29
December
2012
No comments
December
2012
29
December
2012
No comments
December
2012
A Boston Evening
It is, and always has been, a place of refuge, of safety, of escape and fantasy. My bedroom in Boston is where I can shut it all out. The windows are usually open, letting in all the light possible, especially in the dark days of Winter. The sun will set, and I often find myself simply laying on the bed, watching it go down, then rising when it is already dark. It is the best place to be when the day turns to night.
28
December
2012
No comments
December
2012
28
December
2012
No comments
December
2012
28
December
2012
No comments
December
2012
My Booty is Hightailing it to Boston
Before the year ends I’m planning one more weekend in my beloved Boston. I recall sneaking in an end-of-the-year visit here last year as well, when my friend Kira unexpectedly joined me for one final hurrah before facing another Winter. The blush is already off the holidays, and when expectations are low it makes for happier results. For this weekend, I am looking for quiet and peace, stillness and meditation. And maybe just the slightest bit of shopping, because otherwise I wouldn’t know myself.
A book, some green tea, an afternoon in an empty bedroom. Solace and solitude.
27
December
2012
No comments
December
2012
I’m Giving It Away For Free
You are not going to believe what I am offering up for one lucky recipient in the Boston area: an absolutely FREE television set. It’s like practically new (circa 1990), has an immense screen (maybe 25″ and dwarfed only by its enormous bulky back), makes almost a stand-alone piece of furniture (it weighs a ton), and is yours for the taking (from my second floor condo in Boston, with no help from me because my back won’t tolerate it). Now, this is a one-time deal so you have to let me know if you want it – first come, first served. And remember – it’s 100% FREE. This is a steal. You would be robbing me blind with my hands tied. (Though the kinky will cost quite a bit more.) Contact me to set up a pick-up time for this once-in-a-lifetime deal! You will be nothing but disappointed!!
(Seriously, I don’t how to get rid of this thing. I’ve looked into donating, but no one wants to take it. I’m perilously close to illegally dumping it with a big ‘FREE’ sign on it, but always hated seeing that sort of thing on the street.)
27
December
2012
No comments
December
2012
Roses & Poses
Only a rose, dying away… so sang Little Edie as the house she lived in decayed and fell to pieces around her. We all have our ‘Grey Gardens’ moments, when the world passes us by, when we get stuck in a rut and seem unable to move forward, frozen in a moment of time that stalls and repeats. That kind of stagnation is death to me, and it’s time to shake the shackles in some way.
Like the faded rose seen here, there is a certain dangerous beauty to the past, even when it’s but an echo of former glory. The summer never lasts, and the winter is long. Our gardens are only in our memories now, slumbering beneath the snow, sleeping until the sun returns.
26
December
2012
No comments
December
2012
26
December
2012
No comments
December
2012
Cherry Light
And just like that, Christmas is over. We’ll get a few more days out of it, tie it into New Year’s and everything, but from here on out there’s nothing but a slow, or quick, fade. I did my best to get into the spirit, but sickness and residual strife were difficult to overcome. Maybe next year. That’s the joy of Christmas, you can always try it again when you’ve forgotten how awful it can be. For now, I look to the sun as it sets in the barren boughs of a cherry tree. Â The days are only getting longer from here on out, and it is the time to sow the seeds of change.
The warmth of cherry wood will see us through the remaining Winter. And what remains is the bulk of it, so buck up. This ain’t no cakewalk.
25
December
2012
No comments
December
2012
A Christmas Epiphany
I finally understand the cel phone/texting thing: so you can completely pretend what is happening isn’t. And I am.
25
December
2012
No comments
December
2012
Our Gay Apparel
Andy and I will be preparing for a family dinner today (I’ve already made the dessert, the candied yams, and the butternut squash soup), so I’m printing a holiday story seen here, written by a young boy’s mother. It resonates deeply with all of us boys who only wanted to look sparkly for Christmas:
Don We Now Our Gay Apparel: My Son’s Christmas Dress
It was the most sincere display of appreciation that my 5-year-old son has ever shown. He looked me straight in the eyes and said a very mature ‘thank you.’ The words were full of honesty, relief, happiness and a little bit of anguish.
“You’re welcome, baby,” I said looking at him with a smile and masking the pain I was feeling. “You look so pretty.”
My gender-creative son was thanking me for buying him a dress to wear to Christmas Eve dinner.
He had eyed the ensemble at Target weeks ago and asked to wear it for Christmas so he could take ‘fancy pictures by the fireplace and the tree.’
I told him no. Not because the outfit was made for girls and he is a boy, but because had I bought it then he would have wanted to wear it immediately and often and when we finally sat down to Christmas Eve dinner it would have been thrashed.
He talked about his ‘Christmas outfit’ nonstop and asked everyday if it was time to go buy it.
Today was the day. We got home and both ran up the stairs to my bedroom with its mirrored closets. I sat on the floor removing price tags while he tore off his ‘school clothes,’ which he wears as a disguise when out in society so that people will think he is all boy.
He wears ‘school clothes’ so that he won’t get teased, have to sit by himself at the lunch tables and so he will get invites to birthday parties. More than anything he wants to be thought of as ‘normal.’ But, he’s not.
He closed his eyes as I put on the black bubble skirt covered in sequins, the red long sleeved t-shirt that spells out ‘JOY’ in glitter, and the black sequined vest. I spun him around toward the mirror. He opened his eyes, took himself in and then thanked me.
My first reaction was to smile: He reminded me of when I was a little girl and wanted a show-stopping dress for the holidays. My dresses were made of scratchy fabric that made noise when I moved. I wore white socks with lace trim and stiff, shiny Mary Janes. I learned at an early age that beauty is pain.
My son looked sassy and beautiful. He looked natural, happy and truly comfortable for the first time that day. Then I felt pain. If the rest of the world could be more empathetic, accepting, welcoming and kind, my son could be this happy and comfortable all of the time. Because then my son could be a boy who dresses like a girl and not have to think twice about it. The world isn’t like that.
Other people can’t see the beauty in my son in a dress. I haven’t always seen the beauty either. Two-and-a-half years ago, this scene wouldn’t have happened: I wouldn’t have bought girl clothes for my son.
Never. Ever.
Back then, I felt uneasy when he played with Barbies. When he tried to dress feminine, I’d hand him his brother’s masculine hand-me-downs and tell him to put them on. I didn’t give him choices because I knew that his choices would be pink with sparkle and rhinestones. His choices would smell like the raspberry vanilla body spray he snuck from bathroom and hid under his bed.
Then I realized that my actions were telling him ‘you can’t be you because I want you to be what society wants you to be.’
My husband and I changed the way we were parenting. There was something unique about our son that we could choose to support or destroy. We had to follow his lead. He led us to the pink aisles at Target; and, that’s not a dangerous, harmful, unhealthy place for a boy to be.
My son’s Christmas dress is hanging in his closet. He checks on it before and after school and a few other times each day. On Christmas Eve, a dozen members of our family will gather around the table in honor of religious beliefs and to celebrate the passing of one year and the start of another. It will be the first holiday that my son will join us at the table dressed as a girl. We won’t care. We will tell him that he is beautiful, inside and out. And, we’ll mean it.
- This is my last blog post of the year. Holiday wishes and greetings to all of you! Let’s catch up in a few weeks.
- Love,
- C.J.’s Mom
Full story here: http://www.queerty.com/don-we-now-our-gay-apparel-my-sons-christmas-dress-20121220/#ixzz2G2Xd7Zfy
25
December
2012
No comments
December
2012
Merry Christmas to You
Instead of being a time of unusual behavior, Christmas is perhaps the only time in the year when people can obey their natural impulses and express their true sentiments without feeling self-conscious and, perhaps, foolish. Christmas, in short, is about the only chance a man has to be himself. ~Francis C. Farley
From my home to yours, I extend a heartfelt wish of ‘Merry Christmas’ to you. While part of me tries valiantly to maintain that I would do all of this with or without a group of loyal readers, that’s not at all true. This one goes out to all you wonderful people out there in the dark, the ones I’ve met, and the ones I haven’t yet had the pleasure of meeting. Thank you for visiting this crazy patch of the Internet. Sometimes it feels like you know me better, and care more, than my own family and friends. But that’s what keeps me going – it’s the key to my entire psyche, and to change it now would be… incomprehensible to me and all that I know. There is no other way – it’s simply too late. Now go and spend time with your loved ones or yourself, whichever is preferable… (I’ll be doing a little of both.)
24
December
2012
No comments
December
2012
A Kid of Christmas Past
He stands before the Christmas tree in his sleeper, the warm and snuggly one-piece pajama that has feet to slide over the carpeted floors. Captured by the flash of a camera, he looks slightly surprised, and a little bit haunted. He will not know why – he will never know why – there is a distance to his being loved. The quiet ones just don’t demand it that way. The wonder of Christmas does manage to transform – for a night, for a day, for the week away from school – and even though he is not in school yet he senses the difference.
In church babies younger than him cry and crowd into the cathedral, with parents dressed up and decked out as if going to a party. They have family dinners to attend, relatives to dismiss and impress, drinks to disguise, and quiet corners to find. We seem to want to escape these days as eagerly as we anticipate them. He knows nothing of this yet, and what he has heard of Santa feels too suspect, too unreal, and his mind will never quite get around it enough to believe. He is, already, inaccessible – perhaps the worst thing for a child to be. But it’s Christmas Eve, and he knows enough to pretend.
24
December
2012
No comments
December
2012
My Christmas Eve Outfit, The Rough Draft
This was the test run for what I am going to wear this evening – it’s my take on red and green – and in seeing how it looked in various light I made a slight variation. The sweater was just a bit too bright and bold – what I’ll wear instead keeps the chartreuse hue, but tones it down in style and texture (a brushed velvet replaces the sheen of the sweater, and the shade is taken down a few notches). “I have to think these things up…”
24
December
2012
No comments
December
2012
Caught Unexpected, Caught By Surprise
Every now and then I’ll read something and it will enthrall me with such unexpected gusto that I’ll find myself with tears streaming down my face before I can finish. Such was the case when I read Frank Bruni‘s latest op-ed piece in The New York Times here. He expounds upon his evolving relationship with his Dad as he comes to terms with his son’s being gay. It was such a surprising moment of resonance, I was not prepared for the waterworks to be released in such torrents. Chalk it up to a combination of holiday emotion, pent-up frustrations, and end-of-the-year sentiment. At any rate, give it a read.
