of his skin was electric. He was warm, smooth, hairless and electric. He kind of laughed, that easy funny, laugh and still said, “No, that won't work. I'm not going home with you.”
"I do need to go home though. I have to be up first thing in the morning for my job," he said. And with that, he rose from his seat and turned to face me. All I wanted to do was throw my arms around him and carry him out of the place. But we walked outside the bar together standing on the busy street. We stood for just a little too long and talked for just a little bit more. And then, he took me entirely by surprise. He moved forward, put his hands on my hips, and kissed me. He kissed me squarely and hard on the lips. Right there. In full view of everyone driving down that busy street in the glow of the streetlights and the billboards. He kissed me. I was really shocked but I did not withdraw. Then he walked a few steps around the front end of his car, jumped into the driver's seat and off he went, into the night. I walked in the opposite direction and got into my car and drove home. Alone.

(to be continued)

Gay Like Me - Installment 5

2005-02-11T00:00:00.001-05:00

This encounter was very much different than any other encounter that I had previously had. I was now alone with this guy who knew exactly who he was and there was no pretension whatsoever. He was gay, he knew it, I knew it, the whole world knew it, and he didn't give a damn. That's not to say that he was a feminine in any way, really. He was tall, good-looking, masculine, and gay.

So in this room alone together, I was very much out of my element. He didn't seem to care. I was nervous and the situation was awkward but somehow, it just felt right. It was such an exciting circumstance. It was a renewed wonderment. It just felt right, this beginning of a new gay life.

With the lights down low, we made it to the bed. The awkward small talk was quickly followed by wandering hands and then the comment: “What’s that?” “Oh, you mean the ‘thump, thump, thump’ inside my chest? Don’t mind me, I seem to have swallowed my wristwatch or something.” There was the tickle of a mustache, grasping and groping at smooth skin, hot breath on my neck and finally, the extrication from clothing.

“Holy shit,” I thought. “Look at the size of that thing. Where might he be expecting to hide it?” But the concern soon passed. I had been on the delivery end before but never on the receiving end. He was soon lying on his stomach and pulling me on top of him from behind. “Do you have some lube or something?” I asked. I’ll never forget his response as it rolled off his lips so matter-of-factly, “You’d be surprise by what a little spit and determination can get you.”

When I left, in the gray of the morning, I drove home on streets that were empty. During what was left of this enchanted night, I didn't sleep a wink. I suppose I was running on adrenaline. Late the next morning, I called him from work. I don't know if I was supposed to but I could hardly contain my exhilaration.

Over the course of the following weeks, as any new romantic relationship starts, I was absolutely ecstatic -- my feet didn’t touch pavement. We went to movies, had barbecues in the yard and showed up at the local pubs. I was treading on such unfamiliar ground I didn't know which end was up. But it was exciting and I was energized. "I wanted him," I thought. "I wanted it all."

But, another side of this new relationship started to emerge and with it came all kinds of baggage. As a matter of fact, the ‘relationship’ part started to trouble me as I started to figure things out. Relationships arise from trust and are built over the course of time on honesty and with love. I thought that we could build one but I knew there were holes in this fabric. You see, there was a legacy of a couple of old boyfriends and ridiculous stories about the arguments that they had about joint ownership of some property. Notice, I say “old”, not “ex”.

I was also holding down a brand new job of responsibility with a Fortune 500 company. I was learning the job, learning the company and I was earning a lot of money doing it. My newfound flame, on the other hand, was a hair stylist with a very fast life style and despite making a decent living, generally lived from hand to mouth. He would rise late and go to bed late. If he was late, he would simply reschedule. During the week, he would want go out around 11 p.m. about the time that I should have been thinking about going to bed, and keep me out all night. Up at 6:30 and off to the job by 7:15 came very early. While he was sleeping, I would have to drag my ass off to work.

He told me about another guy that he had recently met. He had mentioned he had a certain fondness for this guy. “He was cute,” he said. As it turns out, one night we were in the same bar in which I had met him, when this guy walks in. He was with two people, a woman about ten years older than he was and the guy about his age. I took the guy to be his boyfriend. In fact, it wasn't. They were childhood friends. After introductions and some small talk, all I really wanted to do was take George home and spend a little romantic time. George leaned over to me and whispered, "If I asked him to go home with us would you be willing?" I thought it over for a few seconds and then turned to George said, "Yes." I guess in my desperation I was more interested in getting home for the romance with George than I was really interested in doing a three-way. The young guy who had come into the bar said emphatically, "No." It was already 11:30 p.m. or maybe even midnight. I decided that the morning was going to come early and I asked George if he wanted to leave with me. He said, “No”, he wasn't quite ready. So I left him and headed home without him.

The times that I spent alone with George, evenings cooking over the barbecue, going shopping at the mall, the things that dating couples do, were absolutely wonderful. It was those other times, when George had had more than a few beers or when he had an agenda of his own, things could be miserable.

And then, oh yes, I forgot to tell you about the baggage. I was at George's house one night and we decided to go upstairs. The two of us are lying on his bed playing kissy-face, touchy-body when we heard a voice from the floor below. George gets up and heads for downstairs, explaining that that must be Jeffrey. Jeffrey was his old boyfriend, the one who isn’t the “ex”. I'm thinking, "When the fuck is going on? Why is his old boyfriend inside this house? My car is parked in front of the house. Jeffrey knows I'm here. He doesn't know who I am; he just knows I'm here. Then, I hear my name being called. I remember walking downstairs. I remember seeing Jeffrey in the kitchen and I remember walking out the front door, getting in my car, and going home. Fuck George. And fuck Jeffrey. Still, I hadn’t learned my lesson. I tortured myself by calling George and going over to have dinner with him.

A few days from then, I needed to go out of town for a week on business. All I thought about the whole time that I was gone was George. When I returned, I collected my car at the airport, and drove directly to George's house. There in his driveway, was parked his old boyfriend's car. I stopped for a second, pounded my head on the steering wheel, and then drove home. That was Friday afternoon. I called George on Saturday. I talked to him. I’m thinking about the space between us. I’m thinking about the “old boyfriend” between us. I’m thinking it’s about time to review the situation and make a critical assessment here. I’m thinking, plainly put, “Three’s a fucking crowd.” I was never very good at ultimatums -- giving or taking but I’m thinking, “Me or him, (them), (whomever).” I learned very early to be independent and my middle name is pragmatism. That’s not to say that I won’t love, just that I try not to let it break my heart. (I also took back the white linen sport jacket I bought him.)

On Sunday afternoon, I knew that George tended bar at the place that I originally met him. So Sunday afternoon, I went down to see George. I thought that if I had a few minutes, I could speak to him about the situation to see if there was an ember glowing or to see if it had reached its logical conclusion. As I sat there drinking a beer and having talked to George for just a few minutes, who should walk in but the young man that we had met in the bar a couple of weeks before. He was just getting off work at a local hotel were he worked in the restaurant. He was on top of the world. He was all pumped up because Huey Lewis was in town and was staying at the hotel where he worked. He was so cute and so funny.

We talked for a little while but I sensed a certain standoffishness. I guess the reason that he had stopped in at the bar was the same reason that I had stopped at the bar. We both wanted to see George. I'm not sure beyond that what his motive was. Nonetheless, it was a pleasant experience talking to him that afternoon. I realized however, that any chance at a relationship with George was done. I ended up getting up, grabbing George by the shirt and planting one final kiss firmly on his lips and then leaving. That was the last time that I really had any more conversations with George.

I had however, made friends with certain people that I had come into contact with. One of those was Eddie, one of the partners that was George's roommate. Eddie had a very pleasant air about him. He bartended at another bar (is there a pattern here?) that I didn't even have the faintest idea was a gay bar. Eddie was very friendly and very approachable. I stopped in from time to time to have a beer with him and to shoot the breeze.

One evening, I was sitting there talking to Eddie when some guy came in and started to hit on me. Fate, I am convinced, is like a river with all its currents and eddies (not Eddies, well, maybe Eddies). Things happen and as a consequence of those events, other things happen, or don’t happen. I was so uncomfortable that I was getting prepared to leave. Had I left, I would be in a different place today. As I was about to get up from my seat, who should come walking into a bar but the young men who had shown up the day that I had kissed George goodbye.

(to be continued)

Gay Like Me - Installment 4

2005-01-07T22:15:00.000-05:00

Years had passed. But after my first gay experiences, I continued to deny in my heart what I knew I really needed: to be gay, to be myself and to establish a meaningful relationship with another man or men. Instead, I played cat and mouse with gay relationships and I never allowed anyone to get close enough to me to allow love to take hold. Not even between my "new friend" and me. Yes, we slept together on numerous occasions. For my part, there would be no real emotional attachment – I wouldn’t allow that. I enjoyed the closeness and the warmth but I still couldn't bring myself to terms with the fact that I was gay and I didn't want to make this commitment openly. I was much too concerned about living an openly gay life and how that might affect career opportunities with the company that I worked for should that information ever get out.

From time to time we went to the single bar in town that catered to gay clientele. We would park a couple blocks away and walks separately and meet again inside. I was scared to death that I would be found out by someone I knew or worked with but once inside, it was a whole world of people just like me. They didn't look any different. They didn't look like the 'creatures' that I had been conditioned by society to believe gay people were supposed to look like. They were just a cross-section of the population except they were gay. And in this bar at least, they were not all 20 year-old good looking young men.

Despite indoctrination into the gay life and through my continued denial that I was gay, I met a woman whom I became friends with and later became a lover to. One thing led to another and before I knew it I was enveloped in a romantic relationship. This relationship went on for years. I continued to deny that I was really gay and I continue to try to foster this relationship; to make it work.

"So if you're gay, how could you get involved in a relationship with a woman?" you ask. This was the part of straight-acting bullshit that gay men sometimes hide behind. This is also the dichotomy of engaging in homosexual acts (that closeted, unliberated gay men tell themselves is ok because they are not really gay) and then going home to a wife or a girlfriend versus not giving a shit who likes you or not for the person that you are and living the life on this earth that you were meant to have, unfettered by the stigma attached to what you should be. It sucks and fortunately, I came to terms with it before I made any really stupid moves like getting married and having children under false pretenses and hurting an entire family. Anyway, as far as I can tell, and of course I'm an inside observer, there is no outwardly tell tale signs that I'm gay in any way shape or form until I’m doing a nasty. I had a string of girlfriends and had performed sexually partly, I'm sure, because I was young, and had a tremendous sex drive. It had only to do with the warmth and sharing of human experience but no physiological association and no real romance with these women. And during this time, I denied the gay me.

That relationship died a slow and painful death for a lot of reasons including the fact that I was gay but that certainly wasn’t the only reason. When the relationship ended I was disappointed because no one likes to fail but it wasn't the right combination of people, regardless of sexuality.

By taking on this relationship, I had also made a terrible mistake that one should never make. I had made a lover of a woman that I had to work in very close proximity to every day. It created a great deal of friction when we had to collaborate on various assignments for work. At the same time, it appeared to me that my career didn't have the momentum that I was expecting and it was time to look for other opportunities. I did just that.

It was not my intention to return to the city of my birth. It just so happens that an opportunity with a Fortune 500 company had opened in that city and I thought that this would cure a lot of the problems that I was feeling at the time. I also discovered that I wasn’t happy living in that small city and that I needed to get to another city that was large enough to allow me to enjoy my life and to come out of the closet. I was maturing and coming to terms with my sexuality. I knew deep in my heart that is what I needed.

I was facing a brand new world. I had a new job in a new city and a new home. All I needed now was a new life, a new gay life.

So I ventured out to find others like me. I was alone because I really didn't have any friends in the city that I knew were gay. The life that I had been leading was always carefully separated from the life what was in my heart.

After a few days of touring the city, I found what I believed to be a gay bar and after driving passed it numerous times, I decided that I would go in. I would chance the fact that I wouldn't be accosted by other gays. The first trip there by myself needed to be planned carefully. I decided that the first time that I would enter needed to be a time when there were few patrons around. I went in early in the evening on a weekday around seven o'clock. I stopped in front of the door and I took a deep breath and entered. Much to my surprise, I didn’t grow warts on my palms, my hair didn’t fall out and the world didn’t stop turning.

Now confident, I returned on a Saturday night. The crowd was obviously much more lively. Despite the sensory overload in unfamiliar territory, I found a comfortable place at the bar where I could see a large portion of the room. And there I sat, taking it all in. What do you do when you want to be picked up but you don’t want to be picked up? It was a reversal of roles that I wasn’t prepared for. I had always been the aggressor. I was the quintessential man's man.

A guy approached me about my age that introduced himself as Joe. He told me he was from out of town and was looking for someplace to eat. Did I know someplace along the boulevard that might be open. Couldn’t he have done better? It was a pretty fucking lame. But after all, this was my first time at being picked up. So we tried to make some small talk, something that I'm not very good at and never have been. Several of his friends were there with him and one of them walked up to the bar as he was just excusing himself to go use the potty.

While Joe was not unattractive, he certainly was not my type. But the friend who followed him up to the bar was striking. He was about three inches taller than me, had golden spun blond hair, gray-blue eyes and a mustache. I never have been one much for facial hair, but this was one nice looking guy.

There was a space of uncomfortable silence as Joe left for the john. I was nervous. I guess anybody would be around someone they find to be quite attractive. In that moment of silence, he said something to me and I wasn't exactly sure what it was over the din of the music. It was this error of understanding that caused him to ask me, "So what do you think?"

I didn't know exactly how to respond. I wasn't exactly sure what he had said. It’s that cognitive recognition thing that happens in your head where you process the words that you got and extrapolate what you think was said and formulate a response. Or maybe it was just two or three beers too many. Either way, I thought I was being propositioned and if I were, it was something I was gladly accepting. So I responded with some lead-in by regurgitating a key word or two and then, "Sure. What you think?" He realized in that split second that what I was doing was accepting an invitation that he wasn't quite sure that he had just given. It was actually comical. Offer and acceptance. It was all that mattered.

I don't know exactly what ever happened to Joe. But, off I went into the night with George. It was so unlike me. While it was not my first time headed for a good time with a stranger, it somehow felt so strangely unfamiliar and very exciting. I followed him in my car to a suburban house that he shared with two sets of roommates. I would later meet them: a gay couple and a large lesbian. The four of them lived in this nice suburban three-bedroom house.

We went to his bedroom. He turned the lights down low and put on some music.

(to be continued)

2005-01-04T09:30:00.000-05:00

It's a brand new year. It's January and this is one of the benefits of living in South Florida. This is alamanda. Yesterday, it showered on and off. Last night it went into the 60's. Today's high will be about 77 and sunny. Also, for some reason, this is something the iguana doesn't eat.

2005-01-04T00:06:00.000-05:00

Have you ever wondered how your teeth figure out how to grow so that there isn't any interference between the top set and the bottom set?

Gay Like Me - Installment 3

2004-12-30T23:33:00.000-05:00

So with me moving onto more important studies at college and being so far physically from the love of my life and realizing that there was really nothing to be salvaged there, romantically at least, I continued in college. There were no romances at all during my college years but I still couldn't help but look out of the corners of my eyes at attractive young men. Sometimes I regret that I didn't look to find a satisfaction to the desperate yearning that I felt during my early years of college.

Upon graduation I took a good paying job in a small city and in the same state that I grew up in. I visited the city where I would live, searching for an appropriate apartment and was disappointed on numerous occasions not finding anything that satisfied even the most basic requirement of my expectations. Prior to starting my job, I returned to the same city and this time was very fortunate in finding an apartment in what used to be a grand old mansion not too far from the place where I was to work.

When I met the Landlord 's daughter, she pulled up in a Corvette and I was very much impressed, being young, and just out of college. She was about my age. The mansion had been divided into six apartments by a local developer. The apartment that I was to take was on the second story of what used to be the servants quarters. It was a huge one-bedroom apartment. I ask the landlord's daughter who was living in the other apartments. She rattled off some names and when I asked her who was living in the apartment underneath me, she said, "I don't know, a couple of guys, I guess."

I moved in. It turns out that the couple of guys beneath me was only one guy. He was about my age, perhaps a year older. He graduated from a state university not far from the city that I'd move to. I don't even remember to this day what it was he studied while he was in college. What I do remember is that he was a real estate agent and he had grown up in this small city.

It also occurred to me, call it gaydar or whenever, that he was just that, gay. We didn't talk about it but I picked up the slightest of mannerism, perhaps. It also happened that these two apartments, my apartment in the upper half, and his apartment below, were conveniently connected by a door at the bottom of the stairs were there was a dead bolt on each side. Because of our age, and similar interests in the music, architecture, general culture, political issues, we hit it off very quickly. He was reasonably handsome, slim and intelligent and had an average build, curly blond hair and a fairly easy temperament. He also could carry on a good conversation regarding any one of a number of subjects. We spent some time together and he gave me a tour of the city introduced me to a few of his friends, one of whom was a flaming fag, just confirming the fact that my new friend was probably also gay. I don't mention this to be demeaning but this guy was a tall gangly bleached blond screamer who looked so out of scale in his body it was almost freakish. He was soft. His whole demeanor was soft. His whole presence was soft. Not that he was fat, he was just . . . soft.

My new friend and I frequently sat in my living evenings and talk about all kinds of things. It was summer and it was a brand new experience for me to be living entirely on my own. I had lived in a small house on the side of the hill with roommates while I was attending college, but this was the first time, fully on my own. So one evening, he and I were talking. And I decided to get the issue of sexuality out on the table. So somehow the conversation came around to speaking about his friend, the tall gangly guy.

I asked, "Is he gay?"

The answer that came back sort of took me by surprise. I had fully expected that he would give me a straight answer, which was of course, that the guy was gay.

He mentioned something about being "asexual".
I just laughed. "Right," I replied.
Then I said something that completely surprised even me. "I guess if he's asexual, that makes two."
"I beg your pardon?"
"If he's asexual, and I'm asexual, then that makes two," I repeated, holding up the obligatory two fingers in a “peace sign”.

His cheeks became pink as his face flushed. And the slightest smile curled up at the corners of his mouth.

"What about you?" I asked.
"I guess that would make me asexual too, " he replied.
"I see, " I said.

I don't remember exactly how the conversation continued. I know that it was a little bit strained for me. Actually, it was a whole lot strained for me. This was a turning point in my life. This was the first time that I have ever let the words pass my teeth to another person that I was gay. It was also the first time in my life that I've ever sat across from somebody who openly admitted to me that they were also gay. It was a milestone.

I don't remember the chain of events that occurred thereafter. There was obviously, a certain affinity between the two of us. It was nothing like the feeling that I had for the love of my life. There was no love here, but there was a certain attraction that the two of us felt for each other. It was a brand new feeling. It was at least a feeling that I had never acted upon. It was a feeling of impending lust. When I say impending, it was because this is the first time that I felt that I could actually act upon the feelings that had been building up inside me for all those years. I was fresh out of college and this was an education that I hadn't had.

There were a few moments of awkward silence and a little banter that didn't seem to amount to a whole awful lot of information being passed back and forth. But we soon came to an understanding. It was agreed that we would both like to have more intimate knowledge of each other. I remember there was some uneasy conversation regarding the need to shower, I had been out running or something, and he also said that he would be more comfortable if he could get ready. This was also not planned on his part. I want to shower, and so did he, in his own apartment. When I was clean, I hastened off to bed.

Minutes later, I heard the creek of the stairs leading from the downstairs up to my apartment. My heart raced as if it were the clack of wheels on rails across the seam between tracks: Tick, tick. Tick tick. Tick tick. Even today, it brings back memories as though these events took place yesterday. Feelings like getting that certain something which you want in the worst way for Christmas when you were a kid. Like holding the ticket that has B17 printed on it as the call B....17 and you win the door prize -- you never win but you did this time. It was the manifestation of a hundred years of yearnings or so it seemed.

He walked into the bedroom and dropped the towel that was wrapped around him. He was naked. I could just make out the outline of his body in the dim light of the bedroom. He lifted the covers and slipped in under them beside me. His warm, smooth skin slid up against mine. I thought that my heart would pound right out of my chest. It was the most incredible feeling that one could feel -- a warm flush coming over me. It was a final culmination of the expectation of fulfillment. I reached over and placed a hand on his chest, the first time I had ever touched another male in an intimate manner. I just absolutely couldn't believe that this was actually happening. My hand moved down from his chest across a flat smooth belly and I felt the slightest touch of pubic hair below. My hand stopped. I paused, not knowing what the next logical step was. And then, it continued, down, down, down, slowly till I touched an angry penis: a penis standing at attention. A penis, in anticipation of good things to come. I just couldn't believe this was happening.

It was the most unimaginable tactile sensation, to reach out and feel a fully erect penis that was not your own for the first time and not feeling any pleasure sensation coming back, expect for his heavy breathing and the slightest whisper of approval. With my hand fully encompassing it, I gently squeezed and he moaned. He was also not so knowledgeable of what the next step might be. It was not his first time but he seemed no more experienced than I.

The night was one of enlightenment and of apprehension, release, lust, desire, and the breaking of the great taboo. It was freedom. It was joy. It was life. Simply . . . life.

It was the experience of a lifetime. The first experience. I was 23 years old.
(to be continued.)

2004-12-24T01:04:00.000-05:00

"Booger" Monster

Gay Like Me - Installment 2

2004-12-23T22:20:00.000-05:00

When puberty came over me like this storm cloud over open plains, I didn't quite know what to do with it all. Aside from knowing that I was different than other boys my age, I was also faced with many bodily changes and the problem of hormones running throughout my veins. So instead of being attracted to boys, I was really attracted to boys.

Even though I came from a liberal minded family, I still didn't have an understanding of the differences that I felt, and I didn't have anyone to talk about them. There were no role models.

There was one wonderful benefit from having reached puberty: masturbation. And it was a wonderful benefit. I couldn't leave the thing alone. It seemed like I was perpetually erect and when you have an erection, and you are 13, there is only one thing to do to get rid of it. I'm sure my parents were wondering why I spent so much time in the bathroom -- one, two, three, four, times a day.

So while I was becoming aware of the new gift, so were my contemporaries. You see, the wrinkle to this whole situation is that up until this point, I was having activities with boys for the sake of activities. Now I was having activities with boys for the sake of boys. My friend G., was excited about showing me his erect penis with hair blooming around the base while declaring that "he was a man". Little did he know, I was a "man" too and I was interested in "men.” Not necessarily in G. with his erect penis, but other boys, nonetheless. G., on the other hand, was interested in showing me his erect penis but was interested in experimenting with it with girls.

This complicated the whole situation because aside from the feelings that I didn’t know how to deal with, I was also expected to be interested in girls just like G. was. Very quickly, I realized that I needed to make a front and develop a defense tactic to screen my real interests from those who were observing me – I guess this is what they proverbially call “straight acting” which came pretty easily to me.

Outwardly, I was an All-American Boy. Once I hit puberty, my pudgier youth was stretched across a lean and nimble frame and muscle and sinew grew to give it all definition. I was slim and handsome and a typical American teenager. Outwardly, there was no hint at all in the trouble brewing over the confusion I was feeling for the love of boys.

I tried the dating scene. Again, the problems were much greater than for a typical teen because not only was I not really interested in the girls whose interest I was trying to win, I was interested in the boys that I was competing with and had to learn how to deal with the awkwardness of courting a girl while also learning to mask my real feelings toward boys. Early on during puberty, this was not a problem. Boys were still just boys. We were all awkward and it didn't seem too much matter what gaffs we made.

The internal conflict began in earnest when I first started to feel the tremendous puppy love that young people feel for each other except my love was aimed toward someone of my own sex. We did masculine things together, activities, that is, but I knew in my heart, that I wanted to share much more. The taboo was far too strong however and I never acted upon the impulse. And to make matters worse, something that the heterosexuals seldom have to contend with is the fact that it is dangling (so to speak) in front of you like a carrot at every opportunity. We took gym class together at High School and I saw him naked every day. I also saw him naked every time we changed to go swimming during the summers. I slept next to him in a sleeping bag inside a tent alone at night and still, never acted on the impulse to touch him, to hold him. Heaven only knows how I managed to control it. I also realized at this point that this was not a phase I was going through and that these feelings weren't going to diminish any time soon.

This was the first of two yearnings that even to this day I will never forget. They say that the first love is the strongest in fact that's not exactly so. A year later, I fell deeply in love with my best friend who was a boy. I expect that I've never gotten over this to the day. I was a sophomore in high school when I first met my love. He was a year younger than me but our backgrounds were very similar. He was the youngest of three siblings; I was the younger of two. Our families were similar in nature.

We became friends very quickly and became so close that we could tell each other all our secrets -- all except one. We were so alike in attitude and values that the friendship was bound to form this incredible bond. We did everything together. Well, almost everything. Armed with fake I.D., we went out together at night to bars where we tried to pick up girls to take back to the car to see how far we could get in the back seat -- he always won. We went skinny dipping in the lake and I watched as those two ivory lobes danced at the bottom of a tan back as he bounced into the water. And I watched as his pink penis slapped his legs as he ran back to the shore. But aside from the typical wrestling that teenagers do, it never went any further. And it tore me apart. I remember a Gladys Knight song called "Midnight Train to Georgia" where one of the lines is, "I'd rather live in this world with him than without him in mine." That was my mantra. And I lived by it -- alone.

He took the required classes in high school to graduate in the same year that I did. I went off to college. Not too far away. He had hated high school. He wasn't ready to go to college, as his family had wanted. He took a job in my hometown. I was only two hours' drive and I returned to my hometown every weekend because I couldn't stand to be without him. Despite being able to talk about anything and everything, sharing our feelings, I could never bring myself to tell him that I loved him and risk losing him. I often thought that if there were a choice to be made to give my life in lieu of his I would have gladly done it. But that's what love is and that's what love does.

When I was starting my second year of college, he wrote to tell me that he had been accepted at a college on the west coast, far from where we had both grown up. It ripped my heart out to think that I would not be able to see him. I considered transferring to the same school. It didn't however make much sense. They didn't have the technical programs that I needed in order to fulfill requirements toward a career in engineering. He, on the other hand, had no use for mathematics or anything scientific, really.

My second year of college was hell without being able to see him. I wrote letters to him two and three times a week. Sometimes more. I called him when I could. One day, I received a letter from him explaining that he was unhappy with the way that he had been managing his life and informed me that he had “asked Jesus to help him” and taken him as his lord. I guess innately, I realized that this was the beginning of the end. We saw each other briefly during the holidays when both of us were in our hometown. But things had changed. It wasn't that I no longer loved him, it was that this new variable had been thrown into the mix and I no longer connected with him at the same level that I always had. It confused and troubled me. At the end of my second year of college, I took the year off. I went to visit my sister in the Virgin Islands for several weeks where she was living with her boyfriend and then I returned, I loaded up my car and headed for the west coast to see my true love. It raised my spirits to see him, spend time with him, converse with him, but he was not the same person. And of course, there would be no affection except a manly quick hug and a slap on the shoulder. There was no kissing, no affection, no sex, and there would be none. I actually stayed the entire summer. I got a job and I supported myself and applied to other schools. The "love that dare not speak its name" was waning.

All these years later, I still have every letter he ever wrote me, every card he ever sent me including the invitation to his wedding that occurred about three years after I returned to college that fall. I sent a gift but I couldn't bring myself to attend the wedding. I never saw him again. We talked on the phone several times after that but I guess we both knew that our friendship would never again be as it had been in those carefree days of high school.

The last time we spoke was years ago. I told him that I was gay. He was surprised. He told me he had no inkling; no clue. He told me he would pray for me. I told him it was unnecessary. I guess he's living someplace in New Hampshire now with his family. I still think of him. And, I still love him.
(to be continued)

2004-12-19T22:22:00.000-05:00

..someone with something to say

Between A Rock And A Hard Place

2004-12-16T23:02:00.000-05:00

I am absolutely haunted by a story I happened to see on the Discovery Channel a few days ago hosted by Tom Brokaw that was originally produced for a new show. I just can't seem to get it out of my head. It was a story that revisited the tragic adventure of a young man whose hand was wedged between a rock and a hard place, literally. It was a tale of not only survival, but of incredible bravery as well. It is the story of Aron Ralston and it was such a chilling video account of the events that occurred on that day I just can't seem to get it out of my head.

The young man's last name was Ralston. The only reason that I recognize and remember the name so well is that there used to be a director at my company who shared the name. There is no relationship.

It seems this young man made a tragic mistake in not telling anybody where he was headed and for that error, it cost him his hand and nearly cost him his life.

He had tried to take a job out of college where he earned a sufficient amount of money for his education but he just couldn't keep himself inside, loving the outdoors. And so he changed his job and moved to a new part of the country. He was drawn in; the canyon country of Utah fascinated him.

He parked his truck in Utah and set out across the desert to a place they refer to as a slot canyon. This is a dry slot between large portions of rock that water had cut millions of years ago. He followed the canyon for a long distance having first climbed a 60-foot rock face to get to where the water had previously been expelled from the canyon as a waterfall. He came across a large boulder wedged between the walls of the canyon and needing to move around it, climbed across its face, and hung from its edge before attempting to drop into the belly of the canyon. While he was hanging, the bolder moved, and started to fall into the throat of the canyon, he falling with it.

He was worried that the boulder would fall on him. He never considered that the boulder would trap him near the bottom of the canyon. As the boulder fell, it wedged his hand between the wall of the canyon and its face. He was hurt, and he was pinned. "The pain was incredible," he said. He could see pieces of his skin stuck to the canyon wall where it had been abraded from his arm. He was fortunate in that his feet were planted on the lowest portion of the canyon floor. However, he was standing. He would be standing for six more days. Six more long days, before he succeeded to cut off his own hand.

The pack on his back contained some rope and a knife, and enough water for a single day's hike. He managed to get the knife out of the pack and attempted, over the course of the first few days, to chisel away enough of the rock to free his hand. It was to no avail. He only managed to dull the knife.

He faced all odds. He had no food. No one knew where he was. No one was expecting him back anytime soon. No one would miss him. No one would see him where he was. There would be no search parties.

After several days passed and he realized that the crushed flesh of his hand was decomposing and he had no feeling there when poking it with the knife that he might be able to remove his hand entirely. His education was that of Engineering. He realized through his education that he didn't have the proper tools to cut through the bone even if he were to separate the flesh. This foregone conclusion, he would later say, perhaps kept him from attempting the amputation earlier. Since I saw this, there is also a 8 minute sound clip with Alex Chadwick of NPR where Alex talks to Aron about his experience which is covered in a recently published book: Between A Rock And A Hard Place . After this realization, he stopped his attempt at cutting off his own hand.

Two more days went by. He came to terms with the fact that he would die there and no one would find him. He etched R.I.P. into the rock with a knife. He was afraid that if his body were to decompose after his death, that no one would know who he was. He etched his name into the rock next to the R.I.P. along with the date. He also had a small video recorder with him and taped a eulogy and a good-bye message for his family as well as taking at least one snap shot.

Nearly six days had passed since the calamity had begun. He came to terms with the fact that he would die. He was dehydrated; he was hungry. He had lost 45 pounds. He was suffering from hypothermia. He then began to think more about the removal of this hand. He fashioned a tourniquet from some material in his backpack. He attempted again to cut the flesh of his arm to free his hand. He realized that the blade that he was using was the large blade that he attempted to chip away rock with. It was very dull. The tool had a secondary blade that was much smaller but was also much sharper. He cut through the outer portions of his arm and found that the toughest pieces were the ligaments and tendons that connected the muscles of his arm to those of his hand and fingers. When he got to the arteries, he realized he had not applied the tourniquet, and stopped cutting. After making the correction for the oversight, he again went to the task. He cut through each of the arteries as he found them. He was oozing blood. He came up on the thing that he considered to be the hardest. It was a bundle of nerves connecting his hand to his brain. When he touched them with the knife, it sent a fiery pain directly to his head. He lifted them carefully and then quickly severed them. It was a pain that he said you could not imagine it was so intense.

He still had the problem of working through the bone. He had no saw. He used his knowledge of engineering. He realized he could probably break them. There are two bones in the lower portion of the arm. He pulled all the way to one side of his captive position and strained as hard as he could against the pressure from the rock until he finally heard the pop of the bone breaking. And then he climbed over the rock in the other direction and pulled as hard as he could in the other direction until he heard the second bone break. He fell over backwards on the canyon floor. He was free.

Still, he was seven miles from his vehicle and several hours ride from the nearest hospital. He took his backpack and started down the slot canyon toward the 60-foot precipice. While trying to untangle and adjust the rope, we heard it sing as it slithered over the edge and he stepped on it before it completely disappeared. Had it gone, he surely would have died. He managed to rig a sling so that he could rappel down the cliff, which he managed to do with only one arm. At the bottom of the precipice he found a small puddle of water that had been contaminated with a dead raven. It had been days since he drank water and he drank from the puddle and filled his canteen. He walked across the desert floor for miles and was lucky to find a family, man woman and child, who were visiting from out of the country. They offered him the only food they had: two Oreo cookies and some water.

The woman stayed with him. The man went off to seek assistance. He and the woman continued to walk along the desert floor toward the location where he had left his truck. When they arrived at the bottom of the loose stone embankment, he realized that he could never make the climb which was an eight hundred feet up. He had lost over 25 percent of the blood in his body. They estimate that at about 1.5 liters. When the body loses 2 liters, they say, critical organ start shutting down and you can actually die of a heart attached when the heart can no longer get enough oxygen to continue to beat.

Miraculously, one of his friends had contacted his mother when he had not returned at the end of the week when he had said he would. She realized something was wrong. He was a very responsible individual. She contacted anyone who might have known where he was. She also went to where he was living and signed onto his computer feeling that perhaps he had sent a message to one of his friends telling them where he might have gone. She also reported him missing to whatever authority would put him on a list. One of the friends that she e-mailed responded with the fact that he had spoken to him and he had told him that he was expecting to go to Utah to do some canyon walking. She had called the park service there. They knew where his truck was but didn't find anything unusual because many visitors to the park frequently left vehicles for weeks at a time. They had dispatched a helicopter to search for him. He was standing at the bottom of the hill as the helicopter arrived. Had he arrived at that location, either earlier or later, it would not have been there was they had planned to return to base for refueling. But, they took him to the hospital. It was months and months of recuperation including a disease of the bones from the wounds that almost killed him.

I cried while I watched this expose. I couldn't even imagine the hopelessness and the mental anguish that this guy went through, hanging there for six days with his arm crushed by a rock, locked in this prison, not to mention the physical pain. It was that incredible bravery and resolve that allowed him to survive. It is unfathomable that nature, having no inclination nor conscience to do so, can be so cruel. Perhaps it was because I don't know if I would have the same fortitude that he exhibited to make that decision and move forward. It makes every day more dear when I consider my fortune in that it was he and not I. Sometimes I lose sight of the fact that life is really a trip and not a destination. We take too many things for granted. Each year I resolve not to, but I think it is our nature that makes us look to the negative. That is, accepting that everything will be okay as the zenith, and complaining when it's not. I resolve to look at life from now on as the cup being more than half full.

2004-12-16T15:33:00.000-05:00

Gay?! Who, me?!

Gay Like Me - Installment 1

2004-12-15T22:51:00.000-05:00

I am gay. It is a remarkable revelation that I can say it. It took me years and when my mouth would form the word and the sound would dribble off my lips, it didn't sound like me. Certainly, it wasn't me that was giving away my gay identity. It was dangerous. It went against every grain in my body: that natural instinct for self-preservation. The secret couldn't be taken back after the cat had been let out of the bag.

It took me an entire adolescence and a few years of my twenties to craft what I considered a pretty good screen against anyone surmising that I was gay. Even the word 'gay' is a misnomer for a person that is attracted to the same sex. "Gay" is an attitude, a style, a flair, an interaction with society, an identity - none of which I knew anything about while I was trying to figure out who and what I was and where I fit in. All I knew is that I found other boys attractive in a strange kind of way. I found that I liked them more than they liked me in that same kind of way. I recognized, very early on, that I was different. Of course, I did know what the difference was at that time.

My earliest recollections of being gay were when I was probably five or six years old and I was with my friend John. My mother told me that I was always intrigued with silky, smooth things like the binding on blankets. I remember the skin on John's back had that same silky smooth quality. It's funny how I can remember that far back (or John's back) but I also recognized that it was wrong to be stroking John's back because I can remember pulling my hand from under John's shirt when I heard my mother approaching. It was all very innocent.

At a young age, and I don't remember exactly when, I can remember looking longingly at the bag boys at the supermarket. I thought they were so cool and it was the closest association I had with 'older men'. I also remember having fantasies of tickling them. I guess tickling was what came natural to a prepubescent little gay-boy-in-the-making. It was very erotic and yet I hadn't reached puberty.

Of course, the early years are formative, and equal time had to be given to exploring the girls. I played doctor with the girls down the street. "I'll show you mine if you show me yours." I've also remembered being in the room when Chrissy's mother came in and slapped her naked butt for showing the boys her chicoidia. The girls were O.K. but it was the boys that really fascinated me. I knew it. They didn't.

And then there were the sleep-overs. First there was some talking dirty then tickling followed by a little groping. It was all so guileless and fresh. It was discovery. I didn't know what it was then but I knew that it was to be hidden.

I have given it a great deal of thought over the years and have unscientifically decided that being homosexual is a predisposition. I use "homosexual" here because the word is really not interchangeable with gay. Gay just makes things simple. In reality, you are born with an orientation focused towards one sex or the other. Being homosexual is a behavior rather than a physical property but being gay is a choice rather than an orientation. There are shades of both rather than absolutes. But, homosexuality is not a choice and gay is.

Like most things, we humans want to attach labels and their associations into neat little boxes but of course, as we all know, life isn't like that no matter how hard we want to believe. If you are truly heterosexual, you feel attraction exclusively to members of the opposite sex and sleep with them. If you are truly homosexual, you feel attraction exclusively to members of the same sex and sleep with them. Very few of us fall exclusively into either of these categories.

Kinsey was right. He developed a scale from 0 to 6. Zero was exclusively heterosexual and six was exclusively homosexual with three being equally bisexual. Remarkably, 18% of the thousands of men Kinsey and his staff interviewed in the late 40s and 50s classified themselves as 0 through 3! Though I haven't had sex with a woman in years, I still get a tingle in my loins every now and then for some shapely vixen. Just wouldn't make a habit of it, I'm afraid - it's not a choice, it's simply a predisposition. I'm sure there would be a lot more sleep-overs today with some dirty talk, some tickling and a little groping if "straight men" weren't so hung up on their masculine insecurities.

(to be continued...)

Work: The Noble Activity

2004-12-14T07:50:00.000-05:00

I exited the interstate near my house. Everywhere in South Florida there are vendors or panhandlers. I am not sure of the legality of the vendors. I don’t know if they have to have licenses but you can buy a lot of simple things right there, waiting for the green. Bottled cold water is popular. Key limes in little mesh bags -- a small yellow skinned lime. Vidalia onions (a sweet tasting onion peculiar to the south, I guess). Fresh cut flowers are cheap. They come in from South America by the boatload. You can get a bouquet of long stem roses for $5.

So as I got off the interstate there is this thin little Hispanic woman – maybe Peruvian, could be Cuban, but I don’t think so. As the cars queued up behind the red light three lanes wide, she ‘shifts into gear' walking along or between the cars holding three or four bunches of flowers up in cellophane with rubber bands around the bottoms of the stems. Outside the car in the heat, you can see her expressionless face except for her mouthing the words, “Five dollars.” It is very late afternoon, perhaps five o’clock. The sun is still a remarkably warm eighty-five degrees or so for December. You can see hope in her eyes and pain in her feet by the way she walks as she makes yet another trip between the rows of cars. She is probably in her late 50s and this is her life. Her gait betrays her feelings. It says, “It is hot. I’m tired and I hurt. If I could just get this stuff sold, I could go home.” She walks back to the head of the line where the cars are waiting to blast away from the light. No customers this cycle of the traffic light. She sets the flowers into a bucket and wipes her brow with the back of her hand. She looks into the faces of the drivers; holds up an open hand and mouths, “Five dollars,” once more. The light turns green and the cars race away. She is here, every day, every hour. You’d think she lived right here on the corner. Maybe she does. I buy flowers from her sometimes, but not today.

I stopped at the supermarket minutes later. In the land of plenty, I run the cart up and down the aisle, grabbing the stuff that I need or want. There is a chubby young black kid with a wide push broom sliding it up the aisle. When I was a kid, I worked at a supermarket. I hated when they sent us out during times of high customer traffic to sweep the floors. I tried to get it done as quickly as I could because I couldn’t stand navigating an unwieldy object between pairs of feet and wheels. I watched this kid. It amazed me how much wasted effort he could put into doing nothing; I mean, he was doing NOTHING. And, as a slap in the face to the work ethic, he was wearing a pair of cotton work gloves. Every move was carefully planned to burn up two seconds of time for one second of work. I thought that maybe he was resisting going on to some task that he didn’t want to do while here in the air conditioned, well-lit, clean supermarket – like maybe selling flowers in the dust and exhaust fumes on the exit from the interstate.

Santa Is Alive and Well

2004-12-10T08:39:00.000-05:00

In the heart of the most commercial holiday of the year, it is good to see that Santa is alive and kicking. I am a most independent person. I don't like to rely on anyone unless I absolutely have to although I am the first person to jump into a situation when I see one and expect nothing in return for my help. It is unsettling to face the unexpected yet, there it is, bigger than life sometimes.

I drove my "old" car yesterday. I bought a new one last year and held onto this one because it is paid for, still looks pretty good and, let's face it, I like the car. It is, however, of the age that things are bound to go wrong. I drove it to pick up some stuff at one location and was supposed to meet two other parties later at another location.

I came out of the first place, climbed into old faithful, turned the key and faithfully, it DIDN'T start. It didn't click. It didn't go anything. I know a little bit about cars. I went and inspected the most obvious thing: the battery. Looks like a little corrosion peeking out from that damn side mount terminal. Not to worry. I have a pair of locking pliers in the trunk. Usually, I have a whole box full of tools because, like I said, I don't like to not be prepared but I had seriously considered selling the car and took everything out of it. I took the terminal off the battery and using a stone from the ground, I cleaned the terminal.

Some guy walked up to me and asked, "Are you OK? Can I help?" What was this? He didn't want to stab me or rob me. I didn't get it. "Looks like a little corrosion. That's all. I should have it under control in no time. Thanks, though, for asking."

I put the terminal back on the battery. Good as new now. I climbed back into old faithful and turned the key. Nothing. No click -- no anything. Radio was ok. Lights were ok. Everything was ok - just not starting. Where was the guy who wanted to help ten minutes ago? Took the terminal back off, cleaned a little more, put it back on, turned it a little tighter this time. Maybe a little too tight as the terminal turned right out of the battery in my hand! It was now very clear that I was not going anywhere and I'm 35 miles from home. I'm soaked with sweat by this time and angry and frustrated and dirty and late for my appointment. South Florida is still in the 80s in December, yo-ho-ho. I called my first appointment and told him that I wasn't going to make it to meet him. I called my second appointment. He was already there at our agreed meeting point.

"We'll have to reschedule," I said. "I've had a little car trouble."
"Can I help?" he replied.
"Only if you wanted to take me to get a battery."
"Well, where are you?"
I told him.
"You're close. I'll be there in a few minutes."

I had never met the guy. We had only talked on the phone once. In a few minutes, he was there in the parking lot approaching the only car with both the trunk open and the hood up and a pissed-off, sweaty grinch hunched over the battery that I had just taken out of the car. We introduced each other. HE picked up the battery, put it in the back of the pickup truck that he was driving and said, "Come on," as he motioned to me. "I'm not sure where there's an auto parts store around here," and stopped to ask someone he saw on the street. A couple of miles away, HE picked up that battery and took it into the store. I got another battery (no, he didn't pay for it - although I almost expected him to). We drove back, I installed it while he waited. I turned the key. Nothing.

"Hold on a second," he said. "Let me call John who knows about cars. He owned a garage for years."
"He says if you're not getting anything and you're sure the battery is OK, which it is, try starting it in Neutral instead of Park."
I put it in Neutral and turned the key. The engine roared to life. It seems that the switch that keeps you from starting in Reverse or any other gear, sometimes might not quite make, keeping the car from staring in Park. First time that has every happened to me.

After lunch (which he had refused twice and finally accepted after I insisted), I watched Santa climb into his Ford F-150 sleigh and I swear I heard him say, "Now, Dasher! now, Dancer! now, Prancer and Vixen!
On, Comet! on Cupid! on, Donner and Blitzen."

The Story of My Life In a Phone Call

2004-12-08T08:03:00.000-05:00

Cellphone: *4-1-1*
Canned voice: “Did you know that now you can get up to three numbers or movie listings through 411 on the same call? Please state the city and state.”
“Coral Springs, Florida.”
Breathing person: “Coral Springs: 411, how can I help you?”
“I’d like the number for Coral Springs City Hall or more importantly, the address. Do you have a listing for the building department there?”
“I have a listing for “Buildings” in Pompano Beach. Would you like that?”
“Well, that would be Pompano Beach, not Coral Springs, wouldn’t it?”
“Would you like Coral Springs City Hall?
“Yes.”
“Connecting. Hold for your number.”
Canned Voice: “You are being connected to 9-5-4-1-2-3-4-5-6-7 at no additional charge.”
*Ring*Ring*Ring*Ring*Ring*Ring*Ring*Ring*Ring*Ring*Ring*Ring* [Silence]

Cellphone: “9-5-4-1-2-3-4-5-6-7" [Send]
*Ring*Ring*Ring: “Good afternoon. This is lwe;; lwhte lske. How can I help you?”
“May I speak to the Building Department?”
*Hesitation…*
“Oh, you must want the City Hall.”
“Isn’t this Coral Springs City Hall?”
“No, actually this is City Hall Citgo.”
“Oh.”
“We used to be City Hall Mobil, but we changed. We call it City Hall because we are right near the City Hall.”
“Oh. And where are you?”
“The corner of University Drive and Sample Road.
“Which corner?”
“Southeast.”
“Where is the City Hall?”
“They’re on the north.”
“Northeast? Northwest?”
“Well, if you were going on University and you turned like and… well they’re not really on the corner. But, they’re big. You can’t miss them.”
“Thank you. You’ve been really helpful. Maybe I’ll come over and buy some gas.”

I should have but I didn’t.

A Stitch In Time Saves Nine....

2004-12-06T13:34:00.000-05:00

It has been said that prevention is much more efficient than trying to fix things after the fact. Take AIDS for example: know your partner, wear a 'rain coat', don't do drugs that might lower your inhibitions and make you NOT follow rules one and two, etc. There are thousands of adages: "Don't drive drunk." "Look before you leap." "If it sounds too good to be true, it probably is." But, you know all that already.

The realities of the world, however, are much different. I had occasion to look through the yellow pages of the City of Fort Lauderdale, FL. The U.S. census bureau estimates the population of Broward County at 1,731,347 people which includes all the smaller cities. The Yellow Pages include 111 PAGES of attorneys! That is: four columns per page (plenty of those pages are fully filled with display ads or part display ads but you get the idea). On the other hand there are six (6) entries for Safety Consultants and eleven (11) enteries for Safety Equipment Dealers! What's that tell you about our society?

2004-12-06T13:01:00.000-05:00

Do you think she could fit into a jacket any smaller or make her tits any bigger? OK. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to say, "It's gonna be sunny again today in South Florida just like it always is. Do my tits look ok?"

Gay Marriage? Hetero Marriage Forever?

2004-11-29T19:37:00.000-05:00

I am gay. I have NO DESIRE to get married except that my partner and I have no protection under the law for things that are starting to have greater importance: death benefits, health benefits, control over the decision making process for a health crisis (such as pulling the plug in the event there is no hope from an accident or an illness. For goodness sakes, we might not even be able to see each other since we would not be immediate family), and of course, financial control over the life that we have been building together. I hope that if I am taken out of the picture first without choice by circumstances in my life that he will go out and find someone who will love him with all their heart the way that I do.

The supreme court of the U.S. decided not to hear the case for recision of the right to gay marriage in Massachusetts today. The religious rightis now clamoring for a constitutional ban on gay marriage to take the issue out of the hands of "liberal" judges and put it in the hands of the people. Seems, the people do such a good job of managing their affairs and the affairs of others. You know, I would support a constitutional prohibition of gay marriage when they include in the same bill, the prohibition of divorce for heterosexual couples.

2004-11-26T19:10:00.000-05:00

I am less than enthustic about Elton John's latest album. I was expecting something so much more than this pedestrian offering. They are all Taupin lyrics that have lost their vibrant picture and weren't saved by Elton's mundane, plodding melodies. I just finished listening to his truly inspired Tumbleweed Connection -- what an album. Where have you gone, Sir Elton?

Black Friday Has Arrived

2004-11-26T13:50:00.000-05:00

So this year, the retailers opened at 5:00 a.m. or 6:00 a.m. I guess those that have survived the last few years are stronger for the trouble. Yes, even I was intrigued by some of the come-and-get-it-early come-on adds. I was out by 7:15. I am usually up pretty early and would have been out earlier but my numerous alter egos were arguing over the thought of fighting traffic. I couldn't pass up getting a 19" Samsung flat panel monitor for $379.00

OK, a couple of observations:
1. Why are there 34 cash registers in a store and only 2 are open? Have you ever seen all the registers open at one time? If not on the busiest shopping day of the year, then when?
2. If you're gonna fight over the last widget on the shelf so that you can give it to an undeserving, unappreciative brat who will break it in the first few minutes of play, just stay home. This is the season of good will towards men and heaven knows, we need it -- especially this year.
3. If you can't think of something each person on your gift list needs or wants, give them a certificate for your time or labor and put the money that you would have spent into groceries for a family or a toy for a kid who otherwise won't get one. That is what I plan to do this year instead of buying some shit (expensive or otherwise) that will go on a shelf somewhere to satisfy the gift giving obligation. The obligation part creates such anxiety and the whole thing is so lame. Just take pictures of the kid opening the toy and give that on New Year's Day to the person on your list.

Thanksgiving to All and to All a Goodnight.....

2004-11-26T03:12:00.000-05:00

I have so much to be thankful for. We had a wonderful Thanksgiving feast. Our friends catered the dinner at our house!. She and her husband picked up all the stuff, a HUGE turkey, sweet potatoes, stuffing, well, you know the rest and brought everything over. Another couple, coming back from visiting their relatives in Arizona, flew home and came right from the airport to our house.

My boyfriend and I used to pick up all the stragglers: those friends that didn't have family in the area and no place to go. When we were still in our 20s, that was a pretty tidy crowd. Now that we're a little older, lots of those friends have their own families started or places to go to. Still, this Thanksgiving was not so different. We picked up two: T. went to have a buffet with his mother and her boyfriend. Then he came to our house because he feels more comfortable spending it here. S. is single and she runs an organization for non-gay (and gay) sufferers of HIV. It was a touching picture of us all holding hands around a table laden with wonderful food, giving thanks for the blessings and luck we have.

Ate too much. Talked too much.

I am thankful that I have my health. I am thankful that I have a boyfriend that loves me and I love him. I am thankful that I have several wonderful, true-blue, loyal friends that would do anything for me. I am thankful that I have a roof over my head and a warm place to sleep. I am thankful that I have meaningful work that pays me a living (although sometimes I find it meaningless and paying too little). I am thankful that I have all my fingers and my toes, my ears and eyes and that everything works reasonably well. I am thankful that I live in a free society and that I can dissent as I please, even if George W. is president; it won't be forever.

I promise that in the coming year, I will not take these things for granted and I will try to be a better person than I was the year before.

What Have We Become?

2004-11-24T09:43:00.000-05:00

In the last week:

A mother in Texas cuts the arms off her 11-month-old daughter, calls 911 and calmly waits for assistance to arrive while her daughter bleeds to death.

A handful of professional basketball players are involved in a fist-to-cuffs episode with fans in the stands due to “sticks-and-stones” name calling and a cup and/or perhaps some water being tossed.

A company releases a video game where you are the shooter trying to kill one of the most popular American presidents of the century in a reenactment of the actual assassination John Kennedy.

Battle Weary

2004-11-20T13:33:00.000-05:00

I’m really torn today. Some poor marine shot a wounded fighter laying on the floor of a building who had just minutes before been shooting at the man who shot him at point blank range. Clearly, our western values say this is simply wrong. However, like so many issues, it is complex with extenuating circumstances.

First, the marine who shot him had probably been fighting for the whole week with a few winks of sleep a night for a week, always at the ready, always ready to jump to protect himself in a hostile city of a hostile nation filled with hostile people who camouflaged themselves against the many innocents sprinkled through the city that didn’t have the opportunity to abandoned it before the assault. Second, in a pent up moment of focused fury and perhaps vengeance, he made a mistake and lashed out with deadly force at a terrorist that would have gladly killed him if the positions were reversed. Surely if he had a few extra seconds to review it, he might have made a different decision. But, that’s fucking war. It’s not pretty. It’s very brutal. It’s very, very brutal and this is not the first time that such a mistake (or not) has been made. My heart goes out to the marine who will surely now be brought up on charges.
The part that I am torn about is whether or not we should send reporters into battle with the troops. As I said, war is brutal and we can’t forget it nor can we present war to our American public in neatly wrapped packages of facts and figures. You smell it, you hear it, you taste it, you feel it and you must always fear it. “War is hell.” It needs to be portrayed that way so that we never forget it must always be a tool only to be used when no other means is available. And good reporting can show just how brutal and painful it is. The case in point is living proof. However, those powerful images can be turned into the clever propaganda that is now being broadcast all over the Islamic world on Arab television. It is raw and unedited and without context – just the slaying of a defenseless wounded insurgent. That’s not to say harmless, just defenseless. So, by portraying the potent pain of the war to our countrymen, we are providing the perfect propaganda for inciting potential enemies within a people. What a great enlistment gimmick: “Ayatollah Sam wants you.”

I Wanna Iguana To Go

2004-11-20T13:32:00.000-05:00

Now I know two new facts about Iguanas. First, they are vindictive. The impatiens that he ate in my planter a while back were just starting to come back into their own, sending up shoots where he had chomped them off. So, I walked out of the house yesterday and there he was, having an appetizer on the new shoots. I soon learned a second new fact about Iguanas. They are fast and efficient swimmers. He bounded from the planter into the pool kind of like the creature that bounds out of the chest of the poor unfortunate astronaut in "Alien", zips underwater, propelling himself forward with his tale and emerges in a matter of seconds at the far end where he jumps out, look back at me for a second as though to ask "What?!" and then skidaddles up the tree where he stops to stick his tongue out at me. I wanna scream. So I did a search on the internet. It appears there are products to use as lizard repellent in case any of you have this problem. So, I was off to Home Depot to see if they had anything similar locally. They do. Armed with this $10 spray bottle and a new flat of flowers, I am ready to do battle. (My b.f. tells me that through "his experts" (the bar patrons where he tends bar) he knows that it is a woman iguana so he has named her Clara. I don't know why, since every goldfish we ever had he named Sharon. Even when we had 15 of them in a little pond, they were all named Sharon: "Well, when I say, 'Sharon, it's time for dinner,' they all come so I guess each one knows her name.)

A Clean Cute Jewish Bee Joke for My Jewish Friends

2004-11-18T18:49:00.000-05:00

So, these two bees were talking.
Harold says to Irving, "Hey Irving, why are you so down in the stinger today?"
Irving replies, "I don't know. Nothing is in bloom - nothing to pollinate. It's kind of windy today. The sky looks like rain and I already have a cold."
"Well, why don't you fly over to the Goldstein's. I understand that they're having a bar mitzvah today and you know how those Jews are. They'll have all kinds of flowers for you to pollinate. Some real unusual stuff too, I understand."
"That's a great idea, Harold," says Irving. And off he flies to the Goldstein's.
A few hours pass and Harold is at the hive, taking a rest and happy that he had helped his friend when Irving arrives back from the party.
"Irving?! What's with the yarmulke?" asks Harold, pointing to the drink coaster plastered to his head.
Answers Irving: "Well you didn't want them to think I was a wasp, did you?"

Us and Them

2004-11-17T20:25:00.000-05:00

It’s so easy to lump people into a group. Us and them. We just witnessed the Republicans and Democrats duel it out in the presidential elections. Are you a Republican or a Democrat? Neither. I just believe that the self centered greed and lack of concern for my fellow citizens that marks the far right Republican ideology is not something I can identify with. Change, and more accurately, progress, is the nature of living and improvements in the quality of life in all its intricate facets are what make me happy. So I guess I would be somewhere solidly left of center. Is that a shade-of-gray Democrat? I guess.

I broke bread with a guy last weekend that used to work for me. We had spoken on the phone a few weeks before. I was close to where he lives on a Saturday morning, having had to meet someone to sign a document and deliver a couple of checks. I called him and we met at a diner for a late breakfast. I asked him how he voted. He looked down and told me he hadn’t. I asked why. He said he would have had to vote for Bush and it would have pissed off all his friends. I looked at him and laughed. He was wearing a tank top and his arms bore a heap of tattoos. He’s a good soul. A guy who always worked hard and was always proud of what he had achieved in life. (One of the reasons he wanted to meet up with me was to show me his Corvette – a torch red four-year old rocket). I recall having him tell me once about what a fucked up childhood he had and how his foster father had beat him and sent him out into a cold, dark, snowy night when he was 15 with nowhere to go and no way to fend for himself. It was all I could do then to keep from letting the tears roll down my face. What had the Republican Party ever done for him? Nothing. His choice for President came down to us and them – not the Republican and the Democrats, the Americans and the Iraqis and how he didn’t think it was a good idea to change presidents in the middle of a war. Can you believe it?

“But the Iraqis are not the problem,” I said. “Let’s say you and I are sitting here and some asshole from Canada is hanging out here and pops off a couple of rounds at an Iraqi tank rolling down main street here. They swing around and put a round through the window of this place and you and I are dead. I was just having a fuckin’ omelet for god’s sake. It was Bush that had the WMDs – and maybe he didn’t’ have them after all. Most of the people that are taking it are just like you and me, just getting by.” It’s a lot harder separating us and them when there is a face on them -- which might just be us.

Us and them
And after all we're only ordinary men
Me and you
God only knows it's not what we would choose to do

Forward he cried from the rear
and the front rank died
The General sat, and the lines on the map
moved from side to side

Black and blue
And who knows which is which and who is who
Up and downAnd in the end it's only round and round
And round

Haven't you heard it's a battle of words
the poster bearer cried
Listen son, said the man with the gun
There's room for you inside

Down and out
It can't be helped but there's a lot of it about
With, without
And who'll deny it's what the fighting's all about

Out of the way, it's a busy dayI've got things on my mind
For want of the price of tea and a slice
The old man died

-- Gilmour and Wright (Pink Floyd)

He's Baaaaack!

2004-11-16T13:31:00.000-05:00

The little bastard came back! My flower planter will never be the same. I walked out of the house and there he was. See, he's smiling at me because his belly was full of Impatiens. Then he scurried up a coconut palm and was gone. . . . .

Would The Last One Out of D.C. Please Turn Off the Lights?

2004-11-15T20:54:00.000-05:00

Fallout So Far........

· John Ashcroft - U.S. Attorney General
· Don Evans - Commerce Secretary
· Michael Scheuer - Former Head of the CIA's Unit for Osama bin Laden
· John McLaughlin - Deputy Director of the CIA
· Stephen Kappes - Deputy Director of Operations CIA
· Colin Powell - Secretary of State
· Rod Paige - Secretary of Education
· Spencer Abraham - Secretary of Energy
· Ann M. Veneman - Secretary of Agriculture

The Miami Auto Show or How I Spent My Veteran's Day Holida

2004-11-13T17:36:00.000-05:00

I went to the Miami Auto Show this week. You can see hundreds of cars there. South Florida is a place of many contrasts. There is a tremendous amount of money here -- and a tremendous amount of poverty. Miami is an international city in the most literal sense of the word and the cars, you can only imagine -- money here from Europe, money from Central and South America and money from the U.S. Northeast. They had a Maybach (the premium line of Mercedes Sedans: base price at $370,000+. There were Hummers: 1 (THE Military Style in Bright Colors)-no armor included, although you might want it in South Florida 2 (The suburban Toned Down Style) and 3 (The pseudo-suburban wannabe-warrior wasteful style in a diminutive size, new this year). The larger ones are in the $50,000+ range. They are so wide, I swear you have to have a phone to communicate with your passenger on the other side of the vehicle! They also get about 8 miles to the gallon. They all have to have an obligatory water bottle receptacle. What good suburban warrior wouldn't have a good bottle of Zephyrhills to quench their thirst. You couldn't drink out of the river you are fording -- who knows where it's been. Of course the closest these vehicles will get to off roading is Georgia, 5-600 miles away. There are no mountains in Florida -- to be fair, we do have a swamp, though. They call it the Everglades. Same thing with the Landrover series. The cheaper full-size model (Discovery) is in the upper $40,000s and the top of the line is in the $70,000s. Would you go off roading in a vehicle whose monthly payment was as much or more than your house? I think not. Highlights of the show: a number of hybrids with mucho-miles to the gallon. Also Ford has a couple of impressive entries in the new Mustang similar to the pony car introduced in the 1960s and the Ford 500, replacement for the Taurus. Also from Chrysler is the 300M Hemi, the poor man's Bentley. Now, for the ultimate in exclusivity, the picture here is a Mercedes McLaren SLR, a sports car with a powerful enough engine to rocket the space shuttle into orbit. For a mere $450,000 you can be the first one on your block to have someone run a shopping cart into your retirement fund.

2004-11-10T01:04:00.000-05:00

This falls under the "I've Seen It All In South Florida" category. I seldom go anywhere without my digital camera and caught this scene on a recent weekend. Notice the "Leo the Lion" cut on the poochy.

A Natural Enemy of Impatiens

2004-11-07T19:11:00.000-05:00

In South Florida, we have many geckos. They are a small tropical lizard that advertises insurance. This is an iguana. It is a large tropical lizard. We don't see many of them in my neighborhood but we have seen one. They are omnivorous. That is a fancy word for the fact that they eat damn near anything. I now know that they eat impatiens, a profusely flowering plant that is frequently found in planters in the fall and winter in South Florida.

2004-11-07T19:06:00.000-05:00

This is my planter. This is my planter without two and a half rows of flowers. Any questions?

The Mourning Period Is Over

2004-11-07T18:52:00.000-05:00

There is not much that can be said except that I am sad. There is nothing more that I could possibly offer. So the majority of the American population is in favor of hate (Iraq War) over love (gay rights -- the ability of two men who love each other to be married). How can this be 'moral values'? And how can Christian funamentalism be better than Islamic funamentalism? Which god is on our side? Which god is on theirs? There is really nothing that I can add that hasn't been written already. I just hope that baboon in the White House doesn't f*ck up the republic beyond what can be repaired when his time is over.

2004-10-29T14:31:00.000-04:00

To Look Into the Face of an Orchid is to Look Into the Face of God.

The Assault

2004-10-25T08:17:00.000-04:00

The assault has changed me. It wasn’t an assault really. It was an annoyance and I shrugged it off. There was no permanent physical damage done. The damage goes deeper.

It was a violation of my personal property but it changed me. Someone spread liquefied shit all over my car and driveway. I had no enemies that I knew of.

I now check the locks twice as I leave. I make certain that the bolt on the garage door is thrown. I don’t leave the door open when I walk to the supermarket half a block away and I listen for any noise that isn’t silence. The assault has changed me.

One More Haiku

2004-10-21T14:35:00.000-04:00

Politician
wind blowing in all directions
not a hair out of place.

--SST

Flight of the Egret -- The Infamous Snapshot

2004-10-21T14:17:00.000-04:00

Now, I'm not one that is superstitious nor am I one who dwells on things but... I resolved today to clean up a bunch of crap that had accumulated into an unsightly clutter and I opened up a card that I found that was addressed from my mother (now dead three years as of October 29) to me. Inside, I found this photograph. What is truly amazing is that she shot this picture the last time she came to visit me in S. Florida and: 1) I didn't know that I had it 2) Had I known I had it, I wouldn't have known where to find it 3) I just posted a bunch of her Haikus on this site and the one that deals with this photograph is there (on which I commented) 4) I hadn't looked at the pile of crap that I just went through to discover this photo nor touched it in at least a year maybe two but two days after I ran across and posted those Haikus (that were in a different place), I would find this snapshot. Bizarre.

Stalking the great white egret
capturing on film
his sudden flight.

Mankind

2004-10-20T14:18:00.000-04:00

"Maybe in order to understand mankind, we have to look at the word itself: "Mankind". Basically, it's made up of two separate words - "mank" and "ind". What do these words mean? It's a mystery, and that's why so is mankind."-- Jack Handy

Haiku Revisited

2004-10-19T20:09:00.000-04:00

Seems the Haiku were an item you good folks enjoyed. October 29 will be the third anniversary of my mom's passing. She would be pleased that even after her death, people were enjoying what she loved. While she was sick, she wrote a number of Haiku of her experience trying to beat the cancer that eventually took her life. They are a little unusual but I thought I would put them up here too. They were published in a MENSA journal. (The syllable counts or some are mixed -- I don't know why and I can't ask the author why.)

Hospital Haiku and Tanka:

Meeting as strangers
first names come quickly
last names irrelevant.

Elevator door opens
bringing new cargo
seeking miracles.

Waiting room becomes a club
exclusive membership
. . . not here by choice.

Keeping up strong fronts
we tell tall tales
to relieve the monotony.

Hearing a story
about endorphins
lifts our brain chemistry.

All in the same boat
doctors at the helm
always searching for solutions.

Prior Posts:

Mom's Photo With Me

Revisiting the Loss of My Mother

Just over a month after my mother died, we had a memorial service for her at her church. She wouldn't have thought of having a funeral nor did she want to be buried. My sister and I shared our unique perspectives of growing up as her children, a woman of many talent who touched so many lives.

Mom's Photo In Her 20s

Memorial to my Mother

Haiku

2004-10-16T21:35:00.000-04:00

Haiku is a form of Japanese poetry. It is three lines totaling 17 syllables. The first line contains five syllable, the second contains seven and the last contains five. It is the writer's aim to capture an emotion or a feeling in this short verse such that the reader can fully identify with it.

My mother always wrote poetry even from the time that she was very young. In the last ten years of her life, she became fascinated with this particular form and wrote many, many poems, some that were published in any number of books but also in Japan in various Haiku publications. She started a chapter of a Haiku society in her home town and 'counseled/coached' a fair number of students in the form.

In January of the last year of her life, one man collected and published a group of poems in a small volume. She died in October of the same year. My mother annotated things -- when she died it gave a lot of insight into her thought on many subjects. I just came across one of the volumes. In the front, she wrote: "When one of my young writing colleagues, M.... K....., learned I was scheduled for radiation, he scanned his computer for books in which he and I had published together, (see list at back) and put together this gift. In was one of the most generous, resourceful, uplifting events of a long, hard winter.

'Hearing I'm gone suddenly
Do not wish me back
Nor mourn too long.
Say she's followed the wild geese
Into the beckoning blue.'" SST

[this was her eulogy]

Some of the Haiku verses contained in the book follow:

Like the Old Haiku Masters
counting down the days...
weighing the options.

With infinite care
she stirs the warm earth
for forget-me-nots.

Topping the hedgerow
ornamental cherry tree
blooms for his neighbor

In her French garden
fragrance of honey-suckle
by another name.

Flooded by spring rain
path through the arboretum
finding its own way.

Abandoned rowboat
tethered to an apple tree
with morning glory vines.

From Highland Heights south
rolling hills and shadows fold
into each other.

Against the evening sky
sharp images of ginkgo leaves
...moon rising.

On the black walnut
a red-headed woodpecker
...a different drummer.

In the roadside ditch
swirling snowflakes dissolving
into black water.

[Before I moved to South Florida, I had an urban house in a yuppie neighborhood. I built a garage in the back yard that occupied a large portion of the available area and with what was left over, I built a Japanese Garden. As a gift, my mom bought me a Ho Tai statue -- resembling Buddha -- that I brought with me to Florida when I left and hence the following poem.]

Japanese garden
the empty space
where Buddha sat.

On Mount Ararat
watching for a sprig of green
a returning dove.

Months after Mother's Day
still on my window sill
your white orchid.

On the old dirt road
contradicting memory
new condo rises.

Three thousand miles...
feeling the tremors repeat
in your weary voice.

In the supermarket
hyacinths blooming
among winter squash.

On the May calendar
my appointment to go where
pink dogwoods bloom.

No gift too small...
An origami crane
Awakens Spring in my heart.

Squeezing through the fence
...young rabbit nibbles
on the greener side.

[She came to visit me in South Florida while she was still able to travel. While she was here, she managed to click a shot of an egret (think: crane or heron) that lifted off in my neighborhood. I don't get why it was so impressive to her but it was. It was a snapshot that was slightly out of focus but it was important to her.]

Stalking the great white egret
capturing on film
his sudden flight.

Light beams sparkling
on midnight water
beat of steel drums.

As he slips silently
into the last seat
...Cushion flatulates.

Trying new clothes
stylish tapestry fabric...
feeling upholstered!

Singing to herself
lullabies she never heard
from her own mother.

His hospital bed empty
I panic. . . until I learn
he's in the bathroom.

In my south window
your jade plant still flourishes
despite my neglect

Through binoculars
watching write-rumped sandpiper
mooning the watchers.

Last trip to the vet...
home with an empty collar
and red-rimmed eyes.

Unpacking my luggage
From the hills of Provence
the scent of lavender.

All night long the thud
of black walnuts striking
the frost-encrusted lawn.

Missing the odor
of burning leaves in autumn
he adds some to the grill.

The lawn's untrammeled snow...
leafless walnut trees
casting long blue shadows.

My memory grows
shorter and shorter
winter is upon me.

Airport parking lot...
not recognizing
my snow-covered car.

Climbing the night sky
flickering lights on her wing tips
becoming stars.

Hesitantly
he inquires about her pet
last seen at the vet.

Silent for so long
disturbed child
draws a man without a mouth.

Birdwatching
from the driver's seat
endangering my own species.

Overwhelming sneeze--
grandma apologizes
to an empty room.

Migraine headache--
removing the child-proof cap
with a claw hammer.

Hanging up his coat
racing for the armchair
ahead of the dog.

Grandma still calling
her six-foot grandson
"my little cabbage".

To Get Involved -- Or Not

2004-10-15T08:28:00.000-04:00

I watched an edition of Prime Time Live this evening. Group psychology is fascinating and sometimes scary. In a perfect world, we would all know immediately how to handle everyday situations but unfortunately it isn’t a perfect world and more times than not, we don’t.

The news show had a women posing as a babysitter yelling at a boy of about 7 or 8, telling him that he was stupid. Not just telling him, but verbally pummeling him over and over again. They set up this scenario near the first tee of a golf course. Not a single man of the ten or so there waiting to tee off intervened although it was obviously that they were within earshot and knew exactly what was going on. They were uncomfortable yet did nothing. Not a singe one.

They moved this same scenario to another venue: into a park. While most people walked by, they finally got a “taker”. It was an older man with a child in a stroller. Turns out he was a social worker and intervened in a very non-threatening way, stayed with the two “actors” for quite awhile to try to dispel the tension that was obvious between the two.

They moved this same scenario yet again to a picnic table near a playground and a woman came almost immediately to intervene. She approached with such conviction, such power. She very verbally spewed venom toward the woman doing the abusing. It was an amazing display – no regrets – she was just short of becoming physical. The situation was repeated: a second woman approached and again forcefully intervened but drew on the other women/moms in the area who had chosen not to get involved even though it was clear the damaging interaction between the “baby sitter” and the “boy” was concerning them. Repeated yet again, a third woman intervened for a different reason. She walked by twice before committing and walked up to tell the “boy” that he was not stupid and that everything would work itself out. It was later revealed that she had witnessed a woman being abused in a similar way by a man some time before and had done nothing. She was a doctor of divinity student at a local university. No one in any of these scenarios called 911.

I took a year off half way through my stint in college. I traveled. I went to visit a friend that was living in Seattle and ended up staying there for months. I got a job and used Seattle as a home base and visited a lot of the Pacific Northwest. There is an area of Seattle referred to as Pioneer Square that had been rejuvenated by the city fathers who had the good sense of avoiding urban renewal by homesteading this area and putting money into the infrastructure instead of ripping it down and putting up antiseptic architecture. In short, the area was cleaned up but lot of the denizens of the area remained: lots of panhandlers. When I first got there, I passed out a lot of quarters but you couldn’t walk a block without getting boosted up by one guy and then another. Soon, I was walking on by without as much as acknowledging this poor wretched guy or that one even existed. Months later, it was time to leave Seattle. I headed south through Oregon and along the coast highway of California ultimately heading back across the country to the northeast that at the time I called home.

I remember around 5:00 p.m. on a Sunday night in Denver, I called home to check in before leaving the city for a night cruise on open highways. I stopped in the middle of nowhere for fuel, coffee and a snack. I finished and walked out of the place into the darkness of the night. A young man was now there and he said something to me as a breezed by. “Do you have a dollar I could have?” or something like that. He wasn’t there -- I was jaded and uncaring.

I got into my car and raced down the highway counting the dots of white divider line flashing into the range of my headlights but miles away, I got to thinking. I wasn’t in a big city restoration zone; I was in the middle of nowhere. I was 20. This guy wasn’t much different than me. How was it that he got here? How was it he was stranded here? What did he need the dollar for? Food? I would gladly have fed him – no one should go hungry. I chose not to get involved. Why this incident has haunted me these years later, I don’t exactly know. I think through projection – he could as easily have been me. Nonetheless, I chose not to get involved and wonder what other situations I will be challenged with and how I will react. Would I intervene in the situation of a babysitter yelling mercilessly at a child? Would I feel justified?
I regret not having at least ‘evaluated’ the situation I was faced with. I think every situation is different and there are no set rules. I will, however, be aware the next time.

2004-10-12T19:58:00.000-04:00

It reminds me I have to take a Wiz.

Tattoos At Large

2004-10-09T20:48:00.000-04:00

What was he thinking?

Tattoos are kind of like billboards or litter, an abomination. Just more "noise" on the landscape. So what was he thinking? Let's see:

"It's Saturday afternoon, I'm sittin' around bored. I am contemplating my body. Yup. Twenty-something. Perfect health. Pretty intelligent. Nice looking, even really handsome by some people's estimation. So let's see. I was given a muscular, perfectly proportioned body. You might even say I could have been the model that Michelangelo used to fashion his sculpture of David. I have flawless, smooth, naturally hair-free, olive-tinted skin as a blessing from a mixture of good genes from my family and not a butt pimple to be seen. So, let me fuck it all up by putting some man-made nonsense into my skin and subject my self to pain, the possibility of contracting an incurable disease like one or another form of hepatitis or HIV, pay a small fortune for it, make absolutely no contribution to the natural beauty that I already possess and that much of my world is envious of. Let me pick a bunch of crap from a portfolio book like the shit that I see at T-shirt shops. And, for good measure, since I wasn't satisfied with the first mistake I made by permanently marking myself on one arm, let me pick some more shit to put on the other side just to balance things out. Oh, oh, wait, wait..... let me also put a really, really stupid fucking bird design from the "Central American Collection” in the middle of my shoulders or maybe it's a dragon fly.... ahh, who cares, I'm only doing it so my future boyfriend will have something to talk about after the first time we make love. Of course, I will have to tell him some story about how in a dream I was freed from my earthly bonds by a dragonfly, errrr, something ... I'll work up the story later. Now, when someone asks me why I did this I will tell them...... ahh, I 'll work that out later too. OK, now what I have shown everyone how cool my tattoos are, let me see if I can't also fuck up my perfectly formed butt. Or maybe, I'll tattoo a bumblebee on the head of my dick. Yeah, that's it. Well, it's cool, isn't it? Well isn't it? This year? Well isn't it?

Tattoos: A permanent solution to a temporary fad.

2004-10-05T23:28:00.000-04:00

When Life Gives You Shit -- Give Thanks.

As I walked out of the gate at the front of the house, I could smell something funny and unpleasant. There was a brown (dried) substance on the gate and the ground and the driveway. I walked out to my car that was parked directly across the street from my house. It too had something brown, dried and unpleasant smelling all over it. The obvious answer was shit. Perhaps shit mixed with water that had dried, but unequivocally, it stunk. It all cleaned up easily with a garden house and a brush but the thought of the violation troubled me. I don't consider myself to have any real enemies but I am the president of the neighborhood homeowner's association and from time to time have to 'engage' or ignore neighborhood people. Mostly, I get support for the things that I do in this capacity.

I could have gotten pissed. Really pissed. I have been known to get pissed. But remarkably, I didn't get too pissed. It really did stink though. I still can't fully figure out the cause/effect relationship for being a victim of this smelly attack. Instead, I consider myself thankful.

I am thankful that no real damage was done. I am thankful that I am healthy. I am thankful that I have a loving boyfriend. I am thankful that I am not in Iraq. I am thankful that my car wasn't stolen and used for a car bomb. I am thankful that I am not running for President of the United State or even vice president and don't understand why anyone would want to. (I just finished watching the vice-presidential debate).

I am thankful. I am not, however, beyond revenge.

He Knows Matters of Nose Matter

2004-10-02T17:21:00.000-04:00

America is embroiled in such serious matters in the world it is almost joyous to examine a far lighter subject, but, I might add, just as important.

Have you stopped to look at what people in the cars around you are doing when you all pull up to the light waiting for the green? In South Florida, you see a lot of things that you wouldn't see in Omaha, for example. I somehow get the impression that in Omaha, the people are more normal. In South Florida, 8 out of 10 people are mentally disturbed.

As I sat at the light, this is who I saw: Nicholas Nailbiter, Sarah Cellphone, Madeline Mascarra and Evelyn Eyeshadow, Nancy Newspaper, Harold Headbobber (music obviously cranking away as his rearview mirror and license plate were also bobbing) and then...... the notorious ........ Norman Nosepicker. Norman is sitting there with his eyes fixed ahead and the index finger of his right hand buried up to the first knuckle and he is digging, digging, digging for gold. He's not aware that I am watching him although I don't believe it would have dissuaded him from chasing the prize if he had noticed. I can't remember the last time I had a finger up my nose -- perhaps when I was 12. Supposing Norman were to be rewarded with a prize: what would he do with it short of the obvious which is eating it? Do you open the window and flick it? Do you wipe it on some hidden area of your car interior? The disturbing thought of the disposal of the evidence brings us to another related but even more important subject: urinal distractions.

For females who don't enter a restroom expecting a battery of urinals against the wall and the games that men play when they are standing there, this is how it works. You approach the urinal of choice, open your fly, let out your appurtenance, make certain that everything is aimed at porcelain rather than a fold of clothing and then signal your bladder to empty. Once everything is in place and the flow has started, you have at least one free hand and twenty seconds or so where it is doing nothing. Norman, has found a use for it. Here, he has also discovered how to dispose of the prize. It is wiped on the wall. And from the looks of it, Norman either visits the same urinals often or he has cousins because at numerous urinals there are trails of nose snails. I just don't get it. Ten thousand years of civilization, the invention of Kleenex (I also think to carry a handkerchief -- snot rag -- containing dried up nose matter like a prized possession is also disgusting) and we still can't seem to keep the nose matter off the walls.

The Middle Seat

2004-09-28T17:10:00.000-04:00

So, I managed to make it home and make it back in one piece. Saw dad. Saw sis. Saw some friends and missed some others. The weather was spectacular in 'graytown' though. An unusual sunny, warm parallel to a time when South Florida was again being pummeled by Hurricane Jeanne.

And, I got on the plane in time to come home -- it's great to be back.

Now, you known when they talk about being put in purgatory because of getting on the plane, finding yourself in the middle seat next to someone really fat. Well.....

I went through security in 'graytown'. It's even more severe than in S. Florida! I couldn't believe it. You go into a phone booth like contraption where they "squirt" air up -- *poof**poof**poof**poof** -- at you and then something vacuums your 'vapors' out of the phone booth for analysis, I guess. I am not a terrorist. Honest. This, at 7:00 a.m. before you get to unpack everything that you just packed into your briefcase at home a mere half hour before so that they can make sure your carry-on isn't loaded with an Uzi.

I get to the plane and sure enough, I have the center seat right next to a woman near the window whose legs must have each been about as big around as my waist! Very nice but she took up her seat and a quarter of mine. We couldn't put the arm rest down between us! Thank gawd the flight was only 45 minutes to the hub city.

I get a cup of Dunkin Donuts coffee for almost $2 in the concourse and get on the next plane. Middle seat again! No one on the window -- thank my lucky stars. Then, just before they shut the door, here comes my seat buddy for the window seat. Huge cup of coffee and a fruit salad and he's another big guy, just like the guy on the aisle! Oh, christ.

So, there I am, sandwiched between these two big guys. The plane is too hot. I can't get comfortable. My back hurts. I can't get my legs comfortable. I still can't get comfortable and I put up with it for two and a half hours. Finally land. Phew. Pilot comes on. "Because of the thunderstorm that just came through here, they are all backed up at the gate and we are waiting to dock. Should be eight to ten minutes." A half hour later -- seemed like two hours -- we start to move. Get me outta here!!! It's good to be home. I'm never leaving again.

Going Home

2004-09-20T23:29:00.000-04:00

They say you can never go home again. I am sure it is true. Everything is as it was except it has changed. My mother died three years ago and my father is now alone. I talk to him regularly but it is obvious that he is to painfully lonely. He complains about the same stuff, tells me the same stories. His life has been reduced to a routine that I dread should I live to be his age. When I see him, he has visibly aged. When you are in the constant presence of someone, at least on a weekly basis, you don't notice the changes but when you are confronted with the "snapshot" of an annual or semi-annual basis, the changes are dramatic.

My dad is a social person. But it was my mother that made the arrangements; she set up their social calendar. He has a lifetime of stories and is intelligent and well versed but he doesn't put himself into situations that satisfy his need for social interaction. I have recommended he take some classes. "Maybe a computer class," I told him. (He can do email and solitaire. That's his extent of computer knowledge.) On line I found a senior class in his city. "I'll look into that, " he told me. The following week: "Are you doing the computer thing yet?" I ask. "No, I called but....."

Arthritis is staring to bother his knees. He used to walk for exercise regularly. His knees don't stand up too well to the distance he'd like to do and when he forces it, it's a couple of days before they settle down. I suggested aqua aerobics or something. He's still not doing it. Part time job? Still not doing it. Volunteer work. Still not doing it.

I love my dad. I just don't want to become my dad.

Car Talk

2004-09-20T01:21:00.000-04:00

I "communed" with my car today. Sunday afternoon, lazy sort of day, not too oppressively hot, car needed a wash. Got time, maybe it needed a wax too.

So, I worked my ass off last year and had the good fortune to make enough money to get a new car. Actually, it's a pretty nice new car. It reminds me of what a nice new car it is every month when I get to write the check for the privilege of driving it.

So I get out all the stuff to wash it with and go to work. As I wash it, I remind myself that the reason that I got a white car is because it hides the dirt (and it really does -- all the road pah-gah that accumulates, anyway). It doesn't, however, hide the little specks of tree sap, road tar and crap like that which required a lot more elbow grease and considerably more time that I had first imagined.

What really pisses me off, however, is when you got through this routine, you come to realize just how inconsiderate your fellow (wo)man is. Battle scars so far include: an obvious shopping cart gouge boo boo on the right rear bumper where the white plastic was compromised to see the skin beneath, a 1/2 long nick on the top, center of the rear bumper, again, exposing the skin beneath, a two foot long superficial scratch on the top of the hood deck. (This one, fortunately, will probably rub out but why should I have to? How, did it happen? I didn't do it.) Another shopping cart gouge on the front right bumper but not as bad as the one in the rear. A 1-inch long scratch through the paint on the left rear quarter panel. This car is only five months old and I park it where I don't think anyone will park near me! Just pisses me off, I guess.

She sure does look "perty" all gussied up though. Clean cars seem to run better too.

2004-09-15T14:52:00.000-04:00

Imaginary Lovers

Imaginary Lover

2004-09-15T14:34:00.000-04:00

Imaginary lovers
Never turn you down
If all the others turn you away
They're around

It's my private pleasure
With my fantasy
Someone to share my wildest dreams
With me

Imaginary lover,You're mine, anytime,
Imaginary lover,Ooh yeah

When ordinary lovers
Don't feel what you feel
And real-life situations
Lose their thrill
Imagination's unreal

Imaginary lover
Imaginary lover,
You're mine, anytime...

by the Atlanta Rhythm Section

So, I had early appointments, came back home to take care of some book work and to research some stuff. Mind keeps wandering. What's the matter? What to do? What to do? Mind keeps wandering. Click over to some bawdy sites on the WWW. That's the ticket. Feeling mighty woody. The house is silent. No one around. It's all good. Yup. It's all good. No more wandering mind. Yup. Relief's at hand. **RING**RING****RING**RING** (Fucking cell phones!)

2004-09-14T07:36:00.000-04:00

Booger

Peripheral Lives

2004-09-13T20:45:00.000-04:00

We have been host to several cats over our years together. I love dogs too. It's just that cats seemed to find us. They were all strays that came and chose to stay for their different reasons. The last one, Cleo, was more special than the rest for a couple of reasons. First, she managed to live longer than the others by virtue of being younger when she came to stay, I suppose, but she was such an exceptional individual: the most remarkable temperament. She left our company earlier this year to chase mice for eternity in a better place. With her passing, my partner told me that he thought we should go without pets for a while, although I was sure I was seeing her walk by from the corner of my eyes regularly. There would be no more making arrangements for someone to stay in the house while we were gone to take care of her or the others, no more hauling of litter and cat food, no more fur on black pants and no more vet bills. It lasted about three months.

Booger has joined our clan. Untimely orphaned in Tennessee, he was moved to Florida by his previous companion's daughter. While she wasn't fond of the idea of having a cat, she couldn't bear the thought of her mother's companion going to a home she didn't know. Booger is mature, perhaps 6 or 7 with the temperament of a kitten. He chases his tail and his favorite toy is an orange golf ball that he bats around the house. He is a soft, black sable from stem to stern without as much as a pink nose and he is loving and fat and well adjusted. It is such a wonderful, fulfilling feeling, sharing space with one of mother nature's creatures.

Being gay, it makes me sad that it is unlikely that I will ever feel the fulfillment of being a parent to a child. Of course, my partner and I can't procreate and the great state of Florida prohibits gays from adopting kids. If is unlikely that I will move just so that I can have children because it is not a driving force in my life. It is only that I will never be able to shower my love on children and some child will be denied the love of a parent.

2004-09-11T16:54:00.000-04:00

Ivan will also miss us. There is only one reason why. I went to two Home Depots to get plywood to put over the windows. The first one had only 5-ply sanded 5/8" thick plywood at $36 per sheet. Yeah, right. It was what they had. Went into the store. Absolutely NO wood sheet products -- stripped bare (the shelves, not me.) Went to the second Home Depot: they had gotten a truckload of plywood in at 6:00 a.m. full of 1/2 CDX sheeting (what they use to cover the outside of houses when they build them -- perfect). Got in line inside the store, took my receipt and got in line. The whole ordeal took a remarkable short 2 hours. Got the ten sheets home ($160 total) and unloaded it. Checked the National Hurricane Center's updated prediction. It worked. The storm is now tracking farther west and is likely to miss S. Florida entirely only I have 10 sheets of plywood with nowhere to store it. Small problem if you have lived through a hurricane, particularly a Category 5 storm!

2004-09-09T17:06:00.000-04:00

Behold the Anti-christ: Grover Norquist. Even within conservative circles, Norquist's combative personality has made enemies. Conservative columnist Tucker Carlson once called him a "mean-spirited, humorless, dishonest little creep ... the leering, drunken uncle everyone else wishes would stay home."

2004-09-08T18:01:00.000-04:00

No, that is not me. It is simply for illustration. *slurp*

Boxers or Briefs?

2004-09-08T01:05:00.000-04:00

I bought some boxer/briefs. Thought they were briefs -- they looked like briefs in the package. My package looks like its in briefs -- Don't you like the play on words? Anyway, I don't like these damn things. The legs roll up if you put your legs into jeans that are a little too tight.

Boxers, pure boxers let everything swing around which can be fun in itself, particularly if you are used to wearing briefs. A new sensation. I went through a phase where that is all I wore but not much anymore.

Briefs. They key is buy the next largest size so they don't crush your stuff but buy a good brand so your nuts don't fall out around the leg. I hate when that happens. Good brands have elastic aroung the leg. Also, who really uses that labyrinth trap door in the front? Don't you just pull the leg to the side to let him out?

Heads or Tails – And the Bare-able Lightness of Banging

2004-09-07T22:36:00.001-04:00

Prompted by a reading recent log entry by Bingo, I couldn’t help but visit my personal experience of tops and bottoms. I have been ‘married’, more accurately, committed to a wonderful guy a few years younger than me for a number of years.

The short answer is: tops or bottoms, sometimes, you wanna be the train and sometimes you wanna be the tunnel. If you are in a caring relationship, you’ll reach an equilibrium that is right for your relationship. ‘Relationship’ indicates that you ‘relate’ and therefore you work at finding the proper dynamic. That dynamic is also likely to change from time to time.

We were both inexperienced as tops or bottoms when we met and preferred manual and oral encounters numerous times a day for quite a long time after we first met. I personally couldn’t keep my hands (or mouth) off him. Of course, we got to know each other better. It sounds funny now because you do get to know each other better. Much better. Sex, in general just continues to get better as you find what each other likes and perhaps, and far more importantly, doesn’t like. And then, in most relationships, comes the big day: the day when one or both of you will no longer be a virgin.

Now, we tended both to be tops – me perhaps more than him. My partner was more experienced from shear numbers of encounters since he was more liberated and wasn’t going to let social norms stand in the way of him satisfying his libido. By his nature and his fear of HIV, he always kept to oral and manual endeavors except for a few instances that he told me about. One was where he was raped after coming out of a bar, having had a few too many drinks and having been shunning the advances of a psycho in the place. He was hit over the head in a parking lot when he was nineteen and woke up with a splitting headache and his pants around his ankles. I throw this in because I find rape a completely abominable act and it weighed heavily on me the day we finally shared our first act of carnal knowedge.

I, on the other hand, chose a conservative profession and slinked around at the fringe of “respectable society” to find encounters to satisfy my curiosity for what I thought might just be a phase I was going through. Of course, it wasn’t and I was just denying what I knew inside and didn’t know how to come to terms with. I was/am pretty macho and, unfortunately, I think this stands in the way of men becoming intimate with each other. (I am not just speaking about gay men here, either. Men are so fucked up about sharing what they are feeling. Right, wrong or otherwise, men have a real problem communicating anything, verbally, especially, but also non-verbally…duh?!)

So, I won’t forget, several months into our relationship when we woke up on a cold Saturday morning with bright sunshine outside and our warm bodies under the covers inside. He was laying face down with his head away from me and I rolled over and slid my leg over his to hold him. It was just so electric. And we lay there. I was as hard as a rock as I always was and I slid the rest of my body up over his and held him tight. Like a bolt out of the blue, I just wanted to fully engage him, to share with him the elation I was feeling. And there was the ever so slight shifting of his legs apart and my erection resting in the cleavage of his butt. I groped around for some hand lotion that was the only slippery thing within reach from the bed, no doubt left over from a manual session. I pulled the covers down and kneaded his perfectly formed butt. He just happens to have a really smooth, muscular butt with those concaves flanks. Within a few seconds, I was entering new territory and within just a few strokes I was launching into orgasma-land. And then, I apologized. Apologized, you ask? We still laugh about it to this day. Something about not being verbally invited, perhaps, something about my fear of his association with rape. I don’t know why exactly, but I apologized.

My own first time catching (as opposed to pitching), I don’t remember as well, only that it was a new experience that took some getting used to. But from experience I say, if you don’t put yourself in each of these positions, you will be depriving yourself of another of life’s little wonders. Of course, the kind of connection we are talking about here, tends to be quite emotional on a visceral level, it’s best done with someone you trust at least, and care about or love at the other end of the spectrum. And despite that I am what I identify with to be a versatile top, I also went through a period where all I wanted to be was on the receiving end of a long comfortable screw. I think that was a time of considerable emotional distress in a particular job I held….whatever, but honestly, having my lover fully in control with the intense emotional and sensory stimulation was liberating. Nonetheless, sometimes, I still just wanna get fucked.

If you want to try being the tunnel, here are a few tips. If you have time to prepare, make sure you are clean. Invest in an anal syringe for $10 or so. It’s a rubber bulb you can put a few cups of warm water in to rinse out any unwanted company. You can also do disposable enemas but either way: Clean water in, waster water out. Without any surprises waiting in the tunnel, you’ll both have a much better time. Now you’re ready for the train. Chuga chuga chuga chuga choo choo.

A quick primer in anatomy if you have never ventured in; there are three parts you need to know about: Outer and inner sphincter and prostate. The outer sphincter keeps the ocean from rushing in when you go swimming. (Is a frog’s asshole watertight?). The inner sphincter keeps unwanted things from being born at inconvenient times and the prostate is a gland that rests against the forward side of the inner passageway that is a remarkable pleasure center. You need to gently get by number one and two to get to number three. Or course, there are thousand of nerve endings in the area so a gentle caress anywhere with a little lubrication is wonderful, but especially with a some wet lips working the orchestra section (hmmmmm). Fingers are great trainers – three inches or so is all you need. Prostate massage anyone?

After the dress rehearsal, the key is to not piss off your sphincters. First things first: always wear a ‘raincoat’ if you don’t know where your partner has been since he reached puberty. AIDS is real and unprotected sex is how you get it. Don’t push too hard and don’t rush – if your partner is in too much of a hurry, maybe today is not the day. The idea here is pleasure. Pain is caused by muscle spasms of one of the sphincters. Can you say lube? After it’s in, relax a few seconds, get a stroke or two then pull it out and use more lube. It’ll go in easy the second time.

Best entry position for lining everything up at the right angle is catcher on his side with lower leg slightly forward of his body and upper knee in front of lower knee and pitcher on his side behind like you were ‘spooning’. This leaves your upper hand free to guide in the rocket and to control rear-entry and later, to reach behind and pull his butt up closer to you. It also leaves your lower hand free to rub your chub if your partner is distracted from your new adventure. Once your sphincters are cooperating, you can try other positions. They all have their advantages and disadvantages.

Happy fucking. [Man, that sounds raw!]

I was blown by frances, but not in a good way...

2004-09-06T18:43:00.000-04:00

feet? are you still here??? *yup*
fingers? are you still here??? *yup*
head? are you still here??? *yup*
frances the hurricane ripped through here for the last two days and i'm still here!

every place where you might choose to live has its cross to bear. if you live in the northeast, as i used to, you get blizzard and ice storms and freezing cold and gray skies for days. if you live in the far west, you get earthquakes, the southwest, blazing sun and heat. if you live in florida, as i do now, you are faced with oppressively hot, humid summers and hurricanes with an occasional thunderstorm with a tornado thrown in just for a little excitement.

for those of you that didn't already know, hurricane frances just came through. fortunately (for us) it was north of here. yes, we did get a lot of wind and a number of trees were knocked over in the neighborhood but we escaped without a scrape. we lost power for a couple of hours. some of my friends still don't have power. saturday, the peak times, everthing was closed and i mean everything. supermarkets, gas stations (may of which were out of gas already as the masses clawed and scratched for the last gallon) restaurants. the obvious thing is the inconvenience but what is not so obvious is how long can you stay insides and watch nonstop coverage of the storms that is surrounding you while you look at your boyfriend. now, there are a few things you can do with your boyfriend when there isn't anything else to do except everyone that had to evacuate nearer to the coast (we live about three miles as the crow flies) is sitting there with you.

now we are waiting for ivan. he's approaching cuba. we'll know more as the weekend approaches.

An Unbelievable Pedestrian/Automobile Crash

2004-09-03T19:17:00.000-04:00

If my mindless meandering of the web, I ran across the most incredible captures of a vehicle accident. A 75-year old woman runs a red light and broadsides a car that in turn rolls over a pedestrian on an adjacent crosswalk to the intersection. This happened in Dayton, OH, in May of this year and was captured by a police camera at the intersection monitoring red light "runners". Read about it and see it. The drivers escaped with minor injuries and remarkably, despite the pedestrian being pronounced dead, he spontaneously revived in the ambulance. Incredible. http://snopes.com/photos/accident/carcrash01.asp

Walmart Wines

2004-09-03T18:53:00.000-04:00

BENTONVILLE, ARK (AP) -- Some Wal-Mart customers soon will be able to sample a new discount item: Wal-Mart's own brand of wine. The world's largest retail chain is teaming up with J Gallo Winery of Modesto, California, to produce the spirits at an affordable price, in the $2-5 range. While wine connoisseurs may not be inclined to throw a bottle of Wal-Mart brand wine into their shopping carts, there is a market for cheap wine, said Kathy Micken, professor of marketing at Roger Williams University in Bristol, R.I. She said: "The right name is important. "So, here we go:

The top 12 suggested names for Wal-Mart Wine:

12. Chateau Traileur Parc
11. White Trashfindel
10. Big Red Gulp
9. Grape Expectations
8. Domaine Wal-Mart "Merde du Pays"
7. NASCARbernet
6. Chef Boyardeaux
5. Peanut Noir
4. Chateau des Moines
3. I Can't Believe It's Not Vinegar!
2. World Championship Riesling

And the number 1 name for Wal-Mart Wine .
1. Nasti Spumante

The beauty of Wal-Mart wine is that it can be served with both white meat (Possum) and red meat (Squirrel).

OK, so this was fairly stolen off the internet but I got laughing so hard that I couldn't help myself. A fly on the wall would have thought I was utterly mad. But, what else do I have to amuse myself now that the Republican National Convention is over?

2004-09-01T20:31:00.000-04:00

Frances

2004-09-01T20:17:00.000-04:00

Frances -- She's On Her Way.

2004-09-01T19:22:00.000-04:00

We're talking hurricane here. I live in S. Florida and if you live here you must someday expect the worst to happen.

I moved here two years after Hurricane Andrew and they were still talking about it. It was the first hurricane of the season. It was a small, dry (relatively speaking - most hurricanes bring a huge amount of driving rain) very violent hurricane and crossed the Virgin Islands in the Caribbean bringing death and destruction over one thousand miles away before making landfall in Homestead, a small city about 30-some miles south of downtown Miami. It blazed through the avocado and orange groves, leveling them and moved through a community called Country Walk where the houses were of substandard construction. The steady wind speed was around 140 mph. It flattened it. As far away as 50 miles, it knocked trees over and loosened roof tiles and brought advertising signs and gas station overhead shelter structures crashing down. When I first moved here, the damage where the eye had come through and visited for only minutes or hours was still evident. It's no wonder that the people who lived through it here, have not easily forgotten it.

Now, Frances, this pissed off tropical bitch is headed this way. Like Andrew, she is very violent with steady winds of 140 mph with 150 mph gusts! And, she is much larger. It's funny that earlier in the season, we had had a milder than normal spring. Winter lasts a couple of weeks sometime in the January/February time frame with nights sometimes into the 40s but the highs in the 60s. By April, the a/c is on all the time. Not this year. It was remarked by many that the weather pattern was just like the year that Andrew came to call.

I am fearless; perhaps even foolish when things like this happen. Projections as the storm gets closer is that the most likely path is many miles from here. We will probably get some wind (40-50 mph) and maybe a little rain. I went to the supermarket. All the bottled water was gone. The canned goods isle had been plundered. Batteries--ha. I just needed milk and bread. Today I stopped in at the local Home Depot. They had pallets of batteries on the isles right behind the checkouts along with flashlights. The place was a madhouse with people moving carts full of plywood. Tomorrow, Broward County (Ft. Lauderdale/Hollywood) is shutting down through the weekend: Thurs., Fri, Sat., Sun. No school. No county services. I don't get it. The storm is headed north.

Only one thing to do for the long weekend: have a hurricane party and pick some names for next year's storms. (Who picks these stupid name, anyway?)

Sorry - Another Phone Theme. Answering/VM Machine Messages

2004-09-01T13:03:00.000-04:00

Have you noticed that the entire world has the same answering machine / voicemail message? I will bet that if you call 10 phone numbers where you don’t get a human being, you will get the following message:

Please fill in the blank:

1. “Hello.” [translation: hello.]

2. “This is (fill in the blank) ___________________________.”
a. insert (John, Joan, Jean, Jane, Joe)
· translation: [“I won’t give you my full name because you might be a stalker or someone that has dialed the wrong number in which case I don’t want you to know who I am.]
b. insert residence name here
· translation: [“I am a retro person that really does usually answer the phone instead of screening calls. I am proud of my last name and will gladly give it to you since I believe you are as upstanding as I am.]
c. insert phone number
· translation: [“I usually screen my calls. This is to make sure if you are a wrong number that you won’t call it back. Besides, my mother told me never to leave my name on an answering machine.)

3. (Optional) “Sorry I/we missed your call.” Translation: [not really but if I flatter you it will make you think more of me.]

4. “We__________________________ “
a. can’t come to the phone right now [translation: can’t = won’t]
b. are away from my desk
c. are not home [translation: are, but wont' answer]
d. are on another line
e. are on-line

5. (Optional) “Your call is very important to me/us.” Translation: [not really but if I flatter you it will make you think more of me.]

6. (Optional) “I will be away on (vacation/business/other) until _________”

7. (Optional) “If you need immediate assistance ________________.”
a. dial “zero” (or some other digit).
b. My (secretary, assistant, partner) can be reached at 555-1212 (or extension x123).
c. Call my cell.

8. Please leave a (brief/detailed) message along with your name, (company), and phone number and/or nature of your call and (optional: time of your call).

9. “I/we/someone” will be call you back as soon as possible.” [translation: “Ho, hum. Ok, I you are going to buy something, I will call you. If I owe something to you, I will call when I have something to tell/give you.]

Today's Phone Etiquette Pet Peeves

2004-08-28T08:10:00.000-04:00

"....final straights the composition of the faceless nation." Translation: "....demonstrates the condition on 'Face the Nation'. I hate when people don't speak into the mouthpiece on their phones. It's like they don't care enough about the person they are talking to let them hear or care enough about themselves and what they have to say. Their voice trails off, the mouthpiece picks up sound surrounding them, particularly if they are in a place with a loud background and when you can't hear them (maybe because you are in a place with a loud background) and have to ask them a second time (or maybe a third if what they are saying is obscure and you can't "logic" it together), you feel like you might be going deaf and they might be getting pissed off because they think you are stupid.
Let me guess what you are having for lunch. I love all the "ymm...unnm....mbbbhhhnn" sounds. If it isn't a good time, tell me so and call me back. Or, if you are the one who called me, that's even worse. So, was it peanut butter and jelly or pasta in a nice marinara?
Ok, I was stupid enough to pay the $9.00 so see "Open Water". Please, let me see it in peace. I don't think "When the Saints Come Marching In" was part of the soundtrack for the film. Turn OFF your phone. There is nothing in the world, so important that you have to take a call during this precise seventy-nine minutes. If there is, you shouldn't have come to see a movie. Not only did you answer the call, you had to check your caller ID while the phone played the refrain to see if it warranted your attention.
Yes there is another person on the other end of the line and even if you hang up the phone, the other person doesn't go away, they just get pissed, get in their car, drive across town and get in your face. Hard to hang up when they're standing on your feet. (I really didn't drive across town, but I was angry enough to.) No one likes confrontation unless they're sadistic or masochistic. Deal with it -- you'll be a better person for it, I promise.
I live with phones in my ears and will likely die of microwave-induced brain cancer from low level exposure over many years. I carry two cell phones (for reasons I'll talk about some other time) and you can get a hold of me at just about anytime of the day, however, there are personal times like early in the morning and late at night. Give it a rest unless Josh Hartnett, Matt Damon, Jake Gyllenhaal, Orlando Bloom, Jude Law and Brad Pitt arrived at your doorstep nude and they wouldn't leave unless you 'service' them all and you didn't believe you were up to the task. I'll come over and help.
" 'scuseme. Can you hold on a second while I get this other call? -- I'll be right back to you." Call waiting is such a wonderful features when you have been trying to get a hold of George W all day and he's been busy and is just getting back to you so you can give him a few pointers on his Iraq policy. However, one hour, 35 minues and sixteen seconds later, I've got to hang up. The wait time for that call just thrust me into the overage part of my cellular plan and the amount I owe the cellular company now equals the gross national product of Elbonia. How quickly we forget our friends when George W calls (puke, puke.)
*ringgggg* "Hello?" "Is Glady there?" "No, sorry. There's no Gladys here." "Is this 555-1212?" "Yes but there's no Gladys here." *click* ........................ *ring* "Hello?" *click* .................... *ring* "Hello?" *click*......... Gladys' caller is the rocket scientist that designed the heat shield for Challenger.

Thanks you doctor. I feel so much better now. I think I'm up to pulling the wings off a fly now.

Try This Quiz

2004-08-26T22:36:00.000-04:00

http://hokev.brinkster.net/quiz/default.asp?quiz=Better+Relationship&page=1

My results:

20 Questions to a Better Relationship

eXpressive: 10/10Practical: 8/10Physical: 5/10Giver: 4/10
You are a XPIT--Expressive Practical Intellectual Taker. This makes you a Manager.You are cool, thoughtful and intelligent. Your approach and your sense of humor are under-the-radar, your charm is undeniable. You keep everything under control. You have distinctive vocal mannerisms. You may not have much interest in approaching strangers, but when you do, you are successful. You will probably end up with someone beautiful, fascinating and off-balance. While your partner may steal the limelight, it's you that keeps things running smoothly and provides stability in your relationship. If you are with someone as contemplative and hard-headed as you, you can have a tough time. Your greatest asset is that you tackle conflict as it rises -- you don't ignore it and let it brew. If you have a partner that *does* let it brew, it will make you crazy! You can find yourself fighting for two -- trying to anticipate your partner's needs and draw their feelings out -- which is exhausting and, well, not your job. You would never cheat. You would make an excellent spouse. When your spouse's friends met you, they would think, "Crap, why couldn't I get that one?"Of the 9905 people who have taken this quiz, 5.3 % are this type.

Diagnosis not quite right? Now that you've taken the quiz, you can view the Relationship key. If you have any attributes that are on the cusp, check out the Relationship that complements that attribute (in other words, if you're an XPIT but only 6/10 Practical, take a look at XSIT.)But beware -- the Taker/Giver attribute is very strong in defining a Relationship type! A RPYT is very different from an RPYG! Write down what Relationship composite this quiz has given you, because viewing the key will erase your score.
XY
Sexy
IT
In control/can be controlling
XG
Good parent
RG
Good-natured/even keel
XP
Good at resolving conflict
RT
Trouble communicating
XSI
Honest to a fault
SG
People-pleaserView Relationship Key

2004-08-26T07:44:00.000-04:00

Great Political Cartoon #3 From Newsweek

2004-08-26T07:42:00.001-04:00

Great Policial Cartoon #1 From Newsweek

2004-08-26T07:42:00.000-04:00

Great Polical Cartoon #2 From Newsweek

A Hundred Things I Probably Wouldn't Tell You If You Knew Me.

2004-08-25T23:55:00.000-04:00

1. I iron almost everything.. It I can’t ‘rub it’ to get the wrinkles out, I iron it..
2. I’m a good swimmer but I seldom swim for any distance.
3. I am a great water skier but I haven’t done it in a number of years now.
4. I had a magical childhood and I remember in great detail so much of it.
5. I am punctual. If I say 3:00, that’s when I’m there (within a minute or two) but I’m seldom early because:
6. I hate waiting for things, people and events.
7. I used to smoke (for year) but I quit – thank god.
8. I have nurtured and am living in a long-term relationship with another man who I love and he loves me. Who says there is no ‘Camelot’? (Well its not that perfect).
9. My partner smokes. It pisses me off. He knows it. He says he can’t quit. He can.
10. I love giving head more than getting it.
11. I am very good at giving head because I love giving it.
12. I am addicted to computers and the Internet but I used to be more technically proficient than I am now, I think..
13. I suffer terribly from Seasonal Affective Disorder. (When I lived in the north, I installed over 1000 watts of lights in the bathrooms and the kitchen to help counteract it.)
14. I moved to South Florida and it went away. Now I can be depressed simply on its own without the influence of S.A.D.
15. I detest body odor when it’s left over from another day.
16. Fast cars get my heart pumping – yippee.
17. I drive too fast but I don’t get tickets. (I don’t know why but I thank gawd.)
18. When I was a kid, I was so badly mocked by a neighborhood bully for such a long time that I never developed the skills for team sports despite the fact that I have great hand-eye coordination and strength. To this day I won’t play baseball, football, basketball or soccer.
19. I’m good at individual sports like paddleball, tennis, water skiing and I like to bicycle and kayak but I don’t do enough of any.
20. I have a temper and sometimes little things set me off.
21. I get angry at inanimate objects and “personify them”.
22. I can curl my tongue and I can also fold it over plus it is very long – ooo-la-la.
23. Giving or receiving, I usually prefer slow, sensuous and steady to fast and furious.
24. I plan pretty well because I hate having to do things twice (or more).
25. I can size most people up in less than ten minutes of interaction with them and know what type of people they are and be dead right 98% of the time.
26. I have an IQ above 140 but it might be lower now since I burned so many brains cells in my “here-try-this” days.
27. My partner and I have never had such an argument that we remained mad enough not to communicate by the time the day came to an end. We simply don’t fight.
28. I know how to and physically can build a house from the basement to the roof.
29. I’m a great cook. At least I think so. Not fancy but generally pretty tasty. (I can also sew. I know, I know…I’ll make a great wife someday. That day is here, honey.)
30. I make an outstanding cheesecake.
31. I hate subwoofers in cars (or anywhere else except movie theatres).
32. I hate rude people. I make a point of putting rude people squarely in their place.
33. I have memorized poems in French and whole passages of plays and dialogue in movies.
34. I am loyal –absolutely true blue – to people that I consider my friends. They are few and carefully chosen.
35. I love a bargain. I’ll buy something that I don’t need simply because it is a bargain.
36. I wash my hands at least seven times a day. The first thing I do when I get home is go to a sink and wash my hands.
37. I love cats. I have one now: Booger. I have had as many as four at the same time – all strays who came to stay. Cleo, the oldest one, and my favorite of all time, died, this year.
38. I love dogs but they are a lot of work. I had a German Shepard, Damien.
39. No event in my life has so affected me (good and bad) as the death of my mother three years ago. I don’t think I have come to terms with it yet.
40. Give me heat (yeah, so it’s uncomfortable) don’t give me cold (it hurts).
41. I am scared to death of becoming blind. There’s no immediate likelihood of it – I just can’t imagine it.
42. Mostly, I shit once a day in the morning. Wham, bam, thank you ma’am and I’m done. Then, I shower. If in the unlikely event of a midday shit, I can’t stand a dirty butt hole and have to wash.
43. Movies are great. Especially, I like, dramas and comedies, but any good movie with a decent plot or excellent character development will do.
44. I still have my wisdom teeth. They came in straight but almost all my teeth have fillings in them despite brushing a lot when I was young. I also still have my tonsils.
45. I hate when people have tattoos. I just don’t get it. You see some hot guy and he somehow had to f**k up a naturally beautiful pristine body with a contrived piece of shit kind of like putting chrome mags on a Mercedes. Understatement dear, understatement. If you have a really ugly body and you want to draw attention away from your shortcomings, then, maybe. Even worse on women. Puke, puke.
46. My older sister is my only sibling. I wanted a brother when I was younger but my sister and I have grown quite close over the years. It didn’t used to be that way.
47. Religion has been bad to me indirectly. I don’t believe in it and I have no tolerance for bible thumpers – to each his own but stay out of my way.
48. My first true love was a boy in high school. It was different than the love that I feel for my partner now. Not better, just different.
49. I knew I was different by age 6. I knew I was gay by age 11.
50. My first gay experience to climax was at 23. I came out two years later.
51. I love good ice cream.
52. I am about 5’10” and I once weighed 208 lbs. I now weigh about 170 and will never weigh 208 lbs again.
53. I think my sister is smarter than me but she doesn’t have an ounce of common sense much of the time.
54. I once maintained a heterosexual relationship for four years. Denial, denial. You can be as straight acting as you want but if you’re gay, you’re gay.
55. I need to exercise more but I have a well-proportioned, smooth, muscular body.
56. I want a flat panel 21-inch computer monitor but am unwilling to part with $1000 to buy it.
57. I graduated from high school in the top 10% of my class and was in NHS.
58. I graduated from college in mechanical engineering with honors and don’t use the degree anymore.
59. I love naked men of all shapes and sizes. Prefer smooth as opposed to hairy.
60. I love penises of all shapes and sizes. Prefer circumcised.
61. I collect pornographic images from the Internet and have many thousand of them. While I look at some of them sometimes, I have no idea what I’ll do with any of them so I don’t know why I collect them.
62. I have been taking a multi-vitamin every morning since I was a little kid.
63. I am circumcised.
64. I’ve been to England and Ireland twice.
65. I’ve never been to mainland Europe.
66. I am virtually incapable of lying and can’t stand people who do. Fibs are different.
67. I am generally very organized but I hate to organize. (Talk about conflict!)
68. I want badly to go on a Mediterranean Cruise.
69. I snore.
70. I could wear a starched white shirt every day of my life – with jeans, with shorts, with dress slack. They are so clean looking.
71. I don’t mind getting dirty at all but I really like getting clean when I’m done.
72. I took flying lessons but never got my pilot’s license.
73. I have worked for two Fortune 500 companies.
74. I have wished I had trained to become a doctor or a dentist.
75. It bothers me when people don’t use proper grammar when they speak.
76. I hate when people use “to” for “too” or “your” for “you’re” when they write.
77. I have a six-inch scar on the front of my left leg from a chainsaw accident.
78. I wish I could relive some of my memories with some minor changes – no real regrets though.
79. I’ve owned two boats – one small, one much bigger.
80. I can sail a sailboat.
81. I have owned nine cars. – three German, one Jap and the rest American – and one motorcycle.
82. I wish I could make enough money at something that I didn’t have to ever worry about making enough money at something.
83. I can’t stand George W. He is such a simpleton in such a complex world. He makes me want to puke. Move aside, dipshit.
84. I consider myself an independent but I find that I usually vote Democrat.
85. I hate the influence of hip-hop on fashion. I hate: baggy clothes, waists below asses unless they plan to drop all their laundry and show us their booty, sneakers that aren’t sneakers, do-rag-bandana-head-shit, stupid necklaces and on and on and on.
86. I own three pistols, a concealed weapons permit for them, a shotgun and a rifle and haven’t fired any of them in years and have never carried a weapon concealed to speak of.
87. I don’t kill animals except maybe bugs.
88. When I was a kid I was a crack shot at skeet – where you shoot clay “pigeons.”
89. My favorite colors are blue, red and black pretty much in that order.
90. At my home in the northeast, I used to have hay fever but I don’t in the southeast where I live now.
91. I love plants, gardening and growing things – and the natural world in general.
92. Bugs fascinate me. Don’t like mosquitoes because they are sneaky and carry disease, flies because they are brazen and annoying, ants because they are invasive and roaches because they move way too fast, they hang out in dirty places and they skeeve me but they all still fascinate me.
93. I can see well in bright light without sunglasses and in the dark with no real problem.
94. I naturally get up before 7:00 a.m. every morning. Every once in awhile, on weekends, I sleep until 8 or so.
95. I need only 4-6 hours of sleep a night to function properly.
96. I write, throw a ball and ususally beat off left-handed. Virtually everything else I do, I do right-handed. Go figure.
97. I have taken French, Spanish and German at different times in my life but while I can learn most things very quickly, I have trouble with languages, not because of my inability to memorize the words but that I have a good English vocabulary and become frustrated that I can’t select the proper word to express the intimate detail rather than expressing the idea.
98. Despite having taken calculus, I couldn’t differentiate or integrate my way out of a paper bag mostly because I hated having to take it and therefore, I think, subconsciously chose to forget it.
99. I have never broken a bone in my body requiring a cast and I have never spent a night in a hospital.
100. I can keep a secret.

2004-08-24T20:06:00.000-04:00

World of the Weird - Twighlight Zone
Damn.... "no dry humping."

World of the Weird

2004-08-24T19:45:00.000-04:00

I love newsweek. I don't read many books unless I have a specific purpose. I read a novel or two a year. But, I read a lot and one of my favorites is Newsweek. It helps me keep pace with what is going on in the world. Human touch is a wonderful thing. Holding someone you love for comfort, for support, as a prelude to other things is a wonderful thing. Holding someone in flannel pj's that you don't know is very strange indeed. Why don't these people go to the straight-sanitized-baths?

2004-08-23T13:16:00.000-04:00

My New Buddy

Coffee Makers -- Who Woulda Thought?

2004-08-23T13:02:00.000-04:00

I can be made very happy with very simple things. I am elated. I got myself a brand spanking new coffeemaker over the weekend and I couldn't be happier. Now, coffeemakers aren't the things that legends are generally made of but there is nothing like a good cup of joe. I didn't have to have a designer name on it. Mr. Coffee is what it is. Wow. So, for $29.99 plus tax at my local warehouse club, I bought this thing. What is entirely wonderful about it is that it has some features that I will probably never use (like setting it up the night before to brew) but what it does have are several very neat features: 1) you can adjust the burner temperature (I love you) 2) it beeps four times when the coffee is finished brewing 3) the clock automatically keeps track of how long the coffee has been on the burner from the end of the brew cycle 4) after two hours, it shut the thing down 4) if allows you to set it for a normal brew or a strong brew--which I prefer. I can't stand coffee that has sat on a burner for more than 15 minutes. I throw it out and start over because it gets scorched and that is generally that most coffeemakers keep the coffee far too hot. So over the last few years, I have amassed a set of thermal mugs. I make the coffee, make sure I get there before it gets nasty and put it in a cup so I can comfortably walk around bumping into things with tasty fresh coffee until the caffeine kicks in. Anyway, now I have my own personal Starbucks right at home. Grind the beans, perk away and I've got a fine cup of java.

Adam Stops By

2004-08-22T14:51:00.000-04:00

So my crush, Adam calls me first thing in the morning. He missed my call Friday evening. I told him we needed to talk business. Does he have a few minutes this weekend? He says, "What are you doing right now?" "Nothing. Where do you want to meet?" Adam comes over. We have a little business to transact -- he has some questions that need my expertise, I need to look at the desire of my idolatry. It's an even trade I guess. We sit in the living room. He sits on one couch. I sit on the other one perpendicular to the first. He's headed to the gym after this. He's wearing basketball shorts and a baggy shirt and a sweatband. The sweatband looks stupid -- I wish he'd take it off. The basketball shorts and baggy shirt hide all the features of a beautifully shaped torso and ass along with what I image can only be jewels (family or otherwise) to adorn this sculpture. I wish he'd take them off. We talk about business. We go through the list and examine everything objectively. We complete business. He leans back on the couch with his ass near the edge of the cushion, his legs spread. "So, what else has been happenin'?" he asks. I'd like to reach over and slip those shorts down over his knees and give him something to talk about but I don't. We have small talk for the next few minutes while all I can think about is giving him a slow, wet, warm blowjob. He leaves. I am left with blue balls -- well, not really blue, maybe....Aqua.

2004-08-20T02:50:00.000-04:00

In her 20's - Sassy Babe.

Tribute to Mom – December 2, 2001

2004-08-20T02:33:00.000-04:00

This was the experiences shared with those who had come to pay final respects by my sister and I at my mother's memorial three years ago. I've just doing some soul searching and thought I would share. The names have been changed to protect the innocent.

Sis: Activist, free spirit, teacher, poet, counselor, cheerleader, beauty queen… Sue Stapleton played all her roles with commitment and compassion. There was truly no role, however, to which she devoted herself with more passion than that of motherhood. My brother and I are uniquely qualified to paint a picture of this ’role’ in her life, which, in all its complexity and paradox, so truly integrated and expressed all the parts of who she was. Our mother whose avowed liberal beliefs shocked the other parents in the neighborhood, required her own offspring to answer all adults with “yes, ma’am” and “no, sir”. (Although I know I cheated when outside her earshot and I suspect my brother did too.) The woman who, dressed in pedal-pushers and Keds, squired all the neighborhood children around in one of many named station wagons that passed through our lives – my brother can be seen in this classic “fifties” photo leaning out of the window of the “Galloping Ghost”. She also often left the house wearing her white gloves and hat leaving a trail of Chanel No. 5 in her wake. These accoutrements to her “formal” life were stored on top of a cylindrical lamp in the front hall, the gloves neatly folded on top of the white hat.

Both my brother and I recall a “traumatic’ childhood incident when our kitten, Sheba, having eaten a piece of string, was frantically scooting around the floor in an attempt to relieve herself of it. Ct and I were both convinced the cat was in mortal danger and our baby sitter was prevailed upon to reach my mother where she was attending a meeting at church. Mom to the rescue! She hurried home and without removing her white gloves, gently scooped up the kitten in one hand and pulled the offending string from the kitten’s bottom.

CT: I knew from an early age that my mother was different than other mothers. I learned years later that my mother's reaction to my infant sister's comment at bath time: "Please give me the goddam soap," was, "We don't have that kind. We only have Camay." She decided that with her second child, me, there would be no baby sitters with bad habits taking care or her children while she worked; so she stopped working. At least, she stopped working for pay and instead focused her powerful sights on other worthwhile causes.

As a child, I went everywhere with my mother. We were on the move together. My recollections are from the many trips and excitement that was generated by my mother's enthusiasm for the causes she pursued. I remember how strongly she felt about a stop sign that needed to be placed on Shelton Road to facilitate the safe crossing of children and how she and Bud Stephanie, another parent and owner of a local Texaco station dogged the municipality through the PTA, of which she was an active member, until it was placed, even though neither my sister nor I had to cross Shelton Road. I remember how she organized and spearheaded a drive to bring to Graytown a local chapter of the national Camp Fire Girls and my disappointment at the age of three or four of only being allowed to be an “honorary member”. I especially remember the regular trips to the office building in downtown Graytown that I personally looked forward to because the elevator operator let me ride up and down with him while Mom attended business and sometimes even let me run it when no one was around to see. I remember that several years later, she hosted a den of cub scouts. After all, equal time for me was only fair. The trips to take collected used newspaper to Sandford’s on Port Ave. and deposit bottles to the grocery store to raise money for the scouts probably didn't even pay for the gas but the lesson was clear: have a goal and work toward its accomplishment. And I remember her concern that the Unitarian Church was to be torn down to make way for some city project and the many trips we made, mother with son in tow, to the Chatsworth house, where the church rented space before the building in which we stand was erected. And I remember the trips to the Graytown Museum and Science Center on Saturday mornings. Mom taught Indian Lore. You can bet I knew all about the five tribes of the Iroquois Nation: "C-O-O-M-S, cooms," she said. "Canandaigua, Onondaga, Oneida, Mohawk and Seneca." I instead, chose to attend Snake Spotters that Mrs. Wilson offered and brought snakes with her on the bus. Mom didn't like creatures without legs.

After I was safely through several years of elementary school Mom went back to work at Washington High School. The backyard of our suburban home became the photographic backdrop for weddings, graduations and football team celebrations because to my mother's city oriented students, we lived in the country. My mother was a mom to many hundreds of kids over the years and yet, I never felt like there was not enough time nor love for me.

Sis: Just as our station wagons were always full of Campfire Girls, Indian Guides, Cub Scouts, and various neighborhood children, so were the two houses in which we grew up. Houses were for living. My mother’s attitude toward housework, which I have inherited, was “pick up a pile of books and papers or move an animal if you have to and have a seat”. The top of the dining room table was for projects, underneath was a fort. (We also had a totem pole and a ten-foot teepee in our backyard, but that’s a story about my father.) As you might imagine, our childhoods were full of literature and one of my mother’s favorite stories was Phyllis McGinley’s version of LaBefana, an Italian tale about a grandmother who is invited by the three Wiseman to bring gifts to the Christ child. LaBefana is too busy with her housework to accept the invitation and spends eternity wandering with her gifts. Our mother never allowed housework to interfere with the important things in life such as having fun. She could usually be convinced to participate in harmless mischief. One of our favorite memories it that of convincing mom to take us out for what we thought were thrilling rides on the winding roads of Windward Park in my father’s precious (and off-limits) Triumph sports car without him knowing it. We would sing “The Little Old Lady from Pasadena, the refrain of which was, “Go, Granny, go,” --she was all of 39 at the time -- as she negotiated the curves. One evening we returned from such an adventure to find my father standing on the front porch scowling. Mom whipped into one end of the circular drive and out the other, waving as she sped by, leaving my father slack-jawed and she and her children squealing with laughter.

CT: The joy she brought to every life she touched was immeasurable. Where many people stop at thinking about making offerings of things or of themselves, my mother’s giving began. Her generosity was legendary – which I say not just because she was my mother but because I have never known nor do I ever expect to meet anyone with the same giving temperament. Of course her family came first but on so many occasions, I watched her provide clothing, school supplies, emotional support, counseling, protection against abusive parents, etiquette training, books, toys, food and any number of other material or emotional items to her students, her friends, her acquaintances, my friends or those of my sister, and even friends of our friends once removed. She intuitively seemed to know what was needed and where a dollar was best spent to make the biggest bang for the buck and she never hesitated to spend it. She focused her resources wherever she saw a need and fixed problems, relieved pain and brought joy. Even in her last year with her health in decline, she conducted a telephone and letter writing campaign to local representatives to assist the honor student child of a local family that emigrated to the U.S. in obtaining a visa status and papers that would allow him to enroll in college. There was no gift too small or too large.

Sis: It would take many hours to recount all the ways in which our mother shared her joy in life. She practiced “random acts of kindness” and “pay it forward” all her life never thinking to commercialize her practices. It isn’t easy being the child of a saint and I also remember by brother and I rolling our eyes at each other as yet another stranger or scheme became a presence in our household or we were convinced that some possession was needed more elsewhere. Her committed belief in the inherent goodness of people and her example of putting belief into action were a gift that far outweighed any glitch in what we realize was an extraordinarily magical childhood.

CT: My mother’s generosity is well known. But aside from the joy that she got by giving, her generosity was a natural extension of another one of her loves: shopping. For the ten years after moving back to Graytown until the time that I moved to my current home in Miami, I don't think I ever bought laundry detergent or any number of other household products nor did my sister “suffer” for cat litter. So finely tuned was her ability to combine her "two for one" store coupon with her "$1.50 off" plopped on top of the manufacturer's rebate that by the time she left the store with the product, the store was paying her to take their inventory.

She truly relished in finding the "good" coupons whether in the Sunday circulars or in various home magazines. While her expertise in shopping was not limited simply to supermarket stuff, I believe that she derived the most amount of satisfaction from it. Even after her mobility was impaired by pain in her legs, she found that the cart was a natural way to continue the sport. It wasn't until the last few years that I realized what true satisfaction she derived from putting the pieces of the puzzle together. It was the hunt that excited. When she was more limited in mobility, she would send my father off on missions with pictures from the circulars attached to a page with notes on quantity and -- coupon or not -- to assure herself he would get the right product. On his return, she would check the receipt to make sure that store had lived up to the bargain. I admit it rubbed off on me. For a while, I would compare my savings with hers. Of course, there was NO comparison. She beat me hands down every time and I gave up on competing.

Mom loved a bargain.

For such a forward thinking woman, technology confounded her. When her older Buick had outlived its reliability, she specifically went out and bought another one identical to the first in all respects except for the color and she had no thought of parting with that car. She couldn’t be bothered with learning the gadgets or the gimmicks of another vehicle. Technology was all Greek to her and literally, she would have preferred it to be Latin for literature if she were to learn anything at all.

I on the other hand, having studied mechanical engineering in college and having worked for several car and engine companies after graduation, took great pleasure in having mom explain to me the mechanics of everyday products. On one occasion, she told me in great detail, with a straight face and without skipping a beat, how an internal combustion engine worked. The tale was grand and filled with contrived and mythical parts, my mother being a far more accomplished wordsmith than a blacksmith. It became a standing joke and actually got transposed to other situations, particularly when she had strayed well beyond her vast knowledge of so many subjects, that I would catch her and say, “Mom, tell me how an engine works,” which would invariably turn to laughter when she knew I had caught on.

Despite her love of shopping however, she never would allow herself to use an electric scooter shopping cart. She said she didn’t want to draw attention to herself. What do you think? I think it was because the dashboard didn’t look like her Buick.

Sis: Mom was a collector of all good things. One would have to debate the merits of the word “good” in this instance, however. From the legacy left by our ancestors, archeologists have painted the picture of years of living and what life was like so many years ago by uncovering relics of past ages. So it is with my mother. In reviewing the artifacts of many years of collecting, we have patched together the wonderfully rich picture of my mom’s life. We are fortunate today to have a collection of representative photographs. Beyond these however, always an avid reader, there were always numerous volumes of books supporting any one of a number of current interests, among them poetry, of course, art and orchids. No literary home would be complete without hundreds and hundreds of newspaper clippings on any subject imaginable from the mind’s eye of a contemporary woman over a span of a life time. There are bolts of fabric from a period of quilting, ungiven gifts (a vestige of shopping) waiting to be bestowed on some deserving soul, and unworked crossword puzzles – another joy for another time. The collecting, however, was never criticized when one needed something in a real hurry. “Mom, I need a birthday card for …………” “Mom, I need a cardboard tube to protect this poster.” “Mom, do you have some masculine wrapping paper?” “Mom do you have……?” Of course she did! Mom asked me when I was in the early years of elementary school what I was good at, hoping to elicit a response of reading or writing. I answered, “I’m a good ‘bringer’,” because no matter what I needed to bring with me to school to help the common cause, Mom made it appear.

CT: I returned to Graytown to attend college and lived with my parents in my last years of college, having collected a dog, Damien, and a piano (Beethoven in the making?) along the way. Upon my college graduation, and knowing that I had accepted my first job out of town, my mother melded the printed lines inside a Thanksgiving card with her own: Dear CT -- I watched you graduate yesterday …with a world of pride, a world of love, a world of special wishes. I feel a kind of Happy Thanksgiving that you're finally graduated, but a bit sad that I will no longer awaken at odd hours of the night to pleasant sounds of piano concertos, or your hearty laughter at wild comedies. I will miss serving you breakfast in bed while you watch cartoons on Saturday mornings and your help with some of the household tasks that are a bit beyond me. I will look forward to your visits home so will Damien! I won't miss your nagging and teasing, but I will miss your magnificent help when it comes to doing impossible tasks, like disassembling pianos and assembling all kinds of other things. Love Mommie.

I will miss you too Mommie.

Sis: Her belief in the magic and beauty of life were strongly conveyed to us in the poetry our mother read to us before we fell asleep at night, always ending with her version of Shakespeare’s (or was it Christopher Marlow’s?) “Good night, sweet prince, may bands of angels waft thee to thy rest”. After we would get ready for bed, I could hear CT calling down the stairs, “it’s time to come and say ‘wafty’ to me.” And so we will end by saying “wafty” to our mother: goodnight, beautiful soul, may bands of angels waft thee to thy rest.”

2004-08-20T02:30:00.000-04:00

Mom & Me

Revisiting the Loss of My Mother

2004-08-20T02:06:00.000-04:00

I read a blog a couple of days ago by a Billy, a 30-year-old man who was just back from visiting his mother somewhere in Virginia. It was a quality-time visit. There were some photos and one of the things that stuck me was how he had commented that his mother had insisted on picking up the check when they ate out and wanted to buy him some shoes or something. I just wandered off in time for a few minutes. I might as well have just been telling the story myself about my mother. I ended up sending an email to him to tell him how lucky he was and he returned one in kind to me thanking me because we don’t often realize just how much we love what is in front of us at any moment and no matter what we say, we take the things we have and love for granted until the day we no longer have them.

I am not certain why I am writing this except that it is cathartic and it jogs some of the wonderful memories that were hiding behind the pain of my loss.

My mother came from a very large family but was raised by her older sister, Annabelle (named after Annabelle Lee, notorious of the Edgar Allen Poe poem) because her mother died when she was just three years old attempting to give birth to twins. During the birth, apparently there were complications and not only did they lose the twins, they also lost her mother. I also never met my maternal grandfather who died before I was born but never forgave the Catholic doctor for not sacrificing the life of the babies for his wife and by doing so, lost them all. My mom and her sister shared a special bond because of this maternal relationship. My mother’s sister came to visit us when I was only five or so but several years later, she died of breast cancer. I couldn’t have possibly understood the pain that my mother suffered with her death.

A year or so later, my grandfather on my father’s side, died of leukemia. Again, I didn’t understand the death, but the loss as experienced by my father was not so significant. My father handled it much differently and years later, he told that he and his father had no real relationship and he felt the loss as a placeholder only – well, he didn’t use those word, but I knew what he meant; his father was not really part of his life. My father doesn’t verbalize things like this very well anyway.

Fourteen years ago, my mother went in for her regular exam. She always had mammograms and pap smears because of the loss of her sister, Annabelle. Her mammogram came back positive for a tumor. It was a small tumor, caught early and everything would be ok. She went in for surgery and they removed it, about the size of a pea or slightly larger and while they were there, they found another small tumor, just starting. They removed it too in a benign sounding operation known as a lumpectomy. The removal process was quick and relatively painless followed by six or so weeks of radiation therapy on a daily basis that my mother hated and a prescription for Tamoxifen, an estrogen therapy drug that would go on for years. It was all so positive.

Five years went by. Five years is significant in cancer patients because it is usually the time when the doctors drive the stake into the ground and say it is very highly unlikely that the cancer will ever return. A year later, however, they found cancer in the other breast. Again, there was a lumpectomy and the removal of many of the lymph nodes under her arm. The lymph system uses tubes throughout the body and cancer cells like to hijack these tubes for the spread of their disease. Affected nodes can now be more accurately detected and removed but in my mom, they removed almost all. There would be no radiation, at my mother’s request. The first time around, it had burned her skin and made her suffer. The doctors said that radiation only improved odds of killing uncollected cancer cells at the site only slightly and so after some hand wringing and discussions with our family, she opted not to take the radiation. No chemotherapy. It surprised me but that is the course that her doctor and her chose. They placed her on another drug, Arimidex, another estrogen depleting drug. It turns out that my mother’s treatment with Tamoxifen was early after the drug was developed. They didn’t realize that its effectiveness was reduced after about five years and I didn’t realize how serious my mother’s circumstances would eventually become. I guess we can never predict the fury of the storm until we are in the middle of it and by that time, it is too late and we can only make what course corrections we can and ride it out.

Another five years went by and I remember speaking to my mother on Sunday morning as I always did but on this one morning it was different. She told me that she had been in for a physical and they had “found a little spot of something in her lung” and a “little spot of something in her upper leg.” “What kind of spot?” I asked. “They’re not sure exactly, but it’s nothing to worry about,” she said. “Everything’s all right?” “Well, of course. Nothing to worry about.” Repeated phone conversations, visits and doctor’s checkups revealed, “the ‘spots’ were not progressing and everything was all right,” she told me.

I hate the cold. I moved from the northeast to Florida partly because of the cold but mostly because of the gray. After autumn with its vibrant northeast color, follows gray, then white, then gray, then “dirty spring” giving way to summer. Gray is a miserable season where everything is sleeping or dead. The sky, the trees, the roads, the splashes of road snot on the hills of gray snow between the gray street and the gray sidewalk. Gray is miserable. I always avoided going home in all but summer. I decided instead, this year to make at least a couple of trips home, the first in 2001 for Mother’s Day.

It was a nice visit home. My mother was always spinning, always involved in something. Even with the invader in her body, she didn’t stop doing. She was involved in the Orchid Society in the “Gray” town. She founded a Haiku Society in the “Gray” town. She was an officer in the University Women’s Club in the “Gray” town. She was involved in her church. She was involved in Writers and Books and on and on and on. She was always a brilliant spot in the gray town.

The Sunday before I was to leave she asked that I go to church with her. You have to understand that her church was Unitarian and my mother was not religious. If you are not familiar with it, this is the church that mostly intellectual people attend where being spiritual trumps being religious. I don’t do church, even that church, although, if you must go, that’s the one. That’s a whole other story that I may get to one of these days. But, she asked me. I said, “If I were hitched to a team of horses, I wouldn’t let them drag me but because it is you who has asked me and because it is Mother’s Day, ok.” She was elated and I was happy to see her happy.

Ceremonies there are interesting. I sat next to my mother on one side and my godmother, on the other. They had an open microphone at one point where people could get up and share with the congregation their thoughts on why they considered themselves “blessed” – lucky, whatever you want to call it and she got up and said how she was so happy that her children were there (my sister attends regularly) and that her “fifty-year friend”, my godmother, whom my parents met when they first moved to “Graytown”, were there to share her Mother’s Day. It was pretty moving actually but I guess you had to be there to get the emotion that went into the thought. I left a day or two later.

Mom’s birthday/anniversary was early in July and when I called her, she appeared a little quiet. Always sharp of mind, it seemed odd. I spoke to my sister later and she said that they had gone to my godmother’s for a birthday dinner. My sister sent me pictures. It was the first time that my sister had noticed a change in her demeanor. In the pictures, she looked a little spacey too.

In early September, my partner and I booked a cruise with his sister and brother-in-law (who is also my very good friend). They live in “Graytown” too. They flew down; we jumped on the boat on Sunday September 9, 2001 for a hard earned week in the sun and fun. Coming up from breakfast on the elevator, we heard that a jet had crashed into the world trade center in NYC. We rushed back to the cabin to flip on CNN in time to see the second plane hit. We’ll save that story of loss for another time.

When we got back into port the following Sunday, I called mom as I always did on Sunday morning. There were other calls of course, but that was the “let’s catch up on what’s-going-on on your end, call.” I had noticed that during our conversations that she would frequently forget her place. She would lose her thought of the moment.

She seemed a little distant.
“So, are you coming home this fall?” she asked.
“Of course, mom. I’ll be there before the snow flies.”
“I think maybe you should make it sooner than later,” she said.
It hit me like a bus. I hadn’t grasped up until that moment what she knew but we hadn’t ever discussed. We never discussed. It just wasn’t something that she wanted to do. No matter how close we were. No matter how much I loved her and she loved me, we didn’t hint at it and for all my denial, we never discussed the inevitable.

I flew home amid the heightened security following 9/11. I arrived in Graytown. My father picked me up at the airport. Mom wasn’t with him. Usually it was she that drove – liked to be in control behind the wheel of her car. When we arrived, she was sitting in what I used to refer to as her nest in the living room. It was one end of a comfortably worn couch with books, pencils, pens and scissors, a stack of magazines here, a stack of newspapers there all within easy reach along with the semblance of her next project, whatever it might be. It was command central. It was also, incidentally, the exact spot that she had been sitting in when I had ‘come out’ to her and my dad, years before.

Her warm blue eyes were clear but they lacked the sparkle that was characteristic of her and she appeared confused, even a little distant. I kissed her and gave her a hug. She was feeling pretty good. She squeezed out a smile but she wasn’t there. She wasn’t really in that room.

I discussed with my sister the medication that she was taking. My sister told me that she had rapidly declined, that she had perfectly lucid moment but at other times, her mind was absent. There was a nurse coming over on a regular basis and the plain fact of the matter was that my mother was dying and there was nothing that could be done to change that fact. My mother was insistent on not having my father or my sister give me a bad report of her condition so that I wouldn’t worry about her without being able to do anything being over a thousand miles away. In my denial, I studied the medicine she was taking and thought that perhaps an interaction was creating her confusion. I discussed it with the nurse who was very kind and understanding but explained that while some of the medication might have an effect as I was describing, the progression of my mother’s disease was at the heart of the problem. It seems that many forms of cancer lose cells that take a remarkable path through the body. Cancerous cells are larger than average tissue cells and they somehow are able to migrate through the membrane of blood vessels, float in the bloodstream until they arrive somewhere else and get stuck (usually in the brain, lungs or bones because these are three places where the blood vessels continue to get smaller and smaller until the cell won’t fit any farther) where they migrate again into the surrounding tissue and instruct it to grow uncontrollably in a non-organized manner. The process is called metastasis and the cancer that occurs in one of the new sites is called metastasized breast cancer rather than lung cancer, or whatever. At least, in my crude, non-medical understanding, this is the way that breast cancer metastasizes and kills its victim.

The weather early in October in Graytown is potluck. You get gray skies, possible sprinkles of snow and the doom before the pending winter or you can get the brilliant color part with the leaves changing along with the azure blue sky and warm breeze. There is a certain smell in the air too. It is a smell of anticipation but not necessarily in a good way. I used to tell my mother it smelled like a time of dying. I wouldn’t have guessed how true that perception would be manifested. My mother’s temperament paralleled the change in the weather while I was there that week. I never noticed it until now – perhaps it was just coincidence. She actually improved the whole time I was there. On the weekend when the fall weather was quite beautiful I told her, “Mom, let’s go for frozen custard.” I managed to get her into the car and the whole family; Mom, Dad, sis and me drove to Graytown Frozen Custard in probably the last week before they close for the season. The sun was shining. The sky was blue. The day was warm. The frozen custard was delicious. My mom was smiling. It was a memorable outing. The last outing.

I had stayed a week and it was time to get back. I had packed all my stuff and my bags were in the car. I sat on a loveseat with my mom and I hugged and kissed her. She was a little distant. I’m not sure if it was because of the confusion or because she knew that she didn’t want me to leave and didn’t know how to tell me or not to tell me. I told her I loved her and I would be back for Thanksgiving. It was only about four or five weeks away. With that, I went to the plane.

On Sunday, October 28, 2001, I called home in the morning as I always did. My dad picked up the phone, which was unusual. Mom would always talk to me first and then dad would fill in his version or the details that weren’t important to her. I asked why the different drill. He said she couldn’t/wouldn’t talk to me. She had been having a lot of problems – extremely restless nights, some pain, and some paranoia. She was sleeping on the couch in the living room and had rolled onto the floor. She couldn’t get up and he couldn’t lift her himself. He called their neighbor from across the street at 4 a.m.(a god sent family) who sent their two teenage sons over to help get things in order. My conversation with my dad was brief. He was in denial and wasn’t coping well. I hung up and called my sister. She thought it would be a good idea to book an earlier plane ticket home, which I did.

Monday morning, I was planning my day and the phone rang. It was my father in tears. I had never heard a whimper from him – solid oak.
“If you can come, you need to come now. This may be the end.”
“I’ll be there,” I said and hung up the phone.

I called my sister.
“Last night, mom wouldn’t go to bed. She insisted on sleeping on the couch again,” she told me. They had had a hospital bed brought in and set up in my sister’s old bedroom so that they could pull up the rails at night to keep her from falling out and hurting herself. She wasn’t having any of it.
“I thought if we could get her to the room everything would be all right. I had her sit in that office chair she likes with the casters on it but she grabbed a hold of the door jam and wouldn’t let go. I couldn’t take any more. You don’t know what it’s been like the last couple of weeks. I told her that the she could either go to bed or we could take her to hospice. She chose hospice. They sent an ambulance and she was actually very cooperative and talkative when they arrived.”
My sister went on to say mom had been irrational, combatative and was now having trouble controlling her body. She had spent the night at hospice with her and had come home to shower, change her clothes and go back. I told her I would call with my travel plans as soon as I could get a flight.

I hung up and my world fell apart. Someone let the air out of my lungs. I was in panic. I told my partner who started calling airlines.
My friend Alan called and I burst into tears as I came unglued.
“My mother is dying and I have to go,” I told him.
“What can I do?” he asked.
Of course there was nothing. Within an hour and a half, I was winging it back to Graytown.

I arrived at the Graytown airport just five hours after I had started to travel. I walked up the concourse to where it intersected the terminal and my father and sister were both there. It was a bad sign since that meant mom was alone. The look on my father’s face was unmistakable.
“Mom died,” my sister said.
Please let a bolt of lightening hit me now. All the angst, the guilt, the tension and the sorrow burst forth in a deluge of tears. We stood in the airport terminal embracing each other and crying.
“She died around 5:30. I was with her. She just stopped breathing. It was pretty peaceful,” my sister said. “I didn’t know if you wanted to see her or not so I asked them to leave her in her room until you got here and we could figure out what you wanted. We can go there now.”

When I was a child and my father’s father died, my mother refused to let me see him laid out at the funeral home. When she had been young, her father had forced her not only to see but also to kiss a dead relative. It lived with her forever. I did see my father’s mother in a funeral home. It was the first dead person I had seen and the last that I had wanted to. I had no wish to see my mother dead. In her mind, the vessel of her body would have been empty. It was her spirit above our heads that she would have wanted us to remember. Closure came from taking her to have frozen custard a few short weeks before, although I didn’t realize it at the time, I was actually saying goodbye then.

My sister called the hospice and made arrangements for the body. My mother would have no part of being buried. Why waste the space? Besides, who wants to rot in the cold ground?

Over the coming days, I cried and cried. I started going through some of her things. There are reminders everywhere of who she was as a person and who she was as a mother. Being the writer that she was, she annotated all sorts of things. Among them, I found notebooks where she had kept journals of her feelings and she never shared any of her fears or concerns with any of us. She was a most remarkable woman. I did, however find that more than anything, she was terrified of being bedridden for any length of time and lingering as a burden on us, her family. I found references to her joining the Hemlock Society (who espouse suicide in the event of tragic disablement) only a couple of years after I was born. Of course, now, I am reliving some of the pain. It has been almost three years since she passed on and I can speak of her now without uncontrolled sorrow bubbling up into my throat and eyes. She lived a full and wonderful life and the world is a much better place for her having been here. I have since come to understand that there is a natural order to life. Unfortunately, death is part of it as is, sickness, pain, love and abandonment. It is William Shakespeare’s “thousand natural shocks that flesh is heir to.”

She was cremated as she had wished the week she died and my sister and I planned a memorial service at her church in December. It was enough time to put a reasonable plan together and I flew to Graytown with my partner again that winter to bid her a final farewell. Remarkably, the day of the service was fair and calm. There was no snow. There was no gray that day. Behind the church on a sweeping hill beneath the trees there’s a large retaining wall with a capstone that bears an inscription, “To Live In The Heart Of Those That Love is Never to Die”. It marks the memorial garden for those members of the church who choose the same cleansing by fire as my mother. Our family, my partner included, as he had become as much a son to her as I was, having lost his mother to colon cancer when we was quite young, spread her ashes on that December day.
My mother had many friends and the church was filled with people who had come to say their farewells. There were many funny stories, many sincere and some sad. My sister thought that she and I had a unique perspective on having been the children of such a youthful minded, progressive woman and so we delivered a memorial, integrating our childhood memories alternately. My mother’s memorial from my sister and I follows.

2004-08-19T09:46:00.000-04:00

Hamming It Up(side down)!

The Olympian

2004-08-18T22:45:00.000-04:00

Wow. They make it look so easy. (I wish they were as easy as they make it look.) OK, ok. While I watch these amazing young men what strikes me is the obvious: they have such hard, strong bodies. However, I haven't seen an ugly one in the bushel. I mean, walk down an average city street and you see a bunch of ugly people. What is it? Did they make one of the categories of acceptance for an Olympian athlete that you had to be no worse than average looking. Phelps, the swimmer, is not what I would call handsome but on the other hand, if you put his head on an average body, he wouldn't be bad looking -- and I am speaking purely physical face, here. He has a certain charm about him when he is being interviewed that makes him much cuter and much sexier. And some of these other guys, U.S. or otherwise are f**king cute. Excuse me while I retreat to a tub of ice water.

The Good, The Bad and The Ugly

2004-08-17T17:54:00.000-04:00

The Good

Sunflower seeds - I crack them with my front teeth and eat the kernel without having to spit all the shell parts out. Can keep me busy for a long time without making me feel like I pigged out on a bag of chips!
Peanut Butter - out of the jar, on bread, in a mudslide pie, in a Reese's Cup, on my boyfriend's body, with or without jelly (I'd never wipe jelly on his body).
DVD's Extras - love the director's commentary to know what was going on behind the scenes or to mentally grade them on what the scene was trying to capture. (Did you know Richard Pryor was supposed to be the sheriff in 'Blazing Saddles' ? Gene Wilder wasn't supposed to be in it either. Still think this is one of the funnies movies ever made.
Gas Tank with the Needle on F - I hate to take the time to stop and fill a gas tank. Secondly, it has gotten much more expensive as of late but what are you gonna do? Gotta go.
Seagram V.O. Manhattan - rocks, not too much vermouth, a teaspoon of marachino cherry juice and with or without a dash of bitters. Nectar of the Gods!

The Bad

George W. Bush - it's gotten to the point where I can't watch the man attempt to speak, I can't watch the political ads, I can't even think about him because I want to vomit because he is so stupid and naive and sits in such a seat of authority.
Litter - it pisses me off to see it all over the place especially knowing that it is so easy to eliminate. It pisses me off even more that the general public isn't outraged because of the deeper societal problem that it represent: a complete lack of respect for everything that is civilized.
Free Floating Pieces of Paper on My Desk - (unlike free floating pieces of paper on the street called litter) Despite the fact that I am pretty organized, I can never seem to find a place for single pieces of paper to be filed for easy re-finding. If a bunch of pieces go paper relate to the same subject -- that's easy, one folder, one subject. It's like the kid in high school gym that wasn't picked for dodgeball -- you couldn't just put him in a meat grinder.
Kelly Green - why did they think up this color. Ugghh.

The Ugly

John Ashcroft and Dick Cheney - these are two dangerous individuals. Really dangerous. Ashcroft because he is a crusader (without a clue) and believes in his dilussion and Cheney because he is greedy and sly and is the brains in the current administration. And what's scarrier is that the general public doesn't realize the danger at hand from these two nazis. There are others like Rehnquist but even he realizes that the supreme court justices have a responsilbity to maintain balance in their decisions.
Rape - there is nothing more vile than the forced submission of an individual to the violence of rape.

Orgasms at Large

2004-08-14T17:59:00.000-04:00

Have you ever wondered if you have normal orgasms? Ok. Every orgasm is good. Yes, yes, we know, "I've never met an orgasm I didn't like." Right? Some are better than others. But, did you ever stop to think, "Are my orgasms normal?" I'm speaking for myself, of course, but I frequently have such protracted and intense orgasms that I can't imagine anyone else experiencing the same thing. After, I climax, my erections stays as hard as a hammer for at least five minutes. I have even had multiple orgasms (on several occasions in my life) where with a few more strokes, I'm off to the races again -- the second time around, much less intense. Anyway, I can't seem to find any research that examines the intensity of orgasms and I'm figuring that I'm a little off the edge in the intensity department.

Oh No. Not Traffic Again!?!!

2004-08-11T19:24:00.000-04:00

You see it all in Miami. I was riding on the notorious I-95 yesterday. Just driving along at what I considered to be a reasonable pace and unlike my usual highway hijinks, I was in the far right lane, still four or five exits away from my exit. For whatever reason, I just turned my head to the left and looked over two lanes immediately in time to see the front right tire of a Cadillac fold under the car, the nose of the car drop so that the brake-caliper-steering-knuckle-tie-rod thing hit the ground and skate along the highway in a fountain of sparks. It was surreal! The other travelers of the road must have seen enough too but the guy in the Cadillac must have had his wits about him because, somehow, he managed to keep the thing going down the highway in a straight line and managed not to lose it. In my rearview mirror, I saw him horse it to the far outside lane and pull over. What happened to the front tire, I don't know and I don't care. Glad no one was killed. (At least I didn't see anything on the news.) Last week a stationary ladder fell off a truck and took off the hood of the car and the windshield. A year and a half ago, a piece of steel reinforcing bar about three feet long was dropped from a truck, run over by a car and ended up coming through a windshield end first and impaling the passenger, the bar half through the person and the seat. Scary.

Life in the Fast Lane

2004-08-06T19:45:00.000-04:00

South Florida is a huge megalopolis. For those of you who have never visited, we have sort of a unique situation here. Civilization is situated between the Atlantic Ocean and the Everglades, a huge swamp that occupies the lower portion of these middle of the state. So population here must expand either north or south where land still exists in the tri-county area of Dade, Broward or Palm Beach counties. You can't build any further from the coast than about 35 miles tops -- most of the time, much less.

The state was never prepared for the influx of population fleeing the cold, dreariness of the rust belt and other places. The highways were not intended to carry this much traffic. So, unlike the north that has two seasons: winter and construction, Florida has one and it isn't winter. They are always adding lanes to the highways where they can. We have 5 and sometimes 6 or more lanes in each direction.

So, the major artery here is I-95 which starts in downtown Miami and ends somewhere in the state of Maine, I am told, although I have never traveled its complete length, I have been to Maine, and I can attest to the fact that it is there.

OK, so here is the problem: public transportation here sucks -- the trains and trams don't go to the right places (mostly) and the buses don't run frequently enough. If you don't have a car, you are screwed. If you do have a car you are screwed and you are getting screwed harder and more frequently these days. I-95 has an HOV lane. HOV stands for High Occupancy Vehicle which means more than one person. Currently, you may not travel in the lane (unless you have a high occupany vehicle: 2 people) from the hours of 7-9 a.m and again 4-6 p.m. It sucks but we get the idea. If was funded by federal money and they were trying to do the right thing, I guess. The ticket you get for un-high-occupying is $83 and no I don't know first hand because I avoid using the lane during those hours. I am now told that some guru has now decided to limit traffic in the HOV lanes to 24 hours a day from Miami to near the Broward county line (the most heavily traveled portion of the road) and expanded hours in the morning and afternoon for the other two commute times: 6-10 a.m. and 3-7 p.m. So, we have the second most congested roads in the country and they are reducing the available lanes -- makes good sense to me. (I think that they think that it will force people to take the ill conceived, ill executed public transportation or encourage more people to double up -- not.) In addition, they are planning on building some extra lanes on a couple of choice East/West X-ways which you can be elite by traveling during peak time for a fee. The fee that you pay will vary from $0.50 to $8.00 depending on the demand when you decided that you must be somewhere and can't wait in traffic. Is this instanity?

To make matters worse, when there is a collision on the highway, the local constabulary or the FHP take great joy in shutting down X+3 lanes. For those of you that have not had algebra it means if the disabled cars occupy 1 lane, they shut down 4 so they can point and laugh. If the crash takes 3 lanes it generally means that you can pitch a tent and spend the night.

God I'm glad I got this off my chest. I feel so much better.

Kind of like watching grass grow.

2004-08-03T23:09:00.000-04:00

Whoever invented painting had to have been related to the Marquis de Sade. The rules of painting are:

Paint never covers on the first coat even if it is white over white -- well maybe if it is white over white.
If you have a drop cloth spread carefully on the floor, the one drop of red paint will fall in the exact location where the drop cloth does not protect the white carpeting beneath it. Of course, the likelihood of this happening are directly proportional to the cost of the carpet.
You will always back into that section of wall that you just finished painting.
When painting the trim with another color, you will get a small amount of color #1 on color #2. When you get out the can of color #2 to fix the problem where you got color #1 on color #2, you will undoubtedly get color #2 somewhere on color #1.
If you don't need a hair cut, turn off the ceiling fan. Ladders (and people on them) are natural enemies of ceiling fans.
If you need a quart of paint to do a job, you will ultimately use a quart plus a cup requiring you to but a second quart which when combined with the cost of the first quart costs more than the gallon that you didn't buy in the first place to save money and required you to make a second trip in the middle of your job. When you get back with your second quart, you find that the color doesn't match exactly.
The color on the chart never looks like the color in the can never looks like the color on the wall never looks like the color in the morning which is completely different than it looks at night and none of these varioius colors match the color in the oriental carpet that you wanted to use the wall color to accent in the first place.
Isn't it satisfying to paint over dirt? Isn't it annoying that the dirt you painted over wasn't firmly attached to something and is now stuck in the roller leaving little dingleberries at strategic locations in the fresh paint in the wide expanse of wall that won't be covered by the picture behind the sofa?
So, would someone tell me how when you have a brand new roller and you put it in the paint in the tray to get the roller covered for the first application onto the wall............ the fahking paint weighs down one side so the thing won't roll and no matter what you do, the paint 'lubricates' the roller so it won't building any friction against the paint tray and allow the roller go get coated with paint.....aaaahhhhrrrrg.

Where are the yellow pages???? hmmmm..... painters, painters....i wonder if he brings his own cat-o-nine-tails and handcuffs?

Still Crazy After All These Years

2004-08-01T20:17:00.000-04:00

My lover and I celebrate our anniversary this month -- August. I don't know if that is politically correct since our union is not legally acceptable. I call him my partner in mixed company -- in the presence of straight people. We have somehow managed to stay together for quite a few years. If is funny to look around because, a number of my straight friends have seen their marriages do like the "duke" and ride off into the sunset and here we are, gay, no marriage, and we just keep perking along. That's not so say that we have had a few bumps in the road but what it comes down to, I've decided, is this: if you aren't best friends first and foremost, you don't have chance of staying together forever. I think that it is this fact that allows us to grow, change, stretch, expand, alter course and still stay together.

Aside from the fact that we are still together, the sex is still great. There's always something new to try or somewhere new to try it. We are having sex outside a lot lately. I love it. We could have it a little more often but we all make adjustments including when are schedules align and sometimes its just nice to curl up on the coach together.

We've always been monogamous. Now, I say that because I know that I have been monogamous...And I believe that he has been monogamous. At least that's what he tells me and I have no reason to believe otherwise. Even that to me is not of great importance. I'm not a jealous person. The fidelity is fairly important but far more important is the honesty. Incidentally, that is the other thing or perhaps the basis of the friendship part of what I was saying above. Friendship, and any other relationship worth keeping, is built on honesty. Without it you have nothing.

Now, the reasons I mention monogamy is that my lover gets propositioned from time to time because he is a bartender at a restaurant. He turns them down and he tells me about the people. I don't go to see who these people are because I always felt that I shouldn't be where he works just like I wouldn't want him to be where I worked. He is an 'entertainer'. People come to see him. He has an established clientele that come to watch him 'perform'. All of a sudden, though, he gets regular phone calls from one guy -- married to a woman. When she is away which she does regularly, he calls my lover and wants to suck his dick. I've never met the guy but my lover says he is cute but dumb -- real dumb. So I said, "Tell him to come over and I'll fuck him up the ass while he sucks you off." Where did that come from? My lover ask, "You really want me to?" I said, "Sure."

I would never do anything to jeopardize the life that we have built with each other but the idea of adding a little salt to the fillet mignon is intriguing.

Try a little tenderness

2004-07-30T20:23:00.000-04:00

i have a crush on adam and i'm not sure why. he is younger -- like 22 and he is not my type really, a little too hairy, a little too immature and he says he is straight. i don't think he has come to terms with the fact that he is gay. some of his buzz reminds me of my when i was 22. he is very cute though -- muscular, solid and very nice. i'd like about two hours to take a tour of his torso. a little too frustrating, a little too confusing -- i'm just steering clear for now since i am monogamously coupled and i have never done any extracurricular activities for extra credit before.

Angels are not just in heaven

2004-07-30T15:05:00.000-04:00

i was riding in the car with my friend alan today who is now healing from an injury to his achilles tendon. he likes to walk. it clears his mind. he puts on a walkman and follows a linear park (a new term for a sidewalk with landscaping) near his house. he usually walks in the morning when there are fewer people but yesterday i guess he couldn't help himself and went out in the evening when he had the time. he started walking. the sky was ominous and was threatening rain. the weather patterns in south florida this time of year means that almost surely, there will be a lightening storm and torrential downpour sometime late in the day after everything has been heated to a "frittata sizzle" by the relentless sun here. as he walked, he ran across two women walking, one in her 30's, the other in her mid-60's. they were hispanic but stopped him to ask a question. he speaks no spanish but the younger women clutched a map of the area and asked "metro station?". he realized that they were miles from where they needed to be. the younger woman indicated that they had walked from some location in the direction that they were headed but expected to have come across the station by then. he indicated that from where they had started that they originally about four blocks from the station but had chosen the wrong direction in which to walk and were now about two miles (plus the four blocks) from the station. about then, another woman (who spoke spanish) stopped and explained to them their error. alan continued on his way. he couldn't get the image of the older woman out of his mind and went home and got his car. he caught up with them and told them he would take them to the station. "Where are you trying to go?" he asked. the younger woman said they were going to take the train to some station and then catch a bus from there. alan told her the mistake had cost them precious time and that the buses stopped running at 8:00 p.m. and that they would be stranded. he drove them home. he surely will go to heaven is such a thing exists.

Well give this a whirl....

2004-07-26T15:57:00.000-04:00

i've just started to become interested in what other people's concious and subconcious minds are saying. i can remember what a facinating medium bulletin boards were before the internet was such an easily accessed appliance and how i got to know people that i never met. it was a strange commraderie and i was facinated getting to know people simply by their personality and the one on one chats that BBS allowed. So, i start down a new road today. i just want to see where it goes.....