Bilerico honored by The Advocate

A very nice tip of the hat from The Advocate.
(I don't know what I'm doing inside a political blog, other than keeping the feet of all the other contributors planted firmly in the gutter.)

How fireflies cruise and sometimes lose.

I had no idea.

And I'm sure I don't need to list the obvious parallels.

Marching NYC Gay Bloggers

Gay Marching NYC Bloggers pause in front of Stonewall on the 40th Anniversary

A wonderful and glorious day.

(Photo by my husband and our marshal, C)

What I said in the South Florida Blade this week:

How Queer is Too Queer

Tomorrow on Bilerico: Fluid Sex - Schedule it for 2020

You will have to go to Bilerico tomorrow after 10:30AM to find my response to the following:

Father Tony, it'd be great to have you write in more depth about why you hope the 'straight vs. gay' dichotomy has gone stale. What kind of potentialities do you imagine? Grounding 'fluidity' in some practical, lived way is always of interest.

Leo

photo by Marius Bugge

Our time in the studio was great fun, and I have to say that I really like the result.

We are on pages 52/53.

Joey didn't like any of his and ended up using the one (by me) that he's had on his blog for years, but don't miss his cover interview with Rachel Maddow.

Jenny, the make-up lady, shared beauty secrets with me. My husband was a better subject than I, perhaps because I am suspicious of photographers because I do it so often myself.

Folsom Street East 2009

If you have to ask whether the following 25 pics might be NSFW, you've never been to Folsom.

Can you spot all the celebrity bloggers?

I wanted "Court and Thwart" in my headline, but

I thought "Court and Thwart" is a catchy phrase describing what happens when politicians woo the gay vote and then ignore the gay community. Anyway, this is what I said in the South Florida Blade this week.

Today on Bilerico: "Spoken Like a True Bureaucrat"

You'll have to go to Bilerico to see my answer to SD's question:

Tony:

In the general I supported Obama, and maxxed out my contribution. I did it because I felt I had no choice, anyone was better then Bush. I still think anyone was better then Bush.

Politically I register DEM. though I am closer to a libertarian republican, before the republican party abbonded its principles and sold its self to the religious right.

Obama is a great speaker, and it is a major difference having a president who can put a sentence together,

but would he say anything to get elected, and then throw gay people under the bus when he tacked right to win reelection? Obama doesn't need the gays at this point. I think his calculation is where else do they have to go?

Obama is Chance the Gardener, from the Movie Being There. Everyone has put what they want to see on Obama. I think he is not qualified to be President, but like an American Idol contestant, he learned how to win. He looked at Bill Clinton, studied Rove, Atwater, and Bush, and he got elected. The thing is, that people who win Idol, are nothing like the voters think. They just played the game, and won the contest. But make no mistake: gays are one of the last groups it is acceptable to throw under the bus.

Tony, you were in two large governments, The Church and The State. I am very interested in your thoughts maybe in a Column for the Blade, or Bilerico.

Thanks

Stephen D

Harlem inspection

In New York, taking the subway means visiting places very different from one's own neighborhood. Recently, we got off in Harlem near 134th Street and walked about rather aimlessly. The idea was Hamilton Heights.

C told me the history of a cemetery we passed. I have forgotten most of what he said because I was distracted by an adjacent church in which we found a wonderful cortile with an attractive garden in the center. I love interior gardens. The quiet. The lack of visual intrusion and traffic. Protection.


We saw a strange plaza with odd dimensions. It contained this attractive door. (Well worth embiggening.)


It also contained an Hispanic Museum.


In the museum, I contemplated two ceramic plates containing severed saintly heads. Not much room for salad on these plates and I question their merit as centerpieces when there are dinner guests. (There were several good paintings by Zurburan none of which I bothered to photograph because I am childish.)


Here is the bathroom in the basement of the museum. I felt extremely comfortable in this bathroom. It had a scale and texture that made me feel very Alice in Wonderland. I wanted to fetch the severed head plates and set them in the sink. (In case you are not paying attention, this is the most beautiful sink in the world.)

Destiny's Long Gone

Nothing will remind you how fast time moves like having a box labeled "ephemera" into which you regularly throw papery things that for a variety of reasons you do not wish to discard. A theater ticket. A handwritten phone number. A Valentine's Day card. A poster from a bath house wall.

Yesterday, while rooting through the box, I came across this mailer from 1983, the first year of GMHC. They sold out Madison Square Garden, supposedly the first time that had ever happened for a cause-generated event. 26 years have passed. Progress has been purchased. I frequently wonder if we are losing our energy in this battle. I hear about cuts in HIV funding in California. I hear about increased infection rates in populations that have no excuse for unsafe behavior. I fold the mailer and put it back in the box next to a comic strip that was on the refrigerator door for years when we had the old farm. Memories converge, converse, argue and inform.

This week, in the South Florida Blade, I said....

In which I come out as a Boyd McDonald porn fan.

Tomorrow on Bilerico: "Was Jesus Gay?"

You'll have to go to Bilerico tomorrow after 10:30AM for my answer to the following:

Hey FT,
I am back to ranting that Jesus Christ was a gay man. Since you were a priest versed in all the jargon and able to be viewed as a credible source on the subject, I want you to tell the rest of humanity that there is not one shred of evidence he was heterosexual. Am I correct? It is time to challenge these fundamentalists with their own distorted beliefs. I say if the "gay community" can and should do anything as a collective group, it is to reclaim our first and truest unapologetic gay activist.

ewe

Update: It's up. Get on it.

Marching bloggers on June 28th

Are you a blogger planning to be at the New York City Gay Pride March? If so, you are welcomed to join our group. You need to email me for details about ordering your shirt and because I may need to invoke the list of acceptable names for security purposes. Looks like we'll be a large and diverse LGBTQ group. This will be great fun.

This week in the South Florida Blade

Either it was a slow news week or they felt my piece on apathy was worth hyping on the cover. It's the sort of topic I usually leave to others, but having been asked for it, and having had a few minutes with a wifi connection at the JFK Delta terminal, I filed it without scarcely more than a quick review. I don't feel comfortable exhorting people to perform in any particular way beyond better sexually, but I rather do believe what I said. We needn't resolve to change the world. Picking just one cause is sufficient and justifies our leisure entirely.

Today on Bilerico: "What marriage has done to me"

You'll have to go to Bilerico later this morning to read my response to the following:

Dear Father Tony,

In all the talk about marriage equality, we hear about laws and rights and injustice, as well we should. But the video interview of George Takei and his husband made me wish I could hear more about the difference it's made to newly-married gay couples. What does it mean to you, now that you're married? As a long-committed newlywed, you are one whose opinion I'd like to hear, and other Bilerico contributors might chime in as well. This is the sort of message that straight people need to hear, to understand the reality of what heretofore may have been just an abstract idea. We need stories—pictures in our heads—to replace the old rhetoric.

I'm looking forward to your reply.

Bird O’Paradise

It's up. Get on it.

Bisexual Writing: the celebration and the rant, and an after-party.

On Saturday evening, C and Nick and I went to the Gay and Lesbian Community Center on 13th Street to attend Bi Lines II: A Celebration of Bisexual Writing in Reading, Music and Theater.

Those of you who read me regularly know that I do not hesitate to critique a work of art, but I will shy away from savaging an organization or an event sponsored by a benevolent organization even when I feel it could use some improvement. Volunteers deserve that respect. I’m going to slip out from under that gentility for a moment to voice my displeasure with one particular aspect of Bi Lines II.

Here is Sheela Lambert, founder of Bi Writers Association that sponsored the evening.



Ms. Lambert began the evening by delivering a long, rambling, worthless and monotonous introduction that did nothing more than reiterate the printed program we each held in our hands. I mention this only because of what followed. The first speaker was the admirable, brilliant and renowned author Edmund White who chose to read from his biography of Rimbaud.



He was to be followed by several writers and performers who would be the first to admit that they are not as accomplished as Edmund White and for whom this podium was an opportunity. Edmund White’s presence at the event was a very gracious and generous gesture on his part, and that is why we were stunned when Ms. Lambert decided she had heard enough of Mr. White’s reading and approached the podium, effectively giving him the hook! She then proceeded to deliver additional rambling words including a thrice-repeated complaint about what she felt was the overly expensive price for using the room. I guess she felt that this childish harrumph of hers was more important than Edmund White’s thoughtful delivery. Before we could protest what had happened, the deferential Mr. White left the podium. We were stunned. If keeping to a time schedule was so important for Ms. Lambert, she could have and should have clipped her own prattling rather than the significant words of an honorable guest.

I won’t bother reporting on other aspects of the mismanagement of the event that made it rather lame and I want to emphasize the fine work of the volunteers who devoted considerable time and resources to the event. It is clear to me that, as is often the case, the founder of an organization is sometimes not the best person to manage and grow it. The other readers and performers we listened to, including Honor Moore, Jenny Block, Ron Suresha and Rob Barton were great and are needlessly burdened with the weight of bad leadership. I can’t imagine that there will be a Bi Lines III unless there’s a change at the top. This organization deserves better.

Here is the spirited and well-kilted Robert Barton.



Here is the intriguing Ron Suresha who spoke about Professor Kinsey.



Here's our friend Nick (born two years after C and I met!) who attended this at our recommendation. He was happy to hear Edmund White and Ron Suresha, and agreed with us that despite the above mentioned irritation, the event was worthwhile.

.

We ended the night at Nowhere on 14th Street where Paul Vitale was having a birthday. Here he is with his everyone's-stamp-of-approval-garnering boyfriend, Stoopes. Don't they look good together? We left the adorably shy Nick at Nowhere in the presence of many handsome men and have not yet heard whether or not he met any of them.

Bear Hill -summer 2009 begins.

On Saturday, the boys gathered on Bear Hill in Central Park. Here are David, Joe, C, Nick, Jeff, Craig, Chris, Mike & Chris.



Others arrived later. The Pino Grigian Sprite was most quaffable.

Some are born raconteurs.



Others are born to dance. (And he had the best line of the afternoon, after having had his fill of Joe describing the perfect Jewish husband that is somewhere out there: “Well you just saddle up your unicorn and find him for me.”)




Still others are born just to love, as is evidenced by this photo made by Dr. Jeff of two guys who settled near our group, having just met in the Ramble.