words, words, words
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If I begin to detail myself here, will you understand?
P. I am me
Q. I don't always know exactly who that is
R. I am Quaker
S. I like words and playing with them
T. I like genmaicha tea
U. I like the word napkin more than most others
V. I spend time walking my neighborhood
W. I cook rice often
X. I sleep well most every night
Y. I eat large amounts of fruit and vegetables
Z. I munch, sleep, write, create, cook, bike, watch, walk, listen, hope, learn, drink, live, breathe, touch, know, question, taste, copy, read, stare, carry, talk, dance, finger, try.
raisin@gmail.com
albums:
Magnetic Fields: 69 Love Songs
Erasure: I Say, I Say, I Say
Depeche Mode: Black Celebration
The Beach Boys: Pet Sounds
Marvin Gaye: What's Going On?
David Bowie: Hunky Dory
George Michael: Listen without Prejudice
George Gershwin: Porgy and Bess
Yo La Tengo: And Then Nothing Turned Itself Inside Out
songs:
Wild is the Wind: Nina Simone
Come Undone: Duran Duran
Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini: Rachmaninov
My Funny Valentine: Chet Baker
Feeling Yourself Disintegrate: The Flaming Lips
This Must Be the Place: The Talking Heads
Hyperballad: Bjork
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Wednesday, November 03, 2004
My candidate won - he'll be going to the U.S. House of Representatives. I'm proud of the work we've done to give him the chance to represent this district. My parting gift to St Louis. I'm not overly enthused because of the presidential election, but I'm trying to focus on personal accopmplishments and my upcoming move. I'll be in the District of Columbia next week, looking for a job, buliding a new home, dating a new man. I've sold my car, reserved a truck, and am anticipating biking through the streets again!
I'm also closing this weblog. I haven't been keeping it updated enough for the past six months. I don't write enough here, and am enjoying keeping my thoughts to my own personal writing. But what a time it's been. I started this blog to have somewhere to write about my feelings while sitting bored at work in the Air Force. It became a large part of me, a source of pride, of writing examples. I've exchanged good words with a goodly amount of people. Mostly, though, I've opened myself more than I ever thought possible. i feel powerful, strong enough to state my opinions, strong enough to understand my feelings. I'm anxious to move, to make choices I was denied while in the military. I still have parts to open, parts i won't reveal here or now. But I'm working on those, too, growing and expanding all the time. my eyes, my arms, my head, my heart, open to possibility, to the great perhaps.
It's misty in the central west end district of St Louis tonight. I love the way the trees and the houses drip at night in the fuzzy street light. I love the way my mind drifts after having too much to do for too long. This last weekend though, I gained more than I could have expected, walking in poor, mostly African-American neighborhoods, encouraging people to vote. I felt accepted, surprisingly enough. They were excited to vote, many of them had already voted when i talked to them on Tuesday. We felt powerful together, and maybe that's what being an American is all about (African or European). i never think of myself as an American; i'd much rather wear a flag upside down or half burnt in recognition of the suffering we've caused. But I can't discount the marvels we have here. I learned more about our greatness this past month than I have in my whole life.
I left the Air Force Academy in 1998 with a string of quotes in my head and printed underneath my picture in the yearbook. Only a few words were of my own making, thankful for help in finding my napkin. The string of words that follow me now are mine, and i am thankful for the help in finding my voice. And I have so many more napkins.
11:06 PM
Wednesday, October 13, 2004
Thanks Philo and Nancy! Who knew I'd wake up to open Queerday and find a farewell greeting from them. I just stopped working for them about two weeks ago because the job I've taken is all-consuming. I'll miss all the news and being involved in a great effort. and um, that picture, well, someone said it looks somewhat like me. who knows who it really is. well, i'm sure someone knows.
8:13 AM
Saturday, September 25, 2004
all politics all the time. that's me. I'm working for the Russ Carnahan campaign now, and it looks like i'll be doing that most every second until the election. not like i've got a whole lot going on elsewhere. here's some good news, too: The New York Times > Both Parties See a Big Increase in New Voters. yes, both parties are pushing non-voters to register, but it's clear from the article that the Democrats are winning that game. hopefully it will turn out the same way in the election.
Time to quit the library - can't help the kiddoes with their homework anymore, gotta help a good man get into the U.S. House of Representatives. I'll miss the kids. strangely, after only two weeks, i think a few might miss me, too. especially the girl who got me to help her with the pre-calc work - i've been having dreams of quadratic equations! gasp.
i was looking for direction right? i may have bit off more than i can chew. but i've always had strong jaws.
1:00 PM
Tuesday, September 21, 2004
I haven't written because i'm overwhelmed with what to write. There's so much news out there that seems important to me, but if the regular american public doesn't see it, does it matter? I'm increasingly frustrated with reading more and more news that makes me powerfully agitated but won't get mainstream play.
And then I've been traveling a lot this month, and planning to move to Washington DC. I'm looking hard for a job out there, while still applying for a job with the Russ Carnahan campaign (hopefully he will take over Gephardt's seat in Congress). I've got plenty to say, and I'm having trouble deciding what I should say, how much i should tell. I used to concentrate on my own opinions of the world, but i'm realizing that doesn't matter as much any more. You have to spend time developing your thoughts and opinions, but once they're developed, you have to do something with them, or they're pointless. I don't want to continue shouting without being heard. So i'm trying to figure out how to be heard, what I want to speak about, what I'm qualified to have a voice over.
How much can I say? what are the opportunities and consequences of my actions? If i tell you secrets, will it just be one more part of me that's open, or will it help me get to a next step?
1:06 PM
Sunday, September 12, 2004
i can't understand politics. I can hardly read the news any longer - it's full of implications i don't understand. Full of facts that should be detrimental to the Bush campaign but somehow aren't. it's full of intelligence nobody wants to act upon. maybe nobody's reading it anymore. it's not as if I've ever had a grasp on how other people behave. I've always watched my peers with surprise at how they act, with motivations completely different from mine. At least it seems that way, even if it can't be that way. i can't be all that different, even if it makes me happy to think I am. even if it makes me lonely to think I am. Who knows though. maybe there's something entirely different going on. something I can't see.
10:52 AM
Thursday, September 09, 2004
Talking to a friend of mine last week, we discussed the length of my hair, which often comes up because it's so different from who i was and so different from most other people around me. I know a decent number of guys who have long hair, so I didn't think it would be a big deal. I've been surprised at how alarming it is to most people. Since there are plenty of other guys out there, i figured it couldn't be a big deal. It is. Comments from strangers about how they prefer my hair when it was shorter, people telling me I haven't found a job because of my hair, my Mother, of course. My friend said I was brave to grow my hair out, to wear it in pigtails, to be me in general. i don't think much about me being brave but about other people being cruel. I figure I'm just being myself, which always surprises people. I've always tried to be that way, to some extent or another. What's dawning on me lately is how much grief i've taken over it.
The one legacy I carry from the Air Force is the constant mockery of who I am. I hoped desperately that would end when I left. It hasn't. It has lessened though, even if it's tough for me to see it. I'm more sensitive now to the taunts than I've been possibly ever. Maybe because i expected them to disappear, maybe because I've just reached a point that I can't take it any longer. not even the light-hearted teasing. Some people would say the years of ridicule should have made me tougher, that i can take it easier now. Strangely, they've made me weaker. I used to be able to handle it. people teased me in high school, but i didn't care then. I had lots of friends who liked me regardless, I had parents who backed me up, and I had a physique that nobody would mess with. I flaunted my strangeness because it bothered people. I used it as a weapon against them instead of letting it hurt me. The Air Force changed that. My friends were fewer, and I was constantly surround by the animosity. Of course, i would occasionally receive incredibly nice comments, this guy Sven called my room a haven once and I swooned. But the bad outweighed the good. Learning i was gay gave me fresh reasons to stop flaunting my weirdness - eventually, i figured, someone would connect the two, and i would suffer real consequences.
Becoming a C.O. challenged people further. I hid that from almost everyone I knew at the time, scared of what they would think. unfortunately, when i did tell them, they proved to me that I was right to hide it from them. My brother told me for the first time during his recent visit that he was proud of me for being a C.O. The impression I had when I told him about what was going on was that I was being stupid, should have just waited to get out. He couldn't figure out why i was doing it. I guess he missed the part where I was about to be deployed and wasn't likely to get out on time. Other friends I might have expected to support me have hardly said a word about it, have never even bothered to have a conversation with me about it. One friend did try to take up the slack and helped me out so much. But he and I found some friendship troubles when I began dating someone who, in retrospect, was the worst possible choice I could have made. That cost me a lot.
i was gonna have a big pity party, but I just realized how badly I dissed a friend of mine for an ungrateful lover. i was leading up so nicely to this great quote about guys who manage to hold onto their selves but end up scarred in the process. maybe it would be more apt to say that they end up scarring other people in their inability to handle the pain. ugh.
quick soap-opera story: a guy who has a partner starts visiting me from out of town regularly, doing work projects over the computer from my place. I needed someone to take care of me because i was desperately lonely - he, well, i don't know, maybe he loved me, maybe he was unhappy with his partner, maybe he was just wonderful enough to take care of me. as soon as someone i saw as better looking came along, I started dating him (I'll call him M) and told the first guy (I'll call him A) all about it, expecting him to be happy for me, since he after all, has a partner. Thngs get too serious with M, A starts distancing himself from me. I get upset about it, feeling wronged. A doesn't bother to call me back for two weeks after I finally get out of the Air Force, and I feel cheated. It takes me a year and a half to realize M was basically a gorgeous loser and A an incredible friend.
hmmph. the joy of seeing through your own dirty secrets.
11:58 AM
Wednesday, September 08, 2004
DC is really great. i could fall in love with it easily. the beautiful buildings, weird mix of houses, great trees everywhere, and tons of public spaces full of people. i felt like i belonged for the first time in a while - everyone was reading, whether on the metro, in the park, even walking along the street. tons of people, average people like me, were biking around, to get to work, for fun, for exercise, whatever. people dressed interestingly and boringly, there were cool shops and ethnic restaurants everywhere, and mostly a city full of randomness, you didn't know what the next street was going to look like, who would live there, etc. it seems so perfect, so unlike St Louis, Sacramento, Colorado Springs, and Tulsa - my past geography.
i know i'm missing out on a great opportunity to move to Minneapolis, but you have to make choices, and right now, I think DC is the best choice for me. If only for the people who at least seem somewhat like me. St Louis has been great, but I have explored so much of it alone, as if nobody in the city knew of the greatness we have. My favorite neighborhood here doesn't have one park bench, and though I have many times sat on the grass, on a stone fence, on the sidewalk, i've been the only one there, enjoying the air, been stared at by those who don't seem to understand the joy of being in a public space.
so i'm looking for jobs there, maybe a non-profit, some kind of low-level management job, maybe in a hospital. I don't know, but I hope i'm reaching in the right direction and I'll find something soon enough.
3:05 PM
Wednesday, September 01, 2004
i'm flying today to the district of columbia, for a visit, for a look, for a romp, for a possible move later this year. job-hunting has unfortunately taken over my life, but i'm hoping for more prospects outside of st louis. and of course, that sweet man who happens to live in the district is a fine motivator. and oh what a sweet man he is.
11:35 AM
Saturday, August 28, 2004
ABC News reports on a Republican party celebrating the life of Johnny Cash, but understands that there is a question in many people's minds about which party Cash would have stood for. His son says he would never have said and Roseanne Carter Cash says the estate supports the party because it is led by a friend of her father's but not because it supports the Republican agenda.
However, I think the article says it best with this quote,
"With a rough voice, Cash sang about the poor and the imprisoned. He said his black clothing symbolized the world's downtrodden people."
since when do Republicans care about the poor and the imprisoned? the world's downtrodden people? I would suggest Cash was not proud of either party and would hope that anybody who likes his songs would be more aware and more willing to help those Cash sang about.
2:11 PM
Friday, August 27, 2004
If I were only going to live for a few more years, if I didn't have to plan for the rest of my life, I wouldn't continue as I'm doing. I'd throw away most of the junk I've been holding on to, as if it matters to me, as if all this stuff really helps me get along. i wouldn't spend so much time alone, and I probably wouldn't work a bit. I imagine I'd wander around the country visiting friends of mine that i never get to see, that i tell myself are too expensive to visit. i wouldn't consider as many consequences, and i wouldn't dread getting older.
I don't want to imagine myself living forty more years. that's far too long - how could i possibly fill up that time? it's a weight on my head, thinking i have to live my life in such a way as to always have a job and back-up money in order to make it. i don't suppose this is up to me, whether i live two more years or forty, not unless I do something drastic. But, I wonder how much I can change the way I live my life. can i compromise, not waste efforts thinking i have to lay down plans for my life as if i can see the end and work towards it? can't it just do what i want to do now and if i look back and realize i've made a mistake understand that i didn't have full vision of the future?
I know what frightens me, making the same mistakes i've made in the past. i chose to play football for my dad and to reach the goals he said football would lead me towards. that was a bad decision, and i paid for it painfully. I chose to go to the air force academy to 'serve my country,' for the free education and to live in colorado. That was a bad decision, and I paid for that rather painfully as well. I'm not saying i didn't learn a lot from those mistakes, that I didn't gain quite a bit from the experiences. However, the pain greatly outweighs the benefits. I don't want to make such decisions any more. i want to choose things that will make me happy, that will help me help others.
I've put too different opportunities in front of me. I want to do them both, but i have to choose. i don't know where either will lead, I don't know which will make me happier. i really don't know how to make a decision. But i have to make it anyway, and soon. What i'm hoping is that it doesn't really matter. They're both good choices, and i'll be happy whatever I do. Nothing says I can't do one for the next couple of years and then move to the other, in that way, plan my next three years as if nothing's going to happen after that, then go through a rebirth and live a different life. I can't see further than that, so why should i strain my eyes trying?
11:51 AM
Friday, August 20, 2004
There's a new place two men or two women can go get married, The Gay and Lesbian Kingdom. Formerly known as Cato Island, The Isle of Heaven has an emperor, Dale, who is basically making a statement against Australia who may or may not own the island. the site is hilarious, and yet with a good political message.
12:05 PM
Thursday, August 12, 2004
she told me i've been a good son. i said, i'd tried, but she said i did more than just try, i was good to her and helped her and she knew it and was so glad for it. all the effort, all the work i've been doing, going to see her, calling her, putting up with her just to tell her i love with her. even though it frightened me, even though i wanted to accuse her of all sorts of things. it worked. just when i thought nothing in life works, when it seems that every effort fails, something i did worked. worked so well that when my mother needed to cry, she called me to cry in my ear.
please let those words replay in my ear everytime i wake up, let them paint over her past harsh words that hurt me for so many years.
11:40 PM
Wednesday, August 11, 2004
I've been taking some time to think about what I should and shouldn't say here. which means i haven't said anything at all. I have character trait of analyzing problems to the last detail and ending up with inertia because i can't solve the differences.
how much of my personal life do i include here? there are stories i want to tell, about growing up, about my family that frighten me. it doesn't make sense unless you know what i'm talking about, and telling you enough to understand is exactly what frightens me. this may become a moot point soon. but i won't explain that, either.
i'd also like to talk about a picture. of course, talking about a picture isn't half as good as simply showing the picture. but again, i'm afraid. do i give up my anonymity? most bloggers have, are willing to post pictures of themselves. I don't want to use this blog to show off; i'm tired of using my body in the gay world to help me make friends, mainly because it's never worked. my body has made love, jealousy, desire, attention and intimidation, but it's never made me a friend. it's been dangerous and powerful, much more so than i first realized. i began growing my hair and keeping a short beard first because i had never done it before but secondly, to change, and to become a little less attractive. or at least, only attractive to a certain crowd. this new picture has made me attractive to many once again, and it frightens me. i don't want to trap myself again, be a slave to my own lust, to go out just to make people lust after me, to realize just how many men want me. it's unhealthy and surprisingly lonely.
Both of these problems though are a problem understanding my entire self. my family, the way i grew up, is a part of me. an important part of me that i usually avoid because i can't make sense of it, because i'm afraid to tell most people about it. my body is also me, although it's taken more getting used to than i can explain. it has a power of it's own, and i want that control back in my own hands. at some point, perhaps i have to let go, realize that i can't control everything, that i just have to be who i am, no matter how complicating and confusing my self is. but at the moment, i don't have the support i might need to lean on while dealing with such confusion. and i'm afraid to try anything too difficult on my own.
12:05 PM
Tuesday, August 10, 2004
yes, I live in Missouri, and yes, I voted against amendment two which will now put a ban on same-sex marriage in the consitution because yes, it passed overwhelmingly. But I'm not as angry about it as some, though grateful to Jeff (aug 6) who wrote a letter to the Post-Dispatch after they outrageously said Missourians chose values on that tuesday, as if gay people don't have values, they just have lust. i completely expected the law to pass here, and most everywhere. after writing for target="blank"Queerday for almost a year, it's fairly obvious that most people hate us and many work to kill us. writing a ban on marriage, something we don't have anyway, into the constitution is not nearly as bad as keeping a law against us having sex, which was only overturned because of the grace of five people in the high court.
i'm moving anyway. missouri's never felt like much of a place to call home for me. i long for winter, a good solid winter with lots of snow and coats. i was thinking i would get it here, but i was way wrong. we've had three warm winters in a row, and i'm leaving. that, and friends are hard to come by in the anti-outsider city of St Louis. i'm always an outsider, so maybe i'll go somewhere where outsiders are appreciated, like NYC. but who knows about that.
12:37 PM
Tuesday, July 27, 2004
you have to work to find the good stuff. whether it's cheese or music, the best never lies around in wait. it hides in corners of libraries, behind the flour in the cabinet, in the way back of your mind. It's always been this way, as much as we look to the past as having all the things we loved. only some stores had the rare Transformers, only some beaches had warm water washing on them. I don't know if most people don't care about this or if they are just too tired to look anymore. it takes work. and it's easy to call the seekers haughty, because they know what they're looking for, because they're not willing to accept imitation. and of course, we can't be so picky about everything. we have to realize that onions pretty much taste the same no matter where you buy them, and it's just not worth the cost to dig them out of the ground yourself. and yet, we also have to know how to find, when we need it, the good stuff. We have to take the time to read the unabridged version, watch the director's cut, find the elusive deep orange paint. and sometimes it's worthwhile to wait for the right person, to tell all your stories, to show him your favorite haunts, the view from Grand Basin or from the Mississippi St bridge.
Life is pain, we all know that. but if you pay attention, you'll find more good stuff than you expected.
5:39 PM
Wednesday, July 21, 2004
I think I'm finally a man. I just successfully changed the battery in my car. yep, unhooked it, bought a new one, recycled the old one, put the new one in, and the car started. wow, i've fulfilled a gender stereotype. now i just have to learn how to grill something.
2:32 PM
Celebrating the 35th anniversary of the first lunar landing, a website is carrying digital pictures of the astronauts and their antics on the moon (as weel as lots of pre-moon pictures) The Project Apollo Archive
I've always loved this story, the seven missions to the moon. I did my first research project on it for my dad during the one year I homeschooled. The pictures make it more real than anything though. These are good images and contain a lot of memories for me, all the studying and thinking i did that year. It was a lonely year spent mostly at home, but the moon kept me company.
11:15 AM
Monday, July 12, 2004
In light of the alarming idea of the government postponing or delaying the elections
in November, I think we all need to freak out.
If the Republicans can get this one through, if they convince voters that terrorrists will attack us if we vote, i don't even know, how can democracy survive that?
Says the BBC:
"No US presidential election has ever been postponed.
Abraham Lincoln was urged by some aides to suspend the election of 1864 - during the US Civil War - but despite the expectation that he would lose, he refused.
'The election is a necessity,' Lincoln said. 'We cannot have a free government without elections; and if the rebellion could force us to forgo, or postpone, a national election, it might fairly claim to have already conquered us.'"
2:50 PM
Thursday, July 08, 2004
I'm learning a lot. I'm learning that my football story isn't as incredible as I think it was, and yet, because it does speak to more people than i would have expected, telling it is more powerful than i realized. I'm realizing that my dad may have been more wrong and misguided than mean and cruel. I'm learning that I can remember more than I expected. I'm realizing that we're all somewhat rotten. i knew that though. My attempt to fix that problem in high school was to simply avoid people. They couldn't hurt me and I couldn't hurt them. I'm learning that isn't life, it's closer to death. Even now, my strategy of avoiding my dad isn't working. He's around, and I have to talk to him; in fact, he has to talk to me. and maybe if i thought less about myself and more about others, I might realize that he's intimidated of me as a gay man that might infect him. I'm realizing that being jealous of other people's parents doesn't make me feel any better about my own, whereas trying to make my family better does help.
I'm learning that you can't get what you want. You can work for what you want, and you might get it, but you can't be assured of it. so at some point, you have to begin liking what you have. not to give up what you want, but to learn how to be happy now. maybe you'll learn that what you want isn't so important, not compared to what you have. maybe you'll learn that what you want is incrediby important, and it's worth the effort to work for it. coincidence is a blessing, and finding friends at the coffee shop is as wonderful as planning to meet up with someone there.
So I was naive in high school and my dad took advantage of it. And yet, he took advantage of me in order to help me achieve my goal of getting into the Academy. Unfortunately, I had told him that it wasn't worth playing football just to get in, and he took that side anyway. He still lied to me, still tried to make my life something that he wanted to live. But maybe that's not the worst thing in the world. What he did to my brother and my cousin who lived with us was worse, and so I suspect that he is naturally a villain. But, what if he's not? what if he's just a self-serving idiot?
Can I forgive him? How much blame do i take on myself for trusting him for so long, for not realizing how much he was lying to me? I blame him for upsetting the balance in my faith, and yet, that would have fallen apart eventually. of course, I hate that argument, that someone is blameless because the other person was too naive. Is naivete a willing blindness or a blissful angelic existence? Dante put parents who loved their children too much in Limbo, the circle right above Hell, where they weren't tortured, and yet, they were still being punished. Did my dad love me so much he wanted to make sure I got what I want, or did he act in his own self-interest, his parents having stopped him from playing football, wanting to have a son on the Air Force Academy football team? Was it a bit of both?
Father's Day came and went recently. This is the first year I didn't call my dad to wish him a happy day. Nor did I send a gift, though I had bought something for him. My brother hasn't wished my dad a happy father's day since he left high school.
I don't know. I'm reluctant to blame, reluctant to point my fingers. I grew up in a world that was harshly colored, where something is something, masturbation is sin, marriage is good, parents and leaders are good and ought to be obeyed. I can't agree with that. I don't want to say something is something anymore, that my dad is just a villain, that all leadership is wrong. I'd rather say that everything is everything. My dad is vile and friendly, funny and dastardly, wrong and weak, calloused and gives great neck massages. He used to sing with me on the ski lifts in Colorado, take me to the National History Museum, take us to plays in London. Even when he made me work out and I hated it, he would buy me milk shakes and compliment me before i went to school on how handsome i was. he is my inspiration when I race up a hill on my bike, and nobody beats me on a hill because he taught me to always race up them. he dragged me across Oklahoma on a seven day biking trip, on a tandem with him, and although I only sort of liked it, I love talking about that huge ride we did, how many miles we put in in a week, how good of an athlete I am because of him.
I love him. I hate parts of him, hate some of the things he did to me, the way he still is devious and has been so cruel about coming out. He was wrong to do what he did, and yet I still hope he did it because he sincerely loved me and wanted the best for me. He was short-sighted and self-serving. He's a human being. I don't want to be around him. I don't want to talk with him about this yet. i don't trust him. But I still have a lot of love for him, and I just don't know what to do with it.
2:02 PM
Thursday, July 01, 2004
Miss Kittin is really good. Her first solo album, I Com, is fun and very cool. I'm enjoying it perhaps even more than The Gift of Gab's first solo album, 4th Dimensional Rocketship Going UP, which is awfully good itself. Of course, neither are as good as finishing the football story. I still have to write some kind of a conclusion, roll in some understanding of it. I'm still contemplating how it affected me, how it continues to affect me, and how to get over that affectation. I guess I've been doing that since the story had its last chapter ten years ago this month.
But not right now. Today, since it's past midnight here, is my birthday. And i'm gonna work very hard to have fun. or at least not be sad. I've got two great new cd's, two great new bouncy balls - large size, one pink and one orange and yellow - some turkey burgers to eat for lunch during my long bike ride I've planned along the mississippi river.
so here's to a good birthday, and hopefully a great twenty-eighth year.
12:23 AM
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