Month: February 2000

The Family

They buried my uncle today in Greensboro. Of course, I wasn’t there. I feel sort of bad, but there was no way I could go east right now. This is the third time I’ve had an aunt or uncle die since I’ve lived in California. I haven’t been able to go home for a single funeral. The time and cost factors are just too prohibitive when you live 3000 miles from home.

I fear it will be a more frequent occurrence in the next few years. Each time there’s a death among my parents’ siblings or their spouses, I think about the fact that my parents are getting on in years too. They won’t be around forever, and I don’t want my last memories of them to revolve around phone calls and one single visit home every year.

I’d like to get to know my parents again before it’s too late.

It’s not as if we’re estranged or anything, and it’s not as if I’m expecting them to die anytime soon. We get along well and we talk often. But we can only maintain a superficial relationship via long distance and email. I want to watch TV with my dad and go shopping with my mom. I want to listen to stories and to go out to dinner with them and even to indulge in the occasional hug.

I’ve spent most of my life running. Running from my hometown and running from all the attention I got as an only child. I often felt that I needed to get as far away from home as possible in order to live my own life on my own terms. And all my life, I’ve kept things from them fearing more that they’d worry than that they’d dispprove or lecture.

Except, of course, in high school, when I was doing lots of rally stupid things so they WOULD notice and stop thinking of me as their “perfect little boy”. But that’s another story entirely…

I don’t feel that urge to run anymore (at least not from my parents). I have my own life, and I think it’s less dependent on geography. I’m not really planning on moving back to my hometown. I just don’ t particularly like it there, for a number of reasons. But I am planning to move a whole lot closer and to do it fairly soon.

I think I can go home now.

Maybe that’s why I had such a great time in Fresno this weekend. Or maybe not. Anyway, the promised “more details” will be coming soon, as will some pictures from the “Mary and Rhoda” hot dog feast Sarah and I had last night…

Off to Fresno

Took a road trip this weekend and didn’t even take the camera. It was kind of nice for a change, although taking the camera wasn’t really an option anyway, since I haven’t gotten it fixed yet.

I just love Fresno, and I’ve yet to find anyone who really agrees with me on this one. It’s such a strange place, physically and psychologically.

I’ll restate the basics first: Fresno is (I believe) the largest American city not served by an Interstate or US highway. There are no VHF television stations there. Test marketing and surveys are often done here because Fresno is apparently one of the most typically American cities to be found.

Which is surprising to me, simply because I find Fresno so very odd. While progress has moved northward, the southern and middle sections of the city has remained virtually unchanged physically (although the demographics have changed considerably). Fresno is like a lab, possibly the best place around to study the history of urban development since the 1950s.

Downtown Fresno was deserted by traditional business decades ago, but Fulton Street bustles with local, largely Latino-owned shops and restaurants. Old department stores have been transformed into bazaars selling electronics and counterfeit Nikes. The former Safeway on Ventura Street looks exactly as it did in 1965 (avocado, orange, and purple interior intact), the only changes being a new sign out front and a large map of Mexico above the meat department.

Old shopping centers from the 1950s flank the wide boulevards, set at approximately one-mile intervals. These centers often house some of the same stores they did on opening day. The clientele has changed, but the stores opted to adapt rather than to flee.

The economic malaise which has gripped Fresno and much of the Central Valley over the past few decades has allowed much of the inner city to look just the way I remember cities looking when I was a kid. Malls and “big box” stores are not in evidence (although they do exist in the northern part of town). The Baskin-Robbins in the dying Manchester Center still has simulated wood paneling. There are still local supermarket chains and drug stores.

Sadly, I must admit, too many of the Denny’s have been converted into the terrifically annoying faux 1950s “Denny’s Diner” concept, which looks like some sort of “laverne and Shirley”-inspired nightmare. We are not amused.

Maybe it’s just comforting in a strange way. More tomorrow, including queer bars, strange radio stations, and the drive-in I finally managed to eat at over five trips and six years…

Today in History

Glad everyone got a little chuckle out of the regular guys. Good response to that one, which proves (once again) that people never respond to what you think they will.

Turns out the wording on my contact page has given some people the impression that I don’t necessarily read all my email. This is not true. I read everything; it’s the responses that I’m treating a little too casually these days. I’d love to say it’s getting better, but it’s not. Which is sad.

Eighteen years ago today, I met my friend Jeff in a public toilet. We’d met before, but this time I realized that neither of us was really there to take a piss.

Seventeen years ago today, I had a first encounter with someone I believed to be a really nice guy. We had nasty sex in my grandmother’s house (I was house-sitting). Didn’t see him again until sixteen years ago tomorrow, and that second reunion started a very unpleasant 1984. I looked at the coincidence involving the dates as a sign that this was something good. Now I realize that said coincidence was merely unfortunate.

Fifteen years ago today, I was in Raleigh, crying my eyes out, but we covered that a few months back.

Thirteen years ago today, I was developing a crush on a skate rat who later invaded my home for several weeks. He was cute as a bug’s ear, but h only liked girls.

Twelve years ago today, some friends did a Culture Club song in drag. it was pretty good.

Not that any of this really means anything, and not that anything particularly significant happened today, but this time of year is one of those which has historically produced events which seemed worthy of journal entries at the time.

Not this year, though, I guess…

Favorite Forks and Regular Guys

I have a favorite fork. You underprivileged souls with nicely matching silverware sets might find that concept a little foreign. I understand. It would be quite difficult to have a favorite fork when all your forks look alike.

My silverware, though, is — well, let’s call it “eclectic”. It’s been acquired through trips to various thrift stores. None of it is particularly noteworthy, with the exception of one set, of which I have about three settings. All the pieces have little sputniks on them. I love little sputniks; I even have saucers with little sputniks.

I have a favorite spoon, too. It’s an ice cream parlor spoon, so it’s bigger than usual. It’s great for cereal. Do you have a favorite fork or a favorite spoon?

Do you think these regular guys do?

Interesting site that last one, huh? Don’t get me wrong; I think it’s great that they have a group dedicated to sports and “guy stuff”. But my god, could they use the word “masculine” a few more times? Sounds a little like a penis size contest to me, although they make it clear the group is not at all about sex.

I’m not into sports, and therefore I guess I’m not masculine. But that’s OK. It’s not something I really aspire to anyway. I think, though, that if I were forming a group of my fellow sodomites who were into sports, I’d refer to it as “a group of sodomites who are into sports”, rather than a group of “masculine men”. I guess all the sissy sports fans I’ve known wouldn’t be welcome.

Nor would I. And that’s OK too. Trust me on this one.

Non-masculine things I’ve done today:

  • Yelled “where’s my damned trivet” while cooking dinner.
  • Crossed my legs in the unmanly knee over knee fashion.
  • Admitted publicly (in front of, gasp, women and heterosexuals) that, until last night’s news, I didn’t even know that Tennessee HAD a pro football team.
  • Addressed two of my houseplants by name.
  • Discussed my silverware online.

No, I don’t fear “masculinity” because it’s “threatening”. I fear it because I have no earthly idea what it’s supposed to be (and I don’t particularly care).