Close the Book

Friday morning, I was leaving the gym and I saw the headlines on the TV scrolling across the bottom of the screen, BREAKING NEWS, all caps of course, that gay marriage had been declared a right. I fist pumped the air and walked to work so fucking happy, on the verge of tears, so full of joy, and pretty useless all day at work because all I could do was think about the news and read stories about it.

And that was the kickoff to Pride weekend, the best kick-off an American probably could have hoped for, your government for the first time in your lifetime forcefully declaring that your love, your affection, is just as valid, just as important, just as necessary to recognize as that of heterosexuals. Truly fucking huge news that I could never have even imagined coming to pass when I was a kid.

Friday night, I hung out with some friends in my apartment before eventually finding our way to Metropolitan. A really attractive man came up to me, said hello. We chatted, exchanged numbers. Hopefully, I’ll hang out with him this week. Hopefully, I won’t let my boy craziness get the best of me, as it usually does, but as with everything, we’ll see.

Saturday was spent mostly in bed due to being hungover and the rain gave me the perfect excuse to stay in and not go out.

Yesterday was a repeat of Prides past. A drunk brunch with friends, watching the parade on Christopher Street, drinking nutcrackers, getting emotional, getting too messy, getting too wasted, not getting up to the Jane Hotel rooftop for the third year, bar hopping, and then finding myself in bed wasted and exhausted around 10pm.

I love the parade day so much. I love being on the streets full of gays everywhere, running into friends in states of undress, everyone so happy, everyone so cute and free looking, unburdened by the stuff they otherwise carry around with them. I want to repeat this again and again forever.

34

Thirty-four started off with a broken shower curtain rod.

Friday morning, I woke up and I was a new age. I was 34. I took a shower, my first shower at this new age. I knocked the shower rod off the wall stepping out of the shower. I was aware, as I am with just about everything in life, of the symbolism, of how this would read in a story, that there is some significance in this moment, perhaps a foreshadowing of what this new age might bring.

I tried putting the rod back up, but couldn't get it to stay put. I was working up a sweat, in our already hot bathroom on what was already at that early morning hour a really hot day. I pulled the tension rod further apart, too far. It wouldn't collapse. I kept pulling it, thinking a spring would activate, that the thing would collapse again. Instead I pulled the rod apart into two pieces. I was wrestling with it, trying to shove the one back into the other, working up a sweat, invoking the Gods, cursing this rod to the fires of Hell. It was one of those mornings. It was the start of being 34 years old.

After a crazy day at work, I stopped by Home Depot, bought a new rod and installed it when I got home, a nicer rod.

Things fall, things break. New things take their place, sometimes better things.

With the new rod installed, with a satisfactory ending written to this ominous story of the start of my year, I started getting wasted, partying. Friday night, I hung out at Nik's house with other friends. We went to Macri Park and then to Metropolitan. As the bar was about to close, I left, walked home. I bought some trail mix and talked to Lucky at the bodega.

Then I had a very romantic morning with myself. I got stoned to counteract other drugs that were keeping me awake. I started blasting Portishead's Dummy in the bathroom and took an hour long shower. At some point, I lay down on the floor of my tub as the shower of hot water fell upon me. Beth Gibbons voice took me to places. I was feeling everything in that moment, stoned and emotional and energetic and sad and happy and horny. I jerked off in the shower, enjoying the spray of water hitting me, curving my back upwards, letting the stream of hot water hit my asshole.

I slept most of Saturday and once I woke up, I started the partying all over again. I went to Nik's house where he threw a joint birthday party for his sister and me. I talked to friends. I blew out some candles. I lit some cigarettes. I left around five, after sitting in his living room on his couch, looking at Grindr while quietly listening to Carole King's Tapestry played on a record player. Walking home, I started chatting with a guy on Grindr. I walked to his house, instead of my own. We fucked in the middle room of his railroad apartment as the sun started to brighten up more and more of the airshaft outside his window. He came. I came. I left.

The sun was well up, the first bits of life starting to populate the street, people opening up bagel shops, coffee stores. Life goes on. The earth keeps circling around the sun. I keep getting older. The sun rises every morning. Things keep going. Metal storefront shutters keep getting rolled up each day. I am so happy to be here on this planet and to be alive. I don't know what that necessarily means, being alive, because to answer that I'd have to be able to also know then what not being alive meant. It sometimes scares me, not knowing what, if anything, follows this. I want to hug people tight in these moments, to feel connected. I go out at night and party and share in the company of other human beings, trying to make the most of this thing we share, this time here together on this spinning rock in space.

Ariana Grande - "Love Me Harder"

Alka Seltzer and Ariana Grande are getting me through the day right now. There are burn marks on my back, places my hands failed to reach as I applied sunscreen. The sun is shining outside these office windows and I’m blasting “Love Me Harder. It’s helping me imagine I’m still there, still somewhere on Fire Island. The breakup isn’t as abrupt with this song playing, with me jamming around to it at my desk. I am dancing around, surrounded by attractive men, sun on my skin.

It was a blur of days, of vodka drinks in Solo cups, of pot brownies, of being stoned and goofy and happy. I got home last night absolutely wrecked and slept so hard, sleep something that doesn’t come easy in a beach house with thirteen gay men in it who love to party all day, night, and morning. A couple hours of sleep after the gorgeous sun rises before fearing that fun and sun were being slept through, dragging one’s self to the beach, talking about boys, about dick, about life, about whatever it is people talk about in such a beautiful and gay place.

The walks, as always, were my favorite, those stumbles back and forth through the Meat Rack, crossing between the Grove and the Pines, seeking out fun here or there, enjoying the process of seeking, of walking through those dark woods, dunes around me, sound of ocean waves crashing, stars, so many fucking stars.

I just want to sit on a pier with you and look out over water and let my feet dangle and watch the sunset as we drink cocktails and contemplate what any of it means. Instead, I am back in Manhattan. Turn the song up louder, close your eyes. Click your heels together three times, Dorothy. Return whenever you want.

William Carlos Williams - "Danse Russe"

I sat with Diego at our kitchen table last evening, drinking wine, talking about various things on our minds. I, of course, was talking about this boy I like, this feeling of having a crush, of liking a person. I talked about how much I wanted to text him, to ask him to grab a drink with me. Diego told me not to act crazy.

What he meant, because he’s seen me do this too many times, was not to appear too thirsty, too hungry, too whatever other adjective connotating not playing it cool you can think of. I told him not too worry, that this boy was different, that I didn’t need to play it cool with this person. Diego’s reply: I’ve heard that before.

And so I texted him, saying we should hang out soon. He responded in the vague affirmative. And then somehow in the following text, in the stretch of just a few short lines, I must have said something wrong, gave myself way, displayed my thirstiness too explicitly, ruined the game. I asked him if he was free tomorrow (now, today).

There was no response. There has been no response.

I got stoned. I got ready for bed. I got naked and looked at myself in my mirror. I looked good. I love the feeling of looking at your body and recognizing that it looks good. There is some vanity in that, obviously. There is also a work ethic in that. I have been going to the gym pretty heavily lately and it makes me happy. I like the feeling of control, of making myself look the way I want to look. It’s such a thrilling feeling to know how much power we have if we listen to our bodies, if we approach the care of them with as much effort as we spend caring for our social media personalities. 

And so this guy may or may not ever happen. I may never kiss him. I may never get to live out all these cute fantasies I had already played in my mind of us dating. And that is perfectly okay. What happens happens, what doesn’t doesn’t. Life goes on. I’ll go to the gym, get stoned, and admire my body in full-length mirrors. “Who shall say I am not the happy genius of my household?”

Janet Jackson - "Never Letchu Go"

I stood on a roof, red Solo cup in one hand, vodka soda in it, cigarette in the other hand. It was sometime after midnight. A party was going on behind me. I stood against the edge of this roof in Bed-Stuy and looked toward Manhattan. The lights of the Williamsburg Bridge had already been turned off. The Brooklyn Bridge was still lit up. I was in love with the darkness and the light punctuating it, a dream demarcated with dots of light.

Few things make me so happy as looking out over Brooklyn rooftops, imagining the lives in them, the lives that were in them. They form such a nice little vista, rising and falling, but only so much, all mostly in line with each other, silver painted roofs, brick exteriors, windows lit, windows unlit.

I thought about things, but in that wasted way one is likely to engage in when smoking a cigarette and looking out at the skyline of New York City. It was a mess of feelings, a mush of feelings, the thought about how much I love this city, how much I love being here, and how afraid I am of losing that feeling. Thoughts of death crept in here for some reason.

I rejoined the party.

I met a boy at the party. I actually met two. Lately, I’m not used to having successful flirtations with guys, but it was happening on that roof. Up in the clouds, magic happens. After flirting with this one cute architect for a long time, this other guy plopped down next to us, and I started talking to him. He was cute and weird and nice and had some energy about him that I wanted to wrestle him, where it seemed like that would probably be okay. He punched my stomach, my shoulders. I was smitten. We sat on the roof and talked about whatever people talk about while on a roof and dance music blasts not too far away.

The night went on. I left without getting his info. The night carried me to other parties, some goth thing, some Metro thing, and a friend’s house where we had sweaty sex until the sun was up.

I woke up in my bed yesterday sometime in the mid-afternoon. The rain started coming down shortly thereafter. I always appreciate a rainy day when I’m hungover and don’t want to leave my house. It makes me feel less guilty, makes the choice to stay in and do nothing that much easier.

The cute boy from the party messaged me back on Facebook. I had found him on there after leaving the party, hunting through the names of the people who were invited to it on Facebook until I found this guy. He gave me his number. We texted back and forth, made vague plans to hang out soon. He was watching The Sound of Music and eating Dominos. Basically, he seems perfect and needless to say I have a huge crush on him.