It Ain't Truth If It Doesn't Hurt

Man in the Mirror...

30 October 2005

So...I actually started writing this blog about six hours ago...but I got up and went to the bathroom...came back...and Friendster had eaten my blog. I was less than amused. If this were the old days...and I was still Queen of some Renaissance power...I would have ordered the immediate execution of anyone now or ever employed by the company. But...alas...my power is llimited to only creative language and ritual cursing.

But back to today's topic...when I was in the fifth grade my favorite song was Man in the Mirror...except...I thought the lyrics were..."I'm talking to the man in the river." Stop laughing. One day I decided to do a karaoke megastar show for my Mom and assorted paparazzi...and I sang a very soulful acapella version of Man in the Mirror...except when I got to the chorus...and I belted out with great enthusiasm that I was talking with the man in the river...my always honest but tactless Mother decides that it is better to interrupt my debut crossover performance...to inform me in front of all my fans (my Mom's boyfriend...my little brother..and a couple of Santa Bears)...that the lyrics to the song...in fact were "I"m talking with the man in the mirror." Well...needless to say that ended the performance right there (smugly thinking about how they would be sorry they missed out on the encore performance of Ashford and Simpson's Solid As  Rock...with both parts flawless sung by me...with a broken mop head to represent the duos trademark jeri curls...I grabbed my egg beater/microphone and stormed into my dressing room/bedroom I shared with my little brother)...and I would not accede to demands of a refund of the 25 cents I required all attendees to pay for the show...considering Mom shelled out all the money...she wanted her 1.25 back...plus backstage passes to my next show. She's been blacklisted every since. So there I was...my dream of being on Star Search and joining the likes of Britney Spears and Rosie O'Donnell in the cornicopia of stars born on Star Search completely shattered...and I also had to come to terms with the fact that Michael was not talking to a kindly chap in the river (which is only polite...even men in the river deserve to have good conversation) but that MJ was probably schizophrenic since he spent his time talking to his own reflection and thought it was this "man" person.

Lately I've come to understand that Michael's mental issue had nothing to do with schizophrenia...we could start with the fact that he is the first trans-raced person in history and leave off somewhere around the point when he decided that in his version of Neverland Peter and the Lost Boys meet the good fairy Chi Chi Larue...and Hook lost his hand in a terrible fisting accident. What I've realized is that Michael...like myself...was attempting to really take a look in the mirror...and see not what we've been programmed and socialized to see...but to try and see ourselves...as horrifying or as terribly beautiful as that might be.

Now...I don't know of anyone that is a part of my world that has any problem making an absolutely comprehesive list of everything they believe is wrong with themselves. They can give you that list cross-indexed, with supporting primary resources and an annotated bibliography...regardless of the reality that 99.999 percent of what we believe about ourselves is utter and complete bullshit. Now... before anyone that knows me starts posting comments on here telling my business...let me be the first to say that the days that I am able to look at myself in the mirror and really see myself as a beautiful and talented individual happen less frequently than W Bush doing something intelligent.  What's even more f!cked up is that I can look in the mirror...I can hear the tapes playing in my head telling me that I am ugly-fat-not smart enough-not productive enough-that my head is too big-my hands too small--etc. etc. I know that those tapes are products of centuries of oppression and savvy marketing by Maybelline (Maybe she was born with it? You're damn right she was.) But I can't shut them down once they start going. I just have to ride them out and hope that my self-esteem hadn't taken a critical hit (you sank my battleship...and now I have another two years of therapy...thanks).

What is really amusing is I have some of the most beautiful and talented people in the world in my life...I can listen to them listing off their self-perceived faults as if they were doing the stations of the cross...when I attempt to correct them I sometimes think they are going to command me to return to hell in the name of Christ...but when I reveal that I perhaps don't have the best self-image...it's like I was speaking in tongues...and they just look at me...say something dismissive...like...you fool...and go back to flagellating themselves as they are sewing together their hair shirts. And that's when I get them with the holy water and a might cry of "The Power of Christ Compels YOU!" Sometimes their heads actually rotate completely around. I generally take that as a moment to end our friendship. I've got limits.

But back to the topic...I've been doing a better job (compared to what?) of seeing myself as someone worth the complex carbon based molecules that are the sum of my physical existence. But I've also noticed what seems to be a ridiculous increase of brilliant people...particulary people of color..that are doing things like oh...med school...but can't seem to believe that anything they are doing has any meaning or value because they themselves believe they have no inherent value...and what makes me truly sad is that at times...I find myself believing that about myself...way down deep (please ya'll I am not running around like Winona Ryder in Beetlejuice). But somewhere in the very core of what I believe or was taught as a child was truth in some way tries every day to negate the person that I really am (including the real flaws...not the Martyr Extra Value Meal Flaws that I believe I have...just like the Monkeypox..don't laugh...I have 'em...should never have eaten that Guinea Pig).

This entry is getting on the shy side of ridiculously long without any heartfelt conclusions...but I'll end with a story. Last Spring Chris and I were having one of our weekly Tuesday iced turtle mochas and getting to know you time at Wilde Roaste in Minneapolis. We were talking about something or another...and I decided that I needed to say something to him. I told him that I had a hard time finding myself attractive and that because of that I definately have a lack of self-confidence in anything resembling a relationship. Chris gave me this look that I can't really describe accurately...it was a mixture between incredulity...disbelief...a little sadness...and perhaps the most sincerity I've ever seen in one person's face and said to me...but Brandon...you're beauitiful. The way it came out of his mouth was like he was telling me that compasses point North, the sun comes up in the East, and the 13 hour sale at Dayton's (it is NOT Marshall Fields) is the greatest gift of commercial retail to the consumer. I still don't have anything resembling the conviction around my "alleged" beauty that Chris had...but I do know that as I try and see myself in a little better light (underlighting girls...) I am also more aware of all the truly blessed and gifted and gorgeous people around me that are walking through a world with someone elses face taped to their mirrors.

Funna Create Some Change...

29 October 2005

About seven years ago...before the sun had even thought about coming up...Coya showed up at my doorstep in her Volvo...you know the one with the glove box door that wouldn't close...and the boombox in the middle of the front seat that substituted for a car stereo (that's Volvo spelled GHETTO). We got our shots from the international travel clinic and made the dangerous journey across the Mississippi River to St. Paul (you never know what kind of strange diseases you'll pick up over there) to grab our pal Eric (aka Panda Chaser..aka...The Minister...really...the freakiest Lutheran you'll ever meet)...and we began our 15 hour vehicular adventure to Pittsburgh to attend our first Creating Change conference. More than perhaps any other singular social/political event that has taken place in my personal world...Creating Change has radically altered my life and my politics.

That first Creating Change was a doozy. I thought I was Mr. Hot Shit College Queer...until I walked into a building with 3000 GBLTs (pronounced GIBLETS)...including some of the leading dykes and faggotry of the time. During that conference...I got into a shouting match with Barbara Smith (yes....THAT Barbara Smith...and if you don't know who she is...I didn't either when I met her...then I found out when a women's study major friend of mine asked me if I were still breathing with all my bones in working condition...Google her if you don't know her...it's worth it). I was drafted into a movement to create a national progressive people of color queer organization (still waitin' on that one...)...and finally oh finally for the first time sat in a room...the People of Color Institute...where I could be brown and queer...all at the same time...without apology or explanation. And all that was just in the first day at the conference. By the time we headed back to Minneapolis...I'd fallen in love...been party of a pepper spray incident by an angry drag queen at a night club (turns out several years later...in Minneapolis...I would get into a fist fight with said drag queen...)...and started on a path to really take a look at the disparate pieces of my identity...how I had viewed or ignored them...and started trying to put together the 10,000 piece puzzle of who I am. Coya and I literally held hands...I was in the back seat...she in the front...we are flexible...and we cried...quite forcefully...for the next two or three hours...until we could wipe away our tears with some chicken fingers and fries from Perkins. And Eric...that man who introduced me to the Yeasty Girls...was an awesome white ally...and drove along...more or less in silence...and let Coya and I celebrate through saline that new sense of self and community we'd been blessed to find.

Since that first conference in 1998...I have been to every Creating Change since...except 2002...in Portland..cuz I was unemployed and broke. Each and every Creating Change has been filled with deepend friendships, celebration, personal and political growth...and straight up drama. I can't tell you how many times youth...or trannies...or colored folk...or old folk...or basically anyone but the middle class white folks...have brought out their pitchforks and stormed the stage during one plenary session or another to demand better accountability from the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force (it's their conference...and to be honest...NGLTF has generally been very responsive).  Every conference also has at least one major issue that centers around something fucked up (it's gotten to the point where there is a national office pool to guess what the issue du jour is gonna be)...like the year the white upper class dykes held a workshop called...How To Steal You a Brown Baby from the Third World (ok...so maybe that wasn't the name of the workshop...but if I see one more university lesbian couple with their "rescued" Guatemalan baby...I am going to go Lee Harvey Oswald on somebody).  The mentioned workshop was attended by several people of color who were adopted...many of whom that had been internationally adopted...and they attempted to interact with the lesbo child stealers (hey...it's my blog...I don't have to be fair) and to bring up some of the issues that center around international interracial adoption. The organizers of the workshop weren't having it. NGLTF actually gave the workshop organizers space at a plenary to defend their workshop, and when some of the POC folks with concerns asked to also have time to address the plenary gathering...conference organizers said no (bad move NGLTF).  Several years later...when I was applying for a job with the Freedom to Marry Coalition...I was told by my friend Mandy Carter that I was being talked about negatively as an instigator of the POC Adoptee Revolution of 2000...now...I have surely been part of all kinds of drama on the national queer stage at Creating Change...but for once...I wasn't...just goes to show...you support justice...and somebody is bounded to get pissed off.  Don't fuck with the white power dykes...or their right to serve in the military, get married, or buy a hand made Chinese baby...cuz that's America!  (Please note...my fellow fagatrons are not exempt from criticism around this issue either...but...overwhelmingly...it's been the lesbian community that has decided to rescue children that have no need for rescuing).

The best part of the conference always takes place after the workshops have ended for the evenings. Sitting around, drinking overpriced cosmos from the hotel bar (except my friend Ingrid...who I once found sitting in the hotel bar...in her pajamas...ordering cokes from a disgruntled bartender and adding rum from her personal bottle of Bacardi that she was carrying around like she had just adopted it from Puerto Rico...but she's Puerto Rican...so that's ok)...talking shit...talking politics...and laughing non-stop. Did I mentioned the sex? Oh yeah...hot boys with great politics...it's the ultimate aphrodiasiac (funny story for those of you that know my Jewish Mom...Beth Zemsky...I worked for her when I attended my first Creating Change...Beth was a CC vet already at the time...she called Ana and I into her office...sat us down...looked at us seriously...and said that she insisted that we go to Creating Change...and get laid...I've only been doing what Mom told me to do!) And then...to cap off the weekend...is Russell's now famous annual CC party...where some person is honored...forced to wear a ridiculous hat (the first one was a cheesehead hat in Milwaukee...last's years was a beer bong hat with the St. Louis arches over it)...and then...once the honoree is nice and drunk...he or she must lead a parade of all the party goers through the hotel lobby. Priceless.

I am definately looking forward to this years Creating Change in Oakland. It is rare that the conference goes to the same city twice... but it was in Oakland in 1999...and that was...to date...the best CC I have attended. So I'm packing my bags...buyin' some condoms...and heading to the Bay. Coya will be there...as will all the friends that I have made that have...whether they know it or not...transformed my life and helped to make me who I am...please don't judge them too harshly ;-).

P.S. If you are interested in the conference...check out the conference website at www.creatingchange.org. Also...I am a big fan of the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force (www.ngltf.org). They do work the right away...cognizant of building power from the ground up...addressing systemic oppression...and celebrating our history of diversity (in the broadest sexual, political, racial, etc. terms)...unlike our more Republican-minded, conformist based, I wanna be just like the people that oppress me national organization...the HRC (all that money...and they've never had...in decades...one single political success on their federal lobbying agenda...go figure...one day maybe they'll realize that liberation is different than equality...and liberation always has and always will be made from the ground up...by radically shifting the hearts and minds of people...not the members of Congress).

Some of My Friends Got Four Legs...

Today's blog is going to be a little bit more sentimental...a little less witty...but full of love. This morning I have decided to write a blog in honor of three very special four legged friends...Tang , Sandie aka Homely Dog, and Roxie the Enormous. Each of my canus familiaris friends has a unique identity...a great personality...and they all share one thing in common...they love me! I am a sucker for a dog...just take a look at some of my ex-boyfriends...ouch...cheap shot.  And the first dog to capture my heart as an adult was Tang (pronounced TONG). (Incidentally...my first pet was a dog named Piso...which in Spanish means floor...don't ask questions...it's better that way).

Tang owns a human named Juliana Pegues (who I sometimes refer to as J-Monster)...who is as great a human pal as Tang is an animal buddy. I am one of the very very few men that Tang will tolerate. It may be because I was raised by wild lesbians or that I look fantastic in a dress...but whatever the reason...I am grateful. I sometimes go long periods without seeing Tang. Especially now that I am living so far from her. But, I am constantly astounded by the way that I underestimate the ability of dogs to recognize their people friends. I can forgot a human friend if I go more than two weeks without seeing them. But not Tang...whether it's a day or a month...when she sees me her tail starts doing double time...and it's game on fun time.  On more than one occassion...I have been meandering aimlessly through Powderhorn Park...only to be bowled over by Tang...who at times seems to materialize out of thin air...and has only one thing in mind when she sees me...to hold my hand. Tang is the only dog I know that loves to hold hands. At all times and in all places...Tang is not completely content unless she has one paw in the hand of her human family. You know you have made it into Tang's world when she gives you her oh so demure look...and slyly offers you a furry paw to hold in yours...a gentle canine reminder that friends come in more packages than just homo sapiens sapiens. Last spring when I was going through some heavy life rebuilding...I would on occassion open my mailbox to find a post card or a clever note...dictated to Juliana...but direct from the desk of Tang Pegues. In all ways...Tang is a part of my family. One love Tang...one love.

The next four legged friend that I'd like to honor today is Roxie. Now...I see Roxie much less than I see Tang. But she is my niece...daughter of my Non-Romantic Life Partner Jason Ruiz. Roxie is also the daughter of Jason's ex-partner David...who...incidentally...was my "glasses" man before he and Jason shacked up...that man convinced me to by a pair of $750 (that was 30% off) glasses...I got the bill...and Jason spent five years globe-trotting. We'll talk about that another time.  Roxie is a little (I use that term loosely) bundle of fun. She would jump into your lap if she didn't have her own gravitational field...but she always has a gentle Kibbles and Bits kiss for her dear Aunty Brandon. Unfortunately....I may have to kidnap Roxie and send her to Doggy Craig before the poor girl goes the way of Nell Carter. I love you Roxie girl...ain't nothing wrong with being a big girl..except when Mo'nique starts suggesting you think about gastric bypass surgery.

And last...but not least...the newest addition to my family...the little ball of fluff with legs that would make RuPaul swoon...little puppy Sandie. I just met Sandie last weekend...but she nibbled and romped her way into my heart during my stay with Kandance and Andrea. Now...I was a little leery about meeting Sandie. Andrea sent me a picture of her right after they got her...and perhaps Sandie doesn't have a modeling career a head of her...but the first word to come into my mind...was HOMELY.  Now...I believe that you should call all babies some version of ugly...really...I called my human nephew Baby Ug for the first year or so of his life...it's the way I like to try and play tricks on fate...like...maybe if you start out callin' them ugly with some affection...fate will decide to pretty them up as they get older...the truth is both my human nephew and my puppy niece are gorgeous. But you can't just go around telling them that...heads will swell...and next thing you know you've got America's Next Top Model...still in diapers or learning to hold it until they get outside. But back to Sandie. Sandie is a trickster. She is one of those young ones that will pull things with the unwitting uncle that she wouldn't dare try with her Mom's. Like...for example...whenever I would enter the room...she would leap on the couch and immediately start gnawing on my fingers...she would put one in her mouth and kind of leave it there for a bit...like a pacifer...and then commence to going at my nubs like they were Milk Bones. And when she would do it a little too hard...she'd look up at me...blink a couple of times...look around at the cat...and then go back down to some serious masticating. We truly bonded. I miss the little furball....Sandie my dear...if I were a Tramp...you would be my Lady.

So...there you have it...the four legged members of my family. Each one there for me...if I need a finger chewed...a hand held...or my breakfast eaten...thanks ya'll...you make the world just a little bit brighter...and fuzzier.

Champagne taste with beer pockets...

27 October 2005

Well...I actually don't like champagne (except the cheap stuff)...and I abhor beer in any incarnation...but you get the picture. No matter what I do, no matter what new and inventive ways I attempt to seal myself away from what money I have...somehow...someway...I am constantly broke...or just about there. Now...one would think that having grown up relatively destitute...a welfare kid child of a Mom that worked full time...often two jobs...and still couldn't make ends meet in this f-ed up capitalist system we call a "democracy"...that I should be able to handle money...no problem. In just about every job I've ever had I've made more money than my Mom made and used to raise two kids and various husbands. But while I can make 1001 recipes from ramen noodles...I can't make it from paycheck to paycheck without that depressing moment when you swipe your check card and the ATM flat out laughs at you.

Now my current dilemma is that I have recently returned to work after a six month "vacation..." or as some people call it..."rehab." So I am faced with un monton de bills that have piled up...and I just can't seem to bring myself to face them...competing with a feeling that I deserve to have pretty things...at least as pretty as I can get from Target...and you've got a perfect Paula Dean recipe for Bad Credit Gumbo. The other problem is the last time that I was gainfully employed...working for the Girl Scouts (may those little green bitches burn in hell)...I was making just shy of $50,000 a year. Now that ain't too shabby for a kid that just turned 28. Of course the trade off (money for the leasing of my soul to the CEO of Hades)...wasn't worth it.  Now I have a fantastic job...long hours...meaningful...and $20,000 less a year than I was making last March. Now...theoretically one would think that if one is making just a hint more than half their former salary...they'd adjust their spending and learn to live a more humble lifestyle...of course...that's why theories are theories...they are made to be disproven. While I have definately curbed my spending...I am still acting like I am making...ohhh...let's say $40,000 a year...which is still greater than my much much much lower salary (although I can't complain...I make a decent wage...adjusted for the local economy in Albuquerque).  Now I am playing the catch up game...which will catch up with me first...my bills...or my checking account balance. I'm starting to be afraid that the Credit Card Crips are going to show up at my house one morning...and all you'll find left of me is a pair of tasteful Steve Madden shoes and my credit card...cut up...and used to mosaic my headstone.

Reality is that I just don't get money. My friend Jeremy is a saving whiz. That kid lives in New York City on like $2.50 a week...shacks up in Manhattan...and always has like $1,000 in savings. Me...I can save money until the next time I see a sale sign. And I'm finding out...from acute observation...that this isn't unusual for the poor kids all grown up. We seem to take two paths...either...we become miserly pinchpennies that won't spare a dime for a six year old with leprosy...or...we choose the other dark side of the force...and shop until we can'ts shops no more....and really...it's not decadent...it's not like my house is filled with fine labels...it's just that...I believe that money was meant to be used to create pleasure and fun. I take friends out to dinner and lunch all the time...even when I can't afford it. I use money to go and visit friends and family. Occassionaly I'll come home with one, two...or more pairs of shoes...and I give money to philanthrohopic causes. I understand the concept of having a cushion in case something goes wrong...but in this world...if I have a horrible accident and I lose my right testicle...two grand in the bank ain't gonna put a dent in my doctor bills...or in my therapist fees either!  Last week when I was staying with the utterly fantastic Kandace and Andrea...I delighted in making sure that my visit cost them nothing. They opened their home to me for five days. They are both busy gals in grad school/law school...and having an I.R.A (I Require Attention) staying with them in the middle of a semester is a saintly act. At one point...Andrea said to me...thanks for paying for all this stuff...but this is how you end up calling me asking me to loan you $40 until pay day. And I'm totally allright with that. My philosophy of the world is that when I have it...I share it...and when my friends have it...they'll share it...and so far...in almost 30 years of living...whenever I've truly had need for money...it's come to me. Maybe I'll have to learn a little bit more fiscal responsibility. If I ran my bank account like I run the non-profit for which I work...my finances would look a lot more like Jeremy's and a lot less like Todd Bridges'. But in the end...the good book says...the love of money is the root of all evil...and really...money to me is like a one night stand...it just isn't around long enough for me to fall in love.

I Ate Something Green...

25 October 2005

I am totally fascinated by bodily functions. In my corner of the world, I am known for the bio-chemical attacks I have been known to generate from my own intestines. If the International Atomic Agency did a geiger counter scan of my anus, I am sure they would stick one of those seals over it like they do to renegade nuclear facilities in North Korea. I am a true master of the S.B.D. (silent but deadly)...I even recall one time releasing an S.B.D. so foul that it stripped the lead right out of the paint in the walls of my childhood home and had my Mom chasing me through the kitchen with a carving knife. Sometimes it can be just that bad.

But really, if I were a scientist, I would be one of those folks that runs around disecting fossilized poo and analyzing it to find out what the Bigbuttasaurus Anusgiganticus ate just before it fell into a slow moving river, settling into the silt, its grave marked only by the occassional methane bubble escaping into the atmosphere...bringing down the occasional pre-historic mammal. Like...this morning for example...I noticed that for the last couple of days...during my morning meditation session on the White Throne...I have deposited what seems to be fecal matter high in chlorophyll. If I were to die right there. And a volcano were to explode covering my body in ash...and 10,000 years from now a Homo Cockroachensis were to dig me up and analyze my spoor...I wonder what they would find? Would they find that the green fecal matter is not actually caused by a diet high in vegetables but instead is a result of the toxic dye found in the marshallows in roughly an entire box of Lucky Charms? Or is it fermented bernaise sauce from the tenderloin beef that I had yesterday at a fine dining establishment in downtown Minneapolis? This is a mystery that I guess we will never know. As I safely removed myself from my half-lotus meditation position, squeezed the Charmin, and sent my little green friend down into the depths of the septic system...and on to its greater glory in the water treatment plant...I missed a golden opportunity to learn just a little bit more about myself.

Now one would perhaps think that because I am a big homo that  I would not find delight and pleasure in the baser bodily functions. One may even suggest that it is the sole province of the straight male species. But I must protest. Whether it be a high femme lesbian like my dear friend Kandace or a quasi-butch black man from the rural South like my older brother Jerry...the enjoyment of the gaseous is something that cuts across all racial/cutlural/class/gender/sexuality boundaries. Could it be that something as simple as the human production of green house gases could in fact be the key to dismantling the oppressive barriers that keep us from seeing one another as fellow travelers and equals on this life journey of ours? Perhaps if we added an Olympic Tooting Event to that venerable sporting tradition...wherein the people of all nations gather together beneath an empty hot air balloon and let one rip in a synchronized fashion...inflating the balloon and allowing us to partake of the natural scents of 180+ nations...we will find that we are not so different...and world peace will truly be within our grasp. This is something, perhaps, that I should bring up at the UN. Next year it could be me accepting the Peace Prize from the Nobel Academy. Or, perhaps this is all just fond spectulation...a  poot in the wind if you will. Who can say what the future will bring. But I look forward to tomorrow morning's meditation session...it could be that it will be the movement to end all movements.