In Anticipation of Torture

Woke up at 7:00. I had a 8:40 appointment with a dermatologist. I found another cyst on my head. Cost of the visit: $116. Now, I think I spent 10 minutes with this guy. He basically told me that the first cyst should just stay their because drainage may cause it to do some freaky shit. Plus hair has already grown over it. The second one is hairless and I look like I have some strange fungus in my head. The doctor said that my hair should grow back in about 6 months and since it has shrunken since the night I discovered it, dressed as a monk, drunk and passed out on my couch on Halloween night, there is no worry. So this news is priceless. I visualized lots of blood and people running around with suction machines and me asking for more shots of local anesthetic like the kidney biopsy that some Columbia doctor preformed on me a couple of years ago (at one point I confessed that I was an alien and he could find my kidneys in my elbow, and if he pinched my left pinky a little door would open up on my arm . . . they just could not find my kidneys, my lower back muscles were so thick it was moving the little wire needle); or the time last May when I had a rotten tooth and this dentist situated in my neighborhood shattered the tooth into three pieces trying to extract it, the assistant nurse had to leave the room because she got sick to the stomach, there were bits of tooth on the tip of my tongue and tons of blood; and, then there was the time I had malaria and they had to take a bone marrow sample and the resident or young doctor at the hospital in New Brunswick, NJ stuck a rod in my pelvis and then pulled the thick metal hollow tube out like he was trying to dislodge a car door and I laid immobile in my own bone marrow. I used to have a phobia to doctors, but after all the test, and prodding, and the catheter coming out of my stomach every three days now, I face the fact that I will bleed and be in pain like a victim of the inquisition. The problem I have is surrendering my body to other people that I should trust and them fuckin' up. And, to watch them try to guise the "transaction that has just transpired" in an aloft and clinical language dumbfounds me. Their faces always betray them. But many times, if it is a young doctor I feel bad for them. They have to present themselves to others and talk in a professional manner and then maybe try something they have never done before. Its humanity no? They didn't do it on purpose. That is the human part of it, they are really trying to help (except for that masochistic dentist!).

Sorry, new readers I am not so gory normally, but that was what was running through my mind this morning in the snow.

It snowed last night!

Now it is melting. But there you go, proof that it is cold in Tennessee. And before the weather got really crazy, there were real snow storms. The last one here was 2003, but they were always regular before global warming of whatever is going on. Most of my birthdays were snow days growing up.

That's all for today I guess. The post from the last couple of days took up some of my time. Now, there really is nothing else to report except that my diet is changing to Smoothies and Coffee . . . wonderful combination . . . all the nutrients that I piss out due to coffee's diuretic nature are replenished with vitamins and more water. All that nice vitamin stuff plus big bad caffeine gives me tons of energy.

Vrrrummm! Vrrrummm!

Nothing Up My Sleeve

Finally got the little bits of programming script and cutting and pasting down so that I can hook up some links to my little blog. Hopefully these are the first steps to me learning more about programming. So, I have added links to Stan and Woof on my blog. Stan is my cousin, and Woof is a porn star.

And that is about it today. It was computer day, and talking to my father day, which ended in some sort of understanding. He said: "I did not know that you felt so passionately about your work." I did not know what to say to him after that. Just an odd pause. What has he been thinking for nearly 34 years about me anyway?

I guess it is normal. I have chosen a profession that no one in the family has done -- and I am talking family reunion, hundreds of descendents of that coachman and woman servant circa. 1868 family reunion, not just in my house. Stan is in the same boat I believe too.

That is all for today. No deep thoughts, just back to the grind stone.

Crunkin' For Christ

While driving from work last Sunday night I decided to get something to eat from Wendy's. I could have eaten at the restaurant where I work, but the volume of rich food (one Brazilian co-worker says "strong food") is too much. I am gaining weight from eating that stuff. Wendy's is not the best choice I admit, but I pleased my conscious with a chicken sandwich over plates full of steak.

While in the drive-thru I heard an advertisement for a street carnival, or fair. It included a lot of community services such as job fairs and church based organizing. I don't mind, I think it is a good way to traditionally reach out to the community concerning a ton of things. And it being the eve of MLK DAY, it was an expected advertisement, but definitely not unwelcome.

Well, as I am turning the corner and concentrating on getting change I hear something like "Crunk for Christ" or "Crunk for Jesus" spoken by the announcer, and then on top of that I hear a church and a pastor's name. Well, I am tripping cause I want to turn my ear to the ad that is starting to go off, but I be darn if I have to give this guy 4 dollars and 27 cent and I like to do exact change at a drive-thru because it helps me get rid of all that extra coinage I lug around in the front seat arm rest.

So let's look at the ad and my delayed reaction.

1. Call me old fashion, but "Crunkin' for Christ" is not my idea of a worship service. Though it could be just that, me aging in a culture that is changing.

2. The bling-bling of our culture has infiltrated our churches.

3. Prosperity Preaching is not my idea of a sermon. I have sat through sermons where people say that if you just pray your bills will be paid. OK, I think that is a bit too simple. Shouldn't we be teaching a more balanced spirituality. At my church (an old fashioned one), the idea of publicly testifying to empty your heart of past fears or addictions is a true test of courage and ultimate surrender. I still find that beautiful and terrifying in my mind. Could I do that? Will I do that one day? Will I have to confess one day from a heavy heart? All are terrifying questions.

The idea that Christ helped you through something that was not right in your heart or your mind is what I am after in a sermon. Not to mention something erudite, dated with BC or AD, a narrative on the consistency of Rome, a speech about the old law verses Christ's new covenant, or a simple announcement that it is "healing time" after you had a hard week at work, etc . . .

4. And finally, ain't there something just not right about Crunkin' 4 Christ. Like does that mean we all go down to the church with a chalice of Crunk Juice 20/20 brandishing our gold plated, diamond encrusted crucifixes. To me it is a sign that the BET/MTV/VH-1 signifiers of our younger gifted and black culture are being noticed not only by the white folk that write dictionaries, but by our sacred black preachers. And maybe it is not that foreign to Moses and Obadiah, there are preachers here that are a little bit older than me, they grew up with hip-hop just as I did. But I can't help but see something short-sighted about it.

So, while I am on the subject of my MLK observations, I might as well post a couple of other things that I noticed this past "holiday season".

-- The very next morning, when I realized that my mother was off from work, I heard her laughing and clapping as Al Sharpton spoke to somebody on CNN or CNBC or what have you. Rev. Sharpton is very interesting. My mother was saying that he was telling the truth in his unmistakable hallmark cadence and candor. From his raspy voice and the timbre of his heaving and sanctified low tenor, I knew he was speaking before I got to the edge of the stairs. But there was something about what he said that tickles my cynically inclinations, a presumption concerning what MLK would say today about our youth is not welcomed on any occasion as far as I am concerned. I am not so sure any of us can say what MLK would find in our current plight of representation in the media verses the reality of our children. And honestly, I don't remember that much about what Rev. Sharpton had said, not like what I heard him say at Rosa Parks’ funeral, which was interesting to me. I was just passing through the family room that MLK Day morning. My mother grew up in Anniston Alabama where they turned over the buses and my uncles talk about the ideal world that was created by my great-grandmother and her and grandparent’s generation in a time of lynchings and slaughter in the streets. Rosa was something more to them than to me.

-- The second thing that happened on MLK Day was the fact that the Fireman called me from Hotlanta to say that tons of people were in the city. And my cousin warned me of that too. MLK is really a "holiday" where mass-o-Negroes congregate in our now spiritual home of Atlanta (not DC, sorry, you lost out). All these black butterflies drinking that peach blossom nirvana of free black culture, a good job, somewhat free sexual expression and crunk music for the love of Martin Luther is something new to me. It is a bit less than the million man march, but what became of that? It was a moment. A good one I believe. But finite for sure. Martin Luther King is a venerated Ancestor on the way to the supernatural in only 40 years. He has already got a festival. He already has a gospel. And He is already being misunderstood. In a generation we might start giving gifts.

-- Atlanta brings us to the idea of Chocolate Cities. DC lost out, but New Orleans really wants to be a big ole glass of Ovaltine. Who knew? While coming home from work on MLK night after serving food to some white folk with my Mexican, Honduran, Brazilian and El Salvadoran friends and glances at the Ultimate Fighter matches on the television, I opened the door to hear something about the mayor of Nawlins talking about the N.O. being a chocolate city and some other things that did not come out right. My mother was half sleep on the couch. She woke up, told me that people were upset about the comments but did not know why. She was looking at some pundits on Fox News or CNBC, which is rare for her, but she really wanted to see why the white folk were going crazy. I just went upstairs. As I was climbing the 4 steep steps to the kitchen I heard ". . . blah, blah, blah, (H)e repeated his imaginary conversation with Dr. King . . . blah, blah, blah . . . " or something like that from a correspondent on the tube.

I think that New Orleans has gone through a disaster and, without the pure fiscal and nakedly corporate resources of New York City, finds itself still out in the middle of the sea that just invaded it. There are many nefarious interest and forces that hunt on the poor and their property. Ray Nagin is trying to manage a city in 2006, but decides to use references to the 60's civil rights movement in order to talk about race, his constituency and the problems of class. I have not figured out exactly how I feel about it. I just know that it was politically unwise, whatever he said.

-- So, Nagin's speech reminded me of the Boondocks MLK Day episode, which I did not see in its entirety because I came in late from work again. MLK was talking to a bunch of people in a church that were busy crunkin', dancing (is that the same as crunkin’?), and fighting. He used the "N" word, which was funny to me in away. I wanted to see it from beginning to end, just to get the full context of Martin Luther King's speech in that pulpit. But I missed it. But I did think of crunk music again, and how I have been gone 4 years, but America looks so different. Maybe I have been away from Nashville's black community, the community where I grew up, for 15 years or more and the crunk thing still sits wrong with me just because I have different musical taste. I just don't see it. I know crunk comes from me and my high school chums gangster walking in the late eighties, but from that where has it gone? I was here for only that moment. 1988-'91 or '92 was just a moment.

An Ordinary Day's Thought on Haiti

There are a couple of things I wanted to mention over the last couple of days but have not had a chance. My vacation was pretty intense and I must admit that when I went to work yesterday I saw many things in a different light. Financially, I just don't need this waiting job since the pay is so low and I am feeling better. Ready to get back into the world I guess, though on this go around and after all the things that happened in Cologne, I am convinced that most people do not need writers and language. Even the business students a the school I taught at in Germany really did not need language, they just wanted vocabulary words. Plus, the business professors there switched out language instructors like used card decks in Atlantic City. To study languages and literature is a rarefied sport and unless you are moving in a community of writers and teachers most people believe that you are not working at all. Typing is not working. LOL

A List Of Things In My Brain Meant To Be Told And Savored For An Uneventful Day

1st Thing
My cousin from Atlanta read the blog. He said that he heard many different voices in my writing. I tried to explain that I like to use many different voices when I write. I like the parenthetical notation, the "on second thought", the after thought. He said that he thought it was multiple personalities and started to laugh. It reminded me of when I was talking to my stepmother about Jason's Lyric I think. I told her it was a good movie, but could have been a great movie if the plot was tweeked this way or that. She then said she did not think it was that deep. She is an accountant.

I think that through my blog, my cousin has seen a part of me that he is not sure that he likes. I am a cynic. And he is not. And now I wonder how he missed that part of me. I think that it is because with family I am a bit different as we all are. I just shut my mouth most of the time because if you mumble in a southern home there is always aunt Dorothy or Peggy asking you to repeat yourself. And sometimes they laugh and sometimes they don't. But me and Stan are always meeting in DC, LA or Atlanta outside of all that. I wonder how he missed my cynical side. I wonder if the line of demarcation is drawn by my pre-formed persona -- my performance of sorts -- or his perception of me?

2nd Thing

I

I have been reading J's Theater. His blog is like the damn New York Review of Books. It is an education unto itself on all things deep. J mentions in his January 7th post the death (apparently suicide) of the Brazilian head of the United Nations peacekeeping force in Haiti General Urano Texeira da Matta Bacellar. This is unnerving. First, I wonder what he saw and who he confided in concerning the turmoil that has hit Haiti. Second, J mentions La Tortue, who I believe has good intentions, but returned to his homeland in a power brokering position with little idea of how bad things were in terms of the everyday life of the average Haitian. I remember when the floods happened in Gonaives, the look of disbelief on his normally big and jolly African chieftain face. I remember him saying that the people of Haiti were suffering neglect. And for that split second I remember the look on my father's face when we were working in Jersey City after I got out of college. It was as if my father left his upper-middle class world for the first time and entered the inner city for work. That world was one he was very unfamiliar with, growing up on a farm and all. But, when he worked with the people and saw the dilapidation, he felt as if things had been neglected. For him, it was the same as walking out of a house in 1962 and returning in 1993 to find the wallpaper had buckled and bubbled; the ceiling's leaks vibrating outward in brown rings; and, the stray animals walking in and out of his old home seeming less than vagrants. And looking at La Tortue, I saw that glimmer in his eye. An entire mountain was moistened and slid down upon this city of Gonaives, what could he do? There is no amount of career idealism masked as administrative experience that can combat such a situation. And in the end, what good is all of the words and cultural knowledge in the shadow of such violence. Super literacy does not defeat illiteracy as much as we may like to think that it does. I have not keep up with Haiti as much as I used to in the last year since I got knocked on my ass. But the despair and senselessness of the situation is mind numbing to me.

And that is the feeling I hear in peoples voices concerning Haiti. And now, I am hearing it in the voice of people who study the Caribbean and want to champion it. It is a level of tiredness coming from the intellectual class in this aftermath of 200 years of independence. Something that looks so vainglorious in history presentations, slave conferences, linguistic studies and literary critiques, but in reality is far less. It is ashen, with black skins thrown from here to there. Running in the mud. Eating cakes made from clay and salt, baked in the sun.

One friend and researcher talked about "that being Haiti"when confronted with the severity of the situation. Another friend that bailed from the halls of a literature department into an administrative position said "things will never change" after her work there trying to empower Haitian women. And the latest came from a department head. Upon hearing my history thesis idea concerning the idea of Haiti in the late 18th/early 19th century formation of PanAfricanism (still in the air, whole project still pending, I want a real job), said: "What is wrong with Haiti? It has been 200 years. They haven't gotten it together yet." And her family is from Martinique. After testing my French (I failed in pronunciation of a certain word) I was dismissed from her office -- nicely I must add, and with good advice concerning the politics of the university. She seemed to be a real meat eater and a cynic. Good for surviving the rigorous bullshit of university posts.

So, upon hearing of this suicide I became a little depressed again. Brazil has been doing things here and there for Haiti. The Brazilian football/soccer team played in Port-au-Prince a little over a year ago. And the high profile of the Brazilian lead UN forces coupled with the newly elected Lula made me think that somehow a real PanAmerican effort to save Haiti could be forming. But now, it all seems to be a downward spiral with very little chance of a significant change. Did the UN ever get the requested number of troops for the Haitian crisis? And as long as our current political landscape stays the way it has, and as long as the United Nations is over stretched with disasters in Africa and Southeast Asia the 8.5 million castaways on "that half" of that unspecific island in the Caribbean will be stranded at sea. I wonder who notices.

II

I decided to pick up one of the few things I have been able to salvage from my life's recent tumble to middle Tennessee (Middle Earth). When I got back from Germany last year, I decided to pick up a copy of the magazine BOMB. The Winter 2004/2005 issue is dedicated to Haiti. I have not finished reading the whole thing one year later. I skipped the Stuart Hall interview with David Scott, but read the majority of the issue before shelving it. After the suicide of the UN General I decided to revisit the Evelyne Trouillot interview conducted by Edwidge Danticat.

When I read it last year I was interested because I had read Haiti, Nation Against State by Evelyen Trouillot's brother Michel-Rolph Trouillot in Germany. I checked it out of the University of Tuebingen's Political Science Library while I was working between there and Reutlingen. The book was recommended by one of my mentors in Paris and was a blessing in a world where Haiti is not even an after thought. Many Germans thought I had said Tahiti when explaining my interest and that particulars of the Haitian world. This time I re-read the article because I was looking for traces of a tangible move toward resolution and problem solving in the face of terrible tragedy, because in 2004 the fire was a flood and the interview was conducted sometime after Gonaive.

In a way, I felt that the article's questions and answers were following a sort of prefabricated idea about discussions concerning Haiti. Lately, I have started to feel a sort of phobia concerning Haiti and its workings in the North American cosmology of race, and the PanAfricanist project. This comes from the fact that I am not Haitian and I am not a first generation American, like my friends are and the way many of my professors and fellow graduate students were. This automatically put me at a certain distance, because whole conversations switch to questions concerning why I am interested in Haiti, or concerning my abilities in French or Spanish. And if those answers are not up to scratch we move on to issues of "seriousness", the ultimate dental floss thin measure of dedication and progression in the craft of intellectualism. In every conversation concerning Haiti or the Caribbean I feel the Gringo flag raised and with time it may lower, or it may just wave and waiver, tittering from side to side until my spirit leaves my comfortable upbringing in Tennessee, and my memories of ancestors on the Gulf of Mississippi (where slave ships landed) and Northern Alabama, to walk to my adopted home of New York City, full of first generations from all over, discussing identity in terms of home verses homeland. I become foreign by the end of conversations concerning C.L.R. James and Fernando Ortiz because this is my home. My identity is set. America is the metropolis, I do not gaze to Port-au-Prince, Havana, Madrid or Paris.

It was only after living in Germany that I realized that I was a foreigner in the certain circles of New York City. I would never and can never conduct a conversation concerning the Caribbean the way many colleagues can. And they will never understand me because many have not been South. Many do not know much about African Americans here. Many take for granted that the only possibility that we have is the urban mass marketed world of our North Atlantic flavelas scattered between Sugar Hill to the tip of the Bronx, from Brooklyn to the sea. New York intellectual Black folk and Latin folk have it all summed up. Being bused 45 minutes into the wilderness for my first day in the 1st grade does not come onto the screen. It is not part of the hip-hop generations master narrative, though we sung Rapper's Delight on our way there. History is scientific in those circles. Urban culture and its multiplicity is its specific code of arms. It is about taking the Western Cannon to task. It is not about feel good politics, it is not about something subtle or overheard conversations concerning your mother when she was 13, a great-uncle dead at 11 or the Klan. It is not a HBCU kind of thing.

So, in this interview, I am sensitive to the code words of that empirical world of thought. Issues of writing and memory; the purpose of the writer in his or her own time; Kreyol's rise; French's acceptability; the government's responsibility; the beauty of a Haitian landscape ; its excavation by hungry hands; Duvalier; Aristide; Dessalines; reparations; the bicentennial; and bits of Haitian literary history all swing and pirouette like phantom dancers waltzing above our heads, as Haiti bubbles and seeps its nutrient bloated river banks into the Atlantic or Caribbean sea below.

There is reassurance in Trouillot's answers. There is an optimism that the Haitian government will pull itself together and be proactive in changing the conditions of most of the people. That was published one year ago. Now, in light of this suicide, I wonder what is really happening. I wonder if her hopes have come true in her beloved Port-au-Prince. How do I know? I am just looking on the sidelines from Middle Earth.

I know that Trouillot's work is enriching, and that of her whole family is a priceless addition to the world of Haiti that one finds in books, that the West finds in this oddity of little pickaninnies defeating that little emperor. This country, the oldest Black Republic, the poorest country in the Western hemisphere does deserve better, but in a world where increasingly I see the value of letters diminishing, how does a writer/scholar enrich Haiti and its soil and those dependent on that fleeting dirt?

The interview does break the mold in the end when Trouillot talks about Haitians needing to confront certain subjects such as AIDS, the depiction and treatment of women, and creativity as an antidote. She does turn her pen to larger issues besides the revolution and the dictatorship in the hopes that people will start to talk about the sinister cocktail of circumstances that are following a free falling Haiti -- a Haiti no longer on the edge of the abyss.

I must admit that I found it hard to read the article, partly because I read it in parts. Part of it at before work, part at work and part this morning. Another reason is that I am out of my normal community of writers and historians and am stuck here, in a place where I can't talk about that world. Everyone seems too preoccupied with their own problems. And maybe that is the root of Haiti's problem. It needs an intervention. It needs a benevolent benefactor, a world philanthropist, an army of ecologists, an industrialist, a pedagogic magician and a political party with a plan. But I am afraid that we continue to waltz, conducting our Haitian conferences increasingly out of sadness, or possibly to simply tell whitey that we are different, or to tell African American how different Haitians are from that experience . . . I am just not sure anymore.

Now, it is another year of the down slide. CNN has not given much attention to Haiti since the mud slide, and the tsunami in Southeast Asia and Hurricane Katrina have devoured our attention spans. I found out about this suicide in Haiti from a friend. I wonder what else I have missed, I do not scour the internet for bits of information the way I used too. You see, I was besieged by problems of my own in 2005. It has been too much for me to formulate an articulate answer to a question being thrown to me from the North, let alone glance down below my feet to see if Haiti is still simmering, is calm or showing signs of erupting.

3rd Thing

Still working on links. Hope to have it mapped out soon.

4th Thing
"Check on it" by Beyonce and Slim Thug is on constant repeat. I love this song. It puts me in a writing trance.

----
Note: Yesterday while trying to explain what went down to co-workers in my broken mixed Spanish (and that is mixed with Mexican and El Salvadoran words for many obscenities and male and female body parts) and Portuguese I had a dual linguistic break through. I learned that cousin is Primo and not Primero. It seemed natural to me to say "first" like "first cousin" but Angela giggled and corrected me. Too late, I have named a whole post Primero.

And Angela? She learned that "parents" is just mother and father. She used "parents" like the word "family".

Just part of learning a language from the people and not a book. The people that I know that swear by the book don't hold down jobs. Meanwhile those that learn a language by working, learn just as much verbally if not more. Plus, they are paid to learn the language in a way, with promotion of linguistic skills matching a promotion in ones pay check. Tell me who is the smarter one.

I am really anti-book today.

A bit cynical.

No?

Screw it.

I am going to listen to Beyonce a little longer and cook Sunday dinner.

Doors

Vacation is over.
Working on trying to set up links on this blog.
Will read mail later today.
I have to plan this German trip.
The great reckoning is what I am calling it in my head.
There are some personal and family oriented mistakes attached to my return trip.
Will leave it at that.
Let's call that part of my non-blog life.
Plus . . .
I have to work today.
Maybe catch a movie.

I got home yesterday about 6:30 central standard time from Atlanta. I drove up to the bookstore and wished friends a happy new year. I have not seen them for a while. I was looking for one of the workers there. He had invited me out to the radical fairy retreat on Short Mountain. I have been hesistant because he asked me how I would feel being the only person of colour there. If I would find it problematic.

I wanted to say, "Let's not talk about my first publishing job in NYC, OK. That was very uncomfortable. And teaching and consulting in Germany was also pushing the envelope."

But note to anyone white reading this page. I do not speak for the rest of the race on this natually, but if you inform a black person like myself, Littlemilk, that I am going to be the only person of colour in your office, retreat, office retreat or establishment I will not be offended. But it will signal me to look out for white benevolence, and that can be demeaning because it makes it, as if, I can't do anything without a little bit of help from my white friends (whose view of me is riddled with stereotypes). It signals that I am somehow inferior. White Benevolence doen't use the front door, a liberal Foucault quoting paternalist just slips the insult in through the back. But I love my friend at the bookstore. He was just being honest.

Which brings me to this idea of doors. I was the first one in the house last night, so when my mom opened the door last night after my arrival I saw the funeral program in her hand but asked anyway, about where she had been. She said a funeral. I looked through the funeral program. It was of a childhood friend I had not seen since I was very young. We went to the same church, though I don't go to church anymore. She was 34. Just turned 34 Christmas Eve actually. She died of cancer. I remembered her face immediately. Then I saw a picture with her and her younger sister, whose name fell into my mind quickly. The younger girl is about the same age as my sister. I was very sad.

My mom talks about funerals all the time now. That is what she does. She talks about the dead and diabetes. I guess she is nervous that I am going to die before her, but that is starting to wear me out. It was at that moment that I felt my vacation was over. A little bit of time passed and soon we were laughing about other things concerning my trip and my cousin. I also had a Stout, which is a great way to cut the edge off of any situation.

Then I got ready to go to a party being thrown by the Brazilians. Ms. A. called me when I was 15 minutes outside of Nashville to say there was going to be a party. So I went. It was cool. Good music. Nice people and tons of women. It was as if I went from my cousin's house, opened the door to Nashville life, and ended the day in Brazilian exile life. All with a turn of the key.

When I got into the living room of Ms. A, there were about 9 Brazilian women there dancing in the middle of floor. It was like I left Boys Town in Atlanta and entered a sorority house in Nashville. The party was alright. There were a couple of American male members of Nadia's band their. She is Ms. A's roomate from Brazil and plays bass. And there was one guy from Peru there too. So there were a couple of guys, a lots of girls and much food. I thought it was cool. I danced with Ms. A and Nadia. The other girls I chatted with shortly but it was difficult because my Portuguese is not too good yet, and they were speaking to themselves. All of them beautiful. I liked them. Lots of smiling and glancing. Many of the chicks left shorty after I arrived. I got there about 12:00 pm. And dancing with A. is nice because she is so soft and lady like and I feel sturdy like a tree when I am with her. I keep my back straight and my hands firm and tight and we do the steps together. I am just not confident enough in salsa or samba to lead. And that is very important when with a woman. Nadia and I just jumped up and down listening to Gilberto Gil's tribute album to Bob Marley. It is a great album. It doesn't sound like him at all. Not that he sounds bad in Portuguesse, but his voice is different in English.

Then I sat with memebers of the band and we talked. Nadia did a samba in the middle of the floor, and I meet Vivi's boyfriend from Central Europe. We talked a bit in German. He appreciated my view on the advantages and disadvantages of Europe. And I appreciated hearing someone trying to deal with the cultural differences and major shock after traveling from the Old World into the New. It really is not about Germany and America in my mind. It is more about societies based on long term planning, strong national identities and structure verse the Americas with all its cultural/racial mixing, shifting internal economies (Das Experiment and many of my students think the Americas are primitive because our social and economic systems do not take care of their own citizens . . . for them that is the same as '"failure") and relative freedom in terms of finding a position in the market place.

When me and Nadia started to dance, Vivi's boyfriend said "We don't have this in Europe." I turned around in mid-step and told him, "Yes, I know". We both smiled. In short, if you want to go skinny dipping and not get any crap over it, I suggest Europe (at least central, I am not so sure about "Catholic Europe", they got a different modus operandi. Stay Central and move toward the North Sea for skinny dipping). If you want to brake dance, samba and listen to house music all in the same evening, stick to the Americas. Anywhere will do.

And that was the night. One of the musicians was busy trying to talk to Ms. A. All men do, and she has a very good way of seeming interested and disarming at the same time. I will see her today. We will talk about the car situation (her search for a 2,000 dollar car), which is a story I promised a while back, but will write later.

Nadia is brillant though. She tours with these guys as a bass player in a country band. They just got back from Japan. She then announced that country music is boring, while her two bandmates were disecting the Gilberto Gil and MPB instead of enjoying it. I should not say that . . . that could be the way they enjoy the music. One commented: "This is such happy music." The other said he got tired when he danced . . . I just looked at him. I never get tired and I am approaching middle age. Could do it all night like I was 18 . . . minus the 40 pounds.

The drummer was trying to get the beat, and the guitarist was sipping wine and listening to Gilberto Gil like he was tasting it too and Nadia was trying to explain that Gil is not a politician. He is an appointed minster. I got bored a bit, Ms. A was singing with her imaginary microphone, I started to belt out those high notes of Gil and Nadia started to dance again. We made an imperfect samba a couple of times. Then Vivi and her boyfriend said good buy. Then I found my jacket. Danced to one more song. Said good bye to the wine sipper. Kissed Ms. A on the check. Said bye to Nadia's drummer from New England. Kissed Nadia and said I would come back next week to make fish soup.

Walked out into the snow.

Started my car.

And drove to my old Nashville door.

Spring left on yesterday.

After the big rain.

And the thing that looked like a funnel cloud

Somewhere south of Chatanooga.

Bears, Firemen, Sushi and Looking for a Greener Pasture

I visited the city a bit more yesterday. Had a good time. Watched my cousin finish his site, and hung out with the Fireman. We went to a leather store. It was nice. He said that I have a nice body, I always feel like a medical experiment due to all the visits to the doctor for my diabetes, so I can't really say at all now a days. Especially since I gained about 40 pounds last year. Part of it was due to my more efficient digestion and processing of nutrients with my new insulin regime and the pump. The other part is the Southern Diet. And the last fragment of my weight game comes from not exercising.

I could get into the whole thing about always walking and riding my bick in NYC and Europe, or into better eating habits overseas, etc . . . But I won't. It just waste my time in dealing with where I am right now.

Anyway. I was looking at all the leather gadgets and I thought that some were very interesting. Others were freakin hot and I couln't wait to squeeze my fat ass into the leather and latex pants. There were also these blue jean overalls that said Pig on them. That was nice too.

The fireman seemed in the right place. Like he really wore a couple of those uniforms himself, but to save lives, not for parties. The firman is very interesting. The way he talks about medicine and the calls he has been sent out too is very interesting. And his view of Atlanta is interesting too. As I was getting into the car, I grabed a newspaper dealing with the leather scene and I realized that I have seen my body transform in the last year. Partly due to age, partly due to diet, partly due to getting a handle on my health. I am becoming more like those guys in the picture. I just need a consistant training schedule and, Bam! I will be staring at the Eagle. I asked the fireman if I was turning into a bear. He said no. But, I think age, my body and my taste (big hairy masc. male bonding straight or gay, over twink disco lights . . . though those have their place) are pushing me out. I am on the search for a new community. Running around and being the only black guy or the only non-straight one or both for 4 straight years really sewed my lips together. Like I didn't comment on all that I saw. Plus so many people thought that I could not speak German, when I could. I just did not feel like relating what I really thought because it would be belittled anyway. I soon, gravitated and made my own little small clicks. But none in the hairy man department. This is so new. It doesn't matter. I think sexual taste change all the time, and depending on what you have to deal with in life.

The fireman also said that he could see my package yesterday. I did not see it, and never pay attention to that on myself. The fireman said that it is because I am bisexual . . . I am never aware of my dick's presentation like gay men are. I chuckled. Very interesting hypothesis. Could anyone expand on that theory, class? I would like to here personal observation before moving on.

Anyway. I watched cousin do his thing yesterday with clients visiting and everything. His website is almost up and I will have to get a link together, as well as to all those other blogs that I love on the net. I have found a good number dealing with the academe, sexual identity (by normal everyday people), political issues, fashion, glam, etc . . . and I will share cause I think others may enjoy them, even if they are not all literary and political, etc . . .

So I guess I am mixing things up.

Wanted to go see what this Flex is all about. But I did not have the chance. I stayed with the cousin and then left him for a little while in the afternoon. Instead of more boys (it is vacation), I decided to have the thing that for me is far more satisfying than sex. I love Sushi (no pun intended). I know saying sushi is more satsifying than sex is very single, white and female middleclass . . .what am I suppose to say . . .BBQ Ribs? Go screw yourself if you think that way? I guess I will screw myself later. Doesn't look that hard (no pun intended). There was a guy at Swinging Richards that looked like he could do that/

I had one small Saki. 1 seaweed salad. 2 Rock and Roll rolls which were basically eel with avacado. And Ahi Poke. It is a raw Tuna salad. Very good, though I thought it was a fresh tomatoe salad at first and sat waiting for my main dish, till I realized that the waitress said Ahi Poke when setting it down. The place was trendy. Nickiemoto's is the name I believe. There were many gay couples inside. Very preppy with their blue blended shirts that had a slightly starched sheen coupled with mustard yellow tinged khakis and laser pearlie white capped teeth. Their skin was perfect, their hair gel gave them the look as if they just came back from snorkling in Mali and their small time chatter was devoid of any seriousness or pitty. Life was a party at every booth. And the women were happy too.

I was sat by a beautiful drag queen that was on her way to becoming unspookable. She had a little raspy voice. I wonder if getting your Adams apple shaved would help. I know it does cosmetically. All her mannerisms and politeness was so genuine and sincere I touched her on her should like she was a woman. The real bonified female waitress was also attractive and straight forward and we had a little tension. I think it was not so much sexual (though it was there), but from me knowing what it is like waiting a table and being very smart. Which she was. And she had some experience under her belt in life too. She was the perfect server.

The bill was $32.89. I gave a $7.11 tip for a total of $40.00. Flex would have been $35.00 not counting drinks or whatever they have in there. I made the right choice.

I have not had sushi in forever. It was perfect except for the hiziki. It was too cold and did not have enough sesame seed oil for me. The seaweed was blanched too long too.

Now. I am sure such comments about the over blanched seaweed is very faggoty behavior. It must balance out my D+ in the "package awareness" department some how.
---------
Otherwise the ride back to Tennessee today was very nice. You must see how Chatanooga is situated. It is in the more mountainous region of Tennessee in the southeast. After you cross Mount Eagle coming from the South, then it is more flat and starts to transform into the Tennessee valley.

For those of you that do not know, Tennessee is divided into three regions. The mountainous East, whose regional capital would be Knoxville. The Tennessee Valley in the middle, which is capped off with the city of Nashville, the actual state capital. And the western third is part very flat and fertile and very condusive to planting cotton and other crops. Its earth is feed by the Mississippi river and its regional capital is Memphis. That is why we have three stars in our flag; why you do not find many agricultural plantations in the middle and eastern part, but much livestock and horse breeders; and, why today was so nice since I have not spent much time in the mountainous part. Just around Mount Eagle. Chatanooga looks geographically very interesting. It is so massive. It is just wilderness.

20th Century Poets, Injections in the Face, and the New Cinematic Gay Craze.

Well, yesterday was very boring. I basically took my cousin to work and came back to the apartement. But don't get me wrong, boring is really the wrong word. It was just uneventful.

Today was a bit different. I got up and got some coffee. I needed it because I have had some heavy little revelations over the past couple of days. First, was the book of poetry that I bought. I read a bit of Cavafy and a poem by Luis Cermuda called "Birds of Night". Both were very nice. They talked about relationships between men in a way I forgot. Now with the electronic age, men don't even talk anymore. It is like sex is up for grabs, but I am afraid that HIV is too.

Which brings me to another deep point. Here in Atlanta I see so many spas that are catering to positive men cosmetically. The latest thing is injectable poly-L-latic acid for the "restoration of facial fat loss". I think it is a great idea, don't get me wrong, but HIV seems to very industrialized, sort of like diabetes (my thing right now). It is a bit nerve racking to me, because it is the idea that you can be and will be healthy by looking healthy . . . and is that the case? And what does your world and life look life if your drug cocktail run you 1500 a month. My little diabetic bill has effected the quality of my life dramatically, especially in the last 12 months . . . add HIV to that. Gee whiz? And if you are a college adjunct, a writer or an artist, forget it! You will have to change professions. Or what about a place like Germany, where doctors turned me away because I did not have insurance (a gay doctor in Stuttgart did that to me, and I thought he would show some solidarity . . . fuck him and the whole fucking city . . . fucking ass wiped, custard lipped motherfucker . . .sorry, had to let that out . . . I got that random cursing syndrome brought on by extreme moments of stress . . . I think it my be hereditary).

Which brings me to gay cowboys and Brokeback Mountain. A bunch of white gay guys are telling me to see and support this movie, but something deep inside of me -- next to my Spike Lee bone -- is not responding in the same way as people saying, go see Malcom X. I am wondering what this is about? This deaden feeling inside. In analyzing my feelings, I get that same ackwardness I felt when an old co-worker talked to me about Jane Austin and Pride and Prejudice as if I would naturally "identify". Like, I dislike Jane Austin just slightly less than I hate doctors in the city of Stuttgart, Germany and the German insurance industry and their way of explaining things to me about it and my chronic sickness. I had to read Ms. Austin in university and I was awashed in dinner parties, and years later I had to hear all these women at my publishing company and the archive I worked at talk about Jane Austin movies and a scene where Mr. D'arcy came out to the garden with no shirt on. Chirp. Chirp. Chirp.

And that is what I hear when I hear about Brokeback Mountain. I think Ang Lee is fantastic. The Ice Storm is the most perfect movie ever, American Beauty you can have, and as for Jake and that other guy playing in this movie, I think they are cute, but would prefer to see them get done right by a homothug from uptown or a papi from Jersey City. That is just me, otherwise all that 'kind' of beauty just cancels itself out to me. But I am going to see the movie eventually, I just wonder with whom. I have to admitt that I feel like it will bring up issues with me and Das Experiment and why it did not go so well, and therefore I kind of want to sit it out. Aside from having to sit and listen to a bunch of evil fags from work say I am a confused bitch, I don't want them to beg me to see a film that includes a married man falling for another man and dealing with the aftermath. They act as if they do not understand me anyway, so who the hell are they to tell me to support this movie, whose premise they mock in me?

I normally save my support for something more militant. Like the documentary on article 175 and the Nazi era's persecution of homos. Then I will get a Spike Lee tingle in my spin. Every queen I know has gone to see the movie because of a chance to see fucking on the big screen (I did that in NYC's red light district when I was 20 something. I don't think those theaters exist anymore. Pity.). And, like you can see dick on your computer or DVD and pop your own popcorn. I just don't understand. I hear that other countries have given the film a PG-13 rating anyway or maybe even PG. America gave it an R. I kind of am over certain things concerning the trivalizing of sex and it being turned into a childrens taboo for adults.

I will see the movie because of Ang Lee, because it is beautifully shot and because I may find something new in it. I am not so sure I will identify with it though, and the other half of my heart says that it might remind me of Das Experiment (his racist and homophobic mother that referred to me as "the Gay Nigger", his now ex-wife, then wife, whatever). This is a tragic movie from what I understand. And one day in the not so distant past, Das Experiment said that our situation was tragic. And he was right. I was being an American optimist. Fucking German Realism.
----

On a lighter note. I was at a dinner party with a fireman, a porn star and an embalmer today. Very enlightening. I will hold on to the details. I have to save somethings for myself.

And I bought the latest album by Eros Ramazotti (I think that is how you spell it and pronounce it). He makes me feel like a teenage girl inside, 16 to be exact. But I am much different outside. The fireman said he thought my butchness was cute.

I am not trying I promise.

Just being myself.

I like Atlanta.

Lost in Atlanta

I wake up at 8:30 am and there is no coffee in the house. That is how it always starts in this house. First my cousin gets up. Then he gets online. I follow about 10 minutes later and then have a cup of water or something. I might find an English muffin. Cuz will play the Luther Vandross Tribute album followed by me blasting the Brown Sugar soundtrack like Mahalia Jackson vinyl on a Sunday morning following biscuit cutting and frying sausage.

It is cool.

Last night I was stood up by Georgie, or rather he had a problem. Basically, I talked to him about meeting first at 6. Then he said no, he couldn't and would like to meet at 9:45 because he has to get his cousin. I said sure I understand. So I told him I would wait for him outside of the complex at 9:40. So, I did all the things I have not done in a thousand years. I showered (I do do that normally, but I am talking about in the courting sense), put grease in my hair (I do that only when I have to work), brush my hair (I just started doing that last year), found a nice shirt in my suitcase, brushed my teeth, put on clean socks (bachelor habits, I know. I do clean undies, but clean socks sometime miss my field of vision), and splashed on some Cologne (I never do that). I already had shaved and felt pretty dapper. So . . .

I stood outside from 9:40 until 10:00 pm. At 10:00 he called my cellphone to tell me that all of highway 75 was closed and there is no other way to get to my house. He said he was sorry and wanted to postpone. I just thought to myself . . . "No!", but said: "I am sorry, tommorrow is bad. I am spending quality time with my cousin late at night when he gets off work and I am here only until Wednesday. Let's just call it off this time." I don't remember what he said after that because I was cold and hungry and I felt that I had wasted my day in Atlanta waiting for him from 4:00 pm when we talked first to confirm until 10:00 pm.

Ass!

I was locked out!

We did not get a copy of the key made.

Double Ass!

So, I drove around the city after picking up a coffee and eating some fig newton tart like thing because coffeehouses don't serve REAL FOOD (Except Cafe CoCo in Nash Vegas). I went through downtown, which to me is like Nashville but just larger streets, which are more practical for a city. But if you go to a city like Rotterdam you see narrow streets to. There is something to be said about this Southern metropolis thing that is growing up around us. Atlanta, Charleston, Nashville, Raliegh/Durham, etc . . . It is a flavor, but what it will be in 20 years, don't know.

While driving I thought about this obsession we have with making cities better and more livable. Is a city ever finished? Did we ever have the notion of a finished city in the past? And what is more livable? People have talked about this concerning Stuttgart for example. And others have talked about it concerning Cologne and Berlin. France is shipping money out of its Parisian center to other cities such as Lille and Marsielle to make them more economically productive and viable for a particular quality of life. It seems to be never ending. But some believe that the South is red hot now. And I think it is too. But Atlanta is massive, it is Nashville but more consistant and connected.

Then after snapping out of deep thought, I realized I was lost.

Once I got to the Morehouse area I was amazed at the way it resembled parts of Nashville, but it is breathing. Fisk is an old residential area, with bits of ghosts and spirits beckoning at every call, like Morena Street and the beautiful house where Nella Larsen threw herself from a window in a failed suicide attempt. But viable industry? Not really. It is just a neighborhood.

This area around Morehouse I saw of Atlanta (don't know its name), has factories and backeries that spew lush smelling steam in the air, or expell sugary chemical gases that remind you of that pink floor wash you can by in a New York bodega. But it is still the hood.

Well, I just got lost and found my way again. Picked up my cousin at the train station. Bought some dinner. Ate. Talked about the black boys on the internet, and how in Germany my body type (not to mention my colour) was not well represented, therefore very exotic. You know, long legs, short torso, big ass, long arms, etc . . . Now I am in a city full of guys like that, and celebrated very opening on websites. Baby, they are not bashful down here.

Then we went to sleep. It was such a good sleep. Many dreams again. I think getting out of Nashville is triggering some visions in me. Things about the recent past. Things that are unsettled or unresolved. Things for which I feel shame. Things for which I hoped, but never happened. A mourning of sorts, but only in my dreams . . . that can be vivid and scary and wonderful. Last night I dreamt that I was being attacked by field rats. I fought them with my bare hands, but I could not make the two largest ones die. I held one in each hand and tried to crush their windpipes, or tear holes into their chest. I felt their bites and woke up with sore spots, until I realized I had been sleeping on my arm.

Wendy's late at night is not a good thing.

Living and Performing Blood Tied Psychic Art

My cousin and I spent Sunday together like that performance artist that tied himself to another lady and lived for one year without speaking or touching her. And she was just as silent and untouchable. The only difference between us and the performance artisit is that the bond is in our heads . . . and we talk all the time.

My cousin said that he laughes at me because I have the same reactions as he does to many things, so much so that it is sickening (that is meant in the Black Faggot sense of the word). I guess it is because we are both switch hitters with some subtle differences. He really prefers black and latino guys. I did I guess till I moved to Germany and I had to broaden my horizons. It did not take long for that to happen.

Our relationship experiences are similar. We are both feeling a deep sense of lost concerning the circumstances of our displayment. Him from LA, me from Europe. We both have the same attitude concerning friendships and their place in our lives. La La La . . .

So, yesterday was more about just being around one another. I took Cuz to get his laundry done. In the meantime I went to a bookstore, got a coffee and bought a book (like I need one of those . . .but the price was a steal). We then went and bought some food because we can't go out until Tuesday, because of his work schedule and on Monday night I have a date for the first time in a year. It is with a guy named Georgie. He is from China I think, but has lived down South for a while. He is 30. Travels a bit. In the resturaunt management business. This is cool because I have had romantic interests running around since Christmas but only kissing, no dinner. No movie. No glasses of wine on a rooftoop somewhere. Just busy schedules. Kisses here and there after driving someone home. Or postponed events because of brothers visiting from Philly, uncles in from San Diego or trips to see cousins in Atlanta.

So a real bonified date today. Plus perfect weather and a feeling that one is in a city. That energy concerning this city is bubbling around me. People getting on with their own thang. I love it. And the park is great. All the people running to it or from it. Georgia Tech professors and atheletes hopping about. That feeling of being in place and being optimistic about ones life is here. I like it.

I called the Goethe Institute, spoke German to the woman. Asked about diplomas. She said they will be giving tests in May. I thought that would be cool. I also got real estate books to see the house prices. Then after that, I will look at the job market. See what is here. People say that there is a lot here, but I am not so sure. I just wonder what is here. I see young professional people in large numbers with their babies and their dogs or both. Or white gay men (I call them Marys, cuz calls them Judys) with their boyfriends and their lovers or both. So, that has to be a sure sign that there is something to keep the middleclass upwardly and mobile. That may soon be me . . . here . . .if the feeling is right.

The only thing that has crashed the day has been the Persian Prince's telephone call. We had a talk. He told me I should tell my mother that I am gay. I said I just show my girlfriends to her, what else is there to it. He went on and on. He is one of these people that think bisexuals do not exist there for I have to come out because I am confused. And since he got married to a woman to appease his parents and then got a divorce he thinks that that is what I am up to. I did not say f*ck you, but I wanted to simply tell him that Atlanta can not be paradise if there is no real job for me here. Boys and ass do not paradise make (in the tradition of Yoda). That is number one. Number two is simple, we are are different people. And three, I don't care about all the phases you went through coming out and your parents excepting you . . . I am sure it was a great growth experience for you . . . but when it comes to my family, that is not possible. Marriage to a man is about as logical as a cow climbing a tree. They can't get their heads around it. And that is fact.

Persian Prince started to talk about his conservative family who are from a country where men are killed for their sexual preference. And maybe to him, what I am going through is a bit too dramatic. But after I explained to him what my family is like and how I do not have a problem with men that keep their business to themselves, he went on to tell me that that is how men in his society deal with it. Then he said that he is not one of those men. I went on to say that I thought all of this "either your are 'out' as a homosexual, or 'in the closet' and not part of the movement" is very facist to me. Not excluding the body culture, the ideas of love that are akin to a big Roman Centurion sex club for the big bootied man and the shear fact that I have to somehow dress and act a certain way in order to be part of the gay community (this is after he told me where to shop in the gay neighborhood).

The conversation ended applicably though. I still like his parents very much. I still want to get into his pants (he is waiting for me to loose weight, shave my chest and my nut sack and get new clothes . . . yeah right! . . . I ain't doing that much for booty . . . he needs to get with the program he is missing good stuff) and I still wonder if in his advise I am missing some essential truth, as I believe he is missing some essential truth in my hesitation towards identity politics and the same sex experience.

Hey?

Who cares in the end?

One day I will just kiss him too, but with no follow up date. I am sure. He is looking for love in the avenues that I only like to visit. So, we can only be brief with one another and speak as intensly for 39 minutes as we did today, ignoring the other but racing to get the last line anyway.

So, beyond talking, napping, drinking wine, cooking food, driving around the city by myself, looking into a tatoo parlor, etc . . . there is nothing to report. Just good vibes. And plans for us cousins in the future (a visit to LA and Miami are in order).

So. That is that.

Will tell you about date tomorrow.

Primero

I got up kind of late. Maybe about 8:30 or 9 on Saturday. My mother took the car to get serviced which was cool, because she was there for a little while and I would have been there forever if I got there at 10:00 or 11:00 am. She also bought some food from the store for the trip and for me to give my cousin when I got to Atlanta. Meanwhile, I got my clothes together, got my suitcase out and looked up the directions on mapquest. I also looked up information on the Goethe Institute for their location. I need to take their placement test to see which certificate I want to aim for. I don't plan on using the cookbook translation as proof of language competence, I could not complete the job the way I wanted after entering the hospital a year ago. Not proud of my job, though the editing job I did for a book before that, I am proud of.

Once I got the car at about 11:00 I went to the bank to deposit my check and got a Double Latte Machiato at Provience in Hillsboro Village. Then I went to the bookstore and bought a book on Modern Persian. Used. It was only $7.95. Then I picked up wine for my cousin. I bought him one bottle of Kaiken Malbec (he loved it, I have tasted better . . . Trepiche I believe is the label . . . great, like candy), a bottle of Ste. Michelle Gewurztramener, one Fontana Pinot Grigio and one bottle of Bogle Petite Sirah (I loved it, cuz was not impressed . . . at least we got a bottle each to swig down). Then I went home. Called my Persian co-worker. Told him about the book. He told me about every club available in Hotlanta. He was so happy about it and my trip. I think Nashville puts you in a rut, especially if you live single or like guys or what have you. It gets to be small real quick, and the orientation of the city (not in the sexual sense) is undecided. People don't know where things are going. There are the clubs that are old staples like The Chute and then there are these other clubs like Play and Tribe that are new and sparkly and warm and fuzy, but quickly turn into the same old watering hole after a while. Atlanta gives spice and edge and a destinct flavor that is becoming more and more Atlantan everyday. It is defining its own party. I am happy about that. And so is the Prince of Persia (we all call my co-worker that because he is beautiful and dashing and exotic and so vain . . . but in a funny and self-conscious way. He knows it and can become like Laurel and Hardy so quickly that you don't mind discussions concenring his foot scrub).

Then I showered. I packed the car. Skipped dinner. Went to Target. Bought a 16 pack AAA ultra Engergizers for my insulin pump (medical expense about 8.00 dollars . . . not covered by insurance ever), a Guiness shirt and hat (I have a cyst on the back of my head, can't go to a new city with that on my head . . . the price of vanity 14.00 dollars), deoderant (can't be stinkin'), showgel (Irish Spring bar soap does not travel well). Added battery to my pump with the hood of my trunk up. Then drove to work to return the wine key to the bartender. Then got on the road. Got on 24 East. Stopped at Exit 111 to go the batherroom and buy some Red Bull. I was tired. Then I went to a winery. Bought a table red to go with the other 4 bottles and the food my mom bought cousin. Then I drove on. Stopped at Nick-a-Jack Lake for a piss again. Drove over Mount Eagle at the precise moment of twilight, it felt so good. The view was something born out of my body and the universe. Just a massive body of earth that cut the horizon in half. I love the vastness of America. I really do.

Went from 24 to 75 South in Chatanooga. Drove to cousins neighborhood. Reminded me of DC driving through, but his apartment is so wonderful I can't even explain. We talked. Opened the Malbec. Gotta pizza. Then went to a club. I won't say anything else till I decide if this site will be intellectual or . . . screw it! . . . upon the request of the Prince of Persia we went to Swinging Richards. The boys are completely naked and dancing like a in stripping scene from a Wyclef Jean video. Very sexy, very Atlanta style show with all the trappings of heterosexuality . . . champagne room and all. We were a bit bored I think, and I ended up talking to people more than gauking . . . but this is definitely the idea I had in my mind of Atlanta before getting there. Just a crunked out place . . . except the club has no black boys. We have to go to a different bar for that I guess.
Race and faggots. . . . do we have a mini-series on that yet? Or should we call Ken Burns for the documentary?

Got to Cuz's home. Talked a bit. Drank some more wine. Fell asleep watching the UNCF telethon's tribute to Stevie Wonder. It was being aired here in Atlanta. Saw Yolanda Adams, Kim and Herbie Handcock. Kirk Franklin had a set, but this whole 20 year addiction to porn starting at 9 is a bit much. I have to read the article in Jet, but why should we be taught such shame concenring our bodies and natural urgies. After all. He was only 9. It is not like he has been doing lines of cocaine since 9. We all have been trying to figure out our woodies since that age at least and for me, it still continues.

Weird.

Gotta go.

It is already the next day here.

Having a late lunch and more wine!

Monday I will do some work . . . family tree and Goethe institute top the list. But also see if this is a place where I could stay for a while. Maybe. It is normal. Like you can buy wine in the grocery market. Not in Nash Vegas (some rich white patrons called it that to me one time at work . . . I liked that lady who said it, the way she said it, and how much it is the truth). Coloured folks call it Cashville . . . go figure. Stuttgart Germany is called Stuggie Town but the hip hop community. And Heilbronn is called Heilbronx by my old German friends because of the crime and poverty I guess.

But back to wine. Buying it in the grocery . . .

. . . NOT POSSIBLE IN NASHVILLE! Though we have 26 wineries in the state. And we were a state full of grapes until prohibition and people were forced to pull their grapes from the ground and plant tobacco. That is what the lady said at the winery. I think we need to call Ken Burns to check that out too.

The Dreadhead Laying in Bed, Watching CNN, and Eating Ice Cream

Much going on. I leave for Atlanta today. But the last 2 days have been all the right conversations at the right time I think.

I called Jay in Germany. And he was in classic Jay fashion. First, he was in bed watching CNN in his new bohemian digs in Cologne. I could see him clearing his dreadlocks from his head, and we did our proverbial lick over the phone (you really had to be there for the birth of that ritual between us). Jay is like my childhood friend by some supersonic soulmate machine. We did not spend our childhoods together, but when he talks about working on Broadway with Gregory Hines, getting reviews for shows, learning the cakewalk for a show, witnessing the AIDS pandemic, etc . . . I feel like I have that big brother I never had . . . but in our own special way "LICK!" (and we ain't f*cking!, just to let you know. But he knows enough sh*t to blackmail me if I ever get elected Senator from Tn.).

I wanted to recreate the conversation for you, but I am afraid that I have waited too long and I do not have time to recreate it. But here are some highlights.


Conversation Excerpt I

Jay in the city of hot and ass in the air German boys: I am watching this mining thing on CNN

Littlemilk in the land of Dixie: Yeah it makes me sick.

Jay: It is just stupid Americans: "Look at us, we pulled them all out. They are alive." Overly optimistic in all situations and then getting things wrong.

Littlemilk: Yeah. (I forgot that in Germany people do have this feeling about America, and the longer you stay there you get infected by German Realism and Pessimism. I have been out of the loop for some time concerning that perspective on life.).

Jay: So when are you coming home to Europe?

Littlemilk: Gotta get some insurance. (Little tears form in the side of my ducts. You have to meet the people I lived with to understand. Many black artist are there that just had to get out of the states. Some for reasons concerning family. Others because of sexuality. I think mine was a deep disappointment in my life in NYC and the people that should have been my mentors. For Jay, no idea. I think it was just a gig for him. You build a life seperate from what you know, and after a while, you crave it. That is immigration, migration, leaving home, etc . . . Right now I am learning about returning home as an everyday way of life, not an abstract black home with greens and black peas falling out of the sky and the bottom of every cornbread skillet burning the bottom just right. I used to write about that. But that was my NYC Southern Act, born out of youth and reflection. Home is now more the experience and excepting the limits of a place . . . I am getting too philosophical again . . . back to sex and German beer. )

Jay: Are you getting your dick sucked?

Littlemilk: No, not really.

Jay: What!

Littlemilk: Well . . .

Jay: YOU ARE SLEEPING WITH GIRLS AGAIN, AREN'T YOU?! (Sigh)

Littlemilk: Well, I meet this woman . . . (Note: I get this sh*t from my straight friends and from my gay friends. It is like I am falling into some bad habit. Gays think that it is an identity crisis and I should somehow leave those girls alone. The straights think that I have just been hurt by girls and I am just messing around with boys because I am used to it . . . but that is only when the straight friend realizes that their is a difference between a bottom and a top. If they think I am taking it up the ass, then I get a condesending attitude that I am somehow not really a man. That I should sit and talk about shoes and lipstick and can't be invited to play soccer. )

Jay: . . . (Interupting) Well, I am loving Cologne.

There is more to this conversation, but more than I have space and time to talk about here. I love Jay because he is practical. I asked him to send me good spiritual energy to get me out of here. He told me, "If you can't generate that by yourself by now, then what makes you think I am going to waste my energy on you. It is about me this year." Hard truth. I love Jay.

Jay was also concerned about my insulin pump and the tub coming out of my stomach. It is serious and not that serious. But I think that it put somethings into perspective for him, though I guess my choice or words was too dramatic. It did sound worse than it is in a way, but for non-diabetics that just run around the world doing whatever they want without having to manage a machine coming out of their stomaches I imagine it can sound a bit crazy. But he did say that he cared in so many words. I have not heard that from many people in the past year at all. I forgot that people ever saw that struggle in me. But that is partly my fault because I am always trying to hide it.

I sent him information on the Augsburg Zoo Exhibition in Germany and some other things that he wanted me to give him. He reminded me that in our little bohemia that we created in 2004 that I was cresended the Intellectual. Jay is a singer and a dancer. He plays in a musical in Germany now. He is f*cking great. Especially when he is tortured by laser beams and dies at the end of the first act.

But he has a steady job with insurance.

The Spirit and the Cobblestone

I am up again. I can't sleep. I should take this time to write something that is part of a larger project, but for now it is me and this blog. I got hungry because this reduction of calories is killing me. My largest meal is in the evening, but it is not filling me up. So I made refried beans. Tons of carbs. Sue me. I am on an insulin pump, I should always eat something or I could get sick. But to this date no Portuguese verbs and no gym. I don't know if I am lazy, distracted, scared or what. Sometimes I just forget. I simply need new habits.

Let's see. Today was productive for a variety of reasons, all my impulsive behavior reared its head in a way that I have not seen in a month of Sundays. I think I am rebelling. After all, I am in the South . . . and it is a Red State . . .so, I got to excuses right there . . .one political and one historical.

First I uploaded so much house music that I don't know what to do with myself. Hours of the stuff. Some of it just good old stuff from mixed CD's borrowed from The People. Others are more jazzy, a couple are a bit too experimental for my taste (I like house that I can stomp too) and one is from some DJ named JuJu out of Amsterdam. It was made for The People by an old high school friend of mine. I have not seen him since I left Nashville 15 years ago. He used to DJ and make mix tapes back in the day, and now he lives in Memphis and does music there. He was mad cool. I probably would not recognize him, last time I saw him he had severe acne and braces.

I also got some 80's essentials. Funk. Gap Band and the sort. Stuff that used to blow out the AM station. Stuff you would put in a specific order and give to a girl on the bus (The Big Cheese) or to say you are sorry after French II on a Monday morning before announcements (Gawd that was so Cold War!).

I also went to the hospital yesterday. Productive. I immediately called an old friend in the Bronx and talked for a little while during a stroll in the mall. I wanted to stop by the resturuant and tell my boss that I am going to Hotlanta this weekend to see family, but he was not there (this is not going to be a pleasant conversation). So I just headed to the mall and went to one of these French bistros that are made for mass consumption and had a pastry called a Cobblestone. I was greated by 3 round the way girls that talked real fast and giggled. They were about my age. It was fun. All that Southern "pumpkin", "sweety", "have a wonderful day" 10:00 am glee and cheer plus an espresso. I enjoyed them more than the pastry. It needed more butter folded into the dough. I ate it and sipped contemplatively while watching middle aged women walk laps. I will go back to try the soup in a sourdough bowl. It is so yuppie. I would normally say something cynical about it, but this is where I live now. What can you do? Even NYC has an Au Pain with the same type of chicks except they ain't smiling.

Called my CUZ. Setting up my trip. I gotta go. I need to see Atlanta, all this chatter about the city is killing me. People talk about it like it is the New Jerusalem. It could well be. But my cousin is from LA. He will give me a good perspective. He also said he would teach me to surf and asked if I wanted to move to South Beach. That is where our other cousin is. Actually Boca Raton.

Who knows what the future brings. Maybe we do need a familial alliance to get through this phase of life. I know I have been hit hard. LA/Atlanta Cuz has had a hard road (he was just diagnosed with diabetes too and I don't know anyone else that is diabetic and my age. This is going to a great cousin/male/diabetic/clubbing bonding experience). Miami Cuz is MIA. I know I miss the water. And the Spirits.

Upon returning the CDs to The People, Black Nationlist Lesbo -- BNL (the DJ) and I talked. We talked about love. Do we really know how to love? Do we really experience love? Does love solve everything (no! that is a lie! some sh*t you have to do yourself!)? Is love between the same sexes harder (no, but sometimes there is an us against the world feeling that is intoxicating . . . but that could be my own Issues.) She did not want to get deep. I respect that. These are the last days she will be with her lover of 6 years.

While Wine Expert Lesbo was at work in some hot to trot ritzy joint, we listened to music while waiting for her to get off work. BNL was going to pick her up. BNL gave me a page describing her piligrimage to some Native American mounds in Georgia. It was beautiful. Her encounter with the Spirits and the river was wonderful. I forgot for a moment that when I was younger I played in the woods. We would see shadows and things that scared us, or heard giggles like there was an extra child. And our parents would talk about Indians in these political and etheral ways. The matriarch of the family next door said that the Indians were treated worst than the blacks so matter a factly that I still feel it in my current analysis Black politics. A feeling as if we are not the only ones . . . and at least we are still here (I miss those down home observation blarred out between commercials while a girls head is being parted and lined with green petroleum jelly and fragrance).

My most vivid memory of the woods (besides my encounter with a green snake on a sappling, that was mystical too, but I almost pissed my husky jeans) happened when I was about 12 and we walked down the Path, to the street below us. I saw a golden bird. It glowed in the mist of a green that was wet and pulsing. The pigment seemed to bounce like rain. Its back was to me and when he turned it had these piercing red eyes. It flew away with its giant wing span through the folage and disappeared like a fleeting deer. I was the only one that saw it.

Imagine that.

I was always seeing things.

On German Prepositions and the Promise of Portuguese Verbs

I am writing this at midnight because I gotta get up and go again to the hospital. Different doctor. 60 bucks. I will see him every two weeks. He is like my diabetic shrink. We talk about whatever I want, but I think our focus has grown to include all the things that make me feel different. Diabetics do feel different (hell, I am a freaking black, middleclass snob, bisexual, diabetic . . . when in the bloody hell do I not feel like I am sitting at the bottom of a well and the party is going on above me?!). It is an identity. The first guy to write about the identity politics of the physically ill and handicap should get tenure at NYU really fast. And I think that that bitch would be "useful". Hell maybe someone has already written something about it. I should google it tomorrow.

The thing I realize about this blog is that I am going to have to edit. The sad fact of the matter is that since I have left NYC, I have not been writing. I have been busy learning German. I learned it well enough to translate a cookbook, but I must say that I did not like the experience. Trying to write a PhD, teaching a class on German History and translating a book did me in for sure. It is probably the reason I got sick and my sugar went out of control (drinking beer after my Bossanova Choir practice every Monday probably did not help things either).

Anyway. Edit. Edit. Edit.

I have noticed that since I have learned another language writing is a bit more taxing. I need more time to find the right word, and I am not comfortable with some of the underlying things in the English language that I used to be able to manage like a man on the flying trapeze. I can't turn a curve or switch a gear the way that I used to. And I have become less erudite. I don't know why. Maybe because German is a different way of being all together linguistically. Prepositions are murder . . . the dative and accusative articles are used depending on whether the object is moving or static. I get it right speaking, because I probably learned the whole sentence in the office or from a student. Also writing in German is a child like experience for me. I kind of get around to it, the heart of the matter is not something I sketch with great detail. I just make crude sentences with the super glue German conjunctions that I know, and concentrate on getting dependent clauses to look half way decent.

This blog is an exercise in and of itself. I write everyday now in the hopes that one of my friends read it and in preparation for the real writing I want to get back to. A novel, a play, a thesis . . . all have swung under the roof of my cranium, but my fingers are not very responsive. They are waiting for the right syncopation, syntax, turn of a phrase, mixture of sentences, allusions or that sentence that has seven words that begin with the letter T, etc . . . It just does not come so quickly.

Plus. Today I should really get started on those Portuguese verbs and grammatical rules. I think I have learned as much at the resturaunt as I will. I like the people there, but my year of rest is almost up. And I want to get on the hunt for that new professional life. Maybe it will be stateside. I will save some money, and be off again.

I read a piece on Ghana recently. And it would be nice to see Africa again. I don't know why I long to go back. Maybe it is a sense to go home. Europe is fine for everyday, but the possiblity of building a community is difficult if you are always seen as exotic.

Plus, I want to see the Atlantic at that latitude again. It is so muddy and dark and flat. It seem so vast, like I could just run into it. It doesn't crash like the Atlantic on the coast of Portugal. It doesn't roll like a jelly roll on Venice beach. It does something else completely. Like you can stand on its edge naked and wash with some soap made from plant fat and the hot ash of a palm tree, or throw a net out in the middle for lunch and simply walk back. The contradiction to this picture, its opposite mental pole is that is somehow still violent. It flows like a mighty river with no banks. There is nothing stopping it from running all the way into the middle of the continent except a verbal agreement, a handshake, a nod of heads of sorts.

It just might have to be.

For now at least.

But I gotta clean this blog up. Too many mistakes.

But I feel better.

Listening to Os Mutantes and Maria Bethania now.

Feeling back to normal after a Bush induced session of manic depression.

Thinking about a trip to Atlanta.

It is impulsive I know.

Maybe it won't workout, I gotta other plans for this money.

But I do want to see my cousin and be in a city.

Stadt, Land, Fluss

I am unmotivated today. Think it has to do with the fact that I work at night, and I have been spending my nights with The People. Last night we watched Underworld. While watching it, I realized that I need a trip to NYC. That would help me out. I guess part of it is that The People seem to be stuck in the same mode of thinking and behavior as I was in when I was 21-years-old and at 33 that is not fun.

I don't think it is the maturity. That seems to be there, but there seems to be nothing for The People to do if they don't get married and have kids. You are stuck renting videos, inviting people over and watching movies like Underworld. Throw in some flavoured Martinis and there you go. You have life in the alternative world of The People. Some DJ's. Some Poets. Some Gender Benders. Some of Everything. But everybody scared to move.

I think I will tell you the tale of Miss A, her friend ViVi and the search for a 2,000 dollar car tomorrow. Miss A is paying. That happened yesterday. It was an adventure and memorable, and that part of my life is vibrant. Work and friends. It is home that is lacking. And it is the world of this city (I guess I am forever talking down about Nashville, but hey my customers from other places do that too), and watching my mother's generation and herself enter retirement. That is the modus operandi of my home life now. But, my life is on hold as I try to figure out the best way to make a lot of money to pay for my medical cost and a house versus writing. I just can't sit the fence anymore. I can do both, but it is hard to complete things when you are constantly being knocked out by medical bills.

Right now, with all that is going on, I just want to go back to Germany for a little while if not forever (they really make me pay for medical coverage there . . . the socialist system is meant for Europeans, not foreigner entrepreneurs . . . they want you dependent on someone), believe me. This President and his administration is crazy. The Lobbyist are screwing us all. I don't know anybody that is happy. What I read is nothing that changes the status quo of ideas concerning race and money. New Orleans is a disaster. And the people in my communities are just people that are disatisfied with their jobs and every aspect of their lives thanks to television. HGTV makes everyone feel inadequate about their house (it used to be just their bodies). A woman named Suzy is feeding into this idea that ones self-esteem is based on ones credit rating. And the electronic news age has made it so that mistakes are happening all over the place. I can't even talk about that mine in West Virginia. It is terrible.

Oh, and Mr. Christmas Night didn't show up yesterday evening for his date. I will find out today why not. I think I am just love starved in the "Daydreaming" Aretha Franklin with her sister Carol's supporting background vocals sense of the word.

When I am down, or am in deep contemplation I put on "Can't Explain (42nd Street Happenstance)" by Jil Scott. I put that bad boy on repeat and just get through what I got to do. Today is that kind of day. But it is the inablity to put my finger on what is the problem. Maybe it is retrieving the world that I lost. But don't we all loose several worlds in a lifetime. Maybe even more. Dozens, perhaps.

Tomorrow will be better I hope.

On Nurses, Cars and Pretty Little Young Things

OK.

I am skipping my appointment with my nurse today because I am not in the mood. First, I was dropped from my insurance, and second I have not done my blood sugars 4 times a day like am suppose to. So to pay 150 dollars out of pocket to have her bitch at me and be frustrated and for me to be frustrated is not happening today. That's that.

Second. I get to see my doctor on the 27th. I will pay 150 dollars to see him and to take my hemoglobian A1C test. That is good enough for me right now.

Also today I take Miss A to look at cars. One of the black nationalistic lesbians (THE PEOPLE) that I know got a brief stint at Car Max. She is leaving for Atlanta on Saturday and breaking up with her other half. The Car Max lesbo asked me yesterday to take care of her Wine Expert lesbo while she was gone. I said yeah I would. It broke my heart. They have been together for 6 years. It seems to be the theme of the last couple of years with most of my friends. Other friends I have are making babies. They can get along with convention, it is not contradictory to their nature, their innate sense of self. I wonder sometimes what that is like. I wouldn't give anything to be anything other than me. But to have the right sexual orientation, race, family name, etc . . . it must be pretty orgasmic. Then again, there are many rich kids that deal with the suicide of a parent, the absence of a father, loneliness . . . it could just feel like the movie Home Alone. Trapped in a secure world.

When I was in Germany a someone told me, "We (my friends) are all trying to live in this different way but just don't know how." I thought that was profound.

Anyway. Miss A is a beautiful woman from Brazil. She just got divorced and used to live in Barcelona. Now she is in Nashville . . . weird no? So she needs a car for 6 months then she goes back to Barcelona to go to graduate school. I don't know where this is going romantically, she is interested in another man, I am interested in dating this other guy, but I do get that feeling . . . the feeling to lead . . . when I am with her. She is a little distraught, and a little tired, and busy trying to figure out the Americans like when I was busy trying to figure out the Germans. She has that look in her eyes. I turn into a big hunter gatherer when I am with her and she is responsive. I am getting this car for her because I would like to make sure she is OK. I don't know if it is a feeling of husband and wife, friend, guardian angel . . . I don't know. But I like the fact that I can be honest with her about everything. And we can be friends so, why not leave it at that. Plus we speak Portuguese now and then. She will need help today for sure, a little translation. I gotta work on my verbs. Man so much to do.

I asked the boy that I kissed on Christmas Eve to go out with me on this evening. I want to go see King Kong again. I really want to see Munich, but I am afraid the English might be too much. King Kong is more visual. I don't know what he wants from me and my Spanish is not good enough. I am getting frustrated, because I am an affectionate and attentive person when it comes to getting attactched. He does not show any affection during work, which seems unfair. Straight people do all the time. Time will tell. The latino machismo is heavy in the resturaunt and the way they look at us (boys who like boys) puts most people (other gay folk) on guard. I don't care. You can tease me, just don't use the feminine pronoun, article or ending near me. I am a man, first and foremost. But anything concerning dick, ass, ass pounding, crushes on the dishwasher. . . I don't care.

I don't care if they pinch my butt, but I usually do it back. Sometimes they protest, sometimes they don't. Its like being in a lockerroom.

Otherwise. Gotta go to the gym, maybe before work. Gotta blender for shakes. Then, I gotta get my resume ready again. Got my rejection letter from the last application. Don't think the job was meant for me. Nashville is just not meant for me in general. I think a good number of my friends are depressed here. It is its normalcy combined with the whole gospel and country music thing . . . it just eclispe so much of the identity of the city . . . people are forever scrambling to make something else like rock, rap, heavy metal, etc . . . survive. We will have to wait and see what happens.

Monday Morning

Well,

The reality of the situation hit me this morning. I live in Tennessee.

Now, I grew up between Nashville and Northeastern Alabama, and to add to that, I belong to a very conservative family. Sure I am a male here, and there are double standards, and there are many affairs and infidelities . . . but what my mother told me this morning shocked me beyond belief.

As I am walking upstairs from my slumber my mother tells me that she talked to my aunt, and that one of my female cousins just got married. Why did she get married? Because she is the assistant church secretary, and the pastor called her house three times upon which a man answered the phone -- ALL THREE TIMES! So, Pastor told Female Cousin to get married because she could not hold her position in the church and be shacking up.

So she got married.

Stop the fucking bus!

I lived with married couples in Europe (nonsexual but plenty of tension). I have been in a couple of interesting situation that did not manifest into anything physical with married couples. I have been with guys. I have lived with a girlfriend for a little while. All the while my mother has been calling me nervously for the past 15 years of my life about who I am living with. What I am doing. Mind you she never says sex, fucking, licking, sucking, being satisfied (I remember when a friend of mine's father came to university and asked his 21-year-old daughter if her boyfriend was sexually satisfing her while puffing on a spliff . . . I was in total awe). Neither does the Pastor. This has kicked up some stuff in me.

1. I live with pilgrims.
2. I was taught to live in shame and guilt about intimacy and the body.
3. I was also taught that Jesus is always watching, and I should do what he wants me to do.
4. When I come home I have to fight this thinking, not in myself anymore but with others.
Which means that many men and women live double lives so they don't have to fight.
5. Hell, when I wake up in the morning, that world view is greating me at the top of my stairs.

Now, that could very well be 800 dollars worth of therapy right there. I am aware of that. But, I am so sure that others have had to go through the same thing. The same realization, and even more frightening, how many people have married despite their sexual orientation because of a call by Pastor or Moma. Interesting hmmmm.

And then there are the straight folk that are living in the matrix. Is it comforting to have the world's views (at least here in the bible belt) on your side, or is it different. Does it feel different . . . the world . . . when it is catered to you?

That's all I am saying.

Now my mom, she has interesting views about the world and life and I think that she is more humored by the facts of the marriage . . . the story we should say . . . than by the theology. But she did tell me this story with a bible in her lap and eating breakfast.

Man. The South.

Leroy

You see the thing is, I did not have the heart last night the tell the living room that Gene Anthony Ray is dead or at least that I read that he had died in a European newspaper. It was New Years and instead of going out with with the gay guys to the club, or out with my co-workers from Mexico and El Salvador, I headed over to some friends' house. We have had a hard year, we have not all been on talking terms, we have been upset with each other and the choices that the others have made but not really looking at our own stuff, and we are seeing relationships change in front of our eyes. 10 year relationships and stuff like that. So, I wanted to start with them, cause we are peas in a pod. A funky left over pod, from Xmas before last.

Anyway, I want to give these friends a name without talking about their shit out in the open on this blogsite. Cause they got massive force, quick tongues and ain't slow about doing street justice on somebody despite their new suburban house and their little dog. So . . . a description and a name . . . hmmm . . . the house consist of 2 beautiful but angry black women in love and one flower child black man in the promise land (who is straight) and they can join powers like the wonder twins (triplets) and put a psychic hurting on a negro so let's call them THE PEOPLE, cause they represent all that practical blactacality that keeps people grounded. But sometimes it can keep you blocked in . . .hince, we are all trying to step out of 2005 and into 2006 more responsibly and spiritually intact. It is a shame though. I always thought we could make a commune together in some very forward and vocal part of my mind. But it is not going to be.

Okay, I digress.

So instead of being with the El Salavadorians (god only knows what was going to happen there, but maybe it is me being xenophobic, surely a good number of white folk would not have hung out with me last night though I live in a nice middle class neighborhood) or with the faggots (we all know what that would have lead too . . . me getting horny and not getting any as it always does in this damn town) I went to The People.

We played my Black Box Greatest Hits Australian import CD. We listened to other hot tracks from the multiple DJ's in the house, then we toasted to 2005 and the bitch that she was. She blew shit down and knocked things over, don't you think?

Then we drank some more, listened to more music, watched Fame with the sound down, then we watched it with the sound up, from the beginning all the way to the end. And all of a sudden people started to talk about Leroy like he was alive and that was his name and they saw him last week. And I just sat there. I watched the film, and I started to remember all these things about the film. And how no one will make a film like that again, and how I wanted to study a million different languages and play trumpet and all those things when I was younger. And . . . and . . . and . . .

We all did.

Think about the past. And what we were doing.

It was a great way to look towards the future of this year. 2006.

Plus I meet a girl at this party.

Well, she is a woman.

She is bisexual.

It makes me feel good.

After a year of waiting for what I really want.

A boy for Xmas.

And a girl for the New Year.

Nothing happened.

Just a telephone number.

I was happy with it.

And I was being honest about all my shit.

And people at the party wer not being judgemental.

And after where I was.

Now . . .

I think America is freer in certain ways than Germany.

Or maybe it is the fact that I have a deep understanding of the language and magic here.

People do what they feel.

I never thought I would think it a novelty.

But after the last 4 years of living without it.

Who knew?

Without magic.

Without doing what you feel.

Man.

Nice night.