tuesday, october 26th, part two (2004)

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Cutie at the gym tonight. I've seen him there before, once or twice. I thought he was the young friend of the rich guy in the fancy house next to the little East Nashville post office. I saw him and a guy who looked a lot like this cutie at the Merce Cunningham dance performance. He was wearing what someone pointed out was a Commes des Garçon suit which was kind of a joke - completely unfinished, with the laundry pencil marks on it where it should be cut out and pieced together, and without finished hems anywhere.

A couple days later I think I saw this guy at the Y, he said hi. More recently, I thought I saw him again, and he had bleached a sprig of hair in the front. I don't guess they were the same guy.

The cutie I saw tonight was the one with the bleached sprig. I was coming in from working out, he was coming out of the shower, toweling off. We looked at each other across the room, our eyes meeting over the tops of the lockers. We were both at end lockers, with four or five rows were between us. He smiled big at me, watched me undress and wrap a towel around me. I walked directly to him, said, "What was your name?"
He said, "M. Have we met before?"
I mentioned the dance, the house, A, the friend of his. None of it sounded familiar to him. I said, "So I guess we haven't met before!"
He said, "M."
I said, "JDJB."
He asked to see the tattoo on my arm: JH in a small blue box. He said, "Oh, from across the room I thought it was a blue dot." He pointed to the blue dot tattooed on his arm, "And I was gonna be like that's just too wild!"

He face was soft, young. His facial hair made a sparse design on his face. A real cutie. He held my gaze and smiled into me, and I returned the experience as best I could.

I went toward the steam room, but didn't have my shave kit or fresh towel. I retrieved them and walked past him again. I mumbled a line to him as I passed.
He said, "Pardon?"
I said, "You made me forget all my stuff!"
He said, "Oh-ho!"

I did my stretches in the steam room, shaved, showered, hot then cold. It's getting easier to be focused on the task at hand and not getting caught up in looking at all the nakedness. I think meditation is doing me good. What would happen if I did it every day instead of just Sundays?!

As I left the building, I had to walk through the workout area. M was finishing up on a treadmill. I walked over to him, holding my canvas bag and sweaty gym clothes over one shoulder. I started to talk, but stopped myself when I saw him taking out an earphone.
"Pardon?"
I said, "You shower before you work out?!"
He said, "Yeah, sometimes...!"

It would've been funny and light if I'd say, "I was thinking I'd never see you again!" But I didn't think of that till I was down the road. It's probably best I didn't say much more at all. Better to look uncomfortable than obnoxious, I think!

I told him to have a good night, he chuckled and told me to do the same. Then I left him there. He was on the far inside treadmill, so I had a while to recompose myself before our eyes met again. I turned and saw him looking up after me by his reflection in the wall of mirrors surrounding us. I was behind a column. I wonder if he knew I was looking. Probably better not to make a big deal out of it!

Cu-tie!

distraction

How can I feel so content and so sad at the same time? That's not a rhetorical question; and I don't really want an answer.

I skipped yoga on Sunday, which hasn't become a regular day for me anyway, and then at the last minute yesterday - as I was getting dressed for it - skipped my regular Monday class, too. My knees hurt because of all of this rain. But I like this feeling, this humidity; it's not hot so the humidity doesn't bother me, it feels rich, I like the smells it activates.

R disappeared from Facebook and I got a little panicky. I had gone to Flightpath Coffeehouse to work on chapter 31 last week and suddenly got an urge to contact him, and thought I would do so on Facebook via my iPhone. He had contacted me a couple of weeks earlier, shortly after (I later discovered) he and his boyfriend had split up and his boyfriend had moved away. He called, but it was a short phone call; he said he had to meet someone and would call back. But then a couple days later he emailed to apologize for getting in touch and then disappearing again, saying simply "I've been unable to communicate..." Forgetting that the sentence actually went "I've been unable to communicate with anyone," my thought at the Flightpath was to ask "Is it just me or are you hiding from everybody?"

But he wasn't listed in my Facebook friends list. I was done writing for the day - that's why I let the distraction take me away - but it quickly turned to anxiety. Again my thought was "Is it just me or everybody." I packed up my notebook and bicycled home. I was somewhat relieved to discover that he had committed Facebook suicide, as it's called, having deleted his profile completely.

I guess I'm not over R. I don't guess I ever will be completely. The fact that he's moving from Tampa to Seattle makes me wonder what he's going there for. Or whom. Surely he's not already "with" someone. It probably has to do with his disdain for Tampa (yeah, I can imagine that).

The fact that S recently had sex with a man half his age who reminded him of R and then blogged that it was possible (not likely) that he could have a "whopping midlife crisis," fall in love and follow the man to California didn't help matters. Things don't feel so permanent here anymore.

I have a sneaking suspicion in the back of my head that the reason I haven't been able to find anyone to be interested in is because I'm still harboring hopes that R and I will be together again. I can picture a happy reunion sooner or later - even late in life. S has his doubts that such a thing would work out. I wish I could get it through my skull that such a thing could never work, but there is for some reason this feeling that R will always and forever be The One.

Not that S isn't important to me, but S is more like family, like a brother, my best friend. Our relationship is less defined in terms of our hearts; it's more of a soul connection, not physical. My love for S is stronger than it has ever been for anybody in my family, but it wouldn't (and hasn't been) changed by living across the hall or across the country from him.

I sent R an email, told him I felt a little pang of fear that he would disappear out of my life, that I felt like he was part of my family, a part that I never wanted to become estranged from. He responded a couple of days later with mutual feelings, said that I'm a big part of his family, too, "probably more than you know."

Was that just a statement to comfort me? It was comforting. It also made me want to write back and say, "Well, in that case, I'll meet you halfway there." But really, I'd much prefer it if he suddenly decided to come here where I've got a pretty good life going for myself, with the kind of weather I like, a performance community I'm beginning to feel comfortable in, and where I can afford to live and write.

Maybe that's the real reason I ain't got nobody...

simplification.

I'm not writing. Today, it doesn't look like I'll get around to it. Maybe this evening, after yoga and the performance I'm taking part in (reading from a numbered list of instructions, guided by audience members calling out random numbers).

I'm trying to simplify my life, but it doesn't seem to be simple right now. Since I no longer have a relationship with C, which was so challenging and simultaneously enriching, I feel like I need to spend more time with the other challenging/enriching element of my life, my book. I left it behind when I went to Paris. Or I should say that was my intent. I had struggled with a chapter rewrite, and then, in a wash of inspiration, completed it a week or so before the trip, and the chapter that followed started coming to me almost immediately, so I felt like I should pay attention, but I had already set the intent to not work on it in Paris. I found a space in the bottom of my carry-on big enough to slip the slim three-ring binder into, just in case.

A couple of times, I packed it in my bag and carried it with me to the Eiffel Tower, the Arc de Triomphe, thinking I would find a place to sit and be inspired and write. But it was too cold in Paris for sitting outside, or inspiration. I didn't write anything in Paris other than random notes in a journal.

Now I'm back from the trip, happy to be back, but more broke than I thought I would be, and feeling the need to really simplify my life. Again.

I've been enjoying improv classes, and I've found a way to take more of them for no money (repeating the current or previous levels). There's a new level two starting up next Thursday evening, which I think I'll join, and I'm already in the Saturday afternoon class and sitting in on the Tuesday evening class. Last week, for the first time, I joined in on the Wednesday improv "jam," which isn't a class but a free-for-all performance for people of all levels (no audience except each other). It doesn't feel as "safe" as the classes that I've been taking, but I feel the need to get out of my safety zone.

I'm also doing more yoga. Monday through Thursday at 3:30, and now Sundays at 1:30. That leaves Friday through Monday evenings to fill up, if necessary. I would like to fill up some of that time with writing. But I also feel a strong urge to work as much as I can, since the recent pay cut, so that takes precedent. If there is work to do on Friday, Saturday and Sunday, I'll do that first, and then fill in whatever leftover time I have with writing. Or at least that's the plan; there hasn't been any leftover time so far.

I just finished the work available this weekend. I've worked 16.5 hours since Thursday - which is pretty good, because I didn't work at all on Thursday and not much on Friday. I went to therapy, got a massage, took some Me time. I needed some time off - even though I just got back from "vacation." It didn't feel much like a vacation. It felt like a challenge. It made novel writing seem like the easier option. So I'd better get to that and prove myself right.

Oh, but I've got to head out for a rehearsal right now, and then yoga, and then the performance. Jeez...

heads-up

I'm not working today. I'm getting ready to go to Nashville. I'm slightly anxious. Who is this guy I'm going to visit? What will we do for the next four days? Will we have sex a lot? Will we have sex at all? I'm still not sure. I don't know why I've gotten so paranoid about things all of a sudden, but I'm not sure it was really all so sudden. Buying a ticket to Nashville a couple of months ago has given me lots of time to think about it. I'm excited about the trip, about the possibilities. But I got a phone call from B last night saying he wanted to give me a "heads-up" on a possible development. His grandfather is sick in Georgia and he might have to dash off at a moment's notice. He wanted to be sure I have another place to stay if it came to that. I do.

S and I got high and watched a pretty bad movie called He Was A Quiet Man starring Christian Slater. And then I tried to write, and then I tried to journal. It was no use. I started wondering if perhaps the story about B's grandfather wasn't true, if he was just trying to find an out in case we didn't hit it off. I'm wondering how much weight I've gained since I saw him, what kind of shape I'm in since then (which is silly because I never exercised when I lived in Nashville, and although I'm not exercising now, but up until a couple of months ago I was daily). I wonder if he'll notice my gray pubic hairs. I trimmed my wild weed patch of pubes today in preparation for a weekend of sex.

I don't know why I've become so insecure. "Become?" Let me take that back. I don't know why my insecurity has become so pronounced of late. Oh, even that isn't true. I know why.


A couple of nights ago, S and I went to see a movie called August Evening and then I met Br and G at Bouldin Creek Cafe. We had a great time. I wrote this in my journal when I got home:

Br thinks I'm this way with everybody. But I think I have discovered the kind of love affair I can have with him, a straight man. "Humor is my weapon." He laughs at that line (because I said it with a humorous flare) but it is true. In a deep way humor is my talent borne of my insecurities. He's not the only one. I have lots of these lovers, men (straight, usually) and women, our intercourse is laughter. Sometimes it's just masturbation on my part, and they like to watch as I prance around and take their thoughts and spin them into "funny." I know I'm funny. But sometimes they join in, they make me laugh, too, at them and with them and it's done right there in the open and anyone can watch and enjoy it if they want to. But I don't necessarily notice anyone around me. It's just the two of us and our laughter. Sometimes it can be a three-way or even an orgy--

That's all I wrote. I got sidetracked, started doodling on the page. I was trying to say it was wonderful, it was satisfying, this relationship I have with Br. He even called me the next morning and I felt like a blushing bride. Not that I expect or even hope that it will eventually become a physical thing between us; I don't think it will, and I really don't want it to. What I was trying to say was that the laughter we share is special, it's like the best sex.

I tried to write about it again last night, starting with my reaction to having gotten the call from B, the "heads-up" about his grandfather:

about a boy, part whatever
If this doesn't happen there's going to be some kind of a shift, there's got to be. I don't know what that means, but I know something's going to change. It's like some kind of a sign. It is a sign. Because that's what I want it to be. I choose to know. D from the Dance always used to say that; instead of "I don't know," he would say, "I choose to know," which doesn't always work. If you asked him what time it was and he didn't know, he'd say, "I choose to know," and it kind of made sense, but if you asked him something like how does it feel to suddenly be forced into fatherhood by his girlfriend's ex-boyfriend's dead-beat-dad-ness and he said "I choose to know," it didn't make much sense. To me. That's true hippieness, that narrow view of the universe, and it isn't all that different from the narrow view of the universe my fundamentalist grandparents had, so I didn't care much for it.

(Did I mention I was high when I wrote that?)

I'm sad and I'm rambling, about nothing really. B called tonight to say he may have to dart before I get there or sometime during my visit because his grandfather in Georgia isn't doing so well. He called to give me a "heads-up." But if he doesn't call, I'll see him at the airport tomorrow night.

I was really avoiding voicing my fears about him making it up. I don't really think that's the case, so I don't want to state it as fact, but I want to point out now that I was avoiding writing about it. I continued:

If worse comes to worse I can always stay with L and C -- L said "my room is always available." I wonder if I could just stay at B's and take care of his animals if he has to go away. I'm thinking I'll take my book, all of it (maybe on disc) and make a writing weekend of it. That would almost be better than a fucking weekend. But then again, maybe not. We'll see.

Night before last I met Br and G at Bouldin Creek Cafe after they got out of the Dance and I was home from seeing a movie (locally filmed, etc.), a preview. Br did the warm-up music at the Dance and maybe I would have gone to that if I wasn't going to the movie, but I don't know, something happened between me and the Dance and I can't get it back.

At the movie, a woman sitting next to S was holding a piece of paper and writing a list on it. I was intrigued and copied what she had written:

1. Copies
2. Grades on books
3. Grades on reports
4. P. development
5. Drop downs
6. Comments?
7. Conference forms
8. Call parents for conferences

It went on but the movie started and she put it away before I could get it all. (I know, I'm snoopy for no good reason, kinda like that college student who hacked into Sarah Palin's email account.) More journaling:

There are several restaurants in Nashville I want to go to. Family Wash for their vegetarian shepherd's pie; that pizza place on 12th St near L's. I asked L if maybe we could all have pizza together on Saturday night, but I haven't mentioned it to Br yet.

And then I tried to write a poem:

We are not lovers
But we laugh like we're in love
The only two people in a crowded room
The woman with you
Laughs at us and at our jokes
But she can only watch from the outside
As I touch you
And you touch back
Eyes wide open
Screaming, throbbing, slobber and tears
Our raucous laughter
Thrusting out and sucking in
Begging for a truce
A moment to catch our breath
Before we wind up again
For another round

I know, it sucks. The first two lines were in my head for a day, and I tried to turn them into something, but I think I failed.

I figured out a way to continue putting entries on my blog while I'm away, the outline of my book, anyway. They're all in there and scheduled to show up, one a day, so it'll look like I'm around, but really I'm not, I'm in Nashville, hopefully in a bed, hopefully with some part of my body buried in some part of B's, or vice versa.

about a boy, part one

Yesterday was boyful, to coin a term. I went to yoga, from which I had been absent for over a week because of a persistent cough that plagues me yet -- I've convinced myself it is a symptom of a mold allergy because of the leaks I've endured in my house. My handsome yoga teacher came over to the front door of his apartment where he holds class and hugged me and welcomed me back. It was a slightly awkward hug, on both our parts, but made me feel special, as usual, in his company.

I had originally been personally invited to join this group of yoga fanatics because I represented some much needed male energy, or so I was told. There was one other on-again off-again male practitioner, but he was barely a "man," having just graduated from high school. (He's E; I'll get back to him.)

Yesterday, there were three other men in the room besides me, one the recent graduate, the second another shaved-headed man I've seen for a couple of weeks, and then a twenty-something man I'd never seen before, but who's obviously been doing this practice of Mysore Ashtanga yoga for awhile, judging from the fact that he can get his feet around the back of his neck and lift himself by his hands. Not me, not yet.

I feel a bit foolish in front of E, not because he is a better yoga practitioner than I (in fact, he seems a lot less flexible, which gives me a bit of perhaps unreasonable confidence about my own practice), but because he isn't yet twenty years old. A boy. And therefore beautiful. In my opinion, everyone in their late teens, male or female (though I'm more attracted to the male species), is beautiful. To make matters more complicated, when I first starting going to this yoga class and encountered E, he smiled at me with puppy-dog eyes and even bowed slightly in my direction when the opening prayer was being recited en masse and our eyes met. A crush. I have lots of crushes. I'm convinced they're harmless, though they do incite occasional bouts of embarrassment.

For example, I got a notion to pluck a purple flower from a plant in the parking lot on the way to my car and put it in the handle of his car after practice one day. Because I'm new to this practice, I usually am the first to finish (since we all go at our own pace under the teacher's, capable, calm and sometimes humorous guidance). A couple of days later, I noticed that the offering I'd made was on E's car dash, which made me feel nice. A day or so later, I plucked two purple flowers and put them on the car, and another day, a white flower, which didn't sit in the handle so well and had fallen to the street by the time I got to my own car. My intention was to make E feel special, an anonymous gesture, though after the three offerings, over a weekend, I decided I should stop such antics before things got "out of control," whatever that might mean.

But when I arrived at class the next Monday, I noticed a piece of white paper flapping in the wind, taped to E's black car door. It was a note, to me:

Dear Flower-Giver,
I'd like to give my thanks, but I do not know who you are. I apologize for not responding sooner. There are several reasons, but are too long to go into detail in this message. I want to tell you but, again, I do not know who you are. Your generosity is appreciated and should you choose to disclose your name and phone number, please write on the opposite side of this message.
Thankfully,
E.

That freaked me out a little bit. It felt like I suddenly knew what "out of control" meant. I ran to S, who is in Indiana visiting his family. He has always had a calm way of looking at things, particularly this type of neurotic thing that I go through now and again. (I like to think that I am able to help him with his struggles as well.)

I wrote to S: I get the feeling he knows I'm the "Flower-Giver," but I don't know about disclosing my identity. I've considered writing a note that says some convoluted thing about feeling a little anxious (or shy) about saying who I am, or trying to explain something about me and telling him I will let him know who I am if he leaves another note, or just ignoring it and leaving more flowers...or not. Or just leaving my name and number on his car with a flower. Even though I have the feeling that he knows it's me, what if he doesn't and it freaks him out in some way, and he ends up quitting yoga because of that, or says something to somebody and I end up having to quit yoga?! Or what if he knows it's me and he's interested in me in some deeper way ("I want to tell you..."); do I really want to go down that path??? Is there some way to go there without it eventually becoming uncomfortable? Or is there some way to get closer without going there? I wish obvious Right and Wrong made themselves apparent to me, but they have not. I feel a lot of societal angst about what if, what if, what if... Even if it's just getting together to talk. That would be very nice, I think. I think it's possible to be friends with someone so much younger; I think it would be okay -- good even. But I fear what people would think or say...

And there's the rub. Fear of what others might think; that old suitcase. More a fear of having to defend myself, or not defending myself and having to live with it in some way. (etc.)

S didn't respond to the email, but soon after that we were having an online Chat, and I brought it up. Me: Did you read my email? He: About flower boy? Me: I guess you did! He: !

His response was exactly what I needed: I think because it's become so complicated in your mind, what you might do is just let the flower gesture be was it was. Just drop it and let it exist as the original gesture, which was to do something sweet and anonymous. So don't respond to his note...but don't be afraid of your affection for him in real life, let that be what it is apart from the flower thing.

So I did. Though perhaps I could have dropped "the flower thing" a little more completely than I did. A couple of days later, E was parked behind me, and I drew a smiley face in the dirt on his car door, wishing right away that I hadn't, but to erase it would have made a big mess on the door, which probably would have been creepy, so I let it be and backed off.

Early last week, I got an email from someone in the class (to me and E) about Wednesday being a "Moon Day." Mysore (and perhaps all Ashtanga) practitioners don't do yoga on days with a full moon or a new moon. I hadn't been to yoga at all in the week before that, and planned on going on Thursday, but didn't, again because of the cough. But I hijacked E's email address from the one sent to the two of us to ask E if he was going to yoga on Sunday (a morning class I've wanted to go to since I first heard about it but had not yet attended), and if he was, if he would like to go to Casa de Luz -- a macrobiotic restaurant I love -- with me after class for brunch. He responded to say that Casa de Luz was his favorite restaurant.

So we went. I awoke very early Sunday morning, had to make myself go back to sleep a couple of times to get enough rest! I guess I was excited about my "date." But I didn't want to give it too much energy. Truly, my intention for having lunch with E was to get to know him better, to take away a bit of the power of this "crush" I had on him. (I almost wrote "inappropriate crush," but that's something I choose to strike from my vocabulary.)

We had a nice conversation, very informational and mutually interesting. Then he said:

I'll let you in on something. I have a secret admirer. It goes like this: One day I went out to my car where we all park our cars in front of M's, and there was a flower in my door handle. And I thought, 'Oh, how sweet,' and that was that. And then some time later, there were two flowers. I didn't know what to do. I've never had anything like this happen to me before. I told M about it, and he had some good advice. I put a note on my car door with four pieces of tape, and when I came out of yoga, the note was gone, but no response. And then, after that, somebody drew a smiley face in the dirt on my car. I don't know if it's somebody from my high school who lives in the neighborhood, or somebody from practice...

It felt very open-ended, like he was waiting for some revelatory response from me. I felt queasy as I tiptoed through a response, not wanting to implicate myself, but also not wanting to lie to him. (Fortunately, he didn't ask me outright if it was me.)

During brunch, E got a call from his sister, with whom he said he has a very close relationship. He left the table for the bulk of the conversation, was hanging up when he returned, saying, "I'll call you back... His name is JDJB... No!" Then he laughed, which in my mind was his response to his sister asking if I was the secret admirer he surely had told her about...

I mentioned a boyfriend in our conversation (about writing, inspirations, my one-act play "august," which I'd written for my first NYC boyfriend, and which was the seed for the novel I'm now writing), so I felt like I was being as open as possible with him. But it still felt a bit dishonest, or at least creepy. I felt a little creepy.

It wasn't wholly a bad thing. I realized that my attraction to young men isn't so much about me being a pervert as it is about me having a wounded soul, about things that happened to me in my younger days. I was thinking yesterday morning about writing a novel that I've thought about before in various ways, about a boy who is molested and then becomes a man who is a molester... but with a happy ending. I've decided that my attraction to people like E -- who seem more often than not to be very spiritually grounded men -- is an attempt on my part to heal.

My dear sweet friend M called yesterday afternoon from Virginia. She's on a four month long performing tour. I called her a week ago or so because I was missing her, and she was returning my call. Eventually, the conversation came around to everything I've just been writing about. She said, "You keep saying that you feel creepy, or you think what you're doing is creepy, and you don't have to do that. There isn't anything creepy about what you're doing. There isn't anything creepy about love." I told her about my sexual relations with a couple of uncles as a kid, and her response was pretty much along the same lines as S's -- support, non-blame -- which gave me a lot of confidence in M. She wondered aloud how difficult it would be for either of us had I told him I was his secret admirer. She said, "He's old enough to receive and process that kind of information."

But still, I'm scared. It's okay. Writing about it makes it better. Makes it okay.

brud to the blain

I'm having a watermelon smoothie. I'm trying to use up the leftovers from the potluck I had a couple of nights ago. Earlier today I made myself an arugula, black olive, feta omelet with white wine (I put the wine in the omelet, I didn't have a glass on the side!). The eggs and the feta were the only ingredients that weren't leftovers from the party.

My friend M is going on a four-month performing road trip (her myspace page) and I suggested a going-away party. She said that two of her girlfriend's birthdays were on the same night, so it became a bigger party than that. It wasn't out of control, though someone showed up with a standard sized poodle and freaked out my cat (or maybe it was just me!)

I made a salade niçoise from my favorite and most used cookbook (Nikki & David Goldbeck's American Wholefoods Cuisine), and I made my Aunt Melba's Dream Chocolate Cake with black onyx dutch process cocoa S and I get from a little spice shop in Denver, Colorado (we order it); it made the cake and icing so black that I wanted to put yellow stripes down the middle of it (longways) to make it look like a piece of highway; I mentioned this to P when she called to ask if I needed anything for the party; I told her birthday candles. She brought candles and a can of yellow icing! It looked cool. She also brought a bottle of Prosecco to celebrate finding out that she had gotten a full-time job that day. She came a little early, and so did A (who also brought a celebratory bottle of pink Prosecco -- or maybe it was P who brought the pink; anyway there was a bottle of white and a bottle of pink) and the three of us had a toast and a nice quite conversation until guests started arriving.

B came late and stayed late-late. He and I were sitting on the front porch drinking beer and talking until 3 a.m. It was nice (it was nice to have started and ended the party in the same way, having a nice conversation with friends). B is one of those guys from the Dance Group I attend on whom I once upon a time had a crush. (Okay, maybe I still do.) He knows this. He's straight, as are the majority of the men who go to the Dance, though they seem to be mostly in touch with their feminine sides -- which is sometimes confusing for a homo like me.

B and I found out we have a similarity in our lives: religion. He was raised Jehovah's Witness; I was raised Assembly of God. We both got out of it at about the same age (though he's nineteen years younger than me), but for some reason he seemed to fare better in the aftermath. Not that I'm totally fucked up, but I think I'm a lot more neurotic. Probably the homo-factor.

The conversation came around to that, to my fears about peoples' perceptions of me, about being judged for being gay and therefore not wanting to let too much of myself out. B encouraged me to be who I am (which sounds cliché, and those weren't the words he used), said that being my more authentic self would allow me to have deeper relationships with others, not just in Dance, but in the world in general. I know that's true. I asked him if he ever saw a woman across the dance floor and had a sexual thought about her. He said yes. I was glad to hear that because it seemed to give me permission of some sort. I told him that I have to hold myself back, though, because I have the urge to go sit in somebody's lap or kiss them... He said, "How funny would it be to go up to somebody and say, 'I wanna sit in your lap!" I guess it's the kind of group that could handle that sort of a thing. But I'm a'scared. I've got this self-defeating thing about not wanting push myself, my style onto people, holding back, not wanting to be a big fairy, not wanting to be a faggot, not wanting to be the labels I was given back in the painful days of my youth...the scars are deep.

Last night, I went to Dance because B was facilitating for the first time (the warm-up, another person facilitated the bulk of the night). I had a great dance. It was wild and I felt really connected to myself, to my past. I felt wide open. At closing circle, inspired by what B and I had talked about the night before, I said: "Some of you may wonder why I'm such a great dancer." (giggles) "Well, from the eighth grade to the 12th grade, I was ostracized by my schoolmates; I was having a hard time coming to terms with the religion I was being raised in; I was having a hard time dealing with my sexuality, with being different from everybody else. But when I went to school dances, I shone." It felt good to say that, and when I thanked B for allowing me to be neurotic and always being encouraging, he said he was happy to hear me speaking. He asked how it was for me. I admitted when I got to the part about SEXUALITY my throat started closing up and my heart was racing. Interesting to notice.

I've got to get ready to go to yoga now. I'm still not sure -- and am very intrigued -- by my very handsome and sexy (and presumably straight) yoga teacher. I get a strong sense that he is flirting with me. I don't know if he knows that I'm gay, but I am very titillated by the things he does for me and to me, holding me, touching me, placing his front on my back when I'm bent over, tapping on my thighs... We're in the middle of a room of women, so it's not like he's making the moves on me, he does these same things with them, but there's something going on, there's an energy; I don't think it's just me. Thump-thump, thump-thump; man, I love yoga! And I love crushes, especially reciprocal ones!

crazy on you

Here's what my week's been like:

Job work has been slow, so I've done a lot of work on the novel, rewriting each chapter longhand to get a feel for it. I keep the PC purring so I can check occasionally for work that might have come through that I can latch onto (for the dough), but I've had stretches of three and four hours of uninterrupted time at the kitchen table. I'm somewhere in the middle of chapter four right now.

I've alternated between that and uploading what I've done so far on my new myspace page, chapter by chapter in the blogs section (I'm enjoying myspace, have reconnected with some old friends).

I've also taken to this "Mysore Ashtanga" yoga practice. It's available Mondays through Thursdays 4:30 to 6:00, but so far -- because it's a work-up-to-it kind of practice -- I haven't stayed longer than thirty-five minutes. The instructor is dreamy, big wide-open eyes to his soul, always coming to look right into mine and say "How do you feel?"

I feel like I love you, I say inside. Can you hear me?

Oh, I'm such a crush-junkie! He's a great teacher, and though I felt like he was smirking at my dismal attempt to get through the first series of Surya Namaskars (sun salutations) on that first day (I thought maybe I was in the wrong place, that he wished I hadn't come, all those insecurities of being at the gym or in P.E. class or something), he seemed equally pleased that I was back the next day. (I have a lot of conversations in my mind, thoughts about what other people are thinking about me, and though they're probably not always correct, there's probably some truth in what I'm feeling). So I went back three days in a row, and he gave me a second set of Surya Namaskars to go through the next day, as well as two more poses each new day (so I'm up to six, right?)

Day One: My muscles, particularly in my arms, were like jelly. At one point, M (the instructor) was talking to me and I reached up to scratch my nose and missed it!).

Day Two: I felt good.

Day Three: My lower thighs (backs of my knees) were so sore I couldn't pull my shoes off with the opposite foot!

So this is Day Four, but there is no Mysore on Fridays, and some of the practitioners don't do it on "Moon Days," regardless of the day of the week, but I'm not there yet (they also stop everything at the beginning of class and do a chant, which M told me on the first day to just listen to silently; maybe someday he'll give me the key to that as well...). Also, I won't be able to go to yoga class at all next week because of SXSW -- I got my Film Pass, and the film festival starts tonight (more on that later) -- I'm going to have to do the six series/poses I was taught on my own so I don't have to go through the jellied muscles and start-up pain again week after next. And I think ultimately, it would be nice to not have to go to the studio everyday, once I know the entire hour-and-a-half cycle, though at some point, M gets more involved in your practice, helping you with stretches (i.e., touching you!)

My yoga practice has blossomed because I have also spent an inordinate amount of time this past week thinking up things to say to R, and then spending the rest of the time talking myself out of calling or texting or emailing him to share those things with him. I feel he has pulled way back, and I feel myself full of a desire to pour myself into him, to swallow him up, to fill up my time thinking about him, thinking about him, thinking about him. It's gotten to the point where I've felt like I need to just cut off any connection or any hope of a connection with him, to tell him as much (though when I told S he said that would be kind of cruel to just cut him off after he opened himself up to me. I'm thinking, In what way has he opened himself??? I don't know, I don't know, I don't know...)

R called me on his birthday and I got all junior-high-girlish. It felt ridiculous. I also sent him a birthday present that I shouldn't have spent so much money on, and then I feared he hadn't received it (because I didn't insure the package, sent it USPO instead of UPS or FedEx, didn't ask for receipt confirmation or anything like that... this actually kept me awake practically an entire night thinking about it, wondering, worrying, obsessing). And then, three days after his birthday, at least two days after I thought he should have received the package, I texted him to see if he got it. This was his message back to me (misspellings his and left in to add to to the sense of confusion and insecurity I felt):

I got it today. Huf
been thinking
about how i say
thank you. Its
awesome, and very,

That was the whole message. And that was the last I heard from him. That was six days ago. I obsessed about that for a long time. And so I dove into yoga, dove into my writing. That's what I've been doing this past week, avoiding that, and it has been good for my creative and physical selves. But dang, there's a part of my brain that's short-circuiting, and there's a part of my heart that's hurting.

Speaking of Heart:

If we still have time, we might still get by
Every time I think about it, I wanna cry
With bombs and the devil, and the kids keep comin'
No way to breathe easy, no time to be young

But I tell myself that I was doin' all right
There's nothin' left to do at night
But to go crazy on you
Crazy on you
Let me go crazy, crazy on you, oh

My love is the evenin' breeze touchin' your skin
The gentle, sweet singin' of leaves in the wind
The whisper that calls after you in the night
And kisses your ear in the early moonlight
And you don't need to wonder, you're doing fine
My love, the pleasure's mine

Let me go crazy on ya
Crazy on you
Let me go crazy, crazy on you, ohhh

Wild man's world is cryin' in pain
What you gonna do when everybody's insane
So afraid of one who's so afraid of you
What you gonna do...ohhh...

(Ah-ah-ah-ah)

Ooooo...Crazy on ya
Crazy on you
Let me go crazy, crazy on you

I was a willow last night in my dream
I bent down over a clear running stream
Sang you the song that I heard up above
And you kept me alive with your sweet flowing love

Crazy
Yeah, crazy on ya
Let me go crazy, crazy on you, oh
Crazy on ya
Crazy on you
Let me go crazy, crazy on you, yeah

(Ah-ah-ah-ah)

Crazy on ya
Crazy on you
Let me go crazy, crazy on you, ohhh...