Cold cold summer

I woke up early, in the middle of a dream which felt exciting but which i immediately forgot, to go to the gym this morning. before the thunderstorms. To see the future, read the forecast as I'm running on a treadmill. To see the map of the country, which parts they think are more likely to burst into flames today. In today's heat. Sometimes people ask me about the name of my zine, Scorcher. I saw it on TV, the weatherman said that's what the day would be. When I got home I was dripping with sweat. As I did my stretches, I heard the sweat drip off my forehead and land in little drops on the floor, at the same time that I heard the first raindrops started with their little clicks against the windowsill. It's raining outside, but that's not the only place it's raining.

GOODSTONE

She wakes up in the morning and get on a good stone. You know: diamonds, rubies, emeralds. In gold bands, soft enough to chew.



New CdG perfume series. I'm obviously excited. I look great in blue. Would I smell good in blue?

Yesterday, the neighbors next door built a church in their backyard and had services. There was a band and a choir and a preacher, who spoke in English and was translated into Spanish. It was supremely annoying, but I got angry at myself for being annoyed. It's church. But it's also loud.

Listening to Teena Marie's Emerald City, which I just found on vinyl for a song. Took it home to see it's on green wax. That's a lucky sign, right?

Today was an exceedingly difficult day. One of my work shirts ripped, on my left elbow. Which wouldn't bother me except it's a H&M CdG shirt I'd been lovingly taking care of. And that wouldn't bother me (shirts wear out, after all) if it hadn't also happened to every other my work shirts this week, the +J shirts I'd been wearing in rotation. They've all split on the left elbow. I've been trying to get them patched but it doesn't work. I've dry cleaned them so many times that the fabric's worn out. Simultaneous spontaneous shirt death. It's petty bourgeois, I know, but it did force a question: what will I wear to work now? This is a loaded question. I never know what to wear on my free time, but I used to always know what to wear to work: one of those three shirts. But now it's all up in the air.

I had a similar realization when I first moved to Brooklyn and my ipod broke. I had saved up for that iPod for months, and I used it to play backing tracks when I sang. So without that, I didn't know how to perform anymore. Maybe I wasn't a performer anymore, or not the same kind. It was scary but exciting. Can I have another realization, please? I'm halfway through my saturn return.

Also on Sunday, amidst the backdrop of a revival in the backyard, I did a bunch of chores. I went to the gym, I cooked, I cleaned, I did laundry. I got a haircut from the awesome Jess Paps and feel much cooler (in all senses). I met my long lost friend Izzie for dinner. We sat next to a pair of sexy boys but I ate with gusto nonetheless and had a really spicy margarita. It was perfect.

Saturday I saw Linda Simpson's photos at ClampArt in their NYC c. 1985 exhibition, which was so cool! A really touching and dynamic way of looking at a really complex time in New York. Linda's my favorite drag queen in New York, and her legendary zine My Comerade made me so excited to live here. I got to perform at her night at the Cock with Telfar (called SLURP, which always reminded me of the SLRP), and it was a definite highlight.

I was thinking about this video I saw of Vivienne Westwood, where she talks about punk rock:



I like this idea of a book as a punk rock accessory so on Saturday:



Afterward, I went to band practice with B0DYH1GH for our performance on Friday night at the BIRDSONG SHOW in Brooklyn. Which is going to be very exciting. Then we went to this awesome reading at Interstate Projects, featuring: Joseph Keckler, Xeňa Stanislavovna Semjonová, Samantha Thornhill, Anthony Thornton, Mary Walton, Lord Breaulove Swells Whimsy, and Joseph Whitt. It was SO MUCH FUN. I was really inspired by my awesome friends. It was outdoors, there was too much free red wine, it was great.

Friday night I got to read at the SUMMER CRUSH, opening for Ariana Reines. I gotta say, it was a super fun event, and I got to hang out with Kayla and Duchess Crystal, but I do feel like I totally bombed. It was okay, though. I like bombing (much to my professional detriment). I like doing a bad job sometimes. I'm just so excited to get to open for Reines, it's the same feeling of playing the same punk show as a band you like. Just to be on the same bill. Just to be in the room. You know? It's not different form being a fan; it includes that. Sometimes we think we need more than we do.

And then today was awful hard, really. In so many ways, all day. Most of it was my own doing, just me freaking out. But there are some things bugging me. Some worries. I feel really disorganized and stressed out, and like I can never catch up. But I came home and one of my room mates gave me a H&M CdG shirt he was getting rid of, which is gorgeous, and my other room mate gave me a glass of prosecco and I did a facial masque and ate a light dinner including pharmaceuticals and my room mate also gave me a spare cigarette he had hanging out, so it can't be all bad.

I just feel like, if you're really smart and if you practice a lot, you can function invisibly. They say it's impossible but we know (so many of us) that it's not impossible; camouflage is an ancient survival mechanism. And so I know, I think I know, that we can poison ourselves silently. I could be shooting myself in the foot without realizing it. And that's a scary thought. But it's not scarier than the alternative. 

Tomorrow I'm going to work then to rehearse some songs at BAX by myself, then to meditation then home to cook dinner (or something?). I'm going to try to get up extra early to go to the gym.

Sometimes I wonder about timing, or how long things take versus how long they feel like they take. Sometimes I think I am so tired of certain things not being done. I'm so frustrated for not having outgrown some aspects of myself. And other times I really miss things about myself that I used to believe were true. These are the negative parts and I'm trying to think of the positive parts. The positive parts are less glamorous.

I wrote a poem, for the beginning of the new issue of my zine. But now I feel like I can't publish it because it came true. And so now, I feel like life is trumping what I was trying to do, or something. The world took the words out of my mouth. Isn't that what breathing is? That's what Caroline says in meditation class; we think it's us doing it, with our brains but that's not actually it. That's not how it works.

I think I'm protecting myself and maybe that's a delusion. But at the same time, I don't think that by pretending that my brain was in charge,  I don't think that I could breathe underwater.

I had the lyrics all wrong, duh.

There Are Boys Who Could Be Monsters There Are Boys Who Fuck Her Dead

It doesn't matter how we got there, but at one point tonight, my Analyst did congratulate me for making it 29 years without killing myself or winding up in a mental institution. And I did enjoy that, I thanked him and I laughed.

I didn't reply: "Yes, but I pay you."
He didn't ask: "Do you think you're paying me to congratulate you?"

Came home to another message from a random stranger on the internet:



Do y'all know that Heavens to Betsy song: "These Monsters Are real"? It's amazing. One of the lyrics is: There Are Boys Who Could Be Monsters There Are Boys Who Fuck Her Dead.

Stay Dry

I would, you know, like to think of myself as someone for whom the weather doesn't completely dictate their mood, but that is a fantasy. I felt pretty much oppressed by the heat this weekend, bedraggled by the rain. It was a particular comfort to watch the sun burst through the clouds yesterday evening, standing as I was at a swanky queer art fundraising party on the roof of BAM, sipping as I was mojito número cuatro. Gorgeous, right?

The party was a ramp-up to the fantastic event happening for Gay Pride at BAM: EVERYBOOTY. Organized by SPANK and Earl Dax and Hey Queen, it features a ton of amazing performers, including a FAG CITY reading I organized with Becca Blackwell, Juliana Huxtable, Sam McKinniss and Khaela Maricich. The reading kicks off the night. it's going to be amazing. You should definitely buy tickets in advance! I have a discount code which I posted on my FB page, or can e-mail you if you like (billycheer@gmail.com). This is your advanced notice.

It has been a tremendously exciting week.



Last week I went to the NYU Fales library to celebrate the release of the Riot Grrrl Collection, published by the Feminist Press. It featured a panel with Lisa Darms, Ramdasha Bikceem, Johanna Fateman and Kathleen Hanna. It was so cool. I've seen some of the material collected in the book before, but definitely not most of it. It's a fantastic compendium, a way cool resource. It kind of makes me feel old, too? But in a good way. A great summer read. The panel discussion was interesting too, I feel like it's sort of surreal to try to relay the impact of zine culture in a sort of post-Internet world. One person (zinester/zine-star Kate Wadkins, of the totally essential zine International Girl Gang Underground) asked the panelists if they could give advice to their younger selves, what would it be? I thought this was a really interesting question, and Johanna Fateman's response, about giving herself permission to make art, to be a writer, was really inspiring. She said (I'm not directly quoting because I don't remember) that anyone who tells you that making art is frivolous or not important is stupid, and that the reason people say that is because they're mad that they're not making art. I don't know; this is basic, this is simple, but it's meaningful to me to hear an artist whose work I admire say something like that? My whole experience of Riot Grrrl (happening, as it did, so far after RG "ended" or whatever) was a call to arms in terms of making your own culture, so it's nice to be reminded of that message. There was a very nice vegetarian reception after the panel. I had a blast.

Oh my gosh, speaking of Riot Grrrl and herstory, today is the birthday of one of my favorite Riot Grrrl records, Bratmobile's legendary Pottymouth.


Happy 20th Birthday!

Pottymouth is probably the vinyl record that I listen to more often than any other one in my collection. Still. It's totally a classic. I love Bratmobile so much.

After the fun vegetarian reception, I ran over to Bowery Electric to see Miss Lydia Lunch perform with her new group, RETROVIRUS, made up of No Wave heavyweights, performing polished gems from Miss Lydia's back catalog.

Shitty photo.

OBVIOUSLY it was amazing and I almost wept. I never in a million years thought I'd get to see Lydia perform any of the 8-Eyed Spy stuff, "Shotgun Wedding", anything from 13 13. All of which was reinvented, stripped down, and gorgeous. Her voice is awesome. I absolutely never thought I'd get to see her sing  "Mechanical Flattery" (that's why I took the liberty to cover the song myself, duh). It was such a really magickal and special night.

And then the next fucking night, I went to see Lydia Lunch host a reading at the Pyramid Club, which was ALSO fantastic. Miss Geraldine Winnifred Visco was there, covering the event for a blog she writes for. She  gives a much better description than I could, and generously quotes me waxing rhapsodic on my feelings for Lydia Lunch. As if you didn't know. 

After the LL reading at Pyramid, I ran over to Julius' Bar for Mattachine, the coolest party in NYC, where a certain star of my favorite movie which begins in "P" and ends in "-arty Girl" performed a scintillating apocalyptic monologue, to the collected delight of all gathered.



Another epick Thursday night, right. I did beg off early just after that (though I was having too too much fun with my co-editors at Gay Sunshine Press, Mister PLD and Mister Boogers, respectively), because I had to save my energy for Friday, when I had the foresight and the good luck and the $20 to spend to go see Cibo Matto at Littlefield.



I'm such a bad photographer. I don't know why I even bother. The Cibo Matto show was soo good! I can't believe it's been like three years (?!) since I saw them before. And like ten before that. Littlefield is such a cool, small, well-run venue. It wasn't crowded, the audience was really happy. The new songs are so cool. Miho intimated that they're kind of going in a new direction. The new album isn't going to be so much about food as, based on the new bits we heard, about ghosts and a hotel where the ghosts are. It sounds weird, and it is weird, but it's also exciting. Nobody sounds like Cibo Matto. The new songs are really catchy and unexpected and groovy and heavy in a way that feels consistent with their sound but also new. I can't wait for the record to come out. We weren't given a hint as to when that would be, though. Fingers crossed.

Saturday, I hid from the sun and ate dumplings and kind of wasted my time, until the evening when I met up with Steven and Max B. to go to dear heart Ben Rimalower's now-legendary show Patti Issues at the Duplex. It just keeps getting better and better! I had a fantastic time. I love Ben and the show so much, and so did my friends. After the show we went to Marie's Crisis, then the Boiler Room (where you always run into so many friends, on the quest for cheap drinks), then sneaked home.

Sunday I also avoided the Sun, and the rain, and made it out in the afternoon to Tompkins Square Park for the HOWL Festival's LowLife performance, featuring Downtown and East Village legends saluting iconic East Village Goddesses. Some highlights include the always-motivating Bridget Everett, singing "I'm Waiting For My Man":

And Mx. Justin Vivian Bond, reading words by Cookie Mueller.

Fucking awesome. After that we met up with super Jill and Amber and Nath-Ann and went for drinks, then to a very nice rooftop party where I had too much summer fun, but did make it home before it started raining.

Excited to go to Meditation class tonight!

RIP Ari Up

We just got this video of the B0DYH1GH show at the Birdsong benefit in October of 2010 online. I think it's a good show, and time sure has flown. Check it out:



Am I preaching to the choir or talking to a brick wall? I sometimes think there's no reason to sharing on here. I wanted to update with a bunch of exciting descriptions of all the fun I've been having but I'm in a shitty mood today because nothing, it feels like, is going my way. Oh well. I'm going to see Cibo Matto tonight, which I am actually really excited about.

I want to play more music shows in New York. And elsewhere but specifically New York. I am now beginning the summertime project of bugging people about it. Which feels really fucked up. I know it's what people do. I am frustrated. Let me do it.
OK.

BAO BAB

Having skipped spring, she finds herself tumbling down the rabbit-hole of summertime. The hot sweaty blur of New York City. Doing the ritualistic sniff-test of her clothing before accoutering herself in the morning. Dousing with Florida Water to maintain her hygiene across multiple planes of existence.



Been going to so many awesome shows lately. Living out my dreams of an adult life in the metropolis, where I could see as many concerts as my time, energy and money allows. The first thing to run out is my energy.


Miss Khaela bringing the gorgeous rage at Pussy Faggot.

Had some relatives in town, relatively who like to live well, and they got some awesome treats for an awesome cocktail party I was invited to.


Manolo Blahnik ice cream

Been partying with people a little bit older than I am, and really feeling it. It's not even about people being older than me, or a specific age. Just, this thing of partying with peopel who are grown-ups. People who are not out to prove how desirable or alive they are. Or at least not trying to prove it in the same way. People who flip out less, and flip out more intentionally. People who are responsible with their substances, the laws of nature. People who have better style. People who already know all the techniques for seduction. People who you don't have to bundle into a taxicab at the end of the night. I like feeling alive and grown-up. And Present.



Last Saturday night I saw PLANNINGTOROCK at the DFA Records anniversay extravaganza. There were a ton of performers, the space was gigantic beyond belief. A truly overwhelming crowd. I was there for PTR, man, and I was not disappointed. I can't believe she never plays in New York. She played her newest hits, as well as some favorites off of W. Nothing from the first record, which was sad for me but which I understand. Incredibly inspiring for its difference. Nothing else sounds like PTR. Janine Rostron is a true visionary. I feel really emotional and queasy about her work; like I'm scared or worried someone's going to take it away from me. It feels like a security blanket? In the sense that her, doing her own thing, plumbing the depths of her imagination, is a call to arms. It's like a dare. She makes stuff that's so complex, thought-out, curious, and thoroughly gorgeous it makes me excited to be alive right now.



It was such an awesome show. The next day we went to the Metropolitan BBQ, a time-honored summertime tradition. Dig this, though, kids: they've put little nails around the flowerpots to keep drunk gay people from accidentally sitting there, ruining the flowers. I think they should take off the flowerpots altogether. I resent the yuppiefication of everything, least of all a gay dive bar. To be treated like a common pigeon!



Though of course I suppose I could be compared to any number of less-favorable animals. Pigeons are fine. I might sit wherever I want anyway. A savvy friend of mine found a workaround for this problem anyway, natch. We hightailed it over to the Knitting Factory to see Jess Paps' band HEAVENS GATE and dear hear Matt Elkin's band the SoSoGlos perform. It was so wonderful.



Jess brings the rage.



SSG's emotional strategies. Wonderful fun. We got to hang out backstage in the green room with the band. What is it about aging that makes me exceedingly comfortable around younger heterosexual punk boys. They no longer scare me (as much). Maybe they just don't scare me if we're sharing free booze and pizza. Set, you know, and setting.

I have a great deal of other activity to report but will save it for next time. Been thinking a lot lately, though, about how no one likes to be around in the present moment. Especially gay people. I feel like queers are so often bothered that there's either too much history, or not enough. That there are too many labels, or too few. That the past is too important and yet also unimaginably opaque, while the future has never been more necessary, and has also never been further out of reach. I feel like the Mindfulness Meditation class I've been going to at The Spectrum makes me think about things like this: what if we dealt with the present moment? What if understanding that accepting yourself and the world around you at the exact moment you're reading this is not, in fact, a defeat. It's not deferring your dreams to acknowledge that they're a long way off. It's not disrespectful to the past to forget it sometimes. Queers are so obsessed with the past, and so anxious and nervous about our future. But in the meantime, we're all here, failing to capitalize on the perfection of today.

But, you know, maybe I'm projecting a little bit.

One last thing is that it's been so insanely hot and humid here, and I like many of my curly-haired sisters, have been battling the frizz. MY preferred technique for dealing with hot humid summer weather and curly hair is BAOBAB OIL. It is amazing, I feel like my life is better because I started rubbing into my hair after the shower.



Although to be honest I did kind of go overboard yesterday and am breaking out on my forehead. Learn from my mistakes, children.

I'm so exhausted! And tonight is another party night. I'm running home after work to take a disco-less nap (my spiritual parents told me it's not really a disco nap unless you take drugs when you wake up, natch) and then re-dress myself for another night on the town.

Stay cool.

looking like you used to

Bobby and I were sitting on my floor, smoking a joint and listening to jazz records. We had just spent some time admiring paintings by that famous artist who killed herself. Bobby was telling me about this movie he made with his friend Timmy. I didn't know Timmy very well at all, and was certain that he didn't know who I was, either, even though we had both slept with the same guy Johnny, who broke my heart. Bobby told me that in fact Timmy did know me, and had mentioned me to Bobby. While they were making their movie (an erotic--soft-core--art film, about power dynamics and aesthetic dynamics). Bobby said that Timmy brought me up, because Johnny had told him that he slept with me. Bobby said only that Johnny was talking about me, mentioned that we had slept together. I said I was surprised that Johnny mentioned it, especially to Timmy. I said that I naturally assumed that Johnny would have been embarrassed to have slept with me (so many times). I said he probably didn't want that known, and I was touched, in a way, that he told Timmy. I wasn't so touched that Timmy told Bobby. I didn't ask what Johnny said about me. Whether he said if I was any good in bed or not. I knew I wasn't. Not then. I was ashamed at my performances with Johnny, and felt some secret regret that he never caught me at the right time. In the years since then, I did have the opportunity to show off, to Johnny, how great I am.

Get in, get in. Get in, get in, get in.

Last night I saw Chain and the Gang and Calvin Johnson perform in Brooklyn. I've actually never seen Ian Svenonius perform live before. He was, of course, the fucking greatest. I had no idea the Gang was such a great band as well. I really liked it, it sort of made their record make sense to me. Mr. Svenonius is a punk icon and someone who's work means a lot to me. His books are fantastically inspiring. I've had a crush on him ever since I thought I might be queer (for quite a while now, obviously). He put on a great show! I feel smarter.

And Calvin Johnson performed. I had wondered what the crowd would be like. Would it be old record collector types? Straight couples in their 40s? Would it be punk rock chicks? Twee indie kids with fussy bangs and summertime sweaters? It was all of these and more. The crowd skewed a bit younger than I would have thought. I felt kind of old? It was so nuts, though, to see what I imagine to be college students, who knew the words to all these Hive Dwellers songs. Maybe it's not that weird. He played last, and I was exhausted, but it was amazing. He performed acoustic, singing his own songs both old and new, as well as some Hive Dwellers jams. He sang an a capella version of this song, and it basically broke my heart:



GET IN. It's about coloring outside the lines. This has always been Mr. Johnson's MO: to make a place for the freaks, the outsiders, the not-famous, the not-superlative, to congregate and celebrate our difference. Our freakiness. The only barrier to participation in the world of the International Pop Underground is that you have to want to participate. I tend to think of this kind of stuff, these days, as axiomatic of a kind of Buddhism which I assume everyone is familiar with. I think of this as a basic tenet of post-post-modernism, the moment in which we live. But I sometimes forget that I learned this idea from people like Calvin Johnson: that the idea of underground culture is not just some adenoidal stance against mainstream culture for the sake of being uppity; it's actually an embracing of actual lived experience. It's not a thing of "Fuck MTV" but "The records me and my friends are making are more applicable to my life than what's on TV-- plus, they're free."

I guess what I'm saying is that I really love a lot of things about my life in New York. I love almost all the people I run into. I get to see some rad art and I get to be exposed to lots of amazing and inspiring thinkers and people. But New York is also a cultural and capitalist hub. A lot of motherfuckers in this city clearly think that they are very special, and a tremendous amount of power and energy is directed (even by well-meaning, "radical" leftist and ostensibly freaky people) towards maintaining power structures based in exclusivity. A lot of energy is spent making special people feel special by showing them who they are not. A lot of us get comfort from setting up our clique and then deigning to decide who's invited to our table.

So, it means a lot to me to get to see engaging, intelligent, dangerous, funny and sweet art, practiced by an actual Authority on Counter Culture and Punk Rock, whose message is unabashedly inviting. Art which says, above all: GET IN. I feel really good about it. It made me sad that I don't feel that way all the time.

He also played "Love Will Come Back Again" from What Was Me. That song is a favorite of mine of all time, it sounded just as beautiful as when I first heard him perform it, over ten (!) years ago. I remember that tour he did with Little Wings and I think Bobby Birdman, the Come Along tour, where they'd perform in traditional punk rock venues (such as warehouse squats) but also in public parks. I saw them perform a couple times on that tour and it made a huge impression on me. That first solo record of his was very important to me and I was really happy to hear that song from it. It was also cool to see him perform acoustically, to a pretty packed space, with all the lights turned on. Everyone was quiet, except for those who were quietly singing along. A pretty magickal moment, I must say. Very, very different from the theaters, cabarets, nightclubs, and art galleries I imagine I want to be in. A different context which felt familiar. A thing that might not actually be here.



Making a big list of books to read. Do you have book recommendations? I'm looking for book recommendations. Pretty excited that Boy Genius Travis Jeppesen's new book The Suiciders, which you can pre-order HERE.



It's so sexy when you can be crazy and nihilistic and still manage to contain that certain joie de vivre. Just because everything is rotten doesn't mean it's not great. Travis' writing always strikes me as sort of subverting nastiness. Not mean-spirited exactly, but sassy, snarky. That makes it sound more benign than it is. Maybe it's like that Pop Group song, "She is Beyond Good and Evil". There's a kind of energy to his writing which I'm really drawn to and am also a little bit scared of. Can something be morally neutral? Isn't there a D&D term for this? Chaotic Neutral?



I'm excited to read it. Went window shopping last weekend to see the new Comme des Garçons collections, which came out for Golden Week (in Japan). The big new one is the collaboration with the Andy Warhol foundation.



Cute, right? The bags are rad, I don't know how I'd feel about wearing a t-shirt with that print of his face. I once worked with some proximity to the Warhol Foundation and it is absolutely as fabulous as you can imagine, and the licensing is one of the many things they do. I didn't get any of the Warhol x CdG stuff, but did drop by Uniqlo uptown to get some Warhol-printed pajama pants. I was more excited by the Original Denim collection CdG quietly launched at the same time.


The Original Denim cave at Dover St. Market London, designed by Ms Kawakubo. 

As much as I'm obviously a die-hard fan, I'm most often interested in and impressed by the late-season shipments, the weird supplemental collections CdG puts out, such as for Golden Week or Christmas. The Original Denim stuff is really cute, OBVIOUSLY. It's basic CdG silhouettes in lightweight medium denim, including work shirts (peter pan collars for girls), backpacks, and the drop-crotch pants. If I hadn't just found some CdG SHIRT denim pants at the Barney's warehouse sale, I would be all-in for these. I'm into the idea of denim as being a genre, right? Like, singing a cabaret version of a heavy metal song makes you wonder about cabaret. CdG's "original denim" idea is cute: recasting the obliquely decorative CdG shapes (newness in design, novelty as luxury, freedom of energy as reward or conceptual payoff) in tough-wearing denim. Like what a Jackson Pollock would wear, right? I remember seeing in an interview between Calvin Johnson and Ian Svenonius, that Calvin was talking about why he's often seen wearing his now-iconic straight-leg denim pants. He traced this to a punk-rock thing of being working class. Denim has this association, still. For the high fashion world, however, the class messages are somewhat washed out in a vague mist of "authenticity". Nothing in CdG is ever so simple, of course. These are great because it's pretending to be simpler than it is. Maybe it is so simple.

Been thinking so, so much about Taylor Dayne recently.



I guess I should say I've been thinking of Teena Marie, and then reminded of how much I like Taylor Dayne. The plaintive, out of touch white diva soul singer. That's a thing, a kind of tragic figure, where the tragedy is entirely in my head. I feel, often, these days, that everything I see is tragic and that I am the only one who can see it. And maybe that is the truly tragic part?

The funkiness of Taylor's voice, though. The hair. The early hair of Taylor Dayne. I want you ungrateful little children to know about this. Fuck whatever some pseudo-celebrity of gender/drag revolution told you on your parents' cable, kids: they're aping miss Taylor Dayne and the moment she comes from. When drama was not a joke.

And for many of us, it still isn't.

Monday night B0DYH1GH performed, I think we did a pretty excellent set. Jason & Jill and the new band MESSS also did fantastic jobs. I definitely had too much fun and didn't sleep enough. Last night I went to Caroline's awesome Mindfulness Meditation class at the Spectrum. It's every Tuesday night and it's free (donation-based, please donate) and it's at a rad queer arts space near my house. Please see the FB Page for more info about the series HERE.

I forgot that this Saturday I'm going to see PLANNINGTOROCK at the DFA Records anniversary show. There are tons of really greta bands and DJs performing, but I only really care about PTR. She's maybe my favorite musician/band that's alive and making new music today? Is that creepy? I think she's performed in New York only one other time, in like 2007, which I missed.

MIsxgyny Drxp Dead - Planningtorock from planningtorock on Vimeo.

I forgot I bought tickets and I keep remembering and I'm so excited!

I keep running out of ways, it feels like, to express this feeling. I think maybe I'm scared to vent certain opinions because I think that if people knew I felt a certain way they wouldn't want to be my friend? So fascinated, still, with this idea of rage as a generative thing. I'm into this idea of righteous anger, anger that maybe looks like a smile, or sounds like a song. Some new name for a kind of energy, or something.

I'm really frustrated. I have a hard time thinking of why or how to express it. Is it okay to be a brat for a second? I wish things could alternately stay exactly the same as they were in the past, while, at the same time, allowing for the past to be totally destroyed. I want to own history and I want to be the only one who does!

I'm so tired of pretending that we are more noble and more complex and more fascinating than we really are. I'm becoming narcoleptic, having to wait for people to come around. For it to dawn on them the way it's been glaringly obvious to me. But you can't just tell a person: "you're acting this way because you feel sore about stuff that happened to you when you were a kid." People aren't equipped to hear that. Maybe I should become a psychoanalyst. I feel like I have no good ideas for music or performance or writing or being a person anymore and I want to cease existing. Nobunny cares. No records feel good to listen to, but I have to. At the gym, listen to music, because I can't deal with the radio station the gym owners play.

I wonder sometimes about this cool-kid thing. This attention thing. This myth that getting famous, getting paid will solve your problems or somehow make your "Real life" begin. That once you make it, things will be rosy. That's a fucking bummer. I don't know. Not that getting attention and success isn't great. Not that I don't ache for those things, too. Not that I don't ache to have a perfect life where I am adored by strangers, I do. I do want those things. But this idea that that (fame, attention, success, money, love) is what it would take for you to be happy, that's dangerous. Because that might not ever come. Or come in the way you want it to. Or, worse yet, it might come and then might leave, the way everything man-made does. Where would you be then?

I'm tired of feeling like a loser for not prioritizing those things, and I am tired of feeling like a loser when I do prioritize those things. I guess I'm tired of feeling like a loser. But it's ok to be a loser! That is my whole point. Maybe I'm tired of being tired. Going to see a show tonight which I'm quite excited about, so there's something to look forward to.

2 Jams

TONIGHT B0DYH1GH is performing at Earl Dax' new Monday night party FRIENDS & FAMILY at Hotel Chantelle. I'm very excited because B0DYH1GH hasn't played for a while, and the occasion for the show is dear heart Ben Ha'Bear's blessèd birthday. The other acts are all duos and good friends: MESSS (Mikki and Brian of JUDY) and JASON & JILL, who we're totally obsessed with. It's free at in the basement and will be so much fun. You can see details on the FB page HERE.

ALSO, the video from the ENCOURAGER performance is in! Here is a clip from the show, the "Narcissus" section:



I'm debating putting the whole show online. Maybe another little clip, later on.

I have a toothache that I've had since Friday night. I'm freaking out. I hate it.

Look. At a millionaire.

On the train home from work today, I was reading in the New Yorker about Anarchists. Modern-day ones. Like old hippies but different. I felt sort of suburban.

So, big news you guys. And long-delayed. There're two rad books that my friends put out and I think you should get.

Poet Warrior and Real Girl Kayla just put out her zine, Snakebite, featuring drawings by Crystal. It's definitely required. I'm biased; I'm a big fan of Kayla's work already, but I'm also specifically impressed with these. You should write her and get a copy now.

And also, Jeffery Self's second book, Straight People: A Spotter's Guide to the Fascinating World of the Heterosexual just came out. Technically it's his first book, I think? Because his other book 50 Shades of Gay came out more recently. I know that he has been working on this new book for a minute, and while I haven't had the opportunity to read it yet (my copy's still shipping), I am really into miss Jeffery as the Californian Authoress, slyly deconstructing so-called SoCal American culture or whatever, like Joan Didion. I think it's rad that he's put these books out. I've always admired Jeffery's writing. He's a really great writer, like in his solo show People I Slept With (Who Never Called Me Back). I'm 'xcited by that.

Recently I was riding the subway around Happy Hour, and this drunk guy was yelling at people. He yelled at some guy in the car and said "Look. At a millionaire." I thought that was cool. Because in New York, in 2013, you never know. I didn't know. I mean, I knew, but I wasn't sure. Because you never know, right?

Went to the opening of the new Tracy Emin show, I Followed You To The Sun. I went on my way to see my analyst, because I had an hour to kill in between work and my analysis appointment. So in a way it was perfect timing.


Lonely Chair Drawing V

Awesome. I've totally been there. I don't love Tracey Emin's work. I think it is kind of loveless actually? Am I allowed to say that? There's something, again, suburban about me but I feel like the young British artists are rich, right? Not like they were all super rich before they got famous (though) but like now they're all super rich and successful right? Not to generalize. And not to be like being rich is bad or something. I feel like there are a lot of things I love about Tracey Emin's work. Maybe I love where it intersects with time and place and context or whatever. I love her choices, most of the time. I just think that I would not love the work in the sense of wanting to be it/in it/having made it. It seems like a bummer, right?


That's How You Make Me Feel


a Feeling of Past

Anyway I'm super glad I went. It prompted a lot for me for analysis, for sure.


She Kept Crying

She kept crying. If only. Later on this weekend I went to the Carolee Schneemann show at PPOW Gallery. It was pretty amazeballs, of course. The new installation was maybe a little crusty, dreamy. There's some older work as well, it's just like-- being near a Volcano? Or like some ancient Greek oracle or something. At the opening I said to my friend that Schneemann is like Elvis. I feel like she is. Like, in some circles, for some people, you cannot fuck with her. I'm in that circle, I think. We went upstairs to see the Laurel Nakadate show Strangers and Relations which I liked a lot. It was a cool concept, and I thought the photos were really gorgeous. Creepy and gorgeous. The horse one is a favorite, I bet it's kind of the hit of the show.

The superbig fun of the weekend was the Comme des Garçons sale. I spent a lot of money, I went almost every day including early and I still regret not buying more. I wonder if they will do it again in a few years. My goal was to get these yellow plaid CdG CdG pants from a few years back and get the multi-waisted Ganryu CdG jeans and a bag and a coat, but I tried the pants and they were kind of disgusting on me, and they didn't have the Ganryu jeans in my size. But still I made out like a bandit. I am very happy.

I went to see Jillian Pena's show at BAX over the weekend and liked it very much. I've admired Jillian from afar for a while, and hearing her talk about her process over the last year was really incredible. I saw earlier iterations of this piece, and was blown away each time. The newest version was paired with a new video, and I don't know. There's something very funny and brave and sort of but not exactly sweet about the way her work seems to function. I cannot imagine being one of her dancers. It seems superhuman. I was very impressed by all involved.

I had a meeting with the other artists in residence about the year, our shows, moving on to next year. It was wistful and sweet the weather this weekend was really nice (on Sunday) but I was so sick! I felt like I had the flu, almost. An insane cough which is only now getting better. I did take yesterday off of work.

I went to Erin and Becca's house over the weekend to play apples to apples and drink champagne and eat these really insane cookies they made. I ate too many cookies. It was bliss. I lost both rounds of the game. The first round by only one point (maybe two) and the second round by many points. I couldn't focus because I was too busy eating cookies and washing them down with champagne.

And then last night I saw this reading organized by Emily of Emily Books with Sarah Schulman and Barbara Browning at Housing Works. It was as Emily said, a reminder of why it's so great to live in New York. It was free and open to the public and featured really awesome writers reading their work and talking about it, with relation to the question What is the Queer Novel? Barbara Browning's reading was really cool, and included a description of this scene from Chantal Akerman's documentary about Pina Bausch Un Jour Pina a Demandé:


The Man I love - Pina BAUSCH by birdy66

Gorgeous, no? Sarah Schulman read from her latest book Empathy, which I liked very much. There's a kind of productivity to thought, even what one might think of as anxiety, which she's able to demonstrate. I admire this tremendously. I don't think it's just a matter of force of intellect, it seems to involve a kind of patience, specially-skilled eyes or ears, something. In the conversation, Schulman spoke of writing which includes it's discovery, it's revelation of itself. She said: "If you already know what you want to say, there's no point in writing it." And my heart sang. I felt like I was given permission, or something. That this was not a function of unskilled or disorganized thinking; that this was in fact what good writers like Sarah Schulman did. I felt vindicated, in a way. She wasn't saying not to edit, she was just saying that the reason for writing would be, must be in the writing itself. That felt really right to me.

Hers and Ms Browning's I'm Trying to Reach You are also two more books to pick up. Wow. So many rad books. I was telling someone today that I was listening to records, and I realized how old-fashioned that makes me sound. But I do, actually listen to records and I do read actual books and not just to be fussy, because that's what's around.

At one point in the reading I think a recipe had come up for crescent rolls and 3 musketeers bars? Is that right? Can that be real?

Over the weekend, we met these two foreign guys at the bar who were real nice and social and really wanted to get to know us. I had a strange feeling, like something weird or bad was going to happen. They followed us and struck up conversation. I blamed it on the fact that my friend was showing off his impressive physique in a spring/summer ensemble but I quickly apologized for perpetuating rape culture. He looked good as is his right nay obligation. The foreign guys had no reason, no occasion, I thought, to bug us. Thinking we were cute tripped me OUT. So they followed us and sat with us and mentioned something about listening to TLC and how I'm probably too young to remember the 1990s. I told the guys how old I am, and though they're only a pair of years younger than I am they reacted really strongly. They were surprised, i guess, about how "good" I looked for my age. That made me tremendously uncomfortable, because I know it means that they were then looking for the thing that would give away my age, right? Like, being only 18 months older, I'd have some weird wrinkle that only shows up when I laugh, or something. I wonder at what angle, making what expression will they think I finally look old.

I ran into this friend of mine who, the last time I saw him, had gotten some bad news. And this time when I saw him, he told me that after he saw me last time, he got more bad news. Last time, his lover broke up with him, and this time it's that right after his lover broke up with him, his room mate asked him to find a new place to live. This guy can't catch a break! I told him maybe it was because of the eclipses. But he always seems like he's in a good mood. He's always very nice to me.

Covered in Hope and Vaseline

So I went on a juice fast and it only lasted 24 measly hours. I'm sure some people experience enhanced mental clarity, increased physical energy, heightened concentration, and emotional buoyancy, but not me. I was miserable and exhausted, so I quit. I am still trying to not have caffeine for two days in a row (maté doesn't count, natch, it's a different chemical). I felt really sad? But I don't know if I can blame that on the fast.



So I went to meditation class and it was pretty great. I did have a harder time concentrating than usual. My stomach was growling. I came home and I broke my fast, gloriously, with baked yams and carrot soup and papaya. I don't know whats up with me where somehow all of the food I'm drawn to eating is orange. Doubtlessly subconscious. What is it? What does β-carotene signify, I wonder, to my unconscious? Is it a thing of needing sunlight? For some reason all of the foods I want to eat fall within the same color range.

I guess I'm just skeptical that my body knows what's best. I believe in the dictum to "Listen to your body". I think most people need to be more in tune with our bodies. I think our bodies have a lot to teach us. I don't know if my body, really, knows best, though. All I want to eat is orange and all I want to wear is green and black and blue.

I want to disappear, but there aren't enough ways to do it. I want to disappear into people. To point to the places where the seams end: "Look!" I'd say, excited, "it's already happening!"



I said: "I don't know what I want. Nothing appeals to me." I was hoping that he'd make me an offer. That he'd think maybe I had just overlooked him or his thing, and that if he drew my attention to it, it might be thing I need.  I want to meet someone who thinks they have what I need, and for once they'll be right. Maybe I'm not making myself emotionally available enough. Or have made myself too available, wasted my capacity. I'd read those stories, in high school, about aging gay porn stars, with destroyed bodies. Impotent, sure, speckled with carcinoma, with mouths, throats, assholes all busted, loosened. I want to think that my indecision would be attractive but I know it's not. I know I come across like a brat, I wish I didn't know it. I wish I thought I was the coolest, most plugged-in and attractive person. I wish I didn't know the awful truth about myself and I wish I didn't know it was usually true for everyone else too. I wish I didn't learn it about myself first. Maybe I didn't, actually. But hindsight's always 20/20. I recently had a conversation with someone I don't know very well, and I told her that I get nervous, just like anyone does, introducing myself to a handsome stranger in a bar. I told her I feel insecure, just like the rest of the world. She laughed in my face and said that it's silly for me to be insecure because I am attractive. It didn't make me feel amazing, or very attractive. It made me think how cute she was. I felt pretty guilty.

So much wasted time. It stinks!

I'm trying to do a two-day juice fast/cleanse. I ate dinner last night at 6pm and have had nothing but water and green tea since then. It's miserable. Over the last month I feel like I've been stress-eating, or just not taking the most amazing care of myself, and I wanted to give my system a little rest. I also want to have no caffeine or other substances in me, just for a minute, just to see. I'm on my third glass of green juice. It's expensive and I'm bored and irritable. The goal is to go 48 hours. I don't know if I can make it. Tonight I'm going to do some light exercise at the gym then go to Caroline's awesome meditation class at the Spectrum. Tomorrow I want to go to a yoga class, which I haven't done in a very long time. I feel like I'm kind of losing my will, though. I may break the fast tonigh. I hate fasting. I'm starving. Alright.

Last night I saw the Breeders perform Last Splash, which was like a dream. I've had the phenomenal good luck to see them a few times in the last couple of years, but it's always to promote their new record, so it was cool to see the album played, as if like one long song. I also got to hear them do songs I never thought I'd get to see performed live. "Hag" is one of my absolute favorite songs. It was weird because I felt like the crowd was all weirdly invested in the show. I mean, we all love that record. It's meant to much to so many people. For the encore they played a bunch of older songs, including some jams from Pod which I was definitely not expecting. Totally wonderful. A wonderful night.

I've been really obsessed with Teena Marie lately. Kind of for a while. There's something about her relationship to culture, identity, race, genre that's so interesting to me. She identified as a black artist with white skin. But like, in the 1980s, and totally straight-faced. And she was kind of taken seriously in that regard. It's kind of baffling to me, and I love her records so much. I can't stop.



I do want to harp on one last thing about the show I did. In ever performance, I ask an audience member to come up on stage and discuss their keychains with me. People are nervous to do it. I forget that people get freaked out so easily. I don't want my last post to seem to unnecessarily bratty, and I was thinking about how every night I did get fantastic volunteers (eventually), and how grateful I was. The first night, rising NYC comedy and performance legend Becky Eklund came up. The second night writer and Stonewall rioter Jim Fouratt came up, and the third night, international icon of stage, screen and teen dream Erin Markey came up. This seems a metric. I feel so lucky! It was kind of the highlight; that these people came at all to my shows (wow!) and that they were eager enough or pitied me enough to come onstage. It makes me feel good.

Friday night I went back to BAX to see Love/Forté's show Memory Withholdings, which I really liked. I've seen them develop the piece along a couple of different fronts throughout the year. And I know that, independently of one another, they're both tremendously accomplished and busy choreographers, dancers, teachers, people. I was curious to see how they could sort of bring all the themes, motifs, elements of their project together. And I was really happy to see how it turned out. The piece is, to my mind, about constructing and inhabiting a narrative. I was struck with the motif of distance. I sometimes think of time-travel as a kind of hokey or staid artistic device, but in Love/Forté's newest work, the influence of the past, the inevitability of one's destiny are foreboding, scintillating, and impossible to ignore. The weight of history threatens to tear the present moment apart. I was struck with how, as a duo, they managed to portray a kind of pluralism, a multitude of dynamics, without even really dancing in duets for much of the show. I was struck by the visual motifs that reminded me of Butoh, I was touched by the scenery, (a chair and a desk sat sideways on the floor, so that if one dance sat in the chair and looked into the desk, she was leaning on her left side). It was really gratifying for me, personally, since I'd seen elements of the piece workshopped earlier, but I think even without that prior knowledge, anyone coming into the space of that show would have experienced what I did, a kind of tender nudging. An insistent pull, like an undertow, imploring us to keep thinking bigger, longer, farther back. Remember more. Incorporate more. Look further into the future. Listen to more voices. I dug it.

Afterward, PLD and Ptrck the Witch and I went to 11:11, the fantastically glamorous party hosted by Ladyfag and Juliana Huxtable in the Lower East Side. It was fun, but I was kind of exhausted. (The theme of this month's issue is that I am exhausted).

Saturday I saw Becca Blackwell's staging of "Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?" at Ideas City at the New Museum. It starred B.B. as Martha (of course) and Jenn Harris as George and I forgot the names of the other two actors, but they were fantastic! Then I saw Erin give her presentation as part of the NEA 4 residency at the New Museum, which was fun in a different way. I am so proud of both of them. I sneaked home for a minute to get changed, and then went back to the Lower East Side to see Jack Ferver's new show All of a Sudden, which I liked a lot, but it was I must say harrowing in a way that I don't feel like his work has been. For me, in the past. I was into it. It was scary, in a good way. And funny. Afterward PLD and the Irish Horse and Erin and Justin from the Meeting went out for fancy, sort of disgusting cocktails at a karaoke bar in Chinatown, which was a lot of fun.

Sunday I did an interview for a documentary this nice artist boy is making for Taiwanese public TV about gay cruising. I took myself out to lunch then went to Gio Black Peter's Cinco de Mayo party, where there were tons of near and dear friends, including the always glamorous and delightful miss Coco. The party was also the occasion of a video shoot for GBP's new song, and the filming of the video at the party was itself being filmed by a European TV crew who told me they were doing a TV show about "Drugs. And sex." but they told someone else that they were making a show about the current climate of nightlife in NYC, because Michael Alig is getting release from prison soon. It was a trip. I love an early party, though, and was home by 9pm.

I am so totally bored and tired and a little bit angry and I have to believe it's because I haven't eaten anything all day. So I think instead of the gym, I might just go to yoga tonight, then meditate.

Then eat some fucking fruit. I feel weird.

It's hard; let's choose.

Someone, two people actually, who don't (I don't think) know each other, or even really know me well enough to know how much it'd mean to me, mentioned the idea that I might be sad now that this show is over. It had not occurred to me that I might get sad, and I'm a little irked that they're right!

Of course, I want to say how really grateful I am. How totally, absolutely flabbergasted I am by the response I got. I asked so many people to come, and most of them did. My dear friends. Friends who are not so dear. Even total strangers. Some people came because they were curious, or they got dragged by other people.

Only one person, on Sunday night, sat in the front row and texted. But you're entitled to do that, I suppose, if you're bored. That person sucks and is sad inside. I felt bad for him. I wonder if he could tell how much I pitied him.

I'm trying to stay Positive! and grateful for the 100 or so people who came to see the work and seemed to get it. I wish, of course, that people who book performance had come. But you can't win them all. I can't. I'm proud of my work, and I'm proud of myself for doing it.

It was also a tremendously painful process, so I'm really glad it's over. I want to do it again! And bigger! I feel so weird. Like I bared my soul.

I feel like that time we had a psychedelic trip, and I let out my absolute worst qualities in front of my friends. And most of them are still my friends. It's not so bad.



This morning on the train I was stuck underground momentarily. I think I have only myself to blame. I flipped a coin about this before I left the house this morning. The coin said Heads, take the M. But it seemed hesitant, so I asked the Internet and the computer said to take the L, it's faster. But not now, slow and sick, full of toxic passengers. It clots, underground. We're in here listening to fuzzy bass headphones, sipping foamed milk and coughing, sniffling from our pollen allergies. We're down here just waiting for summer. Boiling. Impatient.



I wish I knew the I Ching. How to throw it. At my last job, my coworker (whom I would later come to like very much) threw it for me on my first or second day. I got something about being self-sabotaging, overgenerous and vulnerable. My coworker said "Hmm... I don't know if this is so true, for you." I was insulted, but must admit she had a point. I ended up, though, staying at that job much longer than I should have, becoming totally miserable and kind of fulfilling that I Ching reading. I also once got a tarot reading that basically predicted the catastrophic dental fuck-up I had at the dental school. What other signs have I been given? Maybe I missed something along the way. It definitely feels like that.



My horoscope this week says that I should stop kidding myself. Admit, it says, admit how much I hate myself. Let it out. As if we need the little push. Encourager. Exhortations from the west coast. I don't know this psychic astrologer but I know people who do. I know people who pay her hundreds of dollars just to talk on the phone. So I'm glad to get it for free, even if it's unpleasant, bad news.



TWO GREAT IDEAS:

1) Spend time with someone who loves you. Not a friend. Don't spend the night. Just be around someone who might be in love with you. You know, in that book, movie, TV show, the aging actress? Her one true friend is her hairdresser and they've known each other for years. He adores her and she utterly depends on him. It's pathetic. But no, it's not pathetic. He's the only one who she reveals her true self to. He alone sees that she is, deep down, a lovable person. That's another way of seeing it, I guess. I don't like that, the dissonance, holding both in my head. It's hard; let's choose.



2) Write. Thank you notes, fan letters, anonymous suggestions. For the box.



All I ever wanted was to be invited, included. To be a name on the List. And then, thinking so hard, for so long, so singularly about something, and then you get it. Sometimes you get the thing you want. And it's absolutely as great as you thought it would be. I wish I could get into what makes me feel so special, but I can't for a bunch of exciting reasons. Actually, it's not exciting to anyone but me, so I will keep it to myself. I'm just saying, when you measure what it would take to make you happy, and then you meet that benchmark, it does (yes really) mean that you have to find some new way of looking to get your kicks. I'm getting ahead of myself.

I'm glad I'm me today:


That song always strikes me as a bit more than slightly ironic. Gina Birch refers to her humor as "tragicomic", that seems right. A couple of people asked me if ENCOURAGER is a joke or not. Or people said, with a sly wink, that they could tell which parts I meant and which parts were jokes. That the sincerity was a secret code. I'm actually being totally 100% serious in ENCOURAGER but I do think that you can be serious and joking at the same time. L'air du cochon, natch.

So last night Steven took me to go see Here Lies Love, the musical about Imelda Marcos written by David Byrne and Fatboy Slim. It was amazing. Anna Wintour was in the crowd, along with noted B0DYH1GH fan Hamish smoke a Bowles. I also ran into my dear former office buddies, and saw Daddy Byrne bopping around the audience himself. It was a totally fantastic show. I was so obsessed with the chorus girls. These girls, I assumed they must be younger than I am. I guessed 22. These girls who can sing wonderfully, and dance and act, and they're in this brand new funky downtown musical rock opera immersive theater experience. Handily borrowing the cultural cache of Occupy Wall Street, the bad drag of The Iron Lady, long-simmering and much beloved American homegrown xenophobia, and duh, the superstar songwriters. I thought how great life must seem, as a chorus girl in a fantastic show downtown. Getting to sing these cute songs, in this great show, getting watched by the Vogue editors. They must seem on top of the world. It made me happy.

Yesterday was an exceedingly difficult day but it ended well. Much better than I thought it could.

Cooking without Tasting

I was worried that I was taking myself too seriously, so I thought: "What would it look like to take yourself all the way seriously? To take yourself seriously to the point of delusion?" I was worried that I cared too much about what other people thought of me, so I tried to imagine what it might look like to follow that caring to its logical conclusion. To depict a kind of relating to the world that is so dysfunctional that you charge money for people to share you company. To have such unwavering, natural entitlement and air of expertise that you don't have to bother making sense. I was worried about being not charismatic enough. Or, to be perfectly frank: I was worried that I was already too charismatic. That people only looked at me to get a sense of self, validation. So I thought: "What would it look like to live entirely for other people's sense of validation?" I wanted to make a show about the failure of charisma. It's not charisma's fault, but there is a death of charisma. It has a natural lifecycle. It has an end. I understand the basic task of humanity as accepting death as an inevitable and inextricable part of life, of existence. Charisma is like this as well. To be merely charismatic is to make the audience feel good, be happy. Yeah, sure. We like movie stars and pop singers who make us happy, and make us want to strive to be more like them or embody their qualities. But that's not enough.  To be truly charismatic, however, is to make the audience feel good, be happy, and feel responsible for that. To make them realize that the good-feelings are generated by them. If done correctly; if you can find the time and space and patience to do it, you disappear. There's no space to be a diva. Narcissus is a red herring. There's no room for egotism. I wanted to try to find a way to do that. And I feel like I am pivoting towards taking baby steps in the right direction. If you wanted to congratulate a group of people, all at the same time, what would that even look like, y'know? It might look, at first, so familiar as to be ignored, unless your attention was called to it.

The big lesson I learned in making this, though, was that I could really have used some more input, help, a director, dramaturg, intern, collaborator, co-writer, costume designer, anything. If only to just talk about it. And say if I'm making no sense or a little sense. I think I could have saved myself so much greif by having another person (or people) there with me. SO: lesson learned. I'm definitely seeking any of the above, if anyone is interested. Please write me. It was a trip. It was like cooking without tasting.

Li'l Click

I know I meant to disappear into the anxiety cave, getting ready for my performances tomorrow night BUT the interview I did last weekend GAYLETTER just came out and I think it turned out so well. Check it out: MAX STEELE WANTS TO HELP YOU SEDUCE YOURSELF. Big thanks to Parker and Mansi and Abi and Tom. How sweet!

Here's a video of my favorite Spice Girls song, "If U Can't Dance", which I mention in the interview.



(And it's true, I totally do want to help you seduce yourself.)