Pen and Ink

First wives, current wives, future wives.

On First Wives
There was Footloose (not bad), Saturday Night Fever (I couldn't even think of going), Legally Blonde (absolutely love it), and most recently 9 to 5 (didn't do well on Broadway, but closing soon). 

Now, we have the latest movie-turned-musical: First Wives Club.

According to playbill.com, "They brood, they bend, they break, they bond — and they sing. These are the rituals of members of The First Wives Club — The Musical, opening in its world premiere July 31 in San Diego, CA.

"The Broadway-aimed musical about three women mistreated by their men pulses to an original score by Motown and pop team Holland-Dozier-Holland, and features Tony Award winner Karen Ziemba and Tony nominees Sheryl Lee Ralph and Barbara Walsh."

Somehow, I think it is going to be a good show.  If nothing else, it's worth seeing because of Karen Ziemba (loved her in Curtains) and Sheryl Lee Ralph (got to see her in Millie.)

Current Wives
Oh, those fun-loving, hypocritical moral conservatives are at it again.  After Palin's delightful dramedy last week, now we're treated to Sen. Paul Stanley, Republican lawmaker from Tennessee.  The MARRIED father of two who represents suburban Memphis, resigned from the state senate on Tuesday after his extramarital affair with a 22-year-old intern was revealed. 

According to the Associated Press, "Court records show that Stanley, 47, told agents investigating a blackmail case that he had a sexual relationship with intern McKensie Morrison. Her boyfriend, Joel Watts, is charged with trying to extort $10,000 from Stanley in April. Investigators say Watts demanded the money in exchange for not releasing to the media explicit photos of Morrison that Stanley had taken in what appears to be Stanley's apartment."

What I find so delicous about this is that Stanley, like so many others before him, loved to take the moral high ground. As a state senator, he sponsored failed measures to ban gay couples from adopting children. He also spoke out against funding for Planned Parenthood because he said unmarried people should not have sex.

Unmarried people should not have sex. Nice. Married people should not have sex outside their marriages too. 

Future Wives
Apparently, if I ever decide to go straight, I should have no problem finding me a woman.

My friend Kathy from high school emailed today. She was out with some of our classmates (Facebook really having a great affect on reuniting high school classmates) including a woman named Patty.  Patty and I were in the same youth group at church, so we knew each other somewhat well.  Someone had some pictures from high school and apparently I was in a couple of them.

"Oh how cute little Glenn was that turned into the handsome stud of a man!!!!!" is what Kathy wrote in her email.

She continued, "Do you find it weird that not only men are attracted to you but also women?  What do you do with that information when you find that out?  Do you get skived out?"

Well, no, I don't get skived out. Why would I?

I guess it's flattering. And slightly amusing.

In memory.

Somehow I missed the passing last week of author E. Lynn Harris.

The Atlanta-based Harris died of heart disease in Los Angeles while on tour for his latest book.  I'll miss his work. 

He was considered a pioneer of gay black fiction, enjoying unprecedented success in the genre. He wrote 11 novels, and ten of them became New York Times best-sellers.  I discovered his work a few years ago and I've read just about all of his books.  I think there is one unread on my shelf, plus his latest.

Through his works, I came to appreciate some of the nuances of gay life that are particular to the black community.  It was enlightening.  But beyond that, he was a great storyteller, developing rich characters, many of whom appeared in numerous volumes. 

He was 54 when he died, much too you. It's sad when artists die so young -- we're deprived of what other great works they would have produced.

Rest in peace.

Joey.

Way back when, I think it was about 1985, I met a guy named Joey.

We worked together at a store called Huckleberry Finn (long, long since gone) in Wayne, NJ.  He was out as a gay man, but I was still finding my way.  We hated each other, for reasons I was never quite sure.  We just didn't get along.  He'd do a display in the store, and I would change it.  I would do my own, and he'd change it when I wasn't looking.  (Ah, youth.)

We ended up working together for a couple of years.  Eventually, I came out to myself...and to him.  I'll never forget the night.  It was a Saturday, and we were both closing.  The one or two other people who worked with us left, but I kinda hung back to talk to him. 

"I knew it!" was his response when I delivered my news.

We chatted, really having our first-ever friendly conversation.  During that talk, I revealed that I had never been to a gay bar.

"Oh, this is gonna be fun," he exclaimed with delight.  "Next Saturday, after we close the store, we're heading into the city."  (For the uninitiated, when you live in North Jersey, "city" refers to one place and one place only.)

True to his word, the next week we hopped in the car after dropping the store gate and made our way to the West Village.  Our first stop was Uncle Charley's (long-gone) on Greenwich Street.  It was an S&M bar (stand and model), but friendly enough.  From there we hit Marie's Crisis (happily, still there after a zillion years) on Grove Street.  It's a wonderful subterranean piano bar that is still one of my favorite haunts in NYC.  We ended the night at Trax (also long-gone), a mega dance club in the Meatpacking District.

It was a tour of the various types of gay bars and certainly a good introduction to that world.

From that evening, we hung out quite a bit, often with Lisa, our store manager (part-time dyke, part-time fag hag).  In short, we became friends.

Joey was really my first gay friend (other than Martin, of course).  He was also the first person I knew who was HIV positive. 

At the point I met him, he had been positive for a couple of years.  Remember, dear readers, that this was 1985. The drugs that keep so many people alive today were a good decade away.

We eventually lost touch with each other once I moved to Boston and settled into my life there.

Fast forward about 12 years.  It's 5 a.m. on a cold, rainy September morning, with a hurricane about to hit Boston.  And it was the first day of the Boston-New York AIDS Ride presented by Tangueray (that "presented by Tangueray" part was drilled into our heads; there's nothing I can do about it). 

I was standing under a tent, trying to wake up and be perky as one of the media spokespeople for the event.  Across the table, a figure comes and stands in front of me.  I look up and see someone staring at me with a dopey grin.

"Oh. My. God!" we both shrieked.

Joey!

As we yammered on, catching up with each other, the only thought going through my mind was, "Oh God, I'm so glad he's still alive."

I had thought about him during the previous years, really not sure if he was still living.  Now I had proof that he, in fact, was, and not only that, he looked great.

As things would have it, we lost touch again. 

Fast forward another 10 years or so, and along comes Facebook.  And a very special friend request last week.

I'm not religious, but thank you God for keeping this wonderful person alive and thriving.

Where's the gnome?

John came to the house last night. It was his first visit in months, and definitely his first since A moved it.

In his charming, exuberant, boylike manner, he started walking around.

"What's new? What's changed?" he inquired in his endearing way.

He walked into the bedroom and looked around.

"Where's my gnome picture?"

(Two of the walls in the bedroom are a gallery of photos of friends and family.)

A couple of years ago, while introducing John to my former hometown of Boston, we passed a store on Newbury Street.  On the front steps was a plaster gnome figurine.  It was cute, with hands in a prayer like position.

I had John sit next to it and assume the same pose while I took a picture.  It used to hang on the wall in the bedroom.

In response to his query, I said, "I took it down. A isn't comfortable with the idea of ex's."

There's been quite a bit of conversation, in fact, about the notion of being friends with one's former partners.  A and I have talked about it and on numerous occasions, Cary's joined the conversation.  We've explored it in the abstract. And we've talked about our real life examples.

Is it a gay thing?  Do straight people do this?  Perhaps it's a gay thing, because I think gay men draw different distinctions between sex and love than most straight folk do.

I've even posed the question to myself. 

"Why are you still friends with John, even after you broke up?"

"Because I want to," is always my response.

We talked about it a bit last night, and he brought it up again today in a phone call.

"I think the reason that we can still hang out is that so much of our relationship was based on friendship."

He hit the nail on the head. 

We became friends from the beginning, largely because we both love the theater.  And by this point, we've seen so many local productions that we can talk easily about the local scene.  I can't do that with anyone else.

Romantic relationships often end.  It's a fact of life. That article in the Times yesterday illustrated that so well.  But does that mean you have to throw the whole thing out?

If two people are mature enough and reflective enough about their situation, they can remain friends without hindering new romantic relationships that either might start. 

I've always believed that it's important to find the good in everything and everyone. Including relationships.  And it's important to hold onto goodness. It makes life worth living.

More ecstasy.

Here's some more from Perpetuum Jazzile.  I'm hooked. This video is fantastic.

Vocal ecstasy.

A colleague at work sent this to me. It's just brilliant.

The group is called Perpetuum Jazz and they are from Slovenia.  I love choir music like this, so it's a treat. In fact, I just ordered a CD of their music.

Check this out.

Behind the design.

One of my favorite little indulgences is the Home section of the Times. I look forward to Thursdays and Sundays, and always save this section for last (even after Arts & Culture on Sundays, if you can believe it).  It's fluff, to be sure, but I enjoy it.

Amidst the fluff today was a very poignant piece that was intended, originally, to be about design, but became about the people who live in that fabulous house.

Called "After the Breakup, What About the Lake House," the article opens with a birthday party at a country home of a gay couple in New York. The party was supposed to be their wedding, but after the dissolution of the five-year old relationship several months prior, it became a different party.

The story of how Brad and Ben met, their lives together, and their breakup was quite candid.  I learned even more after reading Brad's blog (which I've added to my blogroll because I happen to really like it, this story aside).  It was an unusual look at the lives of the people behind a design story.

The story and Brad's blog posts really hit home, reminding me of the emotions of the ending of my own 17-year relationship four years ago. For the past week, Mike's been on my mind.

A and I are making a lot of changes to the house that Mike and I once shared.  We're planning a desperately-needed remodel of the kitchen (part of my four-year old campaign to rid this house of the color pink).  And we've bought some furniture to replace an aging sectional and to provide practical solutions to the loss of my study once Cary moves in.

As I was looking around the house the other day I thought of Mike.  I thought that if he stopped by now, he probably wouldn't recognize the place.  Within a few months, virtually every piece of furniture we had together (save the coffee table in the family room) will be gone.  Landscaping has been changed, new lighting installed, paint colors changed, my burgeoning photography collection installed where jointly-owned art once was hung.  Hopefully by the spring, even the outside colors will have been changed.

This is all good, of course. A and I are building a life and doing these things together, much as Brad and Ben from the Times story did. 

Yesterday, I received an email out of the blue from Mike. It's been months since we had any contact. We've had an issue with the ADT security system (it's still in his name and my attempts to get electronic bills sent to me have failed, so we were six months behind in payments).  His email talked about the problem and how to fix it. 

But there was no "hi, how are you, I hope things are well."  Just business-like without an ounce of warmth.

OK, so I was the one who ended things and should expect any more than the civil parting that we had.  Nonetheless, I was bothered by it.

Where am I going with this?  I guess that amid the hopefulness, the springtime feeling of a new relationship and positive change in my life, there are still melancholy moments of "things weren't supposed to happen like this."  The Times article heightened some emotions that I had crept into my consciousness. 

But dealing with emotions is a good thing.

* * * * *
If you want, check out a slide show, narrated by the Brad and Ben, that accompanies the article.

Pops goes a great memory.

I spent some time (OK, a lot of time) tonight on iTunes.  I downloaded some new things (George Winston's Linus & Lucy; Jaimee Paul's At Last, and Stacey Kent's Breakfast on the Morning Tram), made some new playlists, and imported some of my CDs.

It's amazing the power that one song can have.  Some songs evoke emotions, while others transport us to particular places and times.

I'm not sure how it happened, but I accidentally clicked on "Sleigh Ride," as recorded by the Boston Pops, conducted by Keith Lockhart.

Instantly, I was standing on Massachusetts Avenue in Boston in front of the incomparable Symphony Hall. It's a few weeks before Christmas, and I'm with my parents and my ex.  The evening was a surprise as their Christmas present.

We'd taken them to dinner at Ciao Bella on Newbury Street, where we had great window seats to watch the passersby doing their Christmas Shopping on the frigid cold Friday night.

From there, we drove to Symphony Hall. Mike dropped us off and went to park.  I walked my parents into the building and my father immediately figured it out, with a grin on his face.  My mother, however, needed some clues (actually, she needed to be hit over the head with it.)

When she figured it out, she gave me a big hug.

The dinner, the concert...the whole evening was the best.  And listening to that song tonight put me on a "sleigh ride" right back in time.

A real girl.

Way back some months ago, I went out on a couple of dates with a cop.  Well, technically, he was a fundraiser for the local Police Benevolent Association, but he was still a cop. With a badge. And a gun.

It didn't amount to much. We never consummated the relationship.  Like so many in South Florida, he flaked out and disappeared, only to surface a couple of months later.  I politely declined his invitation to go out on a date.  He later reappeared in the form of a friend request on Facebook.

Sure, why not?

Today, I received a message from him.  He said that I seemed happy, as was he, having married a great girl in January.  He then suggested that he and wifeypoo (my word, not his) go out to dinner or a show with A and I.

He married a who???

I sent him an email asking if that was a "real girl," to which he replied yes.

I've been thinking about this all day.

There's no doubt that this guy was gay.  Trust me.  So what's this marriage thing about?

Was it me?  Did I make him go straight?  I doubt it.  But then again, poor John (bless his heart) was driven to drink by me on more than one occasion.  (I knew I had done something wrong if John walked into the house and took the Absolut from the freezer.)

No, I am sure it wasn't me.

I wonder if it's an immigration marriage (marrying someone to that person can come into the U.S. legally).  Could be. There's a lot of that here.

Or perhaps he's trying to get in to his father's good graces for financial reasons. More than one poofter has gone thought route, to be sure.

Maybe he's bisexual. When I hear that word I think of someone trying to come out of the closet.  But no, this guy was really out. 

Whatever it is, it's got me perplexed.  At least for today.

96Gs.

Back at Christmas time, I took the advice of some respected theater friends in Miami and went to see In The Heights. 

Known as the "Latin musical," I had seen the a snippet from the show performed on the 2008 Tony Awards telecast. The show took Best Musical last year, but I couldn't understand why.

But I took the advice of said theater friends and bought myself a ticket.

By the time the first number was done I thought, "now I get it." 

What an amazing show. I can't wait to see it again, which I will do either in New York at Christmas and/or when the national tour hits Fort Lauderdale next season.

This show has really gotten underneath my skin, and I am still listening to the cast album. Great Performances on PBS did a great piece on the show (I would imagine you can find it online) last month.

I found this YouTube clip of the recording of "96,000" for the cast album and decided to post it here.  Take a listen.  The energy of this song is consistent throughout the entire show.