« 08 januari 2006 - 14 januari 2006 | Main | 22 januari 2006 - 28 januari 2006 »

21 januari 2006

Bears Are So 2005; Pogs Are It for 2006

Remember all that bitching I did about 2005? And then it decided to bite me on the ass on its way out by kicking my Vespa out from underneath me at 17th & Sanchez?

Well, in inaugurating 2006, I've decided that the flip on the old time odometer from 2005 to 2006 isn't enough. No, more work needs to be done. And thanks to Glenn, I've learned a new word! That word: pogonophile. A pogonophile is “one who loves beards”.

In this town, and in gay culture bubbles everywhere, a bear is defined generally as someone who is hairy (including facial hair, preferably full facial hair), perhaps overweight, wears flannel and likes selfsame (oh, and male, just in case you were thinking 'lesbian').

I never liked that definition, primarily because I fall into that category. And while I may look like a bear, I don't buy into the whole bear-community thing thing.

The thing I like about “pogonophile” is that it's about one's internal world. Oh, and it collapses the pantheon of animals used to pigeonhole gay men (even though there are no pigeons in the pantheon!), such as otters, cubs, wolves (oh my!) into a single designation.

So. Pogs. I wonder if the meme will travel anywhere. Maybe I should post to that great bear echochamber, LiveJournal; there, it might have legs.

Technorati Tags


Posted by jeff at 08:56 pm | Comments (15) | TrackBack

19 januari 2006

Saving Face

Tomorrow will be three weeks since Vespa go boom. My good friend Crashiepoo emailed me a couple of days ago and implied that “being scared shitless” would be an entirely acceptable reaction to the whole ordeal.

Here's a recap:

I mention all this because I wasn't ever scared shitless until I noticed that my helmet somehow found its way back to my house—Sam is literally right now telling me how it got home. I guess we had a conversation about it my first day in the hospital, but I absolutely don't remember it.

And, to be precise, it wasn't when I noticed the helmet, it was when I noticed the scratches on the helmet. Click on the image for more detail.

Had I not been wearing the helmet, who knows how much of my face 17th Street would have nabbed. Had I not been wearing the helmet, I'm sure my head would have landed hard on the pavement. I mean, so much of my identity is tied up in being a pretty man, what kind of therapy would I have had to go through to live without that going for me? Huh? HUH?

Sany0019 Ahem.

So I did get scared about all of this, but much after the fact. Sam's been driving me around and I'm very skittish in traffic. I look at rails and it takes a second to reassure myself I'm in a car and not on two wheels. The Vespa shop called today with news about my P200E, and my first reaction was “not yet!”

Last week I did manage to pick up my bifocals progressive-lens glasses. There's a pic there for you to see.

The visible/tangible/physical injuries are well on their way to healing. The intangibles are now making themselves evident now that the narcotic fog has lifted. I'm sure those will heal in time. My sense of abundance is making itself evident as well. That'll help.

Technorati Tags




Posted by jeff at 08:38 pm | Comments (9) | TrackBack

17 januari 2006

Tilting At Windbags

Christians get a bad rap; hell, I give Christians a bad rap. While my aim was true, the blast radius tended to be a bit too large: I included too many of the Christian individuals in my slamming of the Christians Who Speak And Politic Too Much.

Truth be told, I was raised Catholic, my family are all Catholics. Mass-going, Communion-taking, tradition-respecting Catholics. And they're all more than just ok with me, they love me. They accept the bio-diversity and/or socio-diversity that produces homosexual individuals. My partner Sam isn't my “friend” Sam, he's just as much a part of the Barbose clan as my sister-in-law Karen or my soon-to-be-sister-in-law, Jessica. Sure, my parents had expectations from their children which were in line with what the Catholic Church wanted: marry a Catholic girl and have lots of Catholic babies who will grow up to be Catholics who marry Catholics and have lots of Catholic babies.

Book Of Daniel 160X600 Gen-1And so on.

I remember telling my Mom on the phone after I came out to her that the hardest part of coming out at all is the loss of expectations. Everyone, when they're young and living in the 'normal' section of society (belonging there or not) has a set of expectations for how their lives will play out. And most people's expectations in NormalLand tend to be very similar to one another. In this similarity is the tacit assumption that there's really nothing outside that small population of expectations, and that to fall outside the ±2 standard deviations of Median Normal was to fall off a cliff and be forever an outlier.

Brokebackonesheet45 Alas, I geek too much.

The Silent Majority of Christians are out there, I'm certain of it. And, there is evidence in the numbers that go with the movie Brokeback Mountain that people like a good love story over and above the circumstances and traits of those whom the story is about.

In returning the favor, in relaxing about Christianity, in setting aside the politicos who falsely fly under the banner of Christianity, in paying attention to those authentic Christians out there, in choosing story and talent (Aidan Quinn, Susanna Thompson, and, OMG, Ellen Burstyn), I have very much enjoyed the experience. It is just a TV show, after all is said and done.

I have never really lived my life as a contrarian. Not to the Catholic Church, not to Christians, not even to Republicans. Sure, I go up against each of those groups, but if you look back, you'll see that it's in response to something they've said or done (or both). For instance, because Pope Panzer says stupid things about homosexuals and homosexuality doesn't mean that I deplore my very Roman Catholic mother.

So I wasn't automatically predisposed to dislike The Book of Daniel because it was about an Episcopal priest. Not even because Jesus was in it!

On the contrary, the trailers and ads for the show—which, granted, got seen only because I caught images of Aidan Quinn in a Roman collar while fast-forwarding through commercials—were impressive for their originality: honesty.

Nothing cloying and sugary like Touched by an Uncle Angel or Hallmark-cardy like Seventh Heaven, but something involving prescription drug abuse and the nuances of relationships and the reality of gay people in families and politics and how even Churches have to live in the real world instead of the abstract and idealistic world of theism.

Watching the show has helped remind me not that reconciliation between my world view and the majority-christian-worldview is possible, but in fact, that there's very little to reconcile at all!

Those who profess faith in the Christian mythos (def: a set of beliefs or assumptions about something) aren't different enough from me and my particular spirituality when it comes to the things in our daily lives to matter.

I identify more strongly with the main character, Daniel Webster (Aidan Quinn), than I do with the gay son. In fact, I identify more with their particular version of Jesus in the story than with even Daniel Webster!

What's wrong with a mild, understanding, non-judgmental pose? What's wrong with accepting the differences in people while also identifying their strengths and encouraging those while also continuing to understand what might be identified as short-comings? What's wrong with looking and dressing differently to everyone else? What's wrong with patience and meekness even in the face of “Evil”?

I'll answer: there's nothing wrong with any of those things.

These were the things I was taught as a Catholic, and these are the things that remained with me, even as I came to understand myself and my lack of belief in the theological aspects of Catholicism and walked away from it.

Those out there who identify as Christians or Catholics, I have a question for you: am I wrong in any of this, according to your own values? And those who identify as atheists or agnostics? Is any of this off-the-charts crazy?

Technorati Tags



Posted by jeff at 05:50 pm | Comments (7) | TrackBack

15 januari 2006

Two Steps Forward...

I was out for a good long time today. Turns out, too long. I had a moment where the pain jumped back into my field of view and made a split-second threat. I had a sort of panic attack, though FTP described it as more of a “you don't look so good, suddenly” kind of thing.

We were at the Gallery Lounge where Sam was spinning and it all hit me all at once. Well, the ribs were aching from standing so long, and the last pain medications were running thin, and my shoulder fired a warning shot across to the other shoulder (which is new), which then shouted in my right ear, “Go Home!”

So Fred helped me get a cab (faster than collecting everyone and packing them into Fred's vehicle and then getting me home) and I got home and took my meds. And here I am, resting.

That'll teach me to overdo it, huh?

Technorati Tags

Posted by jeff at 10:38 pm | Comments (3) | TrackBack