2004-06-28 
 

post pride depression

Tomorrow it's back to work. Ugh. A good vacation, but it felt so short. (I'm already looking forward to the upcoming long weekend!)

G and I spent yesterday morning watching the parade from the Renoir Hotel. In case you missed it, some highlights below. (Apologies to my low bandwidth brothers and sisters as these may take a while to download on dialup, but it's the end of the month and this page will be archived shortly. Since we were up on the 5th floor, I went for a bit of added quality in these pics vs. ease of download.)

Note: These pics are safe for work at my company, but I work in SF...we're a bit different here. (and the word penis isn't automatically screened out as naughty by our web nannies)



fairies on wheels aka: mikes on bikes)



the mayor who won his way to our hearts



we're here, we're queer, rejoice!



totally graham norton



princess pride



who's that hottie pulling the flag?



altoid men - yum!



i love this flag



parading penis



colorful dots



HEAR HEAR!

* posted by me at 11:07 PM

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2004-06-26 
 

newton's third law

It's been a rather good week.

The biggest highlight from NYC is that I got to reconnect with M and B and little e. Bonus was that we all got to catch up with T at Pizzaria Uno (where we saw Donald Faison of Scrubs fame - woo hoo) and then with BB the next day (with whom I had a short but lovely dance by the light of the moon)

Other highlights would be a nifty hotel room and a rather friendly go go boy at Slide. (Super thanks to B for hanging out with me and playing hooky from work...come visit SF SOON. G and I are happy to host you.)

Came home to a quiet and romantic birthday. Nice dinner and Harry Potter on IMAX. (still not as good as the book, but more real than the first two...if you can accept that comment about a story that involves broomsticks and cauldrons)

So, I had a good time, but here it is Friday and my vaca is almost over. When you do things, time does fly by. More to post later this weekend...and Happy Pride everyone!

* posted by me at 5:58 PM

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2004-06-22 
 

my rotting marble valentine

So little e showed me her "yearbook" from preschool which had a collection of snapshots and various art projects. For V-Day, they had taken marbles dipped in paint and rolled them across paper hearts to make designs. The teacher who labeled this particular page let the hook from the y run across the double l in rolling which made for a funny label in a preschoolers scrapbook. It's also a pretty good description of what I'm feeling today. Tomorrow G turns 40. FORTY! and because he ended up staying back in SF instead of coming along to NYC with me, he'll be alone until tomorrow night when my flight comes in. (OK, he may have plans, but he won't be with me, and I'm feeling rotten about it.)

FORTY! That may just be a number. There may not rationally be too much of a difference between 40 and either 39 or 41, but I really wanted something special to happen. We were going to have a fabulous NYC day doing something fun for him. (probably something historical) followed by a yummy late lunch/early dinner and then home to SF to fall into our own bed.

I know it was his choice, but the bossy part of me also knows I could have got him to come with me if I'd pushed it. At the time, I thought I was being nice blocking away the bossy part of me and letting him make his own decision, but now the bossy part won't shut up about what a rotten guy I am.

Anyway, all I'm saying is if you're reading this...even if it's days/weeks/months later send an email to GLG1 AT hotmail.com with the subject "Happy 40th Greg!" Doesn't need to say anything more than "Have a happy day!" or "Your fiance's a freak, but he sure does love you!" etc. (and of course, replace that AT in the email address with an @ and remove any extra spaces...that's just me trying to thwart annoying web crawling email snatchers)

HAPPY 40TH to the man I love more than pasta! M

* posted by me at 9:04 PM

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2004-06-17 
 

take off

Well, it's been settled. G will stay here and I'll head to NYC. All my angst yesterday seems silly now that the decision has been made. We'll get to take a better vaca later on by putting a hold on his ticket. Someplace we're both really excited about. (I was getting excited enough for the both of us and not realizing how unenthused G was about the whole thing.)

More to follow from across the land. (If I can get the laptop up and running.)

* posted by me at 10:52 PM

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2004-06-16 
 

normal

I worry sometimes that G and I are growing apart. We've been together for so long now that what used to feel like closeness just feels like normal day to day interaction.

This weekend we're supposed to be going away to NYC. I have a work trip, and we set it up so that I could bring G along and then extend the stay for a few days to get in some vacation time with him...but he isn't as excited about it as I thought he'd be. We'd gone to NYC before, and I get a nice fuzzy feeling when he remembers it to friends as a great experience. I hoped to get that feeling again, but he's just not into it like I thought he would be. Shouldn't I have known that? One of the worst things about being gay - after the discrimination, name calling, and threat of bashing - is the need I feel to portray my couplehood as something perfect and normal to hetero society. I don't feel right having any sort of doubts. Ever.

I'm smart enough to know that every relationship has moments where partners will fall out of synch, but then I wonder, does everybody really have that happen to them? Do we fall out of synch too often? Is everyone else doing something better than me? And I'm scared to bring it up to friends and family without putting a too positive spin on things in order to keep them from thinking that I'm feeling anything more than a vauge qualm.

Sure, we do have a smattering of gay couples as friends, but then the AIDS thing becomes an issue. It puts an odd spin on our relationship that not everyone is comfortable talking about. There is one couple we know in a very similar circumstance, but they're G's friends. (There I go again, after almost 4 years, should I be categorizing friends as his and mine? I don't know.)

All I know is that the thought of not having him in my life causes such pain that I can't even contemplate it. I guess maybe it's a normal relationship after all.

* posted by me at 10:22 PM

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2004-06-15 
 

jamais

Stopped at a crosswalk moments ago and heard a French woman directly behind me laughing heartily and saying, "Non! Jamais!"

The man she was with then confirmed, "Vrai?"

To which she replied, "Jamais! Jamais!" and continued chortling while he pronounced, "C'est l'Americans!"

Point being that I wasn't expecting to hear French at 7:30 on a Tuesday while staring up across the street at 24 Hour Fitness, and my interpretation of the conversation went elsewhere.

"No! Show Me!"
"Free?"
"Show Me! Show Me!"
"Say 'La Merry Can'!" (Which is when the tiny, but present, French part of my brain kicked in and translated what thought I heard into what had actually been said.)

An aural illusion of sorts. Like when a vase you've been staring at suddenly becomes two faces talking. The bummer is that this hiccup in translation caused me to miss exactly what she said next. Extra frustrating because I'm pretty sure she was reiterating exactly what it is that Americans never do.

That's all, just another random moment in the life of Mike.

* posted by me at 11:22 PM

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2004-06-12 
 

so long grasshopper

So. I'm still obsessing about our debt. Where'd it come from? I know that thanks to my job, our clothing budget is way low. We don't have fancy new tvs, but old hand me downs. My stereo's been around for over 10 years. The VCR/DVD were paid for with cash on hand. Did we really go out to eat all that much? Were my bar tabs that high?

So where'd it come from?

OK, we lived in an apartment we couldn't afford for about a year and a half before downsizing. That was the bulk of it. I also know I spent that time not caring about the growing debt. I also know that until last year, I turned a blind eye to the charges that would appear during vacation times. My frequent flyer miles have been great in getting tickets for G, but I rarely used them myself. (I always wanted more miles. Yes, I fell into the trap. Double shame on me...after all, I'm in marketing.)

Living on just what the paycheck brings in hasn't been easy because it's so tempting to just add a smidge more to the cards. A drop in the bucket as it were, but the truth is that it'd be much easier for us if we didn't have to pay a large chunk each month to cover the various cards and loans. As they slowly shrink down, I dream of a day when we will have all that extra cash on hand and all the things we could do with it. We'll probably end up buying a house then. (There's some money I wouldn't mind owing.)

* posted by me at 9:33 PM

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2004-06-11 
 

living the american dream

G and I are in a massive amount of debt...and have been since we first me. We buckled down a year and a half ago and are slowly paying our way out, but it's hard. San Francisco is an expensive city to live in. It sucks to have to turn down a night at the movies because you know it's going to end up costing you so much more than waiting for the DVD. I also hate that the rare instance of eating out is always accompanied by the guilt that we could've done it so much cheaper at home.

So we sit in front of the television or computer. (About 40 bucks each per month. It's well spent, as both activities help me forget that we can't afford to do anything else.)

Self Pity, party of one? Your table's ready.

Truth is that our income puts us in the top 10% as far as world wealth is concerned. We can walk safely around our neighborhood at 2 in the morning should we choose...and that's free. We have so many clothes that certain items haven't been worn in well over a year. (Sure, my job has sort of forced us into a style that isn't 100% our own and we rarely pay retail for clothing, but there I go, whining again.) I've accumulated another thousand books since moving here...and CDs, videos and DVDs. We have a new car. (There's 200 bucks a month we shouldn't be spending, but it's the one thing I couldn't give up. I know it's tacked another year onto the eventual payoff of debt, but I feel defenseless and trapped without wheels. How American is that?) We have bread makers and microwaves and stereos and tvs and etc. Sure most of them are second hand or ancient, but we have them.

Most importantly, we have each other...and that's something that money can't buy.

* posted by me at 9:06 PM

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2004-06-09 
 

overheard

Heard today while walking home through the Castro:

"Madonna doesn't need to reinvent herself, I like her fine the way she is."

"Dickens wrote something like that, but without the explosions."

Q: "I wouldn't want to f*ck him though, would you?"
A: "Of course I would! He's a PORN star!"

1: "Honey, that's so TIRED!"
2: "But not as tired as saying TIRED!"

"He was there when he died, but he won't talk about it."

"Don't do that thing you do this time, just tell me the truth...OK? Would you rather have Fritos or Lays Chips?"

"That Harry Potter kid's getting cute!"

"I haven't talked to my mom in ages. She can't deal with the gay thing."

(sung) "There's NO business like SHOW business, like NO business I knoooow."

These little slices of other people's lives haunt me...but in a good way.

* posted by me at 12:32 AM

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2004-06-06 
 

sacred tomato

Went up to Sacramento yesterday for a G family birthday bash. June holds birthdays for his Mother, brother, cousin and - of course - for the both of us. It was a pretty good time. I'd met a lot of his family before, but never all in one place like that. Nerves. I know his parents like me, but I still feel like I need to be on my best behavior around the rest of the family.

I think it's partially a side effect of the gay thing. While I've found that I'm now comfortable being pretty true to myself around his parents when it's just the four of us, I still get the feeling that I need to put on my game face when a larger group gathers. (To be fair to his family, this holds true for any large hetero gathering) It's as if I feel the need to play the part of a posterchild for gaydom in situations like that. Suck them in to liking you first and then the big reveal. "What? He's GAY?...I'll have to rethink my entire position on homosexuals as evil creatures that need some good electroshock therapy now."

The truth is that this 'best foot forward/nod now and then argue gently later' habit of mine has helped open some people's eyes to new horizons on many issues, so I doubt it's something I'll change, but it is pretty exausting after the fact.

All that being said, I guess it's not too different from anyone trying to make their way in the world today. (takes everything you got.)

So today is all about some quality time with G, and perhaps a walk through the Castro to recharge the batteries.

* posted by me at 2:05 PM

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2004-06-02 
 

imgagine my surprise

So, I Googled my name today for the first time in ages and found this. It's a rather well written article...although I may be a bit biased due to the name connection thing.

* posted by me at 7:34 PM

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2004-06-01 
 

banana peels and hope

I find myself too often choosing to forget the magic in the world around me. The mundanity of day to day existence and the necessity of getting the job done is somehow easier to bear when I close myself off to knowledge that there's a happy family of elves living in the shimmer of air between the wastebasket and the window.

It's important to remind myself now and again not only that the job is no more than a means to a magical end but also that the world only appears mundane because I choose to see it that way...afraid that I'll be tempted to join the elves earlier than planned and than have to go back to living on banana peels and hope.

Thoughts after watching Big Fish

* posted by me at 2:57 AM

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