CLARITY IN THE RADIO STATIC

As I got in the car, I wasn’t in the mood for news radio so I scanned the dial and came upon an oldie, Air Supply’s “Lost in Love.” It’s from my high school years—I’m an oldie, too. I’d only gone a block when the station drew static. I wasn’t willing to lose the song. I listened as it came in and out. I made it to the end and then flipped to another station.

 

The song—it’s memories and the way it played this most recent time—was perfect for my current melancholic state. I’ve been thinking about love a lot lately. Just like the first time I heard “Lost in Love,” it feels like I know nothing about it. And, just like then, I cannot fathom falling into it. 

 

Back then, I was overwhelmed by the East Texas high school social scene where I felt unseen. I envied the popular people. I wanted their clear skin, their confidence, their gift of walking down hallways with exclamation marks always in tow. Everything they did or said stood out for reasons that didn’t make sense. That’s just what status does. 

 

I went to high school dances. Why so many? I didn’t go to the keg parties in the woods or at people’s houses after the dances. I didn’t know about them. I was honestly shocked to find out a couple years later that there were so many of them, too. I suppose people kept that sort of thing tight-lipped to keep the quality factor up. Isn’t that nonsensical? Unpopular people crashing hip high school parties only happens in movies, right? Why would I want to be ignored more? Why would I want beer which I still find gross unless I squeeze in a half-dozen lime wedges? I didn’t know about fruit beer back then and I suspect these weren’t the kinds of parties that had sliced fruit beside the keg…or anywhere.

 

Love was not conceivable in high school. Not with my zits. Not with my chicken legs and bicep-free arms. Not with my unruly red curls. Not with my utter confusion over my sexuality. I had “tendencies” but they needed constant quashing. This was the Bible Belt. This was the Land of the Southern Baptists. This was Hell. 

 

But on the radio, Olivia sang that I had to believe we are “Magic,” Diana Ross declared, “It’s My Turn” and The Manhattan Transfer harmonized over “The Boy from New York City.” There was hope, wasn’t there? There was something after high school.

 

Still, I subjected myself to deep inhales of Air Supply. Torture, some people would say, then and now. There was something lush in the vocals and dramatic in the way each song built to a crescendo. I sang along to every song on their albums, always hitting the high notes, just like co-lead singer Russell Hitchcock. (Back then, American Idol and William Hung hadn’t entered pop culture. I may have doubted many things about myself, but I had no reason to believe I might have been tone deaf. Ignorance, in that case, was bliss.) I sang along cluelessly to tunes like “Every Woman in the World,” “Even the Nights Are Better” and “Making Love out of Nothing at All.” Still, “Lost in Love” was my number one. 

 

SIDE NOTE: My first ever concert was seeing Air Supply on the Stephen F. Austin campus in Nacogdoches, Texas. (I was never going to be popular.)

 

Then, as now, song lyrics could be garbled, not all of them as much so as, say, “MacArthur Park” (Who leaves a cake out in the rain?!), but, oh, how I’d love to give so many pop tunes a quick edit. If I’d actually been in love when I first heard “Lost in Love,” I’m not sure it would have given me any tips. 

         I realize the best part of love is the thinnest slice

                                [Is this about cake, too?]

         And it don’t count for much

         But I’m not letting go

         I believe there’s still much to believe in.

 

So lift your eyes if you feel you can

Reach for a star and I’ll show you a plan

I figured it out

What I needed was someone to show me.

 

"Mockup" or mockery?

I re-searched those lyrics. He does not pass on the “plan” he’s shown. I blame Air Supply for keeping me lost in love whenever that feeling finally did occur.

 

And still I listen, then and now. Air Supply 4ever! This is just like me in love. Always loyal. Always the fool. 

 

So, yes, bringing matters to the present, the zits went away, the concept of popularity stayed back in high school (since I had no interest in entering politics) and I got myself far, far away from the Bible Belt and places with more Baptist churches than banks and gas stations combined.

 

I fell in love five times. And, remarkably, each of those times the guy loved me back as much as he could. I can go to a Love Anonymous meeting—I think I just made that up; don’t Google a local chapter—and I can stand up and say, “It’s been almost six months since my last love.” No doubt, there would be knowing nods. Translation: Yes, yes. We’ve heard your story. Not again. PLEASE! 

 

Okay, no story time. I’ll just say not every story has a happily ever after. (Do you hear me, romance writers and readers? WAKE UP!)

 

I can lean into another Air Supply song, their follow-up to “Lost in Love”: “All Out of Love.” Yes, well sequenced. First “in love,” then “out of love.”    

 

I can’t be sure, but I think that’s the way things will stay for me. I’m not being dramatic…though I will be next time I hear “All Out of Love” on the radio, Hitchcock pulling vocal gymnastics again to a crescendo that consists of a four-peat of “What are you thinking of?” Frankly, I’m letting all that go. Whatever my ex is thinking of, it’s certainly not me. 

 

Not in the cards...

I’m settled again, a single man. Five times in love feels like an awesome record for a guy like me. Not as awesome as one time in love that lasts forty years and still ticks on but, with an assist from hindsight, that was never going to happen. I think love has run its course. I’ve spent too much time hoping for it, looking for it, saying I’m not looking for it and hoping then it will come my way just like people say. Mathematically, I’ve longed for love longer than I’ve been in love.

 

Dating sites today are empty shells of what they were. I’ve had a baffling five months of  Grindr and Scruff, apps that are reputed to be more about Right Now than Mr. Right but for me have been about guys who are too afraid to post a picture much less say something.

 

I’m not going to hang out in gay bars. I’ve learned and relearned that I really don’t want drinking to be a cornerstone of any relationship.

 

I’m all out of love in terms of opportunities. I’m okay with that. Part of growing older is coming to terms with some of our dreams and aspirations not coming to fruition in the way we imagined. 

 

I do like my time to myself. I want to focus on some friendships I value. I want to explore more of the world. I want peace of mind. I’ve been muddling with all this quite a bit. Leave it to Air Supply to help me reach a crescendo and then let things fade out. 

 

It all feels right. Time to switch the radio off.

 

 

 

  

I'M A BIG KID NOW

I’m fifty-seven. This week I finally became an adult. 

 

Always was a late bloomer.

 

For the most part, I’ve been acting like someone beyond adolescence for a few decades now, but there was always one realm where I was thirty going on thirteen and, eventually, fifty-seven going on thirteen. Even teen me knows that’s messed up growth.

 

I’m often told I look young for my age[1] but, to be clear, I don’t resemble an adolescent. Those whiskers that sprout when I can’t be bothered shaving are decidedly gray. TikTok is still the sound of an old-fashioned grandfather’s clock. I haven’t had the urge to get drunk just because it’s Friday night since…well, that’s never been an urge on any night or day. In some ways, I was an old soul even when I was a teen.

 

Despite my age, I can still be childish. Sometimes I think it’s a good thing, like when I can’t stop peeking out the window to see if the forecast might come true and snow may fall. (It came this week! I raced outside to play, desperate to jump and spin like the dogs who seemed to think snow was almost as nifty as the chewed-up tennis ball that, sadly, rolled behind the fridge two weeks ago and has yet to be rescued or replaced.) I still think “Rudolph the Red-nosed Reindeer” is the best show in the whole wide world and I wouldn’t hesitate to do a cannonball off the cottage dock if my sister were lying there getting some sun.[2]

 

Ah, family. That’s where the bad side of adolescence can pop up. There’ve been other domains that have induced immaturity, but I’ve been able to walk away from them.

 

The silver lining in never having children—something I always wanted—is that I don’t have an ex whom I have to continue communicating with to discuss and inevitably disagree on parenting issues and, somewhere down the line, meeting later in life for our child’s wedding, posing awkwardly in one of those family shots with the weary photography shouting, “Smile! Look happy! Cheese! Ricotta, Parmigiano Reggiano and all that!” 

With exes, I can choose which ones to maintain a relationship with and which ones to relegate to the category, Things I’m Glad Are in the Past. Yes, that’s you, John, last known to be in Phoenix. You may join Cabbage Patch Kids, the Reagan years and debates over Debbie Gibson versus Tiffany. (Why couldn’t I like both?)[3]

 

Unfortunately, I can’t put my family in the past. I’ve put an international border between us, but the ties remain, however tenuous. I know I’m not the only one who still gets triggered when interacting with parents. I immediately regret my behavior after the conversation. Sometimes I feel it in the moment. Why am I acting so petulant, so juvenile? Why can’t I stop it? 

 

Thirteen again. The fact that this round comes without zits is no consolation.

 

Not being a parent, I don’t fully know the process, but I suspect that, in the moments after a child is born, there are two official documents that are drawn up. Of course, there’s the birth certificate, one that is officially passed on to the child when the parents deem him responsible enough to hold onto it. (I took possession of mine just before I turned thirty. Such a big boy!) I can’t confirm it, but I’m pretty sure there’s a more secretive second paper given to members of Club Parent. I picture it as pearl white card stock with gold lettering, a lifelong permit: 

 

Having successfully participated in Lamaze classes, given birth to a baby and committed to painting the nursery in gender-stereotyped hues, you hereby have full permission to push said baby’s buttons, at will, in perpetuity.

 

Some parents, such as mine, treat this permit with particular reverence. They misread “permission” as “obligation.” It doesn’t show up on any X-ray, but I think I was born with an excess of buttons. The triggers are different from that period in the last century when we all lived under the same roof and I spent most of my time holed up in my room, showing my rebelliousness by cranking up Donna Summer and Air Supply. But there’s always new material.

 

“Going to church might do you some good, you know.”

 

“You have to be nice to me. I’ll be dead soon.”

 

“Texas has COVID totally under control. What’s wrong with Canada?”

 

Almost all triggers are pulled by my mother. That’s because I only talk to my father when the calendar obligates a phone call, mercifully spaced six months apart: Father’s Day and his birthday which happens to be Christmas Eve. 

 

I’m officially declaring myself a full-fledged adult this week after navigating the birthday call with exemplary social skills. It’s been a few days and I can’t recall a single thing we said to each other but therein lies the proof. No huffing, no puffing, no churlish sigh, no statement or action/reaction akin to a cathartic door slam, followed by me cranking up “Bad Girls.”[4]

 

We talked just like two people who really don’t know each other all that well, like I might talk to Wally in accounting while queued for the eggnog bowl at the office Christmas party. (Tipsy Tracey is a tad shaky with the ladle.) The subjects were safe—that, in and of itself, is a sign of wisdom that comes with age—the tone unwaveringly cordial.

 

My mother is who she is. My father is who he is. I’ve stopped trying to point out how they’re wrong…about politics, about the fact that depression doesn’t go away by smiling more, about how tricky it really is to get my unpublished manuscript on Oprah’s Book Club list. (Wouldn’t it be nice if my mother were actually correct on that last point!) 

 

My mother will continue to land a half dozen once-maddening, naïve and/or condescending “You should…” or “Why don’t you just…” pokes in every conversation and my father may still drop a shockingly intolerant bomb or two, but part of getting past my teens is that I don’t have to work so hard at establishing my independent identity (i.e., “I’m nothing like you!”) when I’m baited. I’ve realized that, by now, it goes without saying. I am who I am, too.

 

So there it is. Goodbye to thirteen. Now I’ll stick with pretending I’m fifty-seven going on thirty-five. If I cover the mirrors, I can still find a make-believe world in adulthood.

    

---

[1] It’s happening so much less though. I’m holding onto a comment from a doctor I met with in the fall who was startled by my age and said I looked twenty years younger. Yes! But then, we were the same age and, well, I thought he looked twenty years older. Of course, I kept my mouth shut. I didn’t want him telling me I was going to die…and not on account of some underlying disease.

[2] She wouldn’t appreciate it—which would be the whole point—but skin cancer runs in the family. I would tell her it was an act of kindness.

[3] Force me to choose and it’s Debbie. She had me at “Only in My Dreams” and hasn’t been able to shake my love since. Aw, Tiffany…what Could’ve Been.

[4] Donna’s “beep beep” is way more satisfying than The Roadrunner’s, right?

THE PRIDE INSIDE

I’ve missed this year’s Pride parades. I am sure Toronto’s World Pride was incredible. (New and improved, no doubt. What will they call it next? Intergalactic Pride?) I was in Vancouver during L.A. Pride and I’ll be in L.A. during Vancouver’s upcoming big event. It’s okay. I don’t even have anything rainbow in my wardrobe.

Sorry.

But on Tuesday I went to an honorary Pride event: Lady Gaga in concert at L.A.’s Staple Center. As we were doing shots on Saturday night, Benny casually said, “You should go with us to Gaga.” My reflex response was “No thanks.” But that’s not what came out. Apparently I say yes when I’m liquored up. (It was only my first shot. Apparently I’m that easy.)

I do like Lady Gaga. I’m just not gaga for Gaga. My concert days are pretty much over. And I’ve never been one to pick the COOL shows. It’s probably because I got off to a bad start. Air Supply was my first concert. And I LOVED it! My last two concerts were this and this. So, really, it is amazing they let me through security on Tuesday night. Sometimes a short interview is a better screen than a metal detector.

Let’s back up though. The spectacle of a Gaga show begins hours before. As I sat through a dozen lights waiting to turn left to valet park at Benny’s building right across from the Staples Center, I got to enjoy the festive pedestrians who were, incidentally, ignoring those silly lights that we motorists tried to navigate through. Heck, even the naturally courteous ones were obstructing the flow of traffic. When you aren’t accustomed to walking more than three feet in platform high heels, traversing a wide street can be an arduous journey.

From what I could tell, not one of the high heeled and/or tutu-clad folks was in drag, but most of them had tagalong boys averaging nineteen years of age. In this safe pre-concert environment, the boys weren’t trying to pass as straight. Their mannerisms were freely effeminate, their smiles beaming. This is me! No filters! I was probably the same when I was their age as I excitedly rushed to get inside for the Barry Manilow concert. (See? I was never cool.)

We missed most of the pre-show people watching. (The shots bar is also conveniently within walking distance of Benny’s place.) We knew from the previous night’s concert that our Lady would not appear until around 10 p.m. The ultimate fashion diva must, of course, put her own spin on fashionably late. I’m guessing there are last-minute wig crises every night. In the fifteen minutes we had to wait, the gays were easy to spot, almost as common as teen girls wearing outfits their fathers could not have seen them in before they left the house. Lots of skin. Even fleshy rolls. Express yourself! Oh, wait. That comes my generation’s gay music icon. Glow sticks and glam predominated. (I donned a pink shirt. And purple shoes. That’s as Proud as I get.)

To be honest, the concert underwhelmed me. I know I’m not supposed to say that. Surely, it is a sin for a gay man to be meh-meh for Gaga. The choreography seemed haphazard—find your spot and wiggle in an outrageous costume. Too many of the songs were from Artpop, Gaga’s latest album which lacks the hits and the sizzle of The Fame or even Born This Way. (I get it. This is, after all, artRAVE: The ARTPOP Ball tour, but I think at least one of the first seven songs should have been a hit and “LoveGame” and “You and I” should not have been left off the set list.)

How I feel about the concert is irrelevant. It was never aimed at an old guy who can still contentedly pass an afternoon with “Lost in Love” playing in his head.

There were highlights. “Bad Romance” proved to be the most fun song of the night. And the most Prideful moment was, of course, “Born This Way.” Lady Gaga slowed the tune down and sang it at the piano with no dancers on stage. It showcased her strong vocals and made the lyrics more poignant.

Whether life's disabilities
Left you outcast, bullied, or teased
Rejoice and love yourself today
'cause baby you were born this way.

No matter gay, straight, or bi,
Lesbian, transgendered life,
I'm on the right track baby,
I was born to survive.   

I’ll admit my eyes welled up. Here was a pop icon providing validation to the nineteen-year-old boys, many who are still working through their identity in these more enlightened times. She is their Madonna whose words reflect acceptance and embolden them to go forward.

Go, Gaga! Go, boys! “Applause” is in order after all. As we paraded out, how could I not feel the Pride?

FOR A ONE-NIGHT STAND

Sometimes a weekend in L.A. feels like a whirlwind. Especially when popping in from British Columbia, Canada. But I’d committed to this night back in August. When the proposal came, I hesitated. “I don’t usually do this sort of thing.” Still, this was my chance to see a tall, dark , handsome man and, well, L.A. seemed convenient. I’d have traveled to Australia.

It was a very special occasion—his birthday. We’d agreed to meet at an intimate setting, just him, me and 4,500 other people. I learned long ago that I’d have to share Hugh Jackman.

My friend Sue bought the tickets and invited me. Her husband wasn’t too keen on going. “You’ll appreciate him more,” she said. Indeed.

In the lobby of the Dolby Theater, Sue contemplated buying a t-shirt with Hugh’s comely face silkscreened white against the black background. As we’re both 49, I didn’t think she was serious. Wasn’t that more of a teen fangirl purchase? Ah, perhaps I’m still feeling the burn from the day of mocking I endured twenty-two years ago when I proudly/stupidly sported my Air Supply t-shirt. It was yet another high school popularity violation. The curse of “All Out of Love” stays with me to this day.

“Should I buy it?” she asked. Oh, that irresistible face. Who says no to Hugh? I focused on the words instead. Emblazoned across the shirt: “ONE NIGHT ONLY”. I opined that sales would be greater if it said ONE-NIGHT STAND.

“True,” Sue said. But she joined the line of other middle-aged and senior women, eager to take Hugh to bed every night. During the wait, Sue showed pictures on her iPhone from when she’d sat in the third row in New York to see Hugh’s Back on Broadway act a year ago. Women crowded in to see Hugh in a gold getup, part of a tribute to Peter Allen. Hugh can get away with wearing anything. (Even, I’d venture to say, an old Air Supply t-shirt.)

We all had Wolverine claws for the after-the-show auction,

benefitting MPTF (the Motion Picture Television Fund).

Isn't he lovely?

Although she’s married, Sue out-stalks me. I chose the bar line instead of the merchandise line. I’m the type who needs a little something to relax before the promise of a single night of something special.

Waiting for the concert to start, I glanced around. Women outnumbered men three to one. There were some devoted husbands, dragged along as some sort of deal to get uninterrupted Sunday football time flopped in a recliner in front of an oversized television, but my most of the many triggered my gaydar. They drifted in two-by-two. Apparently the singles still prefer Saturday nights watching go-go boys in West Hollywood.

Like Bette Midler, Hugh is an honorary gay. I’m not a Wolverine devotee—too much facial hair obscuring his beautiful features—but the guy’s a doll in rom-coms and when doing a little song and dance. “He’s got a twinkle,” Sue said during intermission. I figure when you are that good looking, that talented and that successful, you can be a confident charmer.

Hugh & his wife on his 45th birthday. She's the

envy of so many middle-aged women...and me!

I have a lot of stereotypically gay tendencies, but Hugh out-gays me. Early in the show, he joked that his action hero movie producers were fretting over this kind of night and segued into a vocal of “I won’t dance” which surrendered to “Gotta dance”.  He sang show tunes in a medley of songs from “Singin’ in the Rain” and “Guys and Dolls”. He honored Peter Allen. He even did a little can-can.

Whenever Hugh began to shake, Sue grabbed her binoculars to allow more focused ogling. I used them sparingly. To be honest, his dazzling smile, his gorgeous face and his pronounced pecs completely distracted me from assessing his talent. I am no better than the go-go boy gazers. I suspect Hugh was good, not excellent, but I left smiling. Surveying the crowd, so did everyone else. (Yes, you tag-along hubbies, start your countdown to game time!)

The trip home will feel longer. A one-nighter can leave a guy groggy. But, Dear Hugh, we’ll always have Los Angeles. I have no regrets.