Even In The Launderette

I almost forgot to tell you...
You can now buy my first published story! It's in a new gay/lesbian quarterly, named Mary. It's a combination of a few stories culled from these pages and told anew for William Johnson. It's a great collection of some new voices in literature, and a steal at ten dollars! Run, don't walk to your nearest Paypal!
You'll be hearing from me sooner than later...
BC

The Angels And Martyrs

OK, so I know I've already posted this photo, but as I was looking at it tonight, I noticed weird things about it I hadn't before: mainly, I know every person in the photograph. If you look at the faces behind Chris (the one in plaid) they are, in order, Cath, Tyler, and Tracey. Chris and I (the one in all white) are bookended by two guys I dated. Skip, my date that evening, is on the right in all black. (I forget the other guy. Not for bad reasons, I just forget.) I thought it might have been Skip, it was twenty years ago after all, but when I saw this photo from the same night, I was sure. The guy behind Skip was a friend of Scotty's, Randy I think, and we had a hot/cold relationship because we kind of liked each other, but we also fought over Skip. He really annoyed the hell out of me at the Shakespeare's Sister show at Metro, the following year. (Coincidentally, Morrissey was in town the same week.) I distinctly remember thinking, "I would be having a much better time at this concert if So and So would quit that non-stop queeny arm flailing in Siobhan's face. YES! She sees you!" That show, believe it or not, was sparsely attended, and he stood out like a sore thumb. But I guess I really can't fault fanly enthusiasm. I find it amazing though, how Rene, who took this photo, was able to capture, with one little well timed snap of her finger, all of these people in my life in 1991. Lastly, the two angels of the far right, hands earnestly clasped in our direction, praying for us all, I knew best of all...

This post is going to be different, because I got some bad news recently about two guys I have written about here. Bryan, who I wrote about in Whisper Loud And Clear, and Donny who I wrote about in Waiting For The Day have both died. I saw Donny working at a make up counter in New York a few years ago, and pretended I didn't see him. Ugh. So to cheer myself up and celebrate their memory, I feel like I have to add some extra color and some unseen surprises, so I dug through my photo boxes and found some goodies. Check the links out at the bottom.


Chris, above, always thought Boy George sung a little sharp. He was quick to add that that was part of his charm; the imperfect sweet tones of his singing voice. When we all found out he was doing two shows at Bistro Too, a club we got wasted at a million times before, it took us months to figure out what we were going to wear. I vividly remember the cold drizzly day in 1991 I took this off a lamp post on Halsted and Addison.

It took Renee and I many trips to Boytown's alternative clothing mecca, 99th Floor, to debate themes, accessories and price points. We knew we wanted to be noticed and daring, so the minute I found my Tova Borgnine Collection-reject motorcycle cap, and Renee found her black feather bustier, we had our foundations to build upon. They did pose a myriad of questions, though: Did we really want to spend $150 dollars on the perfect shoes? Were we really going to wear those satin tuxedo shorts again? Should we go to Chanel, too? Can I really pull off red plaid leggings? Is buying three necklaces and turning them into one a good idea? The answer to all those questions turned out to be yes. Except the Chanel one. I found what I was looking for in a paralegal lady type catalog for 29.99. I had it sent to the salon, and was so afraid of missing it, I made Renee drive me to work and wait with me in her car for the UPS man, in case he came the day we were normally closed. Yes, I was that desperate to show up in a knock-off Chanel.
Hours later, after dozens of cigarettes and cocktails, the hair was done and the make up applied, we swung by Berlin to show Tasso the outfits we worked so hard on and took some snaps, and sped north to Bistro Too, to breathe the same air of our raisons d'etre. The first time you see a musician you truly love is the best.

The mood at the club was high, we were all excited for the show, and Renee abandoned me for the front row the second George walked on stage, and she took some great shots of him in that gorgeous jacket Leigh Bowery made for him: pic1, pic2, pic3, pic4, pic5. He didn't disappoint, and we found out when we got there the later show was moved to the next night, and we were more than happy to come back for more. I don't know why I just have one photo from the second night, but it's a good one! We took a casual approach to the second night's outfit, because of all the stress we created for ourselves on the first one. That's Cath's bedroom. This was mine . Chris is wearing my shirt. Jesus I was obsessed with Jesus...

I saw Morrissey twice in 91, one of which I wrote about in Found Found Found, and the entire summer night is etched into my memory forever, but I do not remember one second of the other show he did that fall, even though Renee assures me that yes, we did indeed attend (I have the stub)and even though it was almost the same week as Boy George's shows. I tend to confuse it with his 92 concert at Poplar Creek, which I remember quite well. Oh well, I guess I took too many drugs or something.
I also saw 808 State in 91 with Mark, whose tape, United State 90, I played to death and Circe Du Soliel with Renee, when they still did their shows in tents. The other show that really stuck with me was the Degenerate Art Show at the Art Institute. It was labeled 'degenerate' by the Nazi's, who knew full well the power of art and imagery to sell their schemes. The art they chose portrayed an idealised view of life, for I guess they were after and selling a kind of 'perfection'.
The art in the degenerate show elicited an emotional response from the viewer, or it inspired debate, be it by the artist's use of color, subject matter or manner of painting. I found room after room of paintings leaping off the wall like that intoxicating and inspiring. I left the museum that day a changed man, with a clearer sense of who I was as a person and an artist, for of course I'm not a degenerate, I'm provocative! For only the basest of cultures label art like that 'degenerate'.
"What you are seeing here are the crippled products of madness, impertinence, and lack of talent" One official declared. Indeed. No wonder it's still one of the most attended art shows in history...





1. Keep Me In Mind (Japan) 2. Going Boy for Renee 1992 3. Erin & Carlisa 91 4. 1987 Limelight invite 5. Nene 91 6. NSFW card Wikie used to pass out 7. Not them, but us! 91 8. Ooo, a rare 1984 pic of me with some one obviously obsessed with me 9. Why I use pics of movie stars...Renee 10. Why movie stars...Tone & Cath 11. Why movie stars... Erin 12. Tickets 13. Pictures of people who love you and kick things (w/Renee, w/the late Donny w/Renee w/Mark, early 90s) 14. The late, great, loved, Bryan, 1985

I almost forgot: a mixtape, circa 1994 about Brad, 'pity, pity', and a pic of me writing this post...

Time Off From The Rain

We knew our downstairs neighbor was dying. Chris told me one night about meeting him as he moved in with his parents.
"Our son is too ill to live alone, because of AIDS." He's lucky to a family like yours, Chris said.
Looking back to those days of 1991, I wish I would have spent sometime with him as he lay dying, but I wasn't strong enough. When I walked past his front door, on my way up to my third floor apartment, my imagined image of him grew more and more detailed, and as the weeks went on, so did the aura of sadness emanating from their home.
I knew the day had come when he had passed, when on one Sunday morning, I saw his family getting into a big black car, on Sheridan Road, in front of our apartment building. I sat at my window and watched and waited for them for what felt like an eternity for them to drive off, on that cool sunny day.
The women were buried under their expressions of grief, and the faces of the men bore a quiet compassion for their women.
Chris, Cath and I left some flowers at their door. He was he first person I knew who died from AIDS.

During this time in 1991, Chris and I took the bus downtown every Sunday for the parties at Cairo and The Victor Hotel. The bus let us off a good mile from Cairo, and I looked forward to this time with him, as we crept through the deserted city streets. On the way to Cairo we had to pass Limelight, which had just closed or was about to, and we regaled each other with the stories of our past glamorous lives. Here we were now, just scraping up enough change to take the bus. Thank God we were already stoned. I have no idea how we got home.

I call 'that place' The Victor Hotel, because I rarely had a good time there. Cairo wasn't a whole lot better, but I distinctly remember thinking a few times, This is fun!, or I wish this place was a little funner!. At the Victor Hotel, it was always: This is no fun. And I got into a lot of fights there. The exceptions being the night the Live Brady Bunch performed the Johnny Bravo episode with Eve Plum, and the night Deee-Lite performed. But by the time they went on we were so wasted we barely remember it happening.
At Cairo, Chris and I stood off to the side and watched the action on the dance floor in the basement, wondering aloud why the revelers looked so happy. Were they faking it? Was it drugs? Drugs never made me that happy. They made me take off my clothes at inappropriate times, but never happy, I confessed. Yes, you do that, Chris said.

My love life was a juggling act between Mark and Skip, I loved them both and had different experiences with them, but it was really the same: Mark was having a hard time dealing with the death of his ex, who ODed, and Skip was still living with his ex, whom he thought he still might want to be with. I remember wishing they could just be present with me, here and now, but I guess it's hard not to drag all those past lives around with us.
In essence I think I saw them as life preservers; something to grab onto as a way out of the sea of drugs and booze and self pity I felt I was drowning in. It's one thing to grab onto someone and say help me, than to just grab and grab and keep grabbing.

I did manage to find some fleeting moments of peace of mind, when the chatter in my head, fix you life! get better! want to live! was quelled, when everything was perfect, usually in the dark quiet moments in the early morning when I woke up next to Skip or Mark. I prayed for the second hand to stop moving, wanting as much time with them at that moment I could get.
I also found those moments on Sunday afternoons, when I lay in bed alone reading for hours. Catcher In The Rye, Boy Wonder, the liner notes for Louder Than Bombs, a story about City Of Joy, the new version of The Stand, to name but a few. I dreamed about having the power to create the worlds these authors created on paper a reality. I wanted to create a perfect world I could walk into and never leave, if I wanted.

I walked many many miles that year I lived with Cath and Chris, sometimes it would take me hours to get home. (I've always been kind of antsy) Hours and hours spent in my head, wondering what to do with my life, knowing I needed to make some changes, again, but not sure what or how. The grip I had on my life was getting harder to hang onto, and the siren call of let go was getting harder to ignore.
My lease was ending soon, and I didn't know where I was going, but I knew if I wanted to let go, it would be better to live alone...




Time off from the rain.
the beat goes on.

It's All In My Mind

Tony had a quiet presence about him, as if he were made of marble, or a statue found in Tutankhamen's tomb, come to life. I sometimes got close to him to check if his chest was actually moving up and down. He was tall and thin and still, and moved with the slow grace of a redwood swaying in the breeze. His presence also had a timeless permanence to it, like all the extra comet dust floating around space was gathered up just to create him.
Was he on drugs, or naturally this way? I asked myself one afternoon in Berlin. We were meeting the other Tony, Tony T, to talk about a fashion show he was putting on- Tony was going to model, I was going to present an outfit.
As we chatted, I realized this was the first time I had spent time alone with him, and it was a little overwhelming for me.

What is his deal? I thought, as we made small talk. Is he depressed or serene? I asked him questions to gauge where he was coming from, without directly saying it, because I didn't know him very well then. We talked a long time that afternoon, in 1991, and I came to the conclusion he was either wearing his eternity on his sleeve, or just plain tired.

The fashion show was a lot of fun; I had my friend Siobhan model a pre-Gaga football girl satire ensemble. (Lady Gaga is a cute weird dresser, but I like Roisin a little better...)
I bejeweled and spray painted gold metallic a set of football shoulder pads from the thrift store, gave her a bee hive hair do instead of a helmet, and paired it with bright orange stretch pants, the word 'hell' sewn to her butt, in big floral letters. Of course she played on Hell's team. To top it off, I gave her a Jewel shopping bag to carry down the runway, as an homage to Wickie-Poo, because no matter where I ran into him, he had on an amazing out fit that turned heads, and elicited jeers. I hope Renee has a picture of it laying around somewhere...

Life with Chris and Cath began pretty well, but I soon grew discontented with our arrangement. I guess I was at the start of my search for a life without drugs and alcohol, but didn't realize it at the time, and I couldn't bear being in the apartment with them very much, between Chris' all night mini drug parties, and Cath's wake and bake-edness (rhymes with nakedness). They drove me nuts because I wanted to be doing what they were doing all the time. Don't get me wrong, I was no saint, and I kept up with them, but only a day or two at a time. I was yet again around 24 hour party people, and resenting their abilities at it. I knew my addictions enough to know I couldn't hold down a job if I partied like I wanted to, and begrudgingly only went out a few nights a week.
So to avoid them , I got up early and went to a coffee shop on Broadway, aptly named Coffee Chicago, and hung out a few hours before work started, at one pm. (It's where Joy's Noodles is now. I spent countless hours next to that brick wall...)
I can't remember what I did for all that time, besides drinking tons of coffee, but I must have read books. After breakfast I walked the fifteen blocks to work, which took me an hour or so, and after walking back to the coffee shop after work, I stayed til close, which was midnight. I liked the nights there better, because they played old movies in a side room. A cup of coffee and a movie for a buck? Not bad. The kids who worked there got to know me pretty well, but I wasn't in the mood for any new friendships, I couldn't handle the ones I already had, so I kept to myself for the most part.
Friday nights were the worst. I had to be up super early to walk to work, to not drive in with Cath, because her smoke wouldn't kick in until we got to work, which was too late, for being with an unbaked Wake and Bake on a Saturday morning is just about the most dreadful way one can start one's day.
Chris' sounds of a party trying to not make a sound in his room, kept me up for hours. Then, just as I fell asleep, his ex showed up drunk on our buzzer, pressing it a hundred times, begging to be let in. No amount of threats or swearing ever dissuaded him from doing it again the next week. Maybe that's why he gave us so much free weed. That stuff was amazing. I had never got anything but paranoid from it in the past, not from lack of trying, but this guy's stuff became my reason for living. One puff and it was hours of happy laughy time. I seriously considered turning my life over to it, and did, for that whole year.
On the weekends, I went out with Renee and we'd do normal things like go to the movies or karaoke, and going to Scoozi or Hat Dance, and brunches at Queeny Mark's place in River City, and tea dances with the Berlin gang.
BUT, if Renee wasn't around, I hung out with Chris and Tony, and their scary friends. Their friends are just a blur in my memory, just a flash, because of all my consumings. I don't mean Chris's old friends you can still find at Berlin. I freak out a little when I see them, for they are still together, tied in their forged familial bonds, all these years later.
No, these people were scary in their commitment to ruin. Hour after hour, drug after drug, it was too much. One night the Mark I was dating was with us, and the next day he told me a the guy hosting the party turned to him and said, in a horrid monotone voice, with a shit eating grin on his face: Soon, very soon, most of the people in this room will die. And you wanna know why...? Mark was to afraid to say anything. Because of the decisions they are making right now...
Mark was so perturbed by that guy, he wouldn't be around him again, even thought it meant a free party. He'd ask me if the You Wanna Know Why Guy was going to be there, whenever I asked him out after that.
Mark, I'd say, that freak always has that look on his face, his brain is fried. He's a mess. Don't listen to him.

But no matter what happened that week or over the weekend, Chris and I would wind the night down together, sometimes with Tony and Cathy, by watching movies on Cath's VCR, her super-expensive early Eighties gift from her dad VCR. Usually the same movies: Female Trouble and Glen or Glenda, and/or Desperate Living. We had them all memorized, but we never tired of them. I guess it always helps when you know somebody else has it worse off than you, and no one had it worse than Dawn Davenport...
No one knows suffering like Lana Turner! (I think that's from Polyester)
I was just looking at the list of movies from 1991, and Chris and Renee and I saw so many of them in the theater, I can't believe it. How did I find the time or energy? None of use could stop talking about My Own Private Idaho, we really loved it, and Whore made us laugh our ass off. (At the funny parts. Or Theresa's blunt performance. I'm not sure which.) To this day, whenever I see a limo, I assume Theresa Russell's in there, nonchalantly working a three way.





Tony, Chris & Renee, 1991
vcr

A Promise to Be Found

Tayler walked into the apartment a wreck. She was crying, and her face was a smear of snot and mascara and lipstick. Her leggings were ripped at the knees, where some blood trickled, and under one arm was a smashed cake box.
"Tayler, what happened?! Are you hurt?!" Cathy and I shrieked. (Well, as much as two could shriek, who had been hitting the bong all morning, anyway.)
"Some bitches robbed me! I'm alright, I guess. I got off the train at Sheridan, and they came out of no where and pushed me down at took my purse and ran off!"
"Oh man, on Easter?!" I said
"Yea. On fucking goddamn Easter. Here's your cake." Tayler said handing over a smashed mess. "Ooo, it smells good. I'll get some forks" Cathy said.
"Dammit! Where's the bong!" Tayler yelled.

Sometime in early '91, Cathy moved in with Chris and I, and I was right, our new solidarity kept us on the right track for a while, and we didn't indulge in night life activities as much as we had been. Chris found a job as a receptionist at a salon on Belmont, B Vamp, where he earned the moniker Pancake, because he was in his compact every two seconds, reapplying. I was loath for him to work there, for I still hadn't forgiven the B in B Vamp, for his jumping on my back and trying to ride me like a pony, not once but three times, bombed out of his mind, at the Midwest Beauty Show, in 1989.
"He was probably just excited being around so many hair stylists." Chris said, laughing.
I pushed those feelings aside, however, when I saw how well they took care of him there, and when I kept hearing the tails through Chris of how much fun they had everyday, I debated applying for a job there.
My work situation turned into one headache after another at the time, and I dreaded going there, and complained to whoever would listen, but I hadn't the nerve to quit. If I hadn't been working with Erin at Neo that year, hosting Sunday nights, I'd have lost it.

Soon after Cathy moved in, we had a party. A 'get to know each other's friends' kind of party. I hoped it would be better than the one I threw for Erin for her birthday, when three people showed up- I told you no one comes to my birthday parties because there's too many Christmas parties going on, but thanks anyway! And not as good as the last one Scot and I threw, where I had sex with Skip after I broke up with him, in Scot's room, after barracading the door, not realizing there was some else in the room, who, it turned out, didn't want to leave. Yes, not that much fun, but not too little, either. In all honesty, if I hadn't pictures from the party that night, I would not remember it. I guess that's good.

My relationship with Mark was slowly fizzling out, and turning into a friendship, and that was bumming me out.
I liked sleeping with him, and wanted to continue our affair, but the night he wriggled out of cuddling with me, while watching Silence of the Lambs, only allowing my temple to rest on his thigh, I realized it was over.
It should have ended the night I realized I was in bed with yet another h addict with an inferiority complex, yet I kept going back to him for a while, because he told me he liked to smell his sheets after I spent the night, because he never smelled anything like it. When I told him I wore Dali, he bought some, too.
He lived by a Green Line el stop, in and old carved up mansion, on the west side. It was one of the few residences left in the area at the time, stuck in a corner, and easy to miss; the once grand homes of the 1880's giving way to industry in the 1950's, and to the street walkers in the 90's. Despite the fact the entire building was surrounded with a chain link fence, the building and their cars were constantly broken in to. I hated spending the night there.
When I couldn't sleep for fear of a midnight murder, I snuck out of bed and smoked in the living room, quietly lit by the blue Italian lights strung on the wall, next to the drafty front window. This was early winter of '91, and I watched the snow fall on the empty lots across the street, and on the unused factory buildings across the other streets, everything stained a piss yellow by the street lights, annoyed by the silence of the car-less road, wishing I were stoned, and wishing there were vitamins in cigarettes; I felt so unhealthy lately.

That was a habit I started at an early age: staring out at a snowy landscape at 3 in the morning, cigarette in hand, wondering how my life got so fucked up, and fighting with every fiber a desire to be normal. Ahh, the introspection winter inspires in me.
I was in a handstand and cart wheel phase at the time, and my constant gymnastics annoyed him, which wasn't hard to do. (I am the oldest of five boys, so I know how to annoy, and he was bullied by his older brother. It made for an interesting combo at times...)
I sat at his typewriter and typed, over and over, ala The Shining, S-T-E-V-E-N, P-U-S-H-O-FF. (Ouija Board is my favorite.) We actually used the Ouija board in his place, but I did not like who I met doing that, so we only did it once.
Mark was a great story teller, and a brilliant writer, but he wouldn't believe me. I often thought to myself, Does he think I'm dumb? Does he actually not believe he has a gift for writing?
We sat together in many dive bars, and divey gay bars, and downed a lot of scotch, and talked about writing and art til all hours of the night. I still have the e.e. cummings book he gave me.

Speaking of Morrissey, I have Rene to thank for rekindling my love of him. One night driving in her car, she played a mix tape, and The Boy With The Thorn In His Side blew up in my brain, and I cursed myself for ever doubting him. Oh God, I gotta get some more of this! I said to her. She also made me fall in love with Pet Shop Boys and Vivaldi.

One Sunday, Cath, Chris and I realised we were about to get the tattoos we had been discussing for the past few weeks, on the same day. Tranay, who was a friend of Cathy's, talked us all into getting inked by the man she worked for, Guy. His newly opened studio, Guilty and Innocent, was across the street from our apartment, and we debated for weeks the designs we wanted and finally chosen: Chris, a belt of vines, Cath, an art deco figure, and me, a Sphinx. We each were present at some point during each other's tattooing, Cath's being first that day, and the sight of all that blood dripping down her white back, gave me pause. I had no idea how much tattooing bled!
When it was my turn, they walked me across the street, stone cold sober, as Tranay suggested, and stayed a few minutes, before leaving me alone with Guy and The Best of Blondie. Needless to say, tattooing is very, very painful, despite what you've heard, and I had an out of body experience the entire time. Guy did an amazing job transforming my tiny picture of an idea into my tattoo, and I regret breaking the creative spell he was under, after I saw what he had started to do free hand, outside my design idea. It was just too painful to stay under the needle any longer than I had to.
I didn't know how Chris kept going back to get his tattoo completed after Guy started his that Sunday, because his was around his entire waist, and required many hours, and mine was finished that night.
I still love my tattoo, and whenever I look at it, I'm reminded of the permanent ways our friends can change us, despite the passage of time, distance, or death.






At Cathy's party, 1991:
Tayler & Cath
Tony & Philip
Yours truly
Rene, betwixt Scot's artwork
At Erin's party, 1990:
Scott & Erin
Me & Erin
Scott & Scot & Rhine
Neo, 91
Guy's card
Kiss Them For Me

Life Without Buildings

The scene opens with a long shot of our hero with his head lying on his folded arms, asleep on his desk, in front of his active computer monitor. Zoom in. You can tell by looking at his rumpled clothes and scruffy face, he's done this many times before. In fact, he spends most nights here sleeping, if you can call it that. As his brain crawls it's way through as much REM time it can get, the computer monitor flashes an endless parade of images and stories related to the object of his search, his raison d'etre. He's read them all, they barely scratch the surface. His months of searching only reveals what he already knows: not much. He hopes his vigilance will yield better results. He hopes if he stays at his computer twenty hours a day, he might find what he's looking for. He hopes if he closes his eyes just for a second, he might find some peace. And the object of this search? If you saw The Matrix, you might guess Morpheus. If you knew our hero, you'd say a pink rhinestone bracelet he bought at Kohl's in 1984, that he just knows is lurking somewhere in a sixty piece 'buy it now' jewelery lot on ebay...


Chris and I floated around our large, sparsely furnished apartment for a couple months or so after Scot left, like two drunk ghosts, before Cathy moved in. Our place was so empty, it reminded me of the many 80's videos set in a smokey, fake street at night, newspapers caught in the wind. Or sometimes, it would look robbed. We'd come home to find our few possessions left askew, everything seemingly rifled through. When you did as much drugs and drank as much as we did, you got used to your life looking like that. We kept our couch and TV in the dining room which was next to the kitchen, and left the living room empty. We hadn't the money to furnish it.
Rex's curtain was still up in the dining room, from when he stayed there, when Scot was still living with us. Chris' friend Tony stayed there for a while, too, after Danny did. I forgot how many glamorous and wonderful people lived behind that curtain.

Looking at the curtain, I often thought of the night, we all were there. Rex, Danny, Scot, Chris, Tony, and I had a little pre-party before hitting the clubs, and went to "Danny's place". (Rex had moved out and was just visiting.) We lay on his futon, dreaming about our futures, sharing some sad stories from our childhood, (Tony in particular; his parents kicked him out at a young age for being gay.) smoking, drinking, and laughing, but there was someone else there with us, unseen. We all felt it; we knew this was a special moment in our lives, all of us coming together like this. It was a cold night in December, yet we were together and warm and safe- I think we knew that we were in the presence of people who would be there for each other when we needed them. We also knew on some level this would be our last night together as a group: in two years, two of us would be dead.
But that was yet to be, and Chris and I tried to go on with our lives as best we could. For me, Scot's moving was the latest in a long line of friends who had left Chicago, and I felt lost and overwhelmed. The life I began creating for myself in 1985 when I moved to Chicago had crumbled around me. And if my friends hadn't moved away, we moved in different directions with our lives, and that can be just as distant. I knew we still cared for each other, but we weren't building our lives together any more.
I became, as much as I could, the stable person in Chris' life, and helped him save his money, made dinner and breakfast when I could, and scolded him when he 'kept the party going' in his room with bar friends til daybreak. I say as much as I could, because I knew this was the role Chris wanted me to perform for him, and I was up to the challenge of the part of a responsible adult, but my coping mechanism at the time was drugs and alcohol, and I easily dashed any amount of respectability I managed to build for myself, and joined Chris in his all night binges.
My irresponsibility came to a head one night after a particularly close K call, and one too many out of body experiences bearing witness to my shocking and embarrassing behavior.
"Oh Christ, what am I doing- put down the straw and put some clothes on??!! "
Chris' actions started to disturb me, for his life seemed to turn into one long continuous binge, and I didn't know how long he could keep it up. We would get into these long talks about his behavior, like I did with Brad, and one day I learned he was an accomplished trumpet player. I begged him to go back to music; to make his life about that, something other than partying. I told him having my hair career and hobbies gave me something other to focus on than going out, and I told him about the friends I knew that hadn't anything else, got into trouble or ODed.
He just looked at me, as you would a child who asked you why the sky was blue.
"It just is, honey."
He would then describe his plight to me, that he was a 'victim of himself'. The damage was done. He was resigned to that idea, no matter how much I pleaded to the contrary.
We needed another person to live with us, and I had someone in mind, and I hoped Cathy's motherly instincts would kick in, and help me help Chris...




Chris & Roxy, above
twentysomething, and hating it, 1991

Left To My Own Devices

Once upon a time, I did so much laundry with Todd, I can't help but think of him every time I do mine now, in my murky 1910 basement.
When I was sixteen, I lived down the street from him, and during that summer of '82, I bore witness to his every waking moment. Happily so. Like Tonto, or 'the Professor and Mary Ann', I was never center stage, but enough for a supporting role, in his story. Yes, Todd saw himself as a star. He was beautiful after all, with his bright green eyes, curly blond hair, and quarter back's build, and he loved the attention it got him. He transformed himself into the role of a 'star' from the one he was forced into as a teen: that of the town pariah. If you grew up gay in the 70's, chances are you know what I mean.
He lived above his landlady Bernie, who smoked despite her oxygen tank, who would shout quit smoking Brian! whenever I passed her door on the way up the stairs to Todd's. I would smile and nod and wave.
We walked the few blocks to the laundromat lugging his baskets. (Both the Laundromat and Bernie's house have since been torn down.)
We would talk about guys we liked, and school, and I would help him shake the lint and wrinkles out each piece of his wet laundry before it went into the dryer.
"Doesn't it all get smashed up in the dryer, anyway? Doesn't the lint trap catch it all?" I would ask.
"I don't care! Every piece must be shook out!" He'd reply.
Todd was a few years older than me, and starting culinary school, and I envied his independent life, and asked myself internal questions about my own, as I watched him live his. Would my life be like his, after high school? What will I study for a career? Where will I live?

His apartment was a little threadbare and depressing, with it's greying white paint and bare bulbs. The few pieces of furniture were clean but over used, and cheap when it was new, in the sixties. Littered about were hand me downs of hand me downs, small attempts by his mother and sister to add a sense of home. But it was his.
To cheer the place up, I painted him a picture of Marilyn Monroe, based off of a photo of her with Carl Sandburg.
Todd was often overwhelmed by the demands of school, and cursed his plight, and instead of studying, ran out to the gay bars every chance he got. He eventually ran off to Colorado for a year with his boy friend Opey, so he could quit school without listening to the wrath of his family, who payed for it.
I moved out of state later that year to finish high school, and watched, through the letters he wrote to me, his enthusiasm for Colorado, and Opey, wane.
Todd's is a long story I hope to tell in more depth sometime, but hopefully you get an idea of him. I don't know if it's Todd's or Bernie's ghost, or just my imagination, but as write here in the Viceroy, and breathe deeply, I get the distinct waftings of their old Memorial Drive duplex. I mention where I am right now because I am meeting two old stars of my story from the eighties, tomorrow for lunch. What, it's only been twenty years since I've seen them?!

Now why did start telling you about Todd? Oh yes, because I saw him as a kind of mentor, and I studied his life as a way of figuring out my own, and that reminds me of my state during 1991. I hated I hadn't a person in my life like Todd, because I had no idea what the hell I was going to do with me life any more. I felt so stagnant and stuck somewhere I didn't want to be, but I had no idea where to start changing.
So when Erin asked me to co-host eighties night at Neo with her and Carlisa, I jumped at the chance. I was nostalgic for a life yet lived, and went back to the past to live for a while. I knew the answers to any question about my life back then, and I basked in the warmth of old news.
They were fun, crazy, drunken nights, and we dressed up to the hilt. Neo is where I got my first taste of performing on stage. We paid homage to our idols by lipsynching to their songs to a mostly disinterested audience.

At the time, my past had little comfort for me, but it was all I had, so I stuck around...

At Neo 1991
'Nona Hendryx & Boy George' at Neo
'Nina Hagen & Boy George' at Neo
Disinteresting: Boy George
Disinteresting: Nina Hagen