My sexuality has become a preoccupation again but it seems healthy now. I should be confronting it. I remember one of the first passages I wrote in my journal was that I couldn’t ignore it because it makes up too much of what I am to hide it under the rug. It’s so true. Especially now that I have publicly joined a gay youth group and helped publicly protest against Clinton’s reneging on his promise to allow openly gay, lesbian and bisexual Americans to serve in the United States army with a million cameras and reporters around. How could I possibly forget all of that and more profoundly... why would I want to?
Today I volunteered to help sell sparkling water the North Halsted Market Days Festival. I don’t know too much about it’s history. But when my youth group called me Wednesday and asked if I would do it and I said o.k. It was fun. It’s a huge flee market, block party, concert, eatery type of a thing in which hung, scantily clad gays from all over come around to cruise, shop, and chillout for awhile. It was cool. Friday my horoscope said I should hang out with skinny people on the weekend to give my diet that extra boost. I couldn’t imagine how it could but I now know. I felt so inadequate. So fat. So short. So nappy headed. Those guys were FYNE. They were like angels. I’ve got to go on a diet. I saw guys holding each other, kissing each other, and just talking together. For the first time I actually viewed homosexuality as being 101% normal and fine. It wasn’t “alternative” or “different” or “exotic”. It was love. Simply love. Nothing more, nothing less. I pray for the day that somebody will fall in love with me. A coworker said something to me the other day that I have felt for many years now. He didn’t exactly word it like this but he said something to the effect that he has so much love to give but he can’t find the right person that he can give it to or who would allow him to. I feel the exact same way. Man, if I had a boyfriend right now...nothing, I tell you, there would be nothing I wouldn’t do for him. I would cut my hair for him!
By the way, I met one of my greatest idols live and in person last Thursday, SANDRA BERNHARD!! She is publishing her second book, “Love, Love, and Love” and was in town last Thursday to sign copies of it. She was beautiful. Simply beautiful. But I have always thought that of her. She is such an inspiration to me. Mainly her teenage years. She was taunted horribly in high school. She is the first “celebrity” who I believe was fucked with to the extent that I was. And the best part of it is that she has grown into a beautiful, rich, infamously famous superstar who can make all of those tired wasps eat every derogatory remark they made to her and choke by doing the one thing they hated her for... being herself. That’s what I want to do. That’s the position I aspire to be in one day. Our time together was short but it’s impression is still here with me. I’m still giggly about it now and it’s two days later. I kept trying to rehearse the perfect thing to say to her. I heard someone ahead of me in the line tell her she was a huge fan of hers. I can tell Sandra wanted to sincerely love each and every one of us then put us in her purse and take us home and love us some more. But leather can only stretch so much and her bodyguards weren’t even that flexible. They wanted you out as soon as possible. But Sandra seemed cool and a bit taken back and worn by the whole day. I looked her straight in the eye and tried to soak in as much of her as possible. Her skin was as smooth as marble. It looked like she didn’t even know the definition of acne or blackheads. Her lips had that indisputably aggressive little pout and her eyes were brassy and truthful. I tried to say to her,
“Sandra, you are one of my biggest inspirations. I know that I’m just another faceless person in a crowd of people who all want to take a piece of you with them but somehow, I feel as if I am different than they are. But you’ve probably heard that too. When I grow up, that is if I ever grow up, I want to be like you. I want to be able to be vain to the ignorant, beautiful for the camera, strong for the lover, comprehensive on paper, respectful of the life and victorious over the past. All my life I have tried to imagine myself being better than what I am and I tried to imagine what someone who succeeded in making something out of their life looked like. I stopped searching when I saw you Sandra. You mean a lot to me.”
It came out,
“Fan...Big fan...I’m a huge fan of your work...oh...could you write my name in there too...thank you so much...thank you... thank you... thank you. [fart]
I was a bit caught awestruck when I was that close to her. As I walked away, she asked me was I named after Malcolm X. I said what I usually say in the usual playfully snotty manner that I do, “Of course!” Mocking me she said, “Oh, of course! You should start a revolution!” I kept walking away from her but gave her a peace sign goodbye as I did. I wanted to stay, I wanted interact with her, what level headed guy doesn’t? But there was no witty response I could come back to her with. Plus if I stayed it would be in hopes of building up some type of relationship/ correspondence with her and I didn’t want to fuck up a beautiful moment in my life by trying to make a fantasy come true then watching my hopes flushed away like White Castle burgers five minutes after you eaten them. I chose to just end the dream there myself and not be awakened by the brutal reality of her being a beautiful celebrity, and me on the complete other side of the tracks, and neither one of us having any real obligation to each other.
I do have to mention that I met these two 8 year old twin White boys at the Fair who kept running over to our tent. They were two bad motherfuckers. No home training at all. But they were adorable. After a while I fell in love with them. I wanted to adopt them. One of them was fairly homophobic. I guess they both were. They didn’t call us fags but he did think there was something wrong with it. Their whole concept of homosexuality was two guys fucking each other. I guess mine was too. I was taking their preconceptions lightly but an older gentleman in the tent named Michael tried to explain to them what it really meant in a serious tone. He got through to them I think. Homosexuality doesn’t really have to do with sex, it has to do with love. And love and sex are two different things. But those kids were the best. One of them wanted me to walk him over to the 7 Eleven to get him a Pepsi. I gave the other one 50¢ to get a popsicle. We played for awhile, they talked about their school and their parents. They were going to Florida in a couple of days. You could tell those guys were lonely. They didn’t have anybody to play with or talk to. You could tell I was lonely. I was playing with them and listening. But they were beautiful. They wanted me to marry a girl friend of theirs so I would come and visit them. It was kind of sad leaving them. I’m supposed to be going back tomorrow and volunteering for the last day of the festival but I’m not sure if I’m going. I’m exhausted right now and plan to sleep for as long as possible. But I do want to see those kids again. I really do miss them. I never considered myself to be good with kids at all. But now that I think about it, all the kids in my family like me. Yeah, I really want a family of my own one day.
