A cherished movie star, two recent deaths, a shitload of pills, and an idiot have been on my mind recently.

I’ll work backwards.

Chris Hayes.  MSNBC.  He is Rachel Maddow’s creature, much as she was Keith Olbermann’s.  Difference?  Maddow is not an idiot.  Too cute by half and often grating, but intelligent, potent and…well, not an idiot.

Mr. Hayes, sort of cute and sort of famous for his nerdy eyeglasses took it upon himself on Memorial Day to express his hesitation in referring to men and women who fight in our armed services as “heroes.” 

    Now, before I unload, let me make myself  perfectly clear.  I think “hero” is the most overused and debased word in the English language save for “love.”  I don’t know where the 20^th and 21^st century “hero” concept originated.  Maybe during the Iran hostage crisis back in the 70’s.  I recall all the references to them as “heroes” and I thought—“Uh, actually, not.  They’re victims, hostages. Heroes are something else, right?”   I was wrong, apparently. 

   Victims are not heroes. Just volunteering for the Army, Navy or Marines doesn’t automatically make one a hero.  Nor does serving in Iraq or Afghanistan. Not everybody serves for love of country.  

    Getting your legs and arms blown off and making a life for yourself despite that, without self-pity—yeah, I’d say that’s pretty heroic.  I also think firemen are heroic.  And good cops and good doctors.  (Good luck on finding the latter two, however!)  People who work in homeless shelters, women who escape abusive relationships, rape victims who testify, investigative journalists who bring down the greedy and corrupt, those who give all they can with a truly charitable heart—heroes, all.

   So, I kind of understood where Mr. Hayes was trying to come from, in his tortured, hesitant, intellectual way.  BUT.  Really?  On Memorial Day?  That’s when you decide you have that little moment on air?  How about just stay at home and barbecue?  Call in sick if knew you’d have to be talking about soldiers.  Mr. Hayes, naturally, was obliged to apologize swiftly.  Too late, asshole.   Not only did you reinforce the idea that all liberal Democrats are anti-military (anti-soldier, actually)   But you undermined the incredible work of Barack and Michelle Obama, both of whom have worked mightily with and for veterans.

More and more I am convinced that self-professed liberals are really conservative plants, doing damage from within.  What else could explain it? 

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The passing of Donna Summer was for me—as it was for many around my age—another door on my youth closing.  As soon as I heard the news, I recalled walking down the street with a friend inGreenwich Villagein 1975.  We were on our way to a bar called variously “The Stud” or “The International Stud.”   (This was where I had originally met B., a few years before.)   My friend and I were breathless, discussing Donna’s song, “Love to Love You, Baby.” 

“Oh, yes,” I said “She was definitely really having sex when she recorded that.”  

My friend was goggle-eyed. “Really?  How do you know that?” 

“Oh, please,” I said with assurance of somebody who actually doesn’t know a damn thing,  “Everybody knows that.”  

My friend was satisfied with my “inside” knowledge, which came from inside my head. We trotted over to the bar, determined to have fun.  We did.  How can you not have fun when you’re 23?  When pants are high-waisted,  high-crotched and flare bottomed.  (Really, jeans were downright pornographic in those days.  Those happy days.)

     Donna Summer’s greatest successes would arrive during the rest of the 1970’s and into the 80’s.  By then B. and me were together.  But I can’t say I stayed away from bars, or stopped leaning up against jukeboxes, or dancing my ass off.  I was still young.  I still wanted to have fun.  And Donna Summer’s voice was part of the soundtrack to good times.  And to more gossip, too.  Media wasn’t what it is today.  But there were gossip columns and fan magazines and supermarket tabloids.  What fun we all had reading and speculating about Donna and Barbra Streisand getting together to duet on “Enough is Enough.”  Who had the better part of the song…who sang better…who sang louder…who held the longest notes?  It was such wicked fun.

Oh, I know.  Donna supposedly got all Christian-y later in life and maybe “misspoke” about gays.  Sometimes people go overboard when they discover religion.  I didn’t let it bother me.  She regretted what she said, IF she said it. Perhaps for her career, perhaps because she got hit upside the head with what Jesus really said and did.  I met her once.  She was lovely, funny, earthy.  I’m not holding silly grudges.   And I must say, her death from cancer certainly held up to the light all those who abused their gifts and died early from their own self-abuse—Billie, Janis, Jim, Jimmy (Hendrix), Judy, Marilyn, Amy, Whitney, etc.   Donna took care, protected her instrument. Never made her fans cringe with embarrassment or be forced to make empty excuses.

The death of Mary Kennedy also struck a note.  I have no particular nostalgic feeling for the Kennedy’s.  I was only eleven when JFK was assassinated.  It was a shocking thing, but it had little impact other than that.  My Kennedy memories are mostly the scandalous/sordid/tragic years of Jackie, Chappaquiddick, Joan, JFK Jr, and other unhappy events of that family.

However, Mrs. Kennedy’s death was an especially gruesome suicide. Hanging.  Unusual for a woman. She was, it was reported, fearsomely depressed for many years.  Nobody could help her.  Certainly not her estranged husband, Robert Kennedy Jr., (As he was quick to point out at her funeral.)  She left many friends and four children.  It was her children left behind that impacted me most powerfully. I could not imagine what agony she must have been in to end her life.  No, let me rephrase that.  I do know that agony.  Over the past ten years I’ve thought of it a lot. All the ways.  Even to making it look like an accident—get drunk and walk in front of a bus. 

Only one thing stopped me.  B. I couldn’t leave him behind.  I realize suicide is an act of desperation, of giving in, ending the pain—or thinking you’ll end it. (I imagine most people fight to live in the final seconds.)   But no matter how low I got—and I got pretty low—I always saw B., alone and wondering how it happened, why I did it, why couldn’t he stop me, wasn’t his love enough?  And…how selfish I remained to the end.  I saw his face, and knew I’d see it beyond the grave.  I don’t believe in hell but I have my superstitions.

Mary Kennedy’s death came just as I began—at the urging of my friends and B.—a new round of anti-depressants and some Xanax thrown in, for the incredible anxiety.  I resist so much. I have a tremendous amount of shame.  Why can’t I simply will myself to a better place, to be a better person, to be an adult?  Well, I can’t.  Tough shit, Mr. Wow. You’re weak.  Take the damn pills and at least be pleasant to those who still have the patience to love you.  And don’t think anymore about leaving. 

I have been more pleasant.  Though not an endless party.  I don’t think about leaving.  I’ve been drinking less after “work.”  (Yeah, that sick situation is still going on.)

It’s so funny that I always resist medication.  Because I never resist anything else that can make my life easier, or at least, I put myself in situations that keep me infantile.  And that seems easier.   Perhaps  I’m afraid if the meds really work, I won’t have an excuse anymore.   We’ll see. 

Finally, and on a much lighter note, I just read the trade paperback biography of Jennifer Jones, which I’d somehow missed in hardcover a few years back.  It’s called “Portrait of Jennifer” by Edward Z. Epstein.  Miss Jones was always a particular favorite of mine—she was gorgeous, intense, tormented, quirky and wildly sexy. (Forget modern interpretations that are “truer to the source”—Jennifer Jones is Gustave Flaubert’s Emma Bovary. Period.)

   Jones herself was a mass of neurotic need, counter-balanced by extreme discipline and a mania for privacy. She was a more interesting, intelligent Garbo, a less messy Monroe.

   Jennifer’s relationship David O. Selznick is one of Hollywood’s great psycho-dramas.  He made her a star and he ruined her as well.  Her tale—which includes the tragic story of her first husband, actor Robert Walker—just aches for big screen treatment at the hands of a Martin Scorsese.

   Was she a hard-nosed girl on the make for a break or was she the victim of a system and mogul who wouldn’t say no?

   I don’t know.  But I loved this book!

P.S.  To all of you—sorry I was away for so long.

Oh, Oh—wait.  One more thing.  Fox News doing a segment paying tribute to fallen soldiers on Memorial Day.  The background music?  “Amazing Grace.”  A Christian hymn.  Hmmmm…what about all the Jews, Muslims, Buddhists, atheists or the just-plain-weren’t-sure-about-God who died for this country?    I guess they don’t count.

“Taps” is the appropriate accompaniment.

Earlier this week, President Obama offered his personal opinion that as far as he—and Michelle and Malia and Sasha were concerned–same sex-marriage was a-okay.  Misty eyes and joyful whooping and hollerin’ emerged from liberals. MSNBC had a collective orgasm. (FOX, naturally, all but put devil horns on the president’s head.)

   Well, there were no misty eyes or joyful whooping and hollerin’ at chez Wow/B.   In fact, there was a lot of eye-rolling and tongue-clucking and “oh, please.”  B. did not offer the big ring.  I did not suggest a June wedding. 

Never have I seen such a load of  horseshit as has been spread by Obama and giddy Democratic pundits and editorial writers on this “evolution” about civil rights.  Obama has flip-flopped all over the place about same-sex marriage. “Yes” when he was nobody. “Evolving” when he was leader of the free world.

     As a gay man, I found the lead-in (and follow-up) to this event insulting and unconvincing. 

First, Joe Biden goes on “Meet The Press” and offers his personal opinion.  Unlike his boss, he had evolved and was ready to say so.  All hell breaks loose.  Then North Carolina says “absolutely not” to same-sex unions.  More hell bubbles up.  What, what what would Obama do?  Everybody who doesn’t want to control other people’s private lives, said it was time for the president to complete his growth as a human being.

  Everybody who thinks that gay people marrying has something to do with them, waited, smacking their lips.  

Finally, on the third day of this “crisis” (wow, where’d all the jobs and economy stuff go?) the president has a cozy chat with ABC correspondent Robin Roberts, and bravely ventures his personal opinion.  He doesn’t say he’ll declare some sort of mandate or demand all states accept his opinion as the law of the land.  He just wanted to get his feelings out there.  Really?  This is a Constitutional issue, Mr. President. The states should have no right to tell me, or you, or Malia and Sasha, what our civil rights are. I’ve said it before, I’ll say it again.  In this country a heterosexual Death Row prisoner has the “right” to marry.  I want the same rights as a as cold blooded straight murderer, please.

On the fourth day, amidst cheering on one side and brutal condemnation from the other, the White House allows a story to escape.  Joe Biden trotted over to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue and formally apologized to the president, for having essentially forced his hand on the matter.  Sooooo…okay.  Obama didn’t really want to favor same-sex marriage right now, looking ahead as he is to a brutal fight to hold onto the presidency.  He didn’t think it would help his chances. 

  The publicized Biden apology sent a message to those who are iffy/negative on the same-sex marriage issue: “I didn’t want to do it.  Maybe I don’t mean it.  Joe is an idiot.”   

  That Rachel Maddow, at least, did not pick up on this disappointed me.  Maybe she just didn’t want to pick up on it.  Despite her incessant “cutes” and her increasingly frantic performing, she is an intelligent voice in the shrieking world of MSNBC’s Sharpton, Matthews and Shultz.

The cherry on the sundae was digging up Mitt Romney’s almost 50 year-old bullying of a high-school classmate, who eventually came out as gay in later years.  (Romney gave the kid a brutal haircut.)   It’s an awful story, but come on—something from high school?  People who hate gays are cheering the well-timed release of this tale. Finally, they have their narrative for Mitt. He hates gays too.

    The White House wants to cover every base—yes we do…yes, we do but…Romney is a homophobe.  They are gonna strap this haircut guy to the top of Romney’s car with the dog and try to drive to a second term.  Good luck with that. Now, about the jobs?

    I thought Romney’s remarks on this long-ago event were fairly good, considering—he regretted his youthful hi-jinks, didn’t recall that incident, but was sorry nevertheless.  Though I think if I’d forced a haircut on a weeping classmate, I’d remember. Also—where’s all that Mormon peace-and-love-let’s-go-be-missionaries thing?  (Maybe being a filthy rich Mormon does make a difference.) 

   And as B. pointed out, the bullies never remember. The bullied are marked for life.

      Bleh!  I don’t want to vote for Obama. I can’t vote for Romney.  I can’t abstain—then I would have no right to complain.  So I’m gonna hold my nose and vote for O. 

However, there was something of a silver lining here. Maybe even more precious than silver.  Now, I have never known what it’s like to be discriminated against because I’m gay. I never had a traumatic “coming out.” My mother’s disapproval was annoying, not heartbreaking. I’ve worked in a business that is gay-friendly. I never had to hide who I am.  I’ve been lucky! Blessed, even.

     With my multiple blessings in mind, I tried to imagine being a gay teen, or even a young person in their twenties. A vulnerable kid who  is afraid, made to feel ashamed, thinks he or she is alone.  To hear, to read, that the president of the United States thinks same-sex marriage is fine, must be a powerful message.  They don’t have to understand the political ins and outs, the wussiness of what Obama really said.  For these young people, it truly is a new world.

So, Obama did the half-assed right thing, for the wrong reason, but he did it.  I give him that much credit.  In time, I’ll probably give him more.

P.S.  During the course of these recent events I found myself reading Time magazine. (Not the new one, with the nursing child.)   It was a story about John Irving and his latest book, “In One Person.”  The article tells how Irving responded when his beloved son came out to him.  “I love you all the more” Irving said.

I was unaccountably moved when I read that. In fact, I began to cry.  That is a real parent and a real human being. There is hope in this old world.  It meant more to me, had more of an effect, than all the self-righteous, self-serving political palaver being dished out. 

I wish every shocked, unfeeling, angry parent of a gay child could read that quote from John Irving, and understand—this is how you do it.  It’s about your child, stupid.

MR. WOW Sees Judy Again–Dead as Ever, Alas. 

As some of you know, Mr. Wow did not become an admirer of Judy Garland until he saw her laid out, dead as a doornail, at Frank Campbell’s Funeral Home in 1969.  To better understand this—for those new to this site—please click on TO COME.  Read it now, or come back to it later.

But on to more recent times. Turner Classic Movies ran two Garland faves—“Easter Parade” and “Summer Stock.”  In the former Judy is skinny and strung out.  In the latter she is plump and strung out.  In both she imbues her cardboard characters with humanity, realism and neurotic tension.

     In “Easter Parade” her musical high point arrives when she serenades Fred Astaire with “It Only Happens When I Dance With You.”   In “Summer Stock” she soars plaintively on “Friendly Star,” mourning the (temporary) halt to her romance with super-hot Gene Kelly.   (I know—we all love the raucous “Get Happy” from that movie.  But for me, Miss G. was at her best turning the volume down, just a bit. Intimate ballads are the peak of her artistry.)

    If you question the adoration Garland inspired, look at these two numbers. Hell, just look at her MGM movies, period. She brought something unique to American filmgoers. And later, to live, rapturous, audiences.  As an actress who sang, or as a singer who acted—you choose!–she was nonpareil.  It was total involvement.  Visceral performing.  She was The Method before The Method, wrapped up in silly musical comedies.  Judy was the cheerful girl next door who might cut her wrists at any moment, because of the callous boy next door.

With those movies—and so many others—in mind, I was wary, approaching Broadway’s “End of the Rainbow.” This deals with Judy’s decline, indeed with everything that immediately preceded her death.

     But…I recovered. (As Miss G. famously asides in “A Star Is Born.”)  And I saw “End of the Rainbow.” 

And this is what I thought.

“IF I am such a legend, why am I so alone?”

    That was a familiar refrain from movie queen and live concert phenom, Judy Garland. She always liked to imply she was alone, friendless, powerless. It was a good story. She came to believe it.

      The reality of the situation was that Judy was never alone.  She was almost always surrounded by people—adoring friends…brilliant co-workers…bewildered but besotted children…an ever-present on-tap entourage. She was one of the most famous, worshipped and honored entertainers of the 20^th century. She had it all.

     If, toward the end of her life the crowd around her thinned, it was she herself who had done the winnowing.  Garland was never quite the victim of her own self-generated legend.  (“Sympathy is my business” she told her daughter Liza Minnelli. And those who were not sympathetic were out. As Liza herself would learn.)

    It is the dark, white hot/ice cold finale of Judy Garland’s life that is captured in the new Broadway show “End of the Rainbow.”  This is Judy in extremis, circa London, 1969. Her voice shattered (again) her career on the precipice (again) involved with an inappropriate man (again), fighting with agents and musicians and nightclub owners (again)

     Those who are old enough to remember, still recall the tremulous wraith who impersonated Judy by this point in her life.  There she was, encased in her glittering pantsuits, still trying to give her all onstage, sometimes achieving a miracle, more often openly asking (expecting) her audiences to forgive their long-lost Dorothy Gale. 

      Hmmmm…forget Dorothy. She had traveled far even from the paper thin, nervous woman—with a still glorious voice– of her 1963 TV series.

   It was not a nice time, those months in London, and perhaps an odd, even unpalatable subject upon which to base a two-hour and ten minute play-with-music. But that is what writer Peter Quilter and director Terry Johnson have done.

    And if it is not appetizing for those with no appetite for a grisly wallow, it is fascinating theater nonetheless.

     Garland is portrayed by Tracie Bennett.  This performance begins on such a high note of near-hysteria and nerves—Garland arrives in England to appear at a supper club—that one feels there’s no-place to go but down.  However to the contrary, Bennett raises the bar with every scene.  She plays the latter-day Judy with all the familiar KayThomson inspired stances, the quirky facial expressions, the vocal oddities—coming down with particular emphasis on certain words.  If she sometimes sounds more like Katharine Hepburn than Garland, one should remember that Garland herself adopted a rather Britishy, posh manner of speaking—as many of the MGM ladies eventually did.   It’s an incredible performance, energy-wise alone. (Isabel Keating, well remembered for her Judy-turn in “The Boy From Oz” was more spot-on, but Isabel didn’t have to carry that show.)

      Bennett does her best to give some meaning to Garland’s lurching, collapsing, neediness, bitchery, vulnerability.

     But she can only work with her material, which offers precious little in explanation at how and why this rare creature, referred to during her lifetime, and without argument, as “The World’s Greatest Entertainer” ends up crawling around the floor of the Ritz Hotel in utter disarray, a hopeless addict. Brief mentions of Judy’s abuse at the hands of her mother and MGM don’t suffice.  Especially when one knows that Garland never met a lily that didn’t require elaborate gilding. (Like her astrological sister, and personal friend, Marilyn Monroe, the truth about Judy is impossible to decipher or deconstruct. The ladies ladled out too much bullshit.)

     But along with the grimy scenes of Garland at the dregs, there’s some wicked humor as well. Miss G was quick to find the ridiculous in her situation. In Judy’s heyday, time and again, people would recall “laughter, always around her there was laughter.”

     Bennett also sings a number of Judy’s famous songs, delivered in the jittery Ritalin-infused energy of Garland’s last years. (Although I don’t think Judy ever became quite so tangled up in her microphone cord as Bennett plays it!)

    Bennett is given nice support by Tom Pelphrey as her sleazy last husband, Mickey Deans, and Michael Cumpsty who portrays one of Garland’s musicians. Cumstry really functions as an amalgam of various people in Garland’s life, a Greek chorus of praise and condemnation, including certain aspects of her audience—the much-abused-and-mocked “gay clique” who never deserted her. 

    This is a niche play for a niche audience about a niche period in Judy Garland’s life.  (To be perfectly honest, the audience with whom I saw it was comprised mostly of geezers and gays. Okay—I’m in there!)

     It is undeniably exploitive, but let’s not pretend exploitation and curiosity about a great star’s fall is something new. Or something we are not curious about. Oh, so we turn up our nose after we’ve rummaged through the troth?  How noble. How phony.  Believe me, soon enough we will have “The Final Days of Whitney Houston” delivered to us in some manner.

      Is it necessary or instructive to see Garland’s penultimate months ridiculously compressed, inevitably fictionalized and held up for display?  No.  Does it provide a surge of remorse and passion for that great talent? Yes it does. Does it make you want to rent one of her old films or listen to the Carnegie Hall album?  Yes it does!! 

      Perhaps somebody young will happen upon this show and wonder—“what the hell was that?  Who was this person? Should I go to YouTube and investigate?”  Yes, young person—go.  You’ll be amazed. 

    “The End of the Rainbow” spares us Judy’s death in the London bathroom of her rented house—an “incautious overdose” the coroner would state.  She literally took one pill too many.  As opposed to MM’s 25-plus.

     Tracie Bennett concludes the evening singing Mort Lindsay’s tour de force arrangement of “By Myself,” best remembered from Garland’s final movie, “I Could Go On Singing.”   It’s not a very good movie—a soapy, semi roman a clef. But it conveys a great deal of what Garland had become, and what she was till the end—a volcanic, indomitable survivor—feeding off her legend, feeding off her loved ones, feeding off strangers, feeding off her audience. Had she lived, she might have erupted brilliantly again.  It would have been hell for her, and for those in the lava path, but it would have been glorious, too. 

   “End of the Rainbow” is by no means all of what Judy was, even at the end.  But I think those who’ll go to see it, already know that.  Judy Garland’s fans—straight and gay– didn’t “love” her unhappiness. That is a cruel myth. They accepted her played-to-the-footlights trauma as part of the brilliant package.  When you have as much talent as Garland, and give so much of it, you have to take even more—from husbands, lovers, children, fans– just to survive another day.

     Garland packed a thousand years into her 47—a miraculous testament to her strength and commitment.

    If she ruined herself, doesn’t that seem appropriate?   You can’t make or break a talent like Garland.  The tornado must finally wind down, all by itself. Sadly, when it’s over, you never end up in Oz.

Oh, but Miss Garland—it only happened when I danced with you.

As I trolled various news shows over the weekend, a serious malaise—in the words of Jimmy Carter–fell upon Mr. Wow.

The closer we inch to the presidential election, the less I want to be there—here!–watching and groaning as both sides debase the Declaration of Independence, The Constitution, the Civil Rights Act and virtually everything this country is supposed  to represent. (But never did, really.)  I malaised myself into a big headache.

After I took some Advil, Aleve and B. placed a moist cloth on my fevered brow—Thank you, Mr. Darcy!– I was drawn back to recalling the night Barack Obama was elected.

    I had voted early in the day with B.  I was not a happy voter.  I wasn’t an Obama man.  I didn’t think he was bad, just not my cup of Chief Executive.  His speeches didn’t wow me, his measured manner of speaking drove me crazy.  Those who looked at him, or toward his potential presidency, as some kind of transforming moment, were foolish, I believed.  Politicians rarely transform, though they promise the world. (That’s why they’re called campaign speeches.)

Still, with Hillary out and Sarah Palin looming, what was a reasonable liberal to do?  I voted for O.  As we left the voting booths in Hoboken, I said to B—“This was pointless.  I don’t care how many teen-themed Disney programs feature interracial dating. I don’t care what ‘data’ claims the improving stats are on bigotry.  This is America. We will never elect a man of color as president. The Civil War never ended. My God, anti-Semitism is still rampant in this country!” I was distrait on the street.  B. took me home and placed a moist cloth on my brow.  Thank you, Rhett Butler!

I took my turbulent feelings with me to a celeb-studded “election party” that evening.  I was instantly regretful having accepted the invite. It was an unusually sultry November. I was sweating and uncomfortable.  Everybody was networking and drinking and making jolly.  I was not so jolly.  I peeled off my jacket only to realize I’d sweated through my shirt. Pit-stains on election night ain’t pretty.  I put the jacket back on, but felt I was kinda ripe. 

I was focused on the big TV screens, running the results, as each state closed. I seemed to be the only one interested!  Eh, show biz goes on, no matter who is president, right?   I didn’t drink much. In fact I barely touched my screwdriver.  I was anxious.  So anxious I left the party at the very moment it looked not so hot for Obama.  I couldn’t bear a room full of movie stars, producers and directors, performing the fabled five stages of grief.  It would happen within an hour and Acceptance would be particularly grisly.

I walked to the Port Authority.  It struck me how empty the streets were, though midnight was still hours away.  I assumed everybody was at home, watching the results or still voting.  I wasn’t sure when the polls closed.  It was slightly creepy, end-of-the-world-ish.  Also lovely. New York is never more beautiful and welcoming as when it is deserted. (August, despite the heat, is a paradise for those who want to wander Manhattan.  Everybody’s on vacation. Visit the Metropolitan Museum!)

When I got home, B. was up, of course.  “Obama won!  He’s the president of the United States!”  I was, and I frankly admit it, shocked.  I had been wrong, perhaps.  Maybe we had come along and I just hadn’t noticed?    We sat and watched his speech and I was momentarily lifted.  I had lived to see a new century.  I had lived to see a man of color in the White House.  Wow–I’d lived a lot!  Obama was stirring to me for the first time.  Well, it was the fact of his ascendancy that stirred me.   I didn’t remain uplifted for long.  As me and B. continued a rigorous night of channel-surfing, including Fox News, a feeling of hopelessness overwhelmed me.  “They’re already campaigning for 2012,” I said.  “He really won’t have a chance.  And I don’t think he’s equipped to handle the resistance he’ll face.”

     I also felt Obama was too idealistic for the office he’d won.   It might have been better to have waited ten cynical years.

But he didn’t wait and he did win. It was his moment in time, I guess.   Here we are three and half years later, the joyful balloon deflated.

    Despite Obama’s big butch bulls-eye as the killer of Osama bin Laden, his good intentions with health care, and his struggle with an economy shattered when he took office, it seems to me we are likely looking at a one-term president, who will leave office both more relieved and embittered than most. 

What I’m feeling now is not so much disappointment—Obama is a politician, I didn’t expect waters to part.  No, I’m tired. It’s the climate. It’s what we’ve allowed ourselves to become—fixated on the second- to- second sensational sound bite. Unable to ignore the negative. The Internet has caused everything to telescope so drastically; each event is all-important for…48 hours. When George W. Bush left office I felt I’d never known another president, those eight years seemed like eighty.  The Obama three-and-a-half seems more like three hundred years! 

The drip, drip, drip of hatred has worn me out.  God knows what it has done to him and to Michelle Obama.  He has made some mistakes.  He has been tentative on certain matters.  He lacks obvious (phony) passion.  He is careful and lawyerly.  Except  when he isn’t.  And then he pays for it, bigtime.  But I’ve never seen ugliness on such a scale as has been directed at this president and first lady.  And that includes the Clintons, who were Lord and Lady MacBeth to the Right for eight years. (Let’s never forget Mrs. Clinton, now Secretary of State, was alleged to be a murderer in the most salacious rumors.)

    Yes, it’s been racial.  And if you don’t agree, fine. That’s how I feel.  That’s what I read in the comment section of stories about Obama on conservative sites. It’s lurks there. Right underneath. Not everybody.  But a lot.

I’d like Obama to have a second term.  I want him to prove something to me, to a person who didn’t expect much to begin with, but someone who feels strongly his life will be harder under a new regime. Looking at 60, and unemployed right now, I see myself in a Republican world.  I don’t like the way that looks.  (Though it’s no gay fling now—the president has yet to acknowledge my personal travail and send a check!)

And, since I abhor political correctness, let me say right now I don’t want a Mormon president.  It’s a cult.  Now, all “religions” are culty and crazy.  But at least, let’s say, Catholicism is based on thousands of years of belief—much of it lifted from pagan mythology—and it inspired great art and great thinkers.

I am not comfortable with a president who believes in a religion less than two hundred years old—an angel visited Joe Smith in Palmyra, New York, seer stones, golden plates, etc.  Palmyra, really?  (Although perhaps they said the same thing back in day—“Bethlehem, really?”)

Anyway, the tenants of Mormanism, not to mention the church’s wealth, power and secrecy, creep me out.  Although, individually, I have met many lovely Mormans.  I just don’t want the insanely wealthy Morman “leader” Mitt Romney ruling the world.  Otherwise, I’m sure he’s lovely, too.  (Yes, I know all about the Vatican.  But our one and only Catholic president, JFK, was an unrepentant whoremaster.  He wasn’t exactly towing the line.)  If we’re gonna go this way, let’s just elect Tom Cruise as president.

Sooooo…it’s gotta be Obama for me, no matter my palpitations or how many moist cloths B. places on my brow. Thank you, Heathcliff.  Oh, wait, Heathcliff would probably strangle me with it. Back to somebody from a Jane Austen novel.   Or B. himself.  Always a gent.

I worry too much. I watch too much cable news.  Anything can happen. November is still eight months away. I want somebody to shake me by the shoulders like Bette Davis did to Miriam Hopkins in “Old Acquaintance.” Just to clear my head. 

And if that doesn’t work, a good Cher-like slap, a la “Moonstruck”—“snap out of it!”    Maybe then I’d stick to the History Channel and Turner Classic Movies.  And…never read a newspaper? 

Hmmm…that’s gonna have to be a pretty hefty slap.

Thank you—Stanley Kowalski?

Okay, okay.  I’ve been trying to be all hands off on Trayvon Martin, the unarmed 17-year-old African-American who was shot to death by George Zimmerman inFlorida.  So inflammatory. And what could I add?  Nothing.  But I felt I had to say something.  I wanted to say something.

Mr. Martin had been to a grocery store, picking up a can of iced tea and candy for his younger brother. He was visiting his father.   Mr. Zimmerman is a neighborhood “watchman.”  With a gun.  Not that he was supposed to have a gun while “watching.”

Eh, who’s counting bullets in Florida?

The case has been brutally and cynically analyzed from every perspective.

The outrageous righteousness of the Right and the Left, the politicizing of the event, has dimmed its humanity. I loathe MSNBC’s Al Sharpton. I loathe Fox News.  I loathe “The Today Show” for its “mistake” in editing the vital 911 call from Zimmerman to the cops.  Basically I loathe everybody who weighs in on this.  Yeah, so I’m hating myself, too.  I’ll recover.  I always do.

So here’s the vibe I get:  Mr. Zimmerman, now—finally!– arrested and charged with second degree murder, will be exonerated.  It is his word, and the “stand your ground” law of Florida, against a dead person.  So far we know of no eyewitnesses to the actual encounter to say who started what.  And even though we have the 911 tapes, and the police telling Mr. Zimmerman to cool it, and not follow the “suspicious” Mr. Martin, we’ll never know exactly what went down in that ultimate confrontation.

If we are to take “stand your ground” for what it intends to be, then young Mr. Martin was also standing his ground—followed by a strange man, in an unfamiliar neighborhood.  He might have felt—as Mr. Zimmerman says he  felt—threatened to the point of fearing for his life.  And using all the weapons at his disposal.  In Mr. Martin’s case, that was can of ice tea and a bag of candy.

Here’s what we do know.  We can hear George Zimmerman’s voice as he made his distress call. Something he often did. Almost always he was wary of  “suspicious” black men.

What do we hear on that fatal tape?  I’ll tell you what I  hear. He’s not terribly bright.  His voice sounds dull and even slightly slurred. (His brother, Robert, who came out to defend him at one point, must have inherited another gene pool.)  He is inexplicably nervous and angry and frightened.  But why?  He’s all safe in his car.  He wasn’t even “on watch.”   He just happened to notice Mr. Martin.   And just noticing him, set something off.

I have listened to this tape, in its entirety, over and over again.   It is terrifying.  This was a man on a mission.  This was a man who had a point of view. It is not a point of view one desires to be on the other side of.

We will never know—and let me stress this—we’ll never know—what happened in that minute nobody saw. Who struck first, what was said, etc.  But I know this.  If Mr. Zimmerman had gone home, after placing his concerned phone call, Mr. Martin would be alive today.

He was only 70 feet from his father’s fiancée’s house when he died, face down in the grass, with a bullet in his chest.

Mr. Zimmerman’s latest lawyer, Mark O Mara—the first two fled– stresses the difficulties his client has faced—“It must be frightening not to be able to go to a 7-Eleven.”  Indeed.  Think about never being able to go to a 7-Eleven again.  Ever.

Oh, and here is P.S. response to CNN’s excellent Don Lemmon, who has kept his cool in various contentious interviews regarding the Trayvon Martin case.  He has asked a certain question, to no avail, because hysteria reigns around Trayvon.  That question is–“Should President Obama have weighed in on this matter?”

Dear Don—Prez O.  should have kept it to “what a tragedy, etc.”   To have personalized it—“If I had a son he would look like Trayvon”—was a big mistake.

So there, Don, at least somebody has finally answered you.

 Dear Friends…Happy Easter or Passover or nothing. That is, just be happy you might have an extra day off from work.  Many of you have followed me from wOw, and probably recall this story.  But, for those who are new–and I see there are more than I expected–perhaps you’ll enjoy this post.  It says a little about me and a lot about B. 

Every relationship has its rituals — but as Mr. wOw learns, it’s the small ones that end up mattering the most

Many years ago—back in the fabulous early 1980’s (well, if you didn’t factor in AIDS), B. went off to Denmark. He was a medical researcher and was … researching in Denmark. B. was away a while. He loved Denmark. He loved the work he was doing and the people he was working with. Especially one fellow. Cute and  smart. Doctor smart. Just like B.   Mr. wOw was jealous.

When B. went off for a second stay in Denmark, he said, “wOw, why don’t come along? Everyone would love to meet you.” This was odd. B. was and is a shy guy, who needs some prodding in the social area. One of the reasons he liked me is that I wasn’t shy, once I relaxed, and would always strike up animated conversations with strangers, and had friends, and brought people over. This eventually ended—it was too much work for me: I cooked I cleaned, they were my friends, I entertained. I got tired. I was working nine to five.

But B. gregarious himself, in another country?! This I had to see. So I braved my very first plane ride to Denmark. I was terrified, but made a hell of a lot of acquaintances during the seven or eight hours in the air. I also drank a lot. Not that it helped. (It was the beginning of many years of air travel, and imbibing way up there.) Denmark was wonderful, and in many ways B. was a different person. Not totally, but that’s another more serious tale   I met B.’s friend and was really jealous. But, I kind of got over it. I loved Denmark too. And we often went to a park in the middle of Copenhagen and admired the swans. We loved swans, despite their famously irritable nature. They were always polite to us.

I left Denmark. B. followed a few weeks later. He returned — depressed, it seemed to me. Was he longing for Denmark and his doctor pal? Was he regretting me? I was so childish. So poor. Not his equal, I was sure. Finally, I asked him, “Do you want to go back? Do you want to separate? We’ve only been together six years, we’re young. You have time to make another life.” His answer was a curt, final, “no!” (Big girly conversations are not his forte, though he allows me an annual monologue.) He seemed to improve somewhat, but I thought he still missed Denmark. It troubled me. Then one day at the supermarket I found a large plastic swan. I brought it home, filled the bathtub and put him in to float.

When B. came from work I said we’d received a visitor, who was splashing around in our tub. B. hurried upstairs, and I wondered what kind of visitor he was hoping to find in our tub? (That cute kid down the block?)   It was the plastic swan, serene. B. was amused, perhaps even touched. I was (am) so rarely sensitive when I should be. He seemed better after that.

We tucked the swan away, and I never thought of it again until Easter rolled around. I woke up Easter Sunday to find our swan jam-packed with sweet goodies of all kinds. I love candy. B. said: “I heard the flapping of wings last night, and he suddenly appeared with all this stuff. It was quite a journey. He can stay awhile, yes?” Of course! Who turns away a swan bearing chocolate?

We must have been hospitable enough. Every year since—more than 25, now—our Easter swan has arrived, loaded down with sweet gifts. He always comes when I am asleep. Sometimes B. expresses concern about the weather, and the swans great age, but he always comes through, not much altered by time, though no great conversationalist. He stays until we’ve pretty much finished off his gifts. He always leaves quietly in the night. Sometimes B. is awake and bears a message—the swan has had a relaxing time, loves us, and will be back next year.

All relationships have rituals. Funny little nicknames and habits. Sometimes they start out annoying but oddly you grow to depend on and even love them. The swan started out as a nervous joke by an insecure Mr. wOw, hoping to charm his B. Today, if anything happened to that damn plastic swan I think I’d have to be strapped down and medicated.

I’d like to go back to Denmark someday with B. Look at the swans again. And maybe bring a present back  to our swan (he’s definitely a Dane.) After all, he’s given us so much. And I don’t just mean chocolate rabbits.

Happy Easter to you all—whether it is a time of spiritual contemplation or bunny rabbits and colored eggs. Or just a few days off.

I must go. Jelly beans are beckoning.

I was wondering what to do today, what to write.  The fact of being laid off—and the uncertainty of applying for unemployment—has weighed me down.  I don’t have the heart or energy to tackle the Trayvon Martin tragedy or Rick Santorum saying “bullshit” or the relentless robotic aura of Mitt Romney.  Or the fading presidency of Barack Obama.  Or even the illness and surgery of our oldest, purriest cat, Doll.

  Frustration, fear and self-loathing have taken me to dark places.

    And so I offer an essay that has been on my computer for a while.  Something, not exactly “light,” but a piece that might explain me a little bit. How I came to be me. Certain aspects of me. The more…sordid me.

   I hope I won’t shock any of you too much.  

HE’S LEAVING HOME…Bye, bye.

How Young Mr. Wow Came to Confront NYC’s Mean Streets in 1968.

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“I took money, Steve….I made a way of life out of it.  The deep shame didn’t hit me until much later.”

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“When the time comes that I am no longer desired for myself, I’d rather not be desired at all.”

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All true movie fans (and/or gay men) know the origin of the two quotes above.  Miss Elizabeth Taylor as the overripe call girl Gloria, in “Butterfield 8.”  And Miss Vivien Leigh as the fragile Karen Stone in “The Roman Spring of Mrs. Stone.”  Both characters traded in sex.  One sold, one paid.

Mr. Wow saw these films as a youngster.  Well, let’s say as a tween–in today’s parlance.  They had an effect.  By the time I watching Miz Liz strut around in her silky slip, and Miss Leigh pine after insensitive hustlers, I was sexually active, and aware that youth was my big calling card. I had no illusions.  Feature by feature I was just a normal, cute-looking kid.  But I was smart and already too worldly for my little world.

As I became more sophisticated (that is, I read a lot of Harold Robbins) I sometimes fantasized about being so desirable that I would be paid for my time, a la La Liz.  I also saw myself in Vivien Leigh’s character!  Even at 13 I knew someday I’d be in that position—not famous, not beautiful, not rich. (Not a woman, either.)   But I would want younger partners.  This struck me profoundly–that I would look so mournfully into the future. Anticipating faded petals while I was still barely a bud myself.

And even then I didn’t like myself.    But I accepted myself.

My disordered childhood left me unmotivated to succeed, or to “be” anything. I certainly didn’t become self-reliant.  Rather, I was obsessed with physical—not financial–security and on my ability to charm somebody into providing me a stable environment. All I wanted was a home. I never fantasized about money or fame.

During my time up at the Peekskill, NY orphanage, St. Joseph’s, I begged a beautiful social worker to adopt me. She was African American and had taken me into her home on Thanksgiving.  Of course she could not adopt me—I was not an orphan. My mother was alive. Hospitalized,  suicidal, volatile–but alive. And she wanted me. She had spent her own grim childhood in the care of good nuns at an orphanage. That her little boy had ended up in the same situation was for her an agony of guilt.

This social worker had already broken rules taking me home with her. (I met her family and they were great!)  But I never forgot her, or that she cried when I saw her for the last time. She was much nicer than the nuns, and the only tenderness I found up there at St. Joseph’s.

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By the time I was fourteen, running away from home—fleeing life with an insecure, tormented mother I hardly knew, or cared to know– had become a rather boring habit.

At first I came back within hours.  Then more hours.  Then a day.  Then two.  Always I would wander, walking on and on and on. I had this strong feeling that if I walked far enough, I would somehow, magically, fall into a new life.  Like Alice down the rabbit hole, or through the looking-glass.  I made myself believe that turning the next unknown corner might change my life, in some fantastic fashion. That never happened.  Not as I anticipated, anyway. I was no Jack Kerouac, taking to the road and having terrific, mind and soul defining adventures. I waited for things to happen to me; passive and fatalistic. I did not believe in myself as a person, only as a commodity with an expiration date.

Midway through my fourteenth year, my epic rows with my mother reached a boiling point. I was relentlessly truant from school and despite an amazing ability to forge teacher’s names on notes and intercept the mail and phone calls, I was doomed to be caught.  There were terrible scenes.

Nothing mattered more to my mother than my education.  She was compelled to leave school at 16, to work. She  suffered what she thought were her intellectual deficiencies, though she wrote poetry, painted and was well-read. There was no possibility of having money to send me to college—we were on welfare by the time I was 11—but my mother hoped I might advance enough to earn some sort of scholarship.  No way. School bored me.  I read voraciously and was certain I knew more than my teachers. I didn’t feel the need to learn French or advanced mathematics. (Today I still count on my fingers!)  My teachers tended to love me at first, then become puzzled, then ignore me—after all, there were students on hand who wanted  to learn.

One of my teachers was so outraged by my indifference to him and to schoolwork in general, he ordered my mother to come see him, so he could have the pleasure of telling her, “Mrs. Wow, I think your son absolutely does not belong in an advanced classroom.  In fact, I am going to make sure he is placed where he belongs, in the ‘average’ classrooms. Though he is barely even that.”  (I don’t know how the system is now—but back then kids were divided into ‘average’ and ‘above average’ levels.  It caused a lot of grief and insecurity.)

After that, I was openly contemptuous, which caused this learned man to throw a book at me.  He missed. He hit the smart kid seated behind me..

In any case, I was always inevitably caught in my intricate but-sure-to-fail truancy lies.  My mother and I slugged it out.  Well, she tried to, and I ducked.  She had a hair-trigger temper and the unfortunate habit of slapping me hard, often in front of others.  She would then wonder why so many took my side, despite her very real concerns and grievances. “Don’t be fooled by his innocent look!” she would scream after sending me reeling with a roundhouse backhand. (I wasn’t trying to look innocent, but all who witnessed these scenes certainly thought I was.)

By fourteen I’d shot up to 5’ 7”  to my mom’s 5’2”.  (For a minute it looked like I might be tall.  But I never grew another inch.)  So it became comic as she tried to hit and corner me in our tiny two room Hollis, Queens apartment.  The struggle was now ridiculous, and I often fell into giggles, leaping from sofa to chair and back again as she flailed, hoping to make a strike.  My mother was not amused.  We battled bitterly shortly after my fourteenth birthday. I didn’t feel like being slapped. I opted out of the house yet again.

I walked down Jamaica Avenue, then up to the more affluent Hillside Avenue and continued into Jamaica itself.  I was so familiar with the area—the crumbling but still-deluxe Loews Valencia Theater…Gertz department store (with its tawdry and active men’s room)  and the very nice public library where I spent many truant hours, reading good books in exquisite isolation. (The men’s room there also had a lot of traffic.)

This adventure would be different.  For one thing, I was away five days.  My longest sojourn from Hollis, ever.  But something else was in the air.  Me! At every turn, on every bench, in every theater seat (I knew how to sneak into the Valencia for free), and on each and every street, I was  accosted, approached, seriously eyed.  I was by no means naïve, or sexually inexperienced, but this was ridiculous.  Had every gay man in the world decided to take a vacation in scenic Jamaica, Queens?  And were they all somehow attracted to little ole cute-but-not-extraordinary Mr. Wow?

Apparently so.  Several of these men were young and good-looking.  (One took me to his tiny room the local YMCA.  He cried with shame when we were done, which horrified me.  Whatever problems I had, confusion about my sexual identity was not among them.)   Others were not so young.

The night before I trudged sheepishly back home—to my hollow-eyed mother who was simply relieved I was alive—I encountered a drunk in the bus station.  He was stout and bald and reeked of liquor.  I was holding up a wall, clutching a paperback copy of “The Queen’s Necklace”—all about Marie Antoinette’s fatal bauble.  I’d stolen it from a drugstore, and was reading it while wandering.

He approached.  Ugh!  I moved away.  He followed.  I went outside.  He followed.  “Hey, kid—you wanna make ten bucks?”  This stopped me.

In 1967, with a mother on welfare, and reduced to stealing 95 cent paperback books, ten bucks might as well have been a hundred.  “Come on, come on over here,” he slurred, indicating a deserted area of the bus parking area.  I followed him warily.  When we were secluded he turned, grabbed his crotch, and said, “So?”  I said, “Money first.”  Who knows where that  bit of business sense came from?   He handed over the ten.  I looked at it.  I looked at him.  He looked mean. He smelled bad.  I ran my ass off.  He was too drunk to do anything but curse me as a faggot.

The next morning I was back in Hollis, promising my mother I’d straighten up and fly right.  Of course I wanted to finish high school and grow up to be a responsible person.  I thought I meant it.  Kind of.

I was thrilled with my ten dollar bill.

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And then I was fifteen.  My last year at home was a total joke.  I was out of school so often that my teachers and supposed classmates didn’t even know who I was, on those rare occasions I deigned to appear.  I spent a good deal of time with the guidance counselor.  She was bright and funny, and had a connection to show biz. I amused her. I made her laugh.  She’d always say, “Oh, you’re okay.  You’re just too smart for your own good.”  Once she said, “Have you ever considered acting?”

I answered, “What do you think I’m doing right now?” She looked somewhat stricken. That I might be less jaunty than I appeared hadn’t occurred to her.

When not being “counseled” I spent most of my stolen hours up at the local library, but I did scoot into Manhattan.  I wandered around the Times Square and 42^nd Street area. That’s when it truly was “bawdy, tawdry 42^nd Street!” I didn’t know it—or maybe I did—but I was getting the lay of the land.

On a warmish November afternoon in ‘68 my mother and I had our final confrontation.  Suspecting I was not going to school, she waited at my bus stop.  Of course, I wasn’t on the bus; I was jauntily making my way down the street from the opposite direction.  Curses, foiled again!

My mother was speechless with rage. Odd, for her.  I was en garde, waiting for the slaps or savage pinches or just the yelling—like the roar of the Concorde taking off. (To this day, a raised voice will cause me to shut down, flee or hyperventilate.)  She said nothing until we reached Rudy’s the corner convenience store, just across the street from our modest apartment complex.  It was a little bit of everything at Rudy’s—a fountain, burgers, drugstore items, newspapers, magazines.  And there was Rudy, too—a crusty character who never warmed to winsome Mr. Wow. (Perhaps he suspected that I often stole magazines and books.)  My mother ordered a cup of coffee, and the mere act of speaking—“no milk”– unhinged her.

She began screaming to Rudy and several neighborhood ladies, about what an excruciatingly horrible, terrible boy I was.  I never went to school, and for sure I was going to hell because of all the trouble I caused her.  (She had a point, but–Young Wow did not smoke, drink, take drugs, use foul language or hang out with a bad crowd—or any crowd. I was a big nerd.  And, tempting though it was, I didn’t sass my mom.)

Rudy and the gathered neighbors knit their brows and shook their heads.  Wasn’t I ashamed of myself?  What kind of a boy was I?  Did I want to go to hell?   And then, as per her habit, my mother hauled off and slapped me so hard I fell back against a pyramid of canned goods, knocking everything over.  Rudy exclaimed, triumphantly, “See what you did?”  One of the ladies piped up, “Look what you’ve done to your mother, she is always so sick, how can you be so cruel and irresponsible?”

“Go home!” shrieked my mother.  “I’ll deal with you later.”

No thank you, Mom.  Later never came.  I dashed out of the store, flung my pristine, uncracked schoolbooks into a garbage can and headed up toward Hillside Avenue, and the subway to NYC.  I had exactly 15 cents in my pocket.  That was the fare. I was wearing grey slacks, a white shirt and short lightweight jacket.  I probably had time to go home and change, or throw a few extra clothes in a bag, or root through my mother’s bureau draws for some money.  I knew she’d be some time at Rudy’s, telling everybody I wasn’t as innocent as I looked.

But falling into the canned peas was my final straw.  I felt desperately sad for my mother.  I knew her own brutal history and I knew that she tried her best. I didn’t love her. I didn’t hate her, either.  But we were not meant to live together.  In later years I realized she wasn’t meant to live with anyone—she trusted so few– herself least of all.  Alone was better. Although it was so terribly alone.

Alice said, once she found herself in Wonderland: “It would be so nice if something made sense for a change.”

So, call it strange or sad, but that November day that I sauntered out onto 42^nd Street and 8^th Ave, determined never to return home…something made sense. To me.  I knew my looking-glass was sordid, grimy, and held little hope.  But I never expected Wonderland anyway.

TO BE CONTINUED…eventually.

Hi.

Hmmmm… I feel shy all of a sudden!    Here’s my new blog.  As you can see it’s very simple.  No bells or whistles, photos or videos.  That might be in the future.  But I was anxious that it be user-friendly,  especially in the Reply section, so  all you guys are able to edit your replies as you want. 

I won’t really be open for business until April 1st.  We–oh, please, it’s all B– are still fine-tuning.

   I’m terribly unsure.  But I suppose if ever I feel sure, that’s the time to stop trying to feel sure.   I have a sense that with too much confidence I’d turn into…Caligua.  Really. 

But until I begin a bloody rampage through cyberspace, I’m still Mr. Wow.  I can’t wind up this little intro  with a definition of Mr.Wow because I have  never  known who he is. 

Maybe this new venture will help.    Oh, and within a few days I will have all my old WoW archives stored here.  Most of them, anyway. 

Love, Mr.W

P.S.  I know that there is an ABOUT section on this site, where I’m supposed to tell you all about myself.   Many of you  already know a great deal about me.   The ABOUT box confuses me.  So for anybody coming here who doesn’t know me,  I’m going to tell you all I can and probably more than you care to know, but I’m going to tell it on this page.

They call me Mr.Wow.

I’m 59 years old.

I’ve had a boyfriend (sorry, I prefer that term to “partner or “lover”) for 36 years.   He answers to B.

I’ve worked in the entertainment business for 30 years.  I’ve met a lot of famous people.  I’ve traveled. You wouldn’t know my name.

I am currently facing my final paycheck. 

I  left school when I was 15 years old.  I left home when I was 15 years old.

My mother died more than twenty years ago.  I never knew my father.  I have no siblings.

I’ve seen a great deal.

I have been very ill, in my time–13 years ago– but I recovered. (And will remain recovered as long as I take my meds.)  

I have been very depressed and I have not recovered.  (No amount of meds or therapy ever helped that.)

I’ve been a heavy drinker.   Not as much now, but still too much.   I’ve never smoked cigarettes, tried cocaine or heroin.  But I did grow up in the Sixties.   Not  all drugs are foreign to me.

I have a few close friends.   They all share qualities of tremendous patience.

I don’t own a cell phone.

I am not on Facebook.

I don’ tweet.

I grew up loving movies and movie stars.  Even (especially!) stars from an earlier time.  Especially women. 

I’m liberal but attempt to look at all sides of a situation.  Except when I’m correct. 

I disapprove of myself most of the time.

I love to read.  Mostly non-fiction, history and biography; these give me a sense of myself outside myself.  Because I am always thinking too much about  myself–usually, what a terrible person I am. 

I still sob uncontrollably when the boy has to shoot his deer in “The Yearling.” 

I adore Marilyn and Liz.  (If you need last names this is not the place for you!)

I’m selfish and childish.   But I can be giving and wise sometimes.  Not often enough.

When I am at my best I can charm the bees from the proverbial tree.  When I am at my worst my vibe can  bring down an entire room.  Or a small state.

I realize that all my problems, as an adult, have been my own doing.   I am human enough to be bitter now and then,  blaming others. 

And now I have this outlet, which will live or die depending on my input alone.    Only I can discipline and motivate myself enough to make this mean something.   Discipline, motivation–I have a hard enough time spelling them!    We’ll see. 

Again, with love–

Mr. Wow.