I Love You Man! or: Evolutions in the Homosocial Continuum.

Check out this Craigslist ad. I love that we live in a time when straight guys can post ads on Craigslist seeking each other out strictly for friendship and "normal guy stuff." (And I liked the movie "I Love You Man," too. Where was Andy Samberg's character when I was in high school? Or more to the point: where was Andy Samberg when I was in high school?)

If I may momentarily delve into the jargon of feminist/queer theory academia, I would say that "I Love You Man," unlike a yucky little dud like "I Now Prounounce You Chuck and Larry," indicates that we as a society may be healing the schizophrenic break in what Eve Sedgwick refers to as the "homosocial continuum" that has been caused in the past by homophobia. (Note homoSOCIAL. Not "homosexual.") What that means in plain English: due to our puritanical heritage, we've had a double standard in this country where women being affectionate and intimate friends can lead into women being "more than friends" without any major backlash or outcry, while the same is not true of men. This doesn't mean that the homoerotic subtext of "I Love You Man" invalidates its heterosexual plotline. It just means that maybe we're reaching a point of maturity and acceptance where the POSSIBILITY of men being "more than friends" isn't something we have to automatically regard with revulsion or distaste.

I'm proud of us. We're growing up. FINALLY.

Compassion, empathy, candy

I told Cousin he should be Anthony and we can call me "Tiger" to differentiate us for our friends. So yeah. I guess that would make me Tiger Kaplan LeTigre, which translated would mean "Tiger Tiger the Tiger" in English, Turkish and French, respectively.

I read in the paper today (The Maui News) that civil unions have been rolled back, and I thought you could even get MARRIED here if you were gay, so Oregon is actually ahead of Hawaii on that issue, right now anyway (Cousin said they're still fighting it).

Cousin napped today while I exercised and made a couple new charcoal drawings and went for a walk through the empty plot at the end of their road and down by an aqueduct creek thing where I discovered that Maui is no more safe from the plague of mosquitos than Minnesota is. I walked one way until I reached a dead end, then walked the other way until I heard voices and music, and then I withdrew, not wishing to meet other humans.

I got the number for the local transit system from one of Cousin’s friends on the phone today, but I hear it’s not very frequent or reliable, and the stops are poorly marked, if marked at all. I’ve also been scouring ads on Craigslist for available jobs, and am going to send out some resumes, but it’ll be difficult to work out the transportation thing. But I need to save more money for San Francisco.

I’m half vacationing, half preparing to move to the most expensive city in the U.S. in six months. My vices now are body-surfing, tanning and candy.

A nice girl came over this afternoon bringing mail from the Hana house – she is, of all things, Linah Cocaine’s sister. She seems too nice to be related to him/her, but there it is. She’s going canoe racing tomorrow, and was telling me about canoeing here, and she made very good eye contact, and I thought she spoke with a slight accent of some kind, but maybe I was imagining that, because it turns out she’s from Canby, Oregon – basically the same place I’m from!

The waitress at Charley’s where we had breakfast this morning (I got a fishermen’s croissant with really good tomatoes instead of home fries – healthier!) asked, “Is that Guan Yin on your shirt?” That would be Guan Yin (also Quan Yin, Quan’Am, Kannon, Kanin, etc., she stretches across countries and cultures), the bodhisattva of mercy and compassion (image of Guan Yin above), sort of the Buddha version of the Virgin Mary or Artemis of Ancient Greek mythology. It’s cool because I bought that shirt a while back before leaving Portland and wasn’t even thinking at the time how well it would show up on Maui, whose culture is heavily influenced by various Asian cultures.

In the spirit of Guan Yin, I will work on being more compassionate, and merciful, and empathetic, and charitable towards others.

Goldilocks and the three laptops

Spent some time at the Fireside Coffee Lodge yesterday, which kind of has the feel of a hostel. Actually with the fireplace and all the stout hairy men it kind of feels like “Goldilocks and the Three Bears,” except that Goldilocks is nowhere in sight, and the three bears are fixated on their laptop computers. I’m waiting for a call back from Kevin Reedy and still brainstorming questions for “Daddy Donner” about How To Be A Gay Porn Star. I put the Sluts and Squares performers in touch with Pat, who will hopefully line them up for the Hat Party, and in so doing I’ve realized that I’m pretty good at this connecting-people thing, juggling different people I know in my mind and thinking “you would work good with so-and-so,” and I’m thinking that may be a career path I should pursue, a way to make money while I devote my free time to various creative endeavors of my own. Meghan said she read a book recently by a guy who talks about different personality types and the “connector” type, which I guess I am, is not something everyone has, it’s a talent.

Prior to getting caffeinated at the Fireside I dropped off the final version of What I Really Want Is at Minuteman (man I hate the #72 bus, the one that runs along 82nd Ave: always crowded, always the most depressing collection of people imaginable), so I will soon have 50 copies hot off the presses to give away and sell. I’d like to give away half at my going away gathering and sell the rest for $5 each, that way I may just make back printing costs. I got off the #4 bus on Division and 35th and walking south to Powell I passed a house that had an upside-down mannequin embedded in the yard with her legs pointing straight up to heaven – photo above. Texted Melanie to say they were playing Grey Gardens free at Pix Patisserie – I happened to be walking very near her old house (still her house, but no one’s living there right now, weirdly).

Posted my list of things to sell and give away on Craigslist and within minutes had several people inquiring especially about the Super 8 camera, which I realize now I should’ve sold instead of given away, I just figured they’re so old people can’t really use them any more, but the kids who ended up picking it up (along with the desk and lamp) said they saw one go for $50 just the other day. Oh well, I got it free, I pass it on free and share the wealth. They seemed like nice kids who’ll put it to good use. It is so nice to get rid of stuff. Only the office chair left now, and then the “for sale” stuff, which of course is going to be harder to unload. Scott is taking my bike pump for $30. I left Fireside at 4pm to meet Kirk at the Berlin Inn for happy hour – we had the whole place to ourselves. Kirk pointed to this club called Blue Dragonfly that we could see from our window and asked if I’d ever been in there, and the waitress coming by told us about the one time she went there and had a really bad time, and they cut her off even though she wasn’t drunk, because she was dancing like a hippie – I guess it’s a reggae/dance hall/hiphop joint, but they don’t like hippies. I picked up a bottle of gluhwein from Edelweiss on the way out (I’m taking a little break from sobriety...but no more heavy drinking.) After Berlin we stopped by Biddy’s for a pint and Kirk took more of his glass-enhanced photos of me. At home I got stuff ready for the guys who were coming to pick it up, and now a lot of nice space is opening up in my room. Lucy, of course, is getting nervous.

I sketched my future plans for both Kirk and Scott: Maui for six months, then San Francisco, then maybe I’ll dip down into South America for awhile, polish up my Spanish, maybe visit the rain forest where Terence McKenna and his brother had the experiences detailed in True Hallucinations, then stop by New York for awhile, visit some people I know there, then across the pond to England, where I’ll investigate Bloomsbury and Hogarth House and other haunts of Virginia Woolf (ending of course at the River Ouse), then over to Spain where I will do the Camino de Santiago pilgrimmage and NOT die, then nip up to Germany for some of the world’s best beer straight from the source – find the Schwelmer brewery – luxuriate in the artistic decadence of Berlin for awhile – then to Italy, which everyone says “changes you,” by which point I will have shacked up with Ben Whishaw, and we’ll travel together, and finally when I’m pretty old and the artistic mission is fully accomplished, Ben and I will settle down in Africa – Botswana or Kenya, not sure exactly where yet – to observe and live among hippos in their natural habitat. Yeah. It’s all pretty much planned out.