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… and Spring has Softly Sprung

A Boston spring is always one of the best springs, and there is something more magical about making my way home through the Southwest Corridor Park when the apple blossoms are sweetly scenting the night air, and spring bulbs are blooming resplendently against the dark earth. 

At the corner of our building, an American dogwood enchantingly begins its leafless blooming period like a flurry of white butterflies alighting on its branches. A Chinese dogwood was planted several years ago in the square in front of our entrance – the perfect choice as it extends the blooming season by several weeks, coming in right after the American variety finishes. 

This little section of Boston, with a few benches, its flowering trees, and the verdant explosion of spring in full effect, works its charm quietly. For many years I took it for granted, brushing quickly by its subtle beauty in the rsh to get home or somewhere else. 

These days it is a destination in its own right, my own ability to find the attractiveness in the smaller and quieter scenes a welcome and intentional shift to a new perspective. The second half of one’s life, already well underway should I be so lucky, is about such a change in perspective. 

As if on cue, the lilacs have begun their blooming season – nostalgic and new all at once. 

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As Boston Beckons…

Preparing for this year’s wedding anniversary, our fifteenth if you’re counting, I made a quick trip to Boston last weekend to drop off some outfits and accessories, and pick up some food for our arrival reception this coming weekend. Maybe it was the fact that fifteen years had already passed, or the deeper foreboding idea of my fiftieth birthday coming up, but whatever the case I found myself engulfed in a strange sea of nostalgia. 

That compelled me to wind my way to Quincy Market, where my Mom brought us on our very first trips to Boston when we were kids. The world had changed a lot since then, and this part of Boston was no exception. 

What was once a bustling tourist trap, filled with bull market carts, shops and restaurants, this surety of cobblestone has slowly and steadily declined, with more empty store fronts and deserted carts than filled places. It was a reminder that you can’t go back, that you can’t recapture the magic of the past. There are newer and showier spaces now, but every once in a while I’ll return to this place, so steeped in history – mine and this country’s – and so riddled with memories. 

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Dazzler of the Day: Jean Smart

Having charmed and entertained audiences for decades, Jean Smart is currently riding on a career high, having recently earned her sixth Emmy Award for her celebrated turn in ‘Hacks’. I still remember her fondly from ‘Designing Women’, and in addition to enthrallingly-varied appearances in ‘Frasier’, ‘The District’, ‘Mare of Easttown’ and ‘Watchmen’, she’s tread the boards of Broadway in ‘Piaf’ and ‘The Man Who Came to Dinner’. This marks her well-earned debut as Dazzler of the Day.

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#TinyThreads: An Insignificant Series

Can former altar boys be chosen as the Pope?

Asking for a power-hungry friend. 

#TinyThreads

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Get A Peep At This

Andy got me this box of Peeps cereal as an Easter joke, but I actually ended up enjoying it.

It’s like a more colorful amped-up version of Lucky Charms (also not as awful as I used to think they were). 

The real Peeps candy is nightmarishly sweet and awful, and I don’t really get a Peeps taste from the cereal, so perhaps that’s why it works a little better. 

That said, once a year is more than enough, so let’s keep this Limited Edition. 

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Troye Sivan in a Jockstrap

Trye Sivan has made several splashes here over the years, starting with this Dazzler of the Day post. They’ve been fascinating the world ever since, as witnessed in this Troye Sivan appreciation post. Sivan also provided the summer anthem a couple of years back, with the driving ‘Rush’

Confirmation was made when Shawn Mendes liked Troye’s butt in this post

 

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Early Rewards… or Are They?

While these spring bloomers may seem like the earliest reward for working in the garden, they actually needed to be planted in the fall, then slumber for a full six months of cold and awful weather, so I’m not sure ‘early reward’ is entirely apt. Many people see the spring bulbs in bloom now and want to go out and purchase a bunch of bulbs to plant immediately, but that’s not the way it works. By the time fall rolls around, they’ve forgotten or lost interest or simply aren’t aware that that’s when you need to work to get spring results

I act in similar fashion, though my version is more one of laziness and forgotten magic. By the time fall roll around, my garden drive has all but dissipated after half a year of watering and wedding and working. The magic of these spring blooms also feels like a distant memory, and I cannot smell their exquisitely light perfume to remind me. Thus I pass by the bulbs when they should be planted, and then I regret that I didn’t do more at this time of the year. 

Perhaps overthinking is the real curse here. 

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I Like Stronger Color

Two scarves and an electric pink coat are all I need for a happy spring outfit

Well, pants and shirt too I suppose, but who’s going to be a stickler for those details?

‘Tis the damn season for some bold color choices

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The Bashful Daffodil

Most daffodils begin their blooming period in bashful form, especially when the weather is so changeable. They only unfurl their full splendor if they can be sure of some sun and warmth and stillness. I do not blame them in the least, and my natural state in times of uncertainty is certainly within the realm of all that is bashful. 

This little blossom is at the early stage of its bloom, still looking groundward and holding its outer petals close to its corona. A shy first step that is full of hope and trepidation. 

I often like this stage better than the fullest bloom, the same way I enjoy the night before a dinner or a party more than the actual event itself. It’s a happy way of prolonging the experience and making every moment matter. 

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Billy Bonkers

“How can you have rivals when no one else can do what you do?” ~ Terrence McNally, ‘Master Class’

When I was younger, and far longer than the twenty years ago when this project was created, I had a much different reading of the opening quote here. Back then I took it with all the heady hubris of a twenty-something young man – young in almost every way. 

Then time passed.

I grew up a little.

And a lot. 

And I realized that the opening words are true for everyone. 

When you realize that – truly and genuinely realize it, take it to heart and let it seep into your soul – you realize there’s no longer a need to compete. You step off the hamster wheel, you step off the scale, you step off the comparison bandwagon, and you are suddenly free. 

‘Comparison is the ultimate thief of joy.’

Or, just mind your own fucking business. 

Both are paths that lead to happier places. 

I’m not quite sure what this has to do with Divine Diva Tour, or why I’m even writing it now, but posting this project from twenty years ago has me intermingling the past with the present. To ignore the evolution that’s progressed in these past two decades is to do a grave disservice to the riches of retrospect at hand. 

These are the sort of riches that can never be found in a jewelry box or bank, they cannot be saved or purchased or bought, they can only be experienced. 

Once upon a time I sold the story to myself that I was divine, and I believed it because I believed everyone was divine. Egalitarian hubris, perhaps. Vanity that candles itself out in the celebration, adoration and devotion to others. 

And the shadow of manipulation that saw it all through glasses far darker than rose. 

~ The Divine Diva Tour: A Fairy’s Tale ~

  1. Pink Frilly Fairy: Part OnePart Two, and Part Three
  2. Homage to Herb: Part One, Part Two and Part Three
  3. A Purple-Hued Interlude
  4. Style & Panache: Part One, Part Two, Part Three and Part Four.
  5. Purple Puff Confection: Part OnePart Two, Part Three and Part Four.
  6. A Blue-Hued Interlude
  7. Fuchsia Fabulousness: Part One. Part Two and Part Three.
  8. Bad Boy Bangs: Part OnePart Two. and Part Three.
  9. Vanity Under Where: Part One, Part Two. and Part Three.
  10. Sugar Plum Ballerina: Part OnePart Two, and Part Three.
  11. A Pool Frolic: Part OnePart Two. and Part Three.
  12. A Cemetery Interlude: Part One and Part Two.
  13. Powder Blue Fur Doll: Part One, Part Two, and Part Three.
  14. A Milky Interlude 
  15. Rock Out, Cock Out/ Hang Out, Wang Out: Part OnePart Two, and Part Three.
  16. Cocktail Cocktale: Part One and Part Two.
  17. A Fairy’s Interlude: Part One and Part Two.
  18. Willy Wonkers: Part One and Part Two.

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A Man With An Umbrella of Ribbons

Tying ribbons to the tips of a black umbrella made for a mad scene beside a graveyard. 

Snow fell on that day.

He didn’t need the sunglasses unless he was trying to hide the eyeshadow. 

A slim gray suit, all three pieces, borrowed from a boyfriend. 

Twenty years later, neither of us can fit into that suit, but it’s still a pretty thing.

Time turns us inside out. 

“A performance is a struggle.

You have to win.

The audience is the enemy.

We have to bring you to your knees because we’re right. 

If I’m worried about what you’re thinking about me, I can’t win.

Art is domination. 

It’s making people think that for that precise moment in time there is only one way, on voice. 

Yours.”

~ Terrence McNally ‘Master Class’

~ The Divine Diva Tour: A Fairy’s Tale ~

  1. Pink Frilly Fairy: Part OnePart Two, and Part Three
  2. Homage to Herb: Part One, Part Two and Part Three
  3. A Purple-Hued Interlude
  4. Style & Panache: Part One, Part Two, Part Three and Part Four.
  5. Purple Puff Confection: Part OnePart Two, Part Three and Part Four.
  6. A Blue-Hued Interlude
  7. Fuchsia Fabulousness: Part One. Part Two and Part Three.
  8. Bad Boy Bangs: Part OnePart Two. and Part Three.
  9. Vanity Under Where: Part One, Part Two. and Part Three.
  10. Sugar Plum Ballerina: Part OnePart Two, and Part Three.
  11. A Pool Frolic: Part OnePart Two. and Part Three.
  12. A Cemetery Interlude: Part One and Part Two.
  13. Powder Blue Fur Doll: Part One, Part Two, and Part Three.
  14. A Milky Interlude 
  15. Rock Out, Cock Out/ Hang Out, Wang Out: Part OnePart Two, and Part Three.
  16. Cocktail Cocktale: Part One and Part Two.
  17. A Fairy’s Interlude: Part One and Part Two.
  18. Willy Wonkers: Part One.

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Willy Wonkers

Culturally-deficient confession: I have never seen any iteration of the Willy Wonka movies. 

Not the original with Gene Wilder, nor any of the remakes with Johnny Depp or Timothee Chalamet. 

Am I missing anything?

I am aware of the visuals, however, and they inform this darker and more sinister take on the top-hatted cultural icon. It marks another turn in the Divine Diva Tour, and the fairy has another tale to tell.

“Where is fancy bred? In the heart or in the head?”

“The story is about the opposite aspects of one and the same person; that which pushes him to escape into a faraway world of adventure and fantasy, and the other part which keeps him bound to common practicality – his id and his ego, the manifestation of the reality principle and the pleasure principle.” ~ Bruno Bettelheim

Shadows and outlines, the man who is there, the man who is not there, the man who will never be.

There or anywhere. 

“There’s no earthly way of knowing which direction we are going.”

~ The Divine Diva Tour: A Fairy’s Tale ~

  1. Pink Frilly Fairy: Part OnePart Two, and Part Three
  2. Homage to Herb: Part One, Part Two and Part Three
  3. A Purple-Hued Interlude
  4. Style & Panache: Part One, Part Two, Part Three and Part Four.
  5. Purple Puff Confection: Part OnePart Two, Part Three and Part Four.
  6. A Blue-Hued Interlude
  7. Fuchsia Fabulousness: Part One. Part Two and Part Three.
  8. Bad Boy Bangs: Part OnePart Two. and Part Three.
  9. Vanity Under Where: Part One, Part Two. and Part Three.
  10. Sugar Plum Ballerina: Part OnePart Two, and Part Three.
  11. A Pool Frolic: Part OnePart Two. and Part Three.
  12. A Cemetery Interlude: Part One and Part Two.
  13. Powder Blue Fur Doll: Part One, Part Two, and Part Three.
  14. A Milky Interlude 
  15. Rock Out, Cock Out/ Hang Out, Wang Out: Part OnePart Two, and Part Three.
  16. Cocktail Cocktale: Part One and Part Two.
  17. A Fairy’s Interlude: Part One and Part Two.

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A Fairy Finds Himself In a Forest

The Divine Diva Tour: A Fairy’s Tale focuses on the second half of its title, as our journey shifts into a more fairy-tale oriented atmosphere, starting with this glimpse into the forest. It’s a place featured in pivotal points of most fairy tales – it is danger and risk, power and might, magic and charm, transformation and realization – sometimes all at once. For the purposes of this 2005 journey, the fairy and the forest provide fertile prancing ground for reconciling childhood and make-believe, and the beginning of the discernment between fantasy and reality. 

~ The Divine Diva Tour: A Fairy’s Tale ~

  1. Pink Frilly Fairy: Part OnePart Two, and Part Three
  2. Homage to Herb: Part One, Part Two and Part Three
  3. A Purple-Hued Interlude
  4. Style & Panache: Part One, Part Two, Part Three and Part Four.
  5. Purple Puff Confection: Part OnePart Two, Part Three and Part Four.
  6. A Blue-Hued Interlude
  7. Fuchsia Fabulousness: Part One. Part Two and Part Three.
  8. Bad Boy Bangs: Part OnePart Two. and Part Three.
  9. Vanity Under Where: Part One, Part Two. and Part Three.
  10. Sugar Plum Ballerina: Part OnePart Two, and Part Three.
  11. A Pool Frolic: Part OnePart Two. and Part Three.
  12. A Cemetery Interlude: Part One and Part Two.
  13. Powder Blue Fur Doll: Part One, Part Two, and Part Three.
  14. A Milky Interlude 
  15. Rock Out, Cock Out/ Hang Out, Wang Out: Part OnePart Two, and Part Three.
  16. Cocktail Cocktale: Part One and Part Two.
  17. A Fairy’s Interlude: Part One.

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Trump is such a Cuck

And so is anyone who still supports this moron.

The world is laughing at him, and US. 

#FAFO

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