I’d like this to be a still from an old movie about two guys who fell in love during WWII.

I’d like this to be a still from an old movie about two guys who fell in love during WWII. I would like it to be romantic, tragic, and poignant like Casablanca. It would be great if such a film were made today, but I would like for it to have been made back in the 40’s. I would like to have seen it when I was a kid. I would like for this film to have helped me imagine falling in love with a man, and being so in love with him that I would risk everything, do anything to be with him. I would like for this film to have shaped my character and my expectations. I would like for this film to have affirmed a nascent dream that was just beginning to emerge in me when I was eleven or twelve.

Plastic Utensils

In the hospital they gave him plastic utensils. That was funny to him because he had always been quiet, never got into trouble, and he was often ignored. No one had ever noticed that his painfully shy exterior hid a savage and unstable heart. But one day he said to his doctor in a low and tremulous voice that he didn’t think he could ever be free until he pealed the skin from his body. Now they treat him as if he’s a dangerous character, speak to him using carefully modulated tones, check on him every fifteen minutes, even while he sleeps, and he is denied the use of real tableware, but at least they’re finally paying attention.

The Spasm Under The Scourge

"There are those for whom virtue is the spasm under the scourge, and you have listened to their clamor too much.”

I first read this quote from Nietzsche many years ago, and it has always stuck with me. I think I remember it because I know this is advice I should take to heart. I have listened to the clamor of those who would make me feel unwelcome and ashamed, and I’m going to try to stop giving so much weight to the opinions of those who are hell bent on bringing me down. I’m not saying I’m perfect. I know I can be a jerk, and I will try to keep myself open to constructive criticism. But a great big raspberry to those who think I should like women instead of men, and those who think I should be more masculine, and those who think I’m not trying hard enough to make friends, and those who think I’m not deserving because I don’t take better care of myself and stay fit, and those who think it’s tacky or creepy or strange of me to openly admit I appreciate the beauty of younger, pretty, slim and not so masculine men. A raspberry to anyone who takes the attitude that they’re better than me. I should turn a deaf ear to the clamor of those people, and I should remember I have a perfectly good deaf ear. Maybe fate struck me deaf in one ear to remind me I should only listen to half of what people say.

The Villain In The Piece

Growing up the son of a schizophrenic woman has, in a way, served me well. That’s because when you’re gay, it seems you have to assume that up to half the population is insane. They say that spiritual truth can only be recognized by those who are ready to comprehend it, and those who are not ready won’t see it even if it’s right in front of them. A lot of people are like that about the whole LGBT thing. You can tell them the truth, the honest truth, plain and simple, and still they cling to weird ideas about choice, endless wild orgies, recruitment of teenage boys and secret agendas. Whatever, hun. I just hope the fantasy version of me that’s running around in your head is much slimmer, dresses well and goes for the elegant, beautiful boys because if I’m going to be the villain I don’t want to be a slouch about it. :P