Country Side

It was a planned weekend, and it was the makings of a short story at best. The Film Critic has moved upstate. I spent the weekend with him, we saw movies and swam in lakes and ponds. I met Sophisticated people and I ate fresh strawberries.

The Film Critic and I have fun content and passionate times together, but where is the warmth? I'm fine with it, that's what makes it such a short story. It's a memory in the making, there really will never be a future in it. I will enjoy it while it lasts. It was a nice getaway and a fun little trip. I got a tan out of the whole thing and to get to know another person.

San Francisco Reflection

I wrote this on the plane ride home today:

San Francisco to New York. Fleeing the daylight as quickly as I can. The other end of the country, a place that came and went in five days. I left at 4:30 AM and had to hold back tears. It’s not like I suddenly hate New York City, but the difference of the cities is stunning.

I am excited to return to New York and I plan listening to Liza Minnelli Live at Carnegie Hall . When she sings, I Happen to Like New York and then finishes with New York, New York. I will be home.

San Francisco is where I will go to die, I think. No, no that’s a touch harsh. It’s true what they say, “You don’t move to New York to rest peacefully.” I think I may have made that saying up. Or a wise man once told me, I forget which. I can only presume that the opposite end of the country is where you go to rest peacefully.

I met some of the locales and enjoyed their quirkiness. Jim is an interesting guy, my San Franciscan Connection, for this I am eternally grateful. Cool, cute and calculated. He’s got a plan and intends to follow through. He captures the world through a camera lens and I find that a worthy cause to live for. I love his photos.

The waitress at It’s Top’s Diner. During both my trips there she discussed politics rather heatedly. She ran the counter and chatted with me as if I’d come into the diner everyday for years. She wasn’t annoying and she often got her point across eloquently enough.

The girl from New Orleans, but not lives in San Francisco whom sat next to me at Hemlock Tavern. She placed her wine down and simply said, “I am just putting this on the table. I don’t want you to think I’m trying to be friendly or anything.” I smiled and we joked back and forth. Then quickly added, “I’m holding you up from being rude.” It was a completely harmless and fun interaction.

In New York, you’d probably get a lewd look, luckily I left the New Yorker Attitude on the East Coast. The only time it slipped out was when we missed a Trolley Car and I screamed out, “WELL FUCK YOU, TOO!” Since it was a tourist area, not to mention little kids were around, I got off looks. You can take the boy out of New York City...

When San Francisco is sunny, it’s like seeing an classic movie in Cinema-Scope. The colors are so lush I found my eyes tearing from the saturation. When it’s rainy the city changes drastically. It isn’t like a gray day in New York. It seems as if the city is in mourning. At one point during my stay the city became completely engulfed in fog. I couldn’t see an inch in front of me. My entire mood fell and thus I allowed myself to weep.

Will I move there? Why is that a question I keep hearing? The waitress, K, my mother and different others would randomly asked that. Is San Francisco where New Yorkers go to when they’ve had enough? I suppose it’s only of the other cities to escape to. For it’s almost impossible to live in anything else after New York.

My soul, my spirit, my body and my mind have all been shaped by such a cruel mistress. In San Francisco, I was able to recapture something. To relive memories of my childhood I’d all but forgotten. Life would be quieter if I moved there, it’s only a fact that the city closes down at 2 AM. Silly Westerners, there were nights when my being didn’t begin until then.

I am home though. I am back in the state where I was born and raised. I am back in New York and the bloodline that connects me to this city, tainted yes, is of a superior strain. To move West would mean to change. To escape. Am I ready to escape?

Not quiet yet. It’s all a matter of order. Finish college, this annoying priority is ahead of any other decisions I make. I am 23-years-old...

I'm back home and finishing up a project. I'm sleepy and tired, but it feels nice to be back. Elizabeth was here to greet me. A friend texted me and asked if I wanted to go into the city for
dinner. The 5-hour plane ride I just got off of obviously didn't seem to matter, I should still come out into the city. It's acts like that that remind me, I am home.

Open your Golden Gate.

One Flew Over

After my father inadvertently asked me if I was on speed, I knew my trip home was coming to a close.

So I sit in the back of the car wondering what did I do to become the messed up one in my family. When did being excited and energetic about things suddenly become an accusal of being on drugs? I’m the first to admit I’m off, the nickname says it all. I’m 23, I’m a theatrical studies major at a CUNY school and I’m battling some issues outside of my comfort zones.

Everyone in my family holds daggers. We all seem to know the trump cards we can play on one another. My father, the patriarch, seems to hold them until he can play them assuredly and without much struggle. I’ve barely seen him this weekend and he chooses to drop this on me in the car. Ah, home again, home again.

Then I go through the opening act of apologizing for myself. Telling my parents I am trying to calm down and halfway through the sentence I stop and quote the great prophet Jerry Herman: I am what I am. That scores a point for me, right? The refusal to be embarrassed and ashamed. It means I’m getting more comfortable.

Then there are the facts. The traits I see in my parents and my Oma. The blatant WASP-y ways of my family. The belief that all issues can be cured by pure will. The constant want to believe that our family is the most normal of the other's around them.

Let’s go through what this presents to my life and what I can do to amend what may be weighing on my mind. First, there is the option to never return home again. I obviously have reached a point in my life where the border has been drawn. Me vs. Them. True, there will be unavoidable issues like Christmas. You do still [sort of] love the company of your mom and dad and immediate family. Yet, minimize the trips down to no more than two times a year.

Second, you can change. You know that these issues expand outside of your family. Everyone sort of always raises an eyebrow with you. Me vs. Myself. You have people telling you that you’re obsessive and fairly nuts. You’re not changing necessarily for them, just to work out issues. Which in a way is what you’re doing already?

Third, you can ignore it all and continue on being who you are and living the same pattern. Me vs. Nothing.

Am I standing at a crossroads? No better yet, am I driving down to a crossroads in a Greyhound bus and by the time I arrive back in Port Authority I must choose one.

Now for a solution. Yes, that’s right I have a solution. I have been doing well, I have been much calmer and I have been more orderly. I am touchy, I admit. I will snap and I will fight. Upstate, NY is my hometown. It was where I was raised, but I don’t live there anymore. This weekend I saw many people who had already given in. The thing is I am returning to a place that I am wedging myself into. I come home and I may snap or be sharp. I’d like to believe that people do enjoy my company, if not then I need some people to start speaking up. I am going to keep on trying to figure out how to mellow out. Each month along means a month of figuring that out. We’re entering seven months since life broke. Remember that. If you didn’t have a drastic mood change in life than something would’ve been more off.

Growing Up Jehovah

My Oma and Opa [German for Grandma and Grandpa] are stuck in a time rift. When I enter there house there are two things I notice. The silence and how I seem to stop aging from the moment I set foot in there.

I would call it a house, but I prefer the proper name. Narnia. It's a mix of Germany, the 60s and 70s mixed with kitsch and tackiness all at the same time. Phenomenal. Then there's her Garden, I expected to see Mr. Tumulus, but he was at Fire Island for the weekend.

I'll let the photos speak now...

Losing My Mind

I hate it here.

Jumpin' Jacks is for Stoners

I always forget how gay and loud I am until a moment like last night.

Above you can see a picture of one of the big summer hangouts in my hometown. The ice cream tastes like delicious paste, you can get a sundae for $3.25 and anything you want (I mean anything) can be fried within an inch of it's life. The place is white trash and Grease all rolled up into one.

This is my childhood/Teenage Development right in front of you. We arrived and to my surprise, a couple of high school guys I expected was an entire picnic table of them. Being one of the only homos in my high school I opened a door that was closed until I made everyone aware that Faggots exist everywhere, even in my small backwoods town.

The table consisted of the straight boys who in high school were punks/rockers/emo/anarchists/Best Buy Employee/stoner/Christians/screamo/scene/atheist/artists and yet through their stone cold gazes I felt like the odd man out.

These are boys in high school I could handle (unlike the tricky Jock, but I'm sure nowadays I could definitely handle them too) and we walked up to this table and I realized I could still deal. Yet, I didn't want to and neither did they. And how sad the scene seemed. All of them just hanging out in my sad town. Most of them were done with school and living at home. I approached the table and some feigned an interest is saying hello.

There was no interesting in how I've been and vice versa. There was no talk of high school times. Just me stand while they didn't even ask me to pull up a chair. I stood there with the one friend I'd chosen to bring. Krista, ever faithful Krista.

Recently, I've been spouting out this:

I sometimes regret having spent my early twenties growing up in the City. It's turned me into a crazier person that I think I would've become. I wish that I had moved here when I was in my later twenties and more financially stable.

I am going to take this time to publicly apologize for saying that. Sure I may have many more woes. Sure I may have been going through a rough time. Sure I may be gay and louder than all of the population of my town put together.

Yet, in that moment. To see this table of people who'd just finished school and were now living at home. I wanted to scream:

There may be more of you than myself. You may be able to gracefully give me the cold shoulder because we are past subtleties of high school politeness. But I have lived 10,000 more lives than you have already! I have cried tears and seen things that you can't even fathom. Don't say hello, don't ask me how I am. I will gladly return the favor, but know that you have helped me. You have helped me see what life could have been like. You have reminded me that there are sadder days than my own and they sit at this very picnic table. I see them in your boredom of a life you haven't even started yet. Good luck fuckers.

After that internal monologue, we left. I think it was heard loud and clear.

Jesus Died For Our Sins

Last night I sat down with my dad and discussed my finances for the next year. I'm going to have to take out a wonderfully hefty loan to live off of. I'm doing what everyone else is doing and living off the system. Despite the fact I will have to pay it back. Rent, food, Subway Transportation, etc. All will live off this loan.

It's very disheartening when you sit down and add it all up. I can't do financial aid because I'm on my parent's income, which is well above 75,000 a year. My father is rich, that doesn't make me rich. What a funny and overheard complaint in the college world. I'm hoping that on this loan I will be able to finish school once and for all. Granted, I will enter the adult world (haven't I been there for a while already?) and have to start paying off the loans. All that jazz. My dad was very helpful, telling me not to get discouraged. It's not as bad as it will seem. It's life, we all have to go through it.

He also approves of my leaving my job. Apparently I am the hardest working person in college they know. Isn't that funny? It's actually very true. No one works harder than I have. That's a proven fact. I'm kidding, my story is a dime-a-dozen here in the city. I suppose. Well I highly doubt it actually I've never heard of any 22 year old who has gone through as much as I have.

A Long Days Journey Back to Home

This is how I remember my family. Yes, I am the little one in the red vest. I remember happiness and simplicity. I don't remember fights and hate. Which utterly perplexes me how times change so easily. People change. It someone looked at this photo could they possibly see what futures were held for these people? Can you spot the alcoholic? The troublemaker/pothead? The faggot? Or the thief?

If you've spotted three of the five, congratulations you are psychic. This is how I'd like to begin the story of my family (someday of course), which an imagine similar to this picture. My very childhood memories rely on this very photo, if I stray to far away from this photo all of my childhood may crackup completely.

I have found out something very important on my visit here. That is the story of our Rise and Fall as Jehovah's Witnesses. It truly is a sordid tale, and once again has inspired me to someday write a play based on it:

Act I:
My mother and her younger sister were raised Catholic until she (my mom) was 13. Then her parents made the change to Jehovah's Witnesses. That is still a mystery, but I also can compare it with the very moment they lost their minds. My mother fled my grandparents iron rule at 18 and promptly became pregnant with my brother at 21.

My dad was a 21 year old pot smoking dropout who wanted to change his life. He wanted something to believe in. He became a Jehovah's Witness and a good one at that. He became a partner in his father's business and was basically one step below being an Elder. Mother's younger sister was a Jehovah's witness and thus her husband was one too. All but my mother never was baptised.

As years passed my mother had me and my brother started school. She began to resent my father and his religion for ostracizing her children. My brother was sent to the Principal's office whenever there were parties of any kind. My father also began to get more involved with the business and that meant sometimes lying about certain business transactions. This was not the way of a Jehovah's Witness. Lying and watching you distance yourself from your family. My father left and thus is officially excommunicated.

Oh, but if only that were the end of this tale. No, it's not.

Act II:

My Aunt and her husband, still Jehovah's Witnesses, have their first child. While my aunt is weakened by birth somehow a rare blood disease she had took that opportunity to become active in her body.

A week after she had her child she developed kidney stones and one one could figure out what was wrong with her. She returned to the hospital and complications began. Jehovah's Witnesses don't believe in Western Medicine and though a blood transfusion could possibly have cured everything. She never got it. My Uncle refused to give her the transfusion, they even had other Witnesses come to the hospital to keep him strong. But my mother said that she still remembers the wails he let out they moment she was gone.

That's not how I remember my family, but that's how it really happened.

Lastly, this is my at my fattest. Some people don't believe I was once chubbier. So I'm bringing pictures home to show the Tall Man because he shared his fat photos with me.

A small delay...

Last night around 2 am my Internet stopped working. I am at work now. If I don't say anything for a little while, in the words of Marianne Faithfull, "Don't forget me."

This weekend I am going home to finally retrieve my passport. The bus ticket is bought and I feel full of resistance to head home. It's always difficult for me. Don't know why. It's for the trip to China, so I'm determined. I have everything else completed other than this and the letter of recommendation from my teacher.

Every girl in Venice longs for Casanova.

Unfortunately, I can't apply for this school because my parents make more than 75,000 a year. Since I'm still registered under his household and every now and then they grant me money, I apparently can AFFORD to pay for China by myself. This is a common complaint in most college students, so I am going to have to accept what is and cannot be changed.

Today I woke up feeling decent, but later than planned. Then I got the stabbing pains in my stomach. They are finally subsiding so I'm feeling much better. That's good to know for me. Yet, I still have no Internet as far as I know. Tonight I'll watch a DVD or go to bed early.

No new love, and you will be my true love.

I have three days off and yet I am spending it doing nada. Well I don't exactly wish to be crazy when hours before my stomach was reeling. Tomorrow shall be different I assure you! Or I don't, I lie terribly.

Our fashion, a fire of un-endless passion.

I'm also upset that The Spelling Bee Tickets I ordered, have yet to arrive. I smell an AWFUL post man. He will PAY if I don't get the tickets I ordered...pay DEARLY.

Simple are the ways of love.