fagophobia

I have been enjoying my comedy improv class, feeling confident, feeling capable. I took this class a year or so ago (Level One), and felt pretty out of place. The experience made me feel like a GOB (Gay, Old, and Big - so I stood out). This time around, it has had a different feeling right from the start. At first, I attributed this to the fact that my classmates were a more diverse, more talented group of people than my first time. I think that at least the diversity thing is correct - previously they were mostly straight white male 20-somethings. This time there are more women, there is more ethnic diversity (black, Asian, Indian), so the straight white male thing is balanced out a little bit. They're still mostly (or totally) straight - except for me and my lesbian friend M who I talked into taking the class with me, but who hasn't been going much lately (not because she feels like a GOB, though, I don't think).

I also thought my comfort level had something to do with one of my teachers, the female one. And that may be the case as well, but halfway through this eight-week session, she and my straight white male 20-something teacher from last year got kicked out of the company for irreconcilable differences between them and the three other members of the company (all SWM20s). The female teacher was there on Tuesday nights; my Saturday teacher was/is a performer I've never been particularly impressed with; not like her, whom I think hangs the stars in the improv sky. But I liked their two teaching styles together, and since I could and can go to any class my level or lower for free, I found myself going to both.

Then, when she got ousted, my Saturday teacher took over the Tuesday night classes as well, and I didn't go at first (in a sort of silent protest of what was "done to" my favorite teacher). But then somewhere in there, a shift happened. I realized I was "getting it," and I realized that my Saturday teacher was doing me a lot of good. So here's the dilemma: Do I take Level Two at this theater (I'm not sure who the teacher is; I don't think it's him, and I worry that it might be one of the theater company's SWM20s, whom I have never had much of a connection with, and don't think much of two of the three's improv stage work), or do I go over to the ousted two's new company they're starting, and take a Level One class.

The bonus about that is that it would be free, and I like that idea since I've had a 25% cut in pay recently and I've gotten one-and-a-half checks reflecting the cut, and it hurts! I'd also be taking from this woman, whose teaching style I really love. Or, I might be taking from her company partner, whose teaching style I don't particularly love.

This came up for me last night because I went to see a sketch comedy show hosted by these two people. They were doing tryouts for a scout from the Montreal Comedy Festival. I didn't realize the show was going to be all sketch as opposed to improv, but when I found out (after the show had started), I was game.

I stayed for maybe six of nine or 10 acts. And in four out of those six, there was some sort of comedic gay play-acting going on onstage. I tried to remain open, but somehow it felt rude to me. I don't identify so strongly as a homosexual (maybe there's the rub), but it struck me that if they were pretending to be black - actually, in one of the six, they did address that - or if they talked about boobs or sex a lot - actually, in another of the six, they addressed that as well - it might have been different.

The difference was, in the act where a guy wiped fake shit on his face to pretend he was black, it seemed like a strong statement, or if not a statement, certainly safe territory in the context of what they were presenting. In the graphic sexual content scene, one guy was supposed to be telling horror stories and kept telling pornographic stories instead to a group of "fellow children" they were playing, and the others were all offended by his stories. His inappropriateness was, in the end, funny.

But with regards to the homosexual stuff, one group of two guys had a "robot" onstage which kept announcing that they were "gay" and "faggots," etc. (It was a malfunctioning robot which also said "I Hate Black People" when they asked about the president.) But then they went on to call each other homos behind the other's back, and then did a musical number in which they professed their heterosexuality, and then one ended up jabbing a sword up the other's ass. And then there were hidden videos of each other "masturbating," one to porn, the other to "The Golden Girls," and then the first one again masturbating to a video of the second one masturbating to "The Golden Girls."

In another scene, two guys needed a third, a stranger, to sit between them on a plane as a "gay buffer," which was a pretty funny scene. When the stranger got mad and left, they were inextricably drawn to each other in their pink polo shirts... But then they ruined it (in my opinion), by going on and on about how they're not really gay, they're just playing characters. It sounds kind of benign to write it, but there was something about their attitude (and the audience's reaction) that was a bit hurtful to me.

It made me wonder if this is a good outlet for my creative talents. I don't see myself doing "gay" comedy - though I do think it would be fun (and have suggested it to M) to do "cover" versions of old Nichols & May sketches. When I suggested it to M, she said, "We can add some queer elements," which kind of annoyed me. But then I realized that my intention was that we would switch roles, she would play the Mike Nichols characters and I would play the Elaine May characters. So, I don't know, maybe the lady who doth protest too much is me!

But I wonder if this is the type of performers my "favorite" improv teacher and the other one draw to them. Maybe I'm projecting too much. I've obviously got some more growing to do, and some comfort level and clarity still to find in certain situations.

v.d.

Saturday was a great day and seems to have marked another shift in me (though that may not be obvious in what I'm writing). C and I were supposed to go for a weekend meditation retreat centered around money and our personal relationships with it -- which, with the recent slash in my salary due to the economic downturn, seemed like a good idea -- but we had had a glitch in our platonic love affair the Monday prior, and I felt the need for some space, particularly since we wouldn't be able to talk about us during the retreat.

First thing Saturday morning, I went to the Blue Dahlia to pick up compost (aka, pig slop), five 5-gallon buckets of it. I usually go through it right away, pull out the stuff that Tinkerbell, the resident pot-bellied, won't eat -- citrus, squash peels, onions -- or shouldn't -- foil butter pats, drinking straws, paper, plastic wrap. (An aside: Recently, Tinkerbell ate a latex glove, probably from the old folks home across the street. I discovered it coming out of her butt. She was in distress, foaming at the mouth, but M fed her some extra food and it worked its way out.) Anyway, I didn't go through the compost right away because it was cold out, and even though I wear rubber dish gloves, my hands hurt when I go through the slop on a cold day. So I vacuumed my truck out instead -- a little V.D. gift for me -- while S made eggs and potatoes to serve with the biscuits he'd made the night before as a V.D. gift to all of us.

At 1:00, I went to my improv class, which was pretty good, then went from there to nearby Hyde Park and picked up our box of produce for the week and brought it home for S to deal with. Then I went through the compost, even though it wasn't much warmer out.

I rushed from there to my friend G's house in South Austin. He was hosting a tea party with a friend (N) who recently spent two years in Taiwan learning all about tea. He had fascinating stories to tell as he served different tea varieties. I was only there for the last hour of the three-hour party, but G, N and I were tea-drunk by the end of it, laughing and dancing to the music the two of them were playing in tandem from their laptops.

The next thing on the schedule was the dance, dinner and concert at the space where the dance group I sometimes meet up with (more often recently). C called while I was at G's house from the meditation retreat to tell me he was going to go to the V.D. event as well. We made plans to travel together. I went to his house and gave him the V.D. card I had made for him the Sunday night previous. We had spent all day that Sunday together making cards for others, then I came home and made one specifically for him; when we had the glitch on Monday, I didn't know what to do about sending it, feeling the way I did, so I didn't mail it, but then gave it to him in person, which isn't t quite as good as receiving it in the mail, to be sure, but he appreciated it.

The dance was great. The usual stuff, except at the end, C, P1, M and I ended up in a three-song four-person embrace. C had talked to M about what was going on between us a couple of nights before, and P1 kind of knew, I think, because she reads my blog. But there was so much affection in that little circle that the tears just streamed down my face throughout the second two songs. I don't remember the exact words of the last song, but it was something like "You are love and you are precious and this is perfect." I wanted it to last forever. It was a healing for C and me. (Yet another!)

After the dance, dinner was served, yummy, healthy vegetarian food, cous cous, veggie stew, kale salad and cornbread. C snagged the very last lemon square, and halved it with me, then I halved my half with another person, and he halved his half twice and ended up with just a tiny little bit of lemon-sugar goodness.

We went inside and sat against the wall behind the people who had the foresight to bring pillows and blankets to sit on and wrap themselves in. My old friend L -- who introduced me to this crazy dance thing -- sang a set of new songs, after having been out of the scene for a couple of years following the birth of her child. She always tells me I make her laugh more than just about anybody, but she's pretty damn funny, too.

While she sang, C, P1, M and I touched each others' hearts, held hands and massaged one another all curled up in the love bundle we had started at the end of the dance. I was in heaven; I think we all were.

And then M sang her songs of love lost and love desired and it was all right as rain.

(graphic: "Jesus Healing a Broken Heart" ALL RIGHTS RESERVED, obviously...)

changes

There's been a change in me. Two weeks ago last night, I had dinner with a friend (whom I'll call P1 'cause she loves it when I call her P1 for some odd reason!). On the way home, I lit up a cigarette and it didn't go down so well. The next day, my sore throat was worse. I had a cold. I got acupuncture and Chinese herbs and chased the cold from my throat to my head to my chest. Today is the first day since then that I haven't felt "sick." I also stopped drinking coffee and alcohol, and smoking pot for the most part (I took a hit once to inspire my writing and another right before S and I went in to see Carrie). And oddly, I stopped masturbating for the most part, just once a week and without looking at porn.

I finished writing chapter 10, which had been plaguing me for a while.

I ordered a new, longer yoga mat and will restart my Mysore practice again on Monday.

I started once-a-month therapy.

I became very close with an old neighbor and we have spent an inordinate amount of time together, talking, eating, crafting, meditating, crying. It's the very first relationship of its kind for both of us; he has never had a close friend who was gay and I have never had such a deep relationship with a straight man before. We are both healing a lot of old wounds. It's pretty incredible, and at times feels like being in love.

It is also scary for both of us in our own ways. We've talked about going to therapy together (since he recommended the therapist I started seeing).

This all came to me because I had dinner at P1's again last night.

(photo "Buddha Tears" by Blue Perez (c) 2007)