ON AN ISLAND, NOT FAR ENOUGH AWAY

I saw the pics of party boys crowded together on Fire Island over the Fourth of July weekend, face masks ditched along with most other accessories and articles of clothing. My first thought was a combination of horror and shame. I’ve always gotten defensive when a gay person or a group of gays does something that makes it easy for haters to cite while claiming we are a deplorable lot. It’s as if gays have to always be on their best behavior. No gay man can be a COVIDIOT. It’s a doubly damning when a gay group comes off as hypersexual and vacuous.

I suppose my defensiveness comes from growing up in an era when homosexuals were regularly labeled as perverts and recklessly lumped in with pedophiles and other societal pariahs. With so few openly gay men forty years ago, the public actions of one was easily deemed the actions of all. It’s why I resented and despised the only gay organization I ever read about in media: NAMBLA (the North American Man/Boy Love Association). It perpetuated the notion that gays were pedophiles and, lo and behold, there wasn’t a throng of “regular” gay men coming forward to state otherwise.

Despite all the gains the LGBTQ community has made, I remain wary that acceptance is far from universal and there are intolerant factions emboldened by the occupant of the White House who look for fodder to fuel their campaign to return to a reign of straight white men.

Maybe I should just chill and tell myself that the “good ol’ days” won’t come back just because a group of gym-primed gays lets loose after months of lockdown, drinking and doing party drugs while cramming together like sardines at some party venue. There have been plenty of photos of predominately straight people flocking to beaches and bars, face masks and social distancing recommendations be damned. There’s a contingency of humans that flocks to It places—crowded spaces—eager to see and be seen, excited to post that they were part of The Happening on social media. Look at me, bitches! I’ll bet you wish you were me!

Actually, no. But then I’m an extreme introvert whose daily life didn’t change a whole lot as the planet shut down on account of the coronavirus. Still, I get that many people have felt like they’ve been cooped up for too long. Lockdown fatigue has led to many episodes of shortsighted, selfish behavior.

As I pass septuagenarians and octogenarians, I take wider detours to give them space and I hope for their continued wellness. I would be shattered if I somehow passed the virus on to them through my action or inaction. I wish more people would remain cognizant of the people most vulnerable to this epidemic.

I truly hope that the Fire Islanders do not contract the virus. I have my doubts though, considering how badly New York was hit. I worry the attendees will return to households, workplaces and communities, unknowingly spreading the coronavirus to elderly and immune-compromised people they come across. It takes a little reminder, but I know their actions do not represent most gay men. Stupid people come in every race, gender, social class and sexual orientation. It’s just when they are COVIDIOTs, the stakes are so much higher.

Be sensible, people. And stay healthy.

IS THERE REALLY A “REALISATION” TO COME FROM THIS?

Exceptional times. Lockdowns. Isolation. No haircuts, for god’s sake.

Playgrounds that can’t be played on. Tennis courts without nets. Parking lots by parks blocked off. Empty sports arenas. Weight racks at normally crowded gyms gathering dust.

Streets without cars lined up at lights that continue to change from green to yellow to red, a reminder of the congestion that once was. Masked men daring to venture out, alone, with suddenly shaven heads. Whoa, dude. Others letting their locks grow out as an homage to the big hair of the ’80s. Whoa, dude!

Starbucks closed. Major shopping areas boarded up.

Buses on the busiest routes passing by at the end of the work day with three, maybe four passengers on board. A plane spotting is as rare as a California condor.

Everybody (but me) takes to Zoom.

The daily highlight becomes standing on porches and balconies at 7 p.m., clanging cowbells, clapping hands, banging pots and pans, a behavior we’d last tried when we were five-year-olds as exasperated mothers coaxed the wooden spoon and whisk from our hands.

People dying alone, bringing some of us eerie flashbacks to the AIDS crisis, only families staying away now is an order, not a choice.

Murky canals in Europe and the skies in Los Angeles becoming clearer. The Himalayas are visible from 125 miles away. Flour, toilet paper and disinfectant appear at the top of people’s wish lists. A talking schnauzer named Pluto goes viral. So does Leslie Jordan.

In North America, the era of hunkering down nears the two-month mark, but there are signs everywhere—We Are Open—that things are returning to “normal”. On April 1^st, I moved into the condo that I’m temporarily renting after my plans for extended travel and a major relocation got sidelined. At the time, my downtown neighborhood felt quietly suburban. Now as I write, there is a constant whir of vehicles on the street forty yards away. Two days ago, when I last ventured out, I stepped off the sidewalk as a group of three people—three, for god’s sake!—passed by, each carrying a heretofore ominous Starbucks paper cup tucked into its questionably necessary cardboard sleeve. I played tennis on Saturday. It may even be permissible for me to get a professional haircut before the end of the month (not that I have high hopes of snagging a coveted appointment slot).

Altogether, everyone, repeat after me: “Whew!”

We made it. Most of us, that is. Along the way, we went from suddenly loving banana bread to just as suddenly hating it. We filled our jigsaw puzzle quota for the next five decades. We allowed bicep and shoulder strains to recover.

Let’s get on with it, shall we?

But wait…

Wasn’t all that time cooped up supposed to count for something? Where’s that silver lining thing? Didn’t we spend a few poignant moments reflecting in between binges of “Tiger King” and old seasons of “Drag Race”? I’m wired to believe, or at least to hope, that something good will come of all this. Beyond a new appreciation for hairstylists. In addition to gym goers making a more conscientious effort to bring towels and wipe down benches.

Have we grown at all?

Sure, there have been some lovely video clips that circulated on social media—the neighborhood car parades wishing youngsters “Happy birthday”; the young woman holding her left hand up to the window of the nursing home to announce to her grandfather she was engaged; celebrities singing John Lennon’s “Imagine”. (Okay, I know people threw a lot of hate on that last example, but I think the intentions were good.) In Vancouver, I’ve appreciated all the murals that have popped up on those sheets of plywood covering storefronts. Everywhere, doctors, nurses, orderlies, custodians, grocery store employees and the minimum wage workers helping coordinate pizza takeout and delivery have had encounters with kinder, more thankful citizens (with some glaring exceptions).

Still, I’m hoping for something exceptional to bloom from this exceptional blip in our lives. Millions of us have seen that video, “The Great Realisation”. When I first saw it, I cheered. At last! Here it is...that moment when everything changes and you can never go back to what was before. Like when The New York Times published sexual abuse allegations against Harvey Weinstein and Alyssa Milano posted a “Me Too” tweet.

We won’t go back. We’ll go forward. This lifting of restrictions during the epidemic must be about more that getting our McDonald’s fries back. As “The Great Realisation” pronounces, let this moment be the dawning of something better...hindsight 2020.

I shared the video on Twitter and in texts. I noticed that many Facebook friends did their own sharing. This would be the beginning of the movement. But, alas, more than ten days after the video caught people’s attention, it doesn’t seem to have legs. Social media has drifted back to what it knows best: attacking people, canceling them, blocking them and occasionally throwing in a shirtless selfie or a cute Labradoodle pic.

Inside of this having Me Too momentum, I fear this may be another epic miss...like Sandy Hook in Newton, Connecticut or Pulse Orlando. Like “We Are the World” after famine fatigue set in.

Really, we can be better. Alas, my mind doesn’t know how. A few days after seeing the video for the first time, I took to Twitter, asking my 7,000+ followers what they were planning to do differently and, yes, better after all this. Crickets. Not a like, not a comment, not a retweet.

I don’t have the capacity to lead this. But I will follow and I’m sure many more will do the same. This is when I want the true leaders to step up. Be bold.

How can we change, long-term, in caring for and respecting the elderly? Could we make something new of the 7 p.m. bell ringing, perhaps transforming it into an hour of personal connection when we set aside our phones and other devices? How do we extend some of the thus-far temporary environmental improvements? How do we continue the conversation about the plight of the homeless, many of whom are plagued by unabated drug addiction and under-treated mental health issues? How do we continue to appreciate all workers? What can we do to make travel and tourism more sustainable? How do we address the gaps in health care and the racial inequities that were further exposed during the pandemic? 

Anything, people. The time is now.

It is expected that the global death toll for COVID-19 will soon pass 300,000. It would be nice if one outcome from this is that more men will finally start washing their hands with soap and water before exiting public restrooms, but this is an opportunity to dream bigger, to switch from spreading a virus to spreading positivity, to make a difference in people’s lives.

What do you think? What’s your dream? Pipe up with a comment, a tweet, a link. How can you—we—set it in motion?

A QUESTION FOR YOU

In 2019, it was they.

In 2018, justice.

2017: feminism. 2016: surreal. 2015: -ism.

We’re not quite four months into 2020, but does anyone doubt that Merriam-Webster’s word of the year will be coronavirus? Perhaps that’s too on the nose. Maybe they’ll go with isolation or fudge things a little with two words: social distancing. (Look at 2015, people. They picked a suffix. Sacrilege.)

With the only true choice already so obvious, I’d like to move on and ponder what may be the question of the year. My nomination: So how are you holding up? Other queries that might appear on the final ballot might be, How’s the curve looking today?, Who else will Trump try to blame? and Where am I supposed to store all this toilet paper?

But seriously, how are you holding up?

Never mind the ocean views. 

Look at me!

For some, life chugs along, fears of some pesky virus swooping in and making every breath a struggle barely registering. Indeed, I don’t have to look far to see signs of “normal”. On my Monday jog around the seawall, I saw a shirtless twenty-five year old up ahead, holding his phone out in front of him, trying to get the perfect daily (hourly?) shot for his Instagram feed. By the time I passed him, he was leaning against a tree trunk, phone still outstretched, his muscle definition not suffering from gym closures, his facial expression decidedly serious. Taking a selfie takes utmost concentration. I managed not to stumble on account of the temporary distraction and jogged on, coming upon clusters of couples on beach towels at Third Beach, each pairing duly spaced out at least two meters from their neighbors. It took great effort for me to suppress a cough as I took in a breath. (Is there a more alarming sound than a cough these days?) I don’t like encountering any kind of smoke when I’m exercising and I was taking in a heavy dose of marijuana mixed with an even more offensive minted cigar, if there’s actually such a thing. Only after I rounded the corner and cleared the human-generated fog did I realize it was April 20^th, enthusiastically celebrated in Vancouver as 4-20, a chance to publicly toke en masse, the occasion switching from a demonstration to a celebration last year after pot became legal across Canada in October 2018. While important things must clearly (hazily?) go on, the scale has been dramatically reduced.

So there you have it, people. My highly unscientific observations of what remains regular. Selfies and public toking gatherings. I hope that offers you (or someone) reassurance.

But if you’re not concerned with selfies, how your abs change in definition every five minutes or the fact that smoking pot has changed from being an act of defiance to being a mild irritant to middle-aged joggers, I ask again, How are you holding up?

Are you bending the rules? Are you absorbing fumes from toxic permanent markers while making posters to attend a rally—with proper social distancing, of course, contrary photo evidence be damned—demanding that nail salons reopen? Or are you hunkered down at home, waiting for the next Amazon package to arrive so you can restock your cupboard with hand sanitizers and cans of Lysol? Admit it, the lower hinge of the cupboard door came off two days ago from excessive opening and closing.

My boyfriend Daniel—okay, maybe I was just looking for an excuse to type that—is an extrovert and he religiously checks our provincial COVID-19 numbers every day, squinting at the charted data, as if he can blur things enough to see that elusive flattened curve. I don’t have to tune in. He gives me the full report. (Alas, a summary would suffice.) Unlike me, he’s an extrovert. I’ve learned through him that “essential travel” is entirely subjective. While his favorite coffee place temporarily closed up a month ago, Daniel and his coffee mates have found a worthy substitute six blocks away. Every morning he heads there for it’s nine o’clock opening. (Are you finding business hours wonky these days? During any other time, what cafe could possibly survive, opening so late?) Daniel and his friends form a sidewalk circle that expands and contracts over the course of an hour as people come and go, the two meters apart rule always in play. I once made the comment that his daily coffee outing could not be construed as “essential” in the eyes of our provincial coronavirus expert, Dr. Bonnie Henry, a woman Daniel reveres. I felt his side-eye stare digging into me. Those were breaking up words I’d dared to speak. He kept silent.

It’s not just the coffee talk that compels Daniel to get out and immerse himself in public each day. There’s always a food item that he can’t delay having at once. Yesterday it was walnuts. And he can’t resist a daily browse in at least a couple of four drugstores to see what he can add to his collection of disinfectants. (I’m pretty sure his supply has gone beyond just one cupboard. He may soon have turf some of his hoarded supply of dried pasta just to make room.) While I’m a classic procrastinator, Daniel must have or do something the moment it enters his mind. While my list of what’s essential might take up two lines, his fills pages and continues to grow.

Ah, COVID-19, 2020. Crazy times.

And yet, for me, things are still normal or, at the very most, normal with an asterisk. To be sure, I “miss” going to the gym.

As a gay man, I felt I was compelled to say that.

Damn. I must be doing something wrong.

Who isn’t pining to get back into a heavily mirrored space to sweat and grunt in baggy shorts and tees—they’re supposed to be form fitting—as buff guys with the middle name Narcissus restrict their gaze to themselves in the mirror as they do bicep curls with dumbbells that exceed our own body weight? I worry too that I’ll lose my patented glare that I cast on oblivious dudes sitting on benches and machines, scrolling through their phones as I’m waiting to work out some body part. A wrist maybe or surely I can bulk up my elbows. For now, I make do with increasing my runs and bike rides, searching YouTube on off days to follow along to routines that have me doing stretchy things with elastic thingies, breathing in, breathing out, hoping this rubber band play will retain whatever muscle tone I have left.

I won’t get into it again—at least, not in consecutive posts—about how badly I long for a professional haircut. I’m making do, covering my bathroom mirror with a sheet and trying to summon up the gumption to “own it” as I step out on rare public appearances with my big ’do. The sky has not fallen, nor has my hair even brushed up against the lowest cloud.

The hardest change for me is that I can’t sit in a local cafe at seven each morning to begin my writing. My Bodum at home works perfectly fine. I’ve adjusted. Other than that morning start, I’ve worked from home for the past two and a half years. In that time, I’ve learned to bat away (most) urges to waste time reading my Twitter feed and I’ve never ever used cleaning my place as a writing distraction. I’ll spare you the current proof, a pic of my kitchen counter. It’s proof on steroids. In the spirit of stay-at-home recommendations, I’ve reduced the number of times I trek down to my building’s utility room with bags full of recycling and garbage. I’m a filthy slob, but a very compliant one.

Okay, let’s shake off that last couple of sentences. I have to admit that there are parts of this new normal that I quite like. I’ve been practicing a form of social distancing all by myself for most of my life. I’ve mentioned many times that I’m an extreme introvert. Add to that a diagnosis (one of many) of social anxiety. In the past, my anxiety hit most often in grocery stores. Maybe it’s the tall shelving on other side of me in any aisle. Maybe it’s all the food items I forbid myself from having (due to another diagnosis, my recalcitrant eating disorder). Maybe it’s too many people in a confined space, people rushing to fill baskets before the dinner hour chimes. Too often, I’ve found myself shaking, wiping an unwelcome tear from my cheek and fighting an irrational notion that I must immediately fall to the ground and curl up in a ball. I feel eyes on me, people thinking, “What’s with that guy?” Nowadays, I take my place in line outside the store, no one too close in front of me nor behind me. When I get inside the store, there is room to roam. Inevitably, I’ll find myself “stuck” in an aisle, someone gazing too long at ketchup brands. I feel a surge of anxiety—do I wait politely or do I hold my breath and quickly violate social distancing recommendations to pass by them? I feel relief, knowing this isn’t one of my quirky dilemmas but something almost everyone is facing. My god, I am normal in a grocery store! It’s exhilarating. I line up to check out, once again completely at ease with no one piercing my bubble. We all have bubbles now.

I write. I read. I run. I bike. I play with elastic thingies. I keep my Netflix to an hour or less. (No thank you, “Tiger King”.) Life goes on, relatively cough-free. It’s good.

So, really, how are you holding up?