It’s a Blizzard, Baby

I must give thanks and praise for the weather.

The snow that began falling today has accumulated on the ground under blizzardous conditions that have been wonderful to watch. The white mass is piling high on the roof outside my window and I hear it's going to continue. I couldn't be happier. About the weather. I plan on playing in Prospect Park tomorrow. Like the kid inside who never died. Jill and I went and saw Avenue Q last night. It was enjoyable, even though we sat among a crowd of New Jersey high school students. This is what one gets when one buys tickets in the mezzanine.

Remember, the same trauma befell me when I saw Fiddler on the Roof last summer. One of my top few favorite songs was "Everyone's a Little Bit Racist." This puppet show for adults was interesting in that it approached such issues as racism, living in the now and the search for love and truth with a comic bent.

Looking at these issues through the words of puppets can have an interesting effect, because it allows viewers to get some distance -- for a time -- and appreciate the musicality of it while letting the messages slowly filter in. It's like maybe having a conversation with someone via instant message.

You're protected by the safety distance and the benefit of space. By not having the person in front of you, honesty is perhaps a little more accessible. I've had one or two flirtatious IM sessions in my day. How can anyone associate with a puppet? No one can, so to cover topics like this, looking at love and the loss of it, for instance, with puppets works. And if you let them, perhaps the puppets can tell you a little something through the distance they allow you to take. Or maybe not. It was a good show. I love musicals. I need to see more.After the show, I waited outside for Jill and found out that one of my favorite actors, Liev Schreiber, is going to appear in Glengarry Glen Ross in April. I'll be at that. Finally, a bit of a New York existence. Theatregoing. I'm seeing a play next week, too. I found a discount ticket for Gem of the Ocean, an August Wilson play. Ok, enough of the theatre for now. Or, speaking of the theatre, I spoke to Erin today. She was in Australia last week. She's becoming a bit of a globetrotter. She met another one of my favorite actors, Matt McGrath. Apparently they exchanged e-mail addresses. And apparently she told him about my love for him. Now if only I can get her to meet Nicole Kidman. I'm still working on getting through Tropic of Capricorn. I'm having a hard time concentrating while sitting on the train. I want to hurry and get through it so I can move onto something else, or just concentrate on my own writing. I'm grateful for not having read the Tropics first. I never would have continued with Miller otherwise. Now I can appreciate the ease with which he writes and writes and writes seemingly nonsensical things, getting lost behind the layers he creates with philosophical critiques of not-so-improbable scenarios. Yes. I can appreciate that now. But it's still is all about The Rosy Crucifixion. He blended everything I just mentioned within a narrative where his honesty emerged. It was more raw, yet more refined. In my opinion. I also picked up Female Masculinity again. I'm always for theoretical analyses of the way of the world. I think it's because it gives me answers, which make me feel better. I'm finding out that my graduate work was pretty much based on nothing new. I didn't set out at the Graduate Faculty to change the world or anything, so that doesn't surprise me. And in a way knowing that I said things in my papers and thesis that I could have backed up with theory makes me feel good. But I also think that, even though the ideas aren't new, my autobiographical approach to them in a graduate school setting was better than re-hashing old stuff. Basically, my essay "Race Trader" and my thesis said the same thing: I don't care anymore about what the outside thinks of my race and ethnicity or of my gender presentation. I don't fit the hegemonic mold that we all contribute to. But that's my deal and I obviously had something to say about it, because I spent a lot of time writing about it. I plan on my book being a final attempt at putting it all together. Obviously the race and gender stuff will be in there. As will the sexuality stuff, which seems to be driving me now. Trying to settle in a comfortable space within that has proven difficult, as well. The butch/femme situation I have found myself in continues to fascinate me. An identity -- butch -- has been placed on me and I feel the pressure to live up to the markers of this identity. To fit the stereotype. Picture it: I walk -- or, rather swagger (a word I've heard used to describe the walk of a 'butch') into a bar and step up to its tender. I buy a drink, but not a girlie drink. Oh no. A beer or something. I walk through the bar and spot a lady and walk (swagger) up to her with a confident air. "Hey, baby." Puke. I can't continue. This isn't always the way; it's simply a gross generalization. But when a woman who I have walked up to after spending 20 minutes mustering up the confidence to do so says to me, "You're cute....but you already knew that, didn't you?" what am I supposed to do with that? Next time I'll say, hell yeah, just to give her what she wants. There won't be a next time. No girls for a while. My favorite, though, has always been a friend of mine I went to school with who, every once in a while when he saw me would look at me and say, "how you doin'?" a la Joey from "Friends" now "Joey." Whatever, dude. Perhaps reading Female Masculinity is a way for me to get answers, or even affirmation (we all need a little sometime) for the way I choose to present myself. But isn't that the rub? Isn't it when we stop looking for affirmation we become whole? Or are we, can we, ever feel truly whole? Not if we're looking for it from the outside. When I put the sexuality together with literature on mixed-race and gender identity....I'm exhausted. Identity's a bitch. So write I will continue to try and do. It's coming out very slowly. But it's coming out. A process just like therapy. And we all know how much I love that process. So enough of this. I'm going to go write an e-mail to Yani who arrived in Iraq a little bit ago to defend our country. Actually, she's there to support the troops in a therapy setting. She definitely managed to therapize me a bit before she left. She's quite good. May my oldest friend come back soon, goddammit.