The Americanization of Richard

By this point, The Park is like an old friend. I haven’t seen it in a while, but coming back was like I never left. It was the place, downstairs by the fire, that Romaine and I first met a decade ago and talked for hours, assured by the end that we could do a radio show together. Years later, near the front bar, I had spotted Erik Rhodes, sheepish after he had been discovered, no doubt feeling guilty after blowing off the show. The subterranean coat check is where I first spotted Daniel, the hot Brit who would make frequent appearances in my writing but to whom I have still never spoken. And upstairs months later, it was Conor McGill who finally helped solve the mystery of his identity, throwing everyone else under the old age bus for not knowing it themselves.

This afternoon it was a different Brit who was the subject of conversation and center of attention. Fresh meat has a tendency to do that, especially when the beef is firm and tender and the winter nights long and lonely. Parked at The Park, sealing in my own juices under the intense heat lamp that Brian Babst called home, I quietly roasted in a wool sweater cleverly disguising long underwear below. Not that anyone there would ever know the difference. I take winter very seriously, but not much else.

In this particular moment, Brian was elsewhere and I was explaining to his friend Omar Torres about my blog and how I write about my nights out on the town and the not-so-ordinary people I meet there. "My fifteen seconds of fame!" he declared excitedly, and that is how long it will be because the subject of tonight's essay is not Omar, or Brian, or any of the other ghosts of bars past. It is Richard, newly delivered to New York City from London.

Omar and Brian enjoy their fifteen seconds of fame while it lasts.

"What a terrible idea!" I told Richard when I heard of his recent arrival. He smiled a winsome grin. "No one has said that to me yet." I didn't mean the city. I meant the weather. January is the worst month in New York, if you don’t count August and about six or seven others. "I wanted to move here now," he explained, "So I had time to get settled and by the time summer rolls around, I’ll be ready." He is a smart cookie, that Richard. Also he has big arms and a good job, so I predict smooth sailing, even now that he is firmly planted on dry land.

Without prompting or request, I gave Richard some of my most valuable advice for living in the city. It started with a story from when I first arrived in 2001. Also known as the year he turned twelve. Oh? Did I not mention that he was born in the 80s? "In November 1989. Slipped in under the wire!" Being exactly twenty years older than he was, I felt it was my obligation, in a strictly paternal way, to tell him everything I knew about the city.

I told about losing my good leather coat on the divine Robbie Hammond's bed at a fabulous party he threw. My coat was exchanged for an inferior leather coat someone else had brought and given how ill-fitting the leftover one was, I don't think it was an honest mistake. I frantically tore Robbie’s bedroom apart for a coat I knew in my heart was gone, a coat that wasn't even mine in the first place, and haven't been invited back since. My bad manners aside, Brian confirmed my advice to always have a couple of cute but cheap coats you won’t mind losing along the way.

"Don't lose your accent" was another sage piece of advice I gave him. "You'll see all sorts of people on TV who came here decades ago and they never lose that accent. It is the secret to their success. And Americans worship class. We think anyone with a British accent is classy. Don’t lose it." Richard insisted he had no plans to lose it but is worried about it slipping on its own as fags became cigarettes and queues turned into lines. "My grandmother doesn't want me to sound like an American." Unfortunately, as I learned from my incomprehensible Scottish friend Jim Hepburn whose mother chided him for talking like an American newscaster, back home they only hear what is gone and we only hear whatever is left.

I have a lot of nerve giving advice. This is the first gay social event I have been to in the city in months. No wonder I persist with perfection as Roy Cohn's definition of a homosexual from Angels In America: Someone who knows no one and who no one knows. I was a host for the event today but my name was misspelled, where you could find it. Ben Roussel, in a crazy fabulous fur hat, his shirt tight like Saran Wrap, fruitlessly toured the bar, never able to accurately determine which VIP table was mine. This culminated in an awkward encounter at table seven where I insisted Brian and Richard could get a drink only to be rebuffed by some queens who had no business being there either.

Aside from the event organizer (the ever handsome and tall Zachary Barnett) and the assorted characters I have mentioned (as well as Ben Dixon and another Ben that I do not know but have seen so many times, I almost feel like we were roommates once), the only other person I knew at the event was someone I met once several years ago at Brian Gianelli's going away party.

"That's Ryan Hahn," I said, gesturing in his direction. "I only met him once but we are friends on Facebook." Knowing my reluctance to digitally befriend anyone, this is me really saying something. But Brian was not impressed. "Are you pointing? In a bar?" His line delivery would have made the Dowager Countess proud as he slipped away from me, drenched in shame. As I told Richard when we met, I am a social dead end. He is wise to stick with Brian Babst who today proved once again to be someone who knows everyone and who everyone knows and who knows not to point at people in public. 

Some man tries to welcome Richard while Ben, never my roommate, looks on warily.

I hope Richard enjoys being in America and more importantly, being in New York. Today Ryan reminded me of the advice I gave to him the first time I met him. "Live in LA in your 20's when you are young and cute and can live well on not much money, but move to New York in your 30's where you can be interesting and afford to live there like a human being." But Richard is starting with New York and I suspect will skip LA altogether, his IKEA shopping spree aside. His quick success will enable him to be young and cute and interesting and afford to live here like a human being all at the same time. 

And that, my friends, is a design for living worth following. 

Guy Society

There is never anything I want to do more on a Friday night after the show than go home. But my world has been shattered since the death of James last week and it has created a certain fever pitch of impetuosity on my part. I thought about the last time I saw him, sweating like a whore in church at XL a few months ago. And maybe it was the magical thinking that if I just went out to every bar in town, eventually I would see his hulking frame lumbering through the space like an elephant moving slowly through the jungle, a catastrophe of casual destruction in his wake.  Like the months after 9/11 when I would gaze down Seventh Avenue at Times Square hoping to catch a glimpse of the twin towers, I think I will forever be looking over my shoulder with a sense of maybe.

In my grief, I sent a flurry of messages to my local friends that I had been remiss in seeing these past few weeks. I guess the arrival of spring had made me anxious to wring every second of delight out of my house that I can and my friendships, long on nightlife support, finally faded away. Ryan White and I planned to get together this week and then never did, but MattKugelman and I shared a delightful late meal at Vinyl on Monday. My friend Erik and I made plans to venture down to The Park on Thursday but fearing the zit on my nose would get worse, I pawned him off to a Friday party in SoHo.

Over Easy

I think it might be the end of Bowery Bar as we know it.

It is not exactly with the heaviest of hearts that I report the long threatened demise of NYC’s most durable club night. For years, I have visited (though not thoroughly enjoyed) my regular Tuesday nights at the famed watering hole. I went there again tonight, the first real night of spring, for what I expected would be the usual gay fanfare. But it had all the charm of the Bates Motel after they moved the highway. They kept lighting the lights but I don’t think anyone is coming anymore.

Classic doorman Derek was positioned outside the entrance but the usual long line of long-legged gays never materialized. Not only did I see him letting in women, a Tuesday night rarity, but he was welcoming them with an enthusiastic smile and at one point, the slightest of bows. The scales of power had definitely tipped. Inside, the attendant gays dripped with the usual unnecessary attitude but it was even more unnecessary than usual in the half capacity crowd. The staff aggressively hustled people away from lingering near the exits but maybe they were just trying to discourage them from leaving.

Adam was waiting for me when I arrived, patiently lurking just inside near the hostess stand. He looks as handsome as ever, and was a little hungry. There wasn’t really anyone there yet, so we got a small table and ordered some food. Near us, a banquette with a wealthy homo stationed inside it swarmed with firm young men in tight new clothes like it was some notorious gay beehive. That was to be expected. But elsewhere the bloom was off the rose and the bees were not buzzing with their usual enthusiasm.

Corey Johnson circled our table three times like a tired dog looking for a place to lay down. He must have found it because we never saw him again. After dinner, we walked around a bit and then ended up at the back bar where we each ordered a drink. Adam and I wandered out to the patio and set up camp near the wall watching the gays pass us by.

“The last time I stood in this part of the bar,” Adam told me, “[A former porn star] suddenly turned and said, ‘I wish someone would just pound my ass right now.’” A startling announcement to be sure even from a porn star, but perhaps it was more startling that none of the men standing around when he said it took him up on the offer. But those were the glory days of Beige, when hot porn stars were just standing around demanding that you have sex with them. Now I am pretty sure they would say that just to have an excuse to leave.

I suppose it was bound to happen. We thought it was all going to come to an end in 2001 but then Britney and Justin showed up and suddenly it all came roaring back in the days following 9/11 when everyone in the city yearned for a return to the comfortable normalcy of the 90s. And in past years, I have tripped over actors and singers and models galore as I snaked my way through the pit. Just four days ago, The Park had porn star Erik Rhodes and fashion designer Marc Jacobs and actor Alan Cumming, which is the kind of star sightings I would have expected at Bowery Bar. But the most notable guy I saw all night was the cream cheesy hunk I spied by the basement coat check line at The Park last week. Hardly something to write home about, though he did look as attractive as ever. And by ever, I mean, since Thursday.

Matt Kugelman had been enthusiastic about joining me tonight, but he and his friend Constantino ended up swinging through G first and arriving much later at B-Bar. Matt was buzzed when he finally got there and I don’t just mean his hair. I had trouble hearing but there was something about margaritas and a party. In retrospect, I probably didn’t need to hear the story to surmise exactly what happened. When it comes to the gays, you don’t exactly have to be Jessica Fletcher to put all the pieces together.

While we were standing there, Bobby popped up out of nowhere. I haven’t seen him in a while. Initially I thought it was at the fancy pride party in the sky I had so much trouble writing about, but he seemed to think it was more recently. Anyway, it was nice to see him, even if it wasn’t for very long. He and his friend, whose name I once again didn’t hear or remember, left almost as soon as they arrived. And even the sudden appearance of Keo Nozari wasn’t enough to keep me there much longer.

“I think Bianca is coming.” Matt said encouragingly, looking up from his phone but that was my cue to go. “I have to leave. You know how I live to miss Bianca’s show.” But in this case, it had nothing to do with Bianca. I could tell Adam was ready to escape the place like it was on fire and I too couldn’t wait to run out of there myself. Perhaps the pulse quickened after I left, but I will never know. As far as I am concerned, it is no longer the beating heart of midweek Manhattan gay life. It's time to call it. Time of death: Tuesday, April 6, 2010.

The Fox Trot

The lighted spire of the Empire State Building is robin’s egg blue. The yellow daffodils are in bloom parading up and down the sidewalks on every Manhattan avenue. The trees along 34th street are exploding with white blossoms as if punctuated with clumps of snowy cotton balls. There are many wonderful times of year in the city, but I think none is more spectacular than that first real flush of spring, when everywhere you turn there is a welcome splash of color and freshness. When a city known more for its grey hue and jet black fashion sheds its heavy winter coat of snowy blah and reveals a kaleidoscope of bright colors that wipe away the months of misery the first of the year can bring. Time once again to shake out my own mothballs and return to the beating pulse of New York nightlife. Spring is here, I hear.

Just in time for the high season of club activity, Josh Wood has launched a new weekly party at The Park called Fox Thursdays. Matty promoted a party in the same space last year and it was always filled with all the gays of our lives. So I naturally assumed since I heard Matty was there the last two Thursdays that he would be there again. The fact that my text messages beforehand alerting him to my anticipated appearance went unheeded worried me not in the least. No matter. There were plenty of other fun and fabulous people to keep me going.

As soon as I walked in the door, I was pleasantly surprised to run into Jordan, who I hadn’t seen since I did a mercy run down to a birthday party at Pieces and returned the gloves he had left in the studio during an interview. I was so surprised to see him that I didn’t hear the names of any of his friends. Naturally once that happened and we had been talking for a half an hour, I couldn’t very well go and ask them again. I mean, I suppose I could, but I probably would have just offended them and then still not remembered their names anyway. I’m just like that.

We lingered in the front bar for a bit and then ventured into the main floor back bar. The Park is a large space and like the water-tight compartments on the Titanic, as one space fills up, it spills over into the next. The whole thing is ready to sink under its own weight when the massive crowd pours upstairs to the patio party space there, and within an hour of my arriving, it was so crowded there, you were literally drowning in a sea of hot gay men. This is not necessarily a complaint, mind you.

Newly gay Erik joined us there with his friend Jon from college. Since Erik is new to being gay, I knew it would be virtually impossible for him to find me in such a gigantic space, so I went back to the front bar to find him. By the time we three made our way back into the beating heart of The Park, I had lost Jordan and his friends in the crowd. For the rest of the evening, we continued to pass each other, like two ships in the night, but never spoke again. I didn’t even get to say good-bye.

Chatting upstairs by the bar, we bumped into my fashionable friend Sam, who was very happy I was there. “I never see you anymore.” Sam told me, "Thank God for Facebook so I at least can keep up with what you are doing.” Apparently both of us took much of the winter off from going out and like that famous groundhog finally poked our heads out to see who might shadow us. Sam was busy taking pictures of some of the gays in the bar who had the nerve to be wearing trucker hats. “Is it 2002 already?” I asked innocently.

We all decided to wander around with our drinks to see who else was there and in the back of the upstairs patio, I ran into Henry and Dan. Tonight for the first time I noticed something I should have realized quite some time ago: that Henry has a fondness for bowties and Dan, like me, likes polo shirts. I now realize that I have noticed them dressed like that on more than one occasion and yet never put it together like it was a thing. Their humpy friend Adam was also there and did not remember meeting me at Chris’ birthday party last week at The Boiler Room. Fair is fair, I didn’t remember his name. He was one of the guys who went to college with one of the other guys, in this case I think Henry. In any event, the important part of the encounter was that Henry was sniffing Adam quite intensely.

“He smells really, really good!” Henry’s boyfriend Dan didn’t even blink he was so unfazed by Henry sniffing Adam’s head like a bloodhound. I will admit, curiosity got the better of me and I smelled him myself. He did in fact smell delicious, a wonderfully soapy fresh clean smell. But I think Henry was in some kind of a gregarious mood because as I was leaving he informed me he was going to hug me until I felt uncomfortable. While he did hug me for an excessively long period of time, I think Henry is just too marvelous to ever grow uncomfortable or even tired of hugging, even under the watchful if passive gaze of his boyfriend.

Down at the basement-level coat check, waiting in the long line to get my backpack, a group of attractive fit thirty-something guys came down the stairs to carouse in the ancient bathroom. One of them, in a white printed t-shirt and poured on jeans that left nothing to the imagination waited outside next to me for all of his also hot friends to finish up inside. He was so beautiful, it was really something. And clearly the best looking of his crew. Without a doubt, the most beautiful man I had seen since the hot guy working the Mr. Softee truck up on Broadway and 50th street. The one who smiled when he saw my giddy charge across the street to get my vanilla cone in my short trot from the radio studio to the subway down to The Park tonight.

“I saw you from across the street,” he smiled a winning smile, leaning out the service window on his impressive party arms. “I had a feeling you were coming here.”

“This is the best thing about spring,” I told him, “When the weather turns and Mr. Softee arrives on the corner.”

He smiled even wider. “Aw thanks. That’s nice to hear.”

I wish I could have gotten the hot guy next to coat check to smile like that but after a quick glance back and forth he suddenly became very interested in his cell phone. The body and face were perfect as if sculpted from velvety rich cream cheese, even if the whole package was up against its printed expiration date. While still so very, very good-looking, he was definitely about to turn that corner to older gay guy. I thought to myself as I grabbed my backpack and headed up the stairs to the ground floor how difficult it will be for him to get old, to lose all that firmness and beauty that has carried him through so many Fire Island summers and to where? What was his final destination to be? After many a Fire Island summer, dies the gay swan.

Now normally this is the point where I could bring the whole evening full circle making some kind of statement about the bloom of spring and things fading almost before they begin to blossom. Or, about how the cream cheese is still edible even if it is a bit dry and crusty on the edges. But I don’t even have time to form the thoughts in my head before I see a familiar hulking figure looming at the top of the stairs.

“You mother fucker!” I yell, my horrid voice echoing out through the bar as I spy notorious porn hunk Erik Rhodes waiting for me on the landing. He looks suddenly sheepish like a child caught ditching school.

“Uh oh. Was I supposed to do the show and I flaked on you?” He looks a little panic-stricken. “I am suddenly having flashbacks about that.”

Erik Rhodes has been MIA for weeks now. He was supposed to do the show and then we never heard from him again. And then his phone stopped working. He hadn’t updated his blog in months. I suppose somewhere in the back of my mind I just assumed he was finally dead. Moving to Staten Island is like faking your own death, but after a while, people will just take it as the real thing.

Turns out that Erik’s boyfriend replaced his phone on him (without asking or telling) which is why he had a new number and didn’t have my number anymore. Moments before arriving at The Park, Erik had just gotten into some kind of verbal argument with an overweight woman at Gray’s Papaya, whom he constantly referred to as “Precious.”

“She even told me she was pregnant. Like I give a shit.”

Despite his instance that he had really calmed down, and to be fair, he did seem more relaxed and normal than I had seen him in a while, he was clearly riled up by a variety of outside forces. “There’s that Alan Cumming. Didn’t he put out a cologne called ‘Cumming.’ That’s disgusting.” This from the man who has told such brain blanching tales on our show gay men have complained that they crossed a line. But, on the good side, he was very happy with his new career behind the camera directing at Falcon. “I love it. I tell the models when they look like shit. They don’t like that very much but I don’t care.” He hasn’t lost an inch of his massive muscle mass or brutish honesty so while I have no doubt the models don’t like it when he says they are in an unflattering position, I doubt any of them challenge him.

It was nice to see Erik again, even if he ended up making me miss the train I had intended to take home. That kind of detour was worth it. He always makes me laugh and if the three hugs good-bye are any indication, he missed me too. Spring is full of wonderful surprises and you never know what fox you might find on any given Thursday at The Park.

Hat People

At the R/W subway station near the Flatiron Building on 23rd street, the walls are decorated with tiles representing famous hats of famous people. There’s P.T. Barnum and far below his hat, the hat of General Tom Thumb. There are colorful tile hats for philosophers and actors, artists and dancers. Isadora Duncan’s hat is there, even though she is probably now more famous for her scarf. I love the walls of tile hats inside the subway station and I wonder if it is too soon for Aretha Franklin’s now famous Inauguration bow hat to join the ranks. We all wear different hats at different times and it was never more evident to me than it was this week as I saw two notable friends wearing decidedly different hats.

On Tuesday night after the show I headed downtown to Paris Commune, where I had such a nice time a few months back. It was back to the Rouge Room in the basement where my beautiful friend Ronnie Kroell was having a release party of sorts for his latest venture. Ronnie is well known from his constantly nearly naked turn on Make Me A Supermodel last year and since then we have become good friends. Now in the receding shadow of fashion week he is launching a new (and I suppose simultaneous) career as a singer. Ronnie is a sweet and wonderful guy and I am sure he can do anything he puts his mind and talents to. Singing may not have been the next logical step for him, especially after all of his political stumping this fall, but in this economy, in the immortal words of Kang and Kodis contemplating a series of Old Navy ads, “work is work.”

When I arrived, I immediately recognized Perry from the show, even though I had never met him. He had a ski cap on his head and a rumpled plaid shirt and he was so thin, TV thin. Just the way I would have imagined him. The Rouge Room is not large but it was crowded, so it took me a moment to find Ronnie in the melee. He was standing with Supermodel judge Tyson Beckford, whom I have seen on TV and in print many, many times. I have always thought he was extremely attractive but in person he has an otherworldly beauty that is nothing short of insane. Who looks like that? No one. Tyson. That’s it. Looking at him, it is impossible to imagine another career for him. He was designed by the hand of God to model. If he had been born 500 years ago, Michelangelo would have chiseled him in stone and then wept at his own inability to fully capture his essence for the ages. Fortunately for us, in our time we have Ralph Lauren ad slicks to commit him to eternity.

Ronnie has such a warmth about him that hugging him always feels like greeting finally a long lost and much loved relative. His firm low brow, stony chin and pouty lips remind me (when pulled down in gravity) of the face of the Statue of Liberty. I have not heard his music, but it doesn’t matter. I am his biggest champion. I hate how busy he has been that we haven’t had any real time to catch up and hang out. As we embraced in the Rouge Room, he reminded me of the last time we saw each other, too long ago. He asked when he was coming back up to my house. “Anytime!” I assured him as I squeezed his arm and rested my head on his shoulder, my home and heart wide open to him always.

Two nights later, the same drill, with me dashing out after the show and heading downtown on the R train, this time to Aspen, a bar in the grey shadow of the Flatiron Building. There is a Thursday party there called Jack which one of the weary patrons explained to me while I was waiting in a booth in back. “The theme was lumberjacks. Big guys in plaid shirts. But it’s less bear now than it used to be. I don’t know why.” Usually I get a “don’t like” vibe from slick gay men in bars but this guy went straight to “don’t care” and after briefly engaging after my question, returned to ignoring and imagining better people sitting near him. While not the bear stop it used to be, the bar was still packed, jammed with eager twenty-somethings buzzing around inside the latest hive.

I dropped by to check in on Erik Rhodes who has been like a magician’s rabbit of late. His blog postings have been sporadic at best and my phone calls and emails had gone for weeks unreturned. He passed a birthday completely in silence and I suspected that his rollercoaster dating life was as much to blame for his absence as the additional candle on his cake. Then last week he finally made a new post on his blog prompting me to send him a txt message: “Done pouting yet?” Two hours later, two simple words from his road back to reality: “I guess.”

Erik is now bartending at Jack @ Aspen, so even though I knew we wouldn’t have a lot of time to talk, at least I would see him. But he was the first to see me. While texting him to find out where he was, he suddenly appeared in the crowd and rushed over to hug me. It was great to see him again, looking good and all in one piece. “I was so worried about you. I almost went to your apartment to check up on you.” I told him when we finally connected in the back of the bar. He looked the part but I could see that he was struggling. I don’t know that bartending is the future for him, but he sure is giving it the old college try. The problem though, as I explained to Ken Hunt who was also hanging out at Aspen tonight, is that Erik bartending is a little bit like getting stuck behind the old lady at the supermarket. The customer wants their moment. In the case of the old lady, it may be her only meaningful human interaction all day (“The grandkids never call. My son doesn’t visit.”). For the gays, they want a photo or to bask in the glow of Erik’s massive arms and rippling torso. And all he wants to do is just pour them a fucking drink and make a life for himself while he still can. But the gays each want to wrench as much as they can out of their vodka cranberry experience with him and seconds later the line is a mile long and no one has a drink in their hands. It’s not Erik’s fault either. He is a God among men. It just impedes his ability to function among the mortals, especially when they won’t get out of the way.

I have had a lot of jobs in my life and some of them I loved and some I hated. Some I was really good at but most of them were all wrong for me. I like where I am now, writing and talking on the radio. These are good occupations for me. I get to express myself creatively but I don’t have to labor too hard. Perfect for a lazy narcissist like me. Sometimes it takes a while to find the right place for yourself. It took me 15 years of trial and error to get it right. That’s a long time. Maybe Ronnie will be a big music star, dancing around on stage with his shirt open to thousands of screaming and adoring fans. And maybe Erik will develop the acumen for being one hell of a bottle jockey. Perhaps these are the hats that will someday adorn the walls of the 23rd street subway station. Or perhaps they will be as temporary as a paper crown at Burger King.

Personally I have never been much of a hat person myself.

Last Night On Earth

I live in two worlds. In one of them, I am an erstwhile homeowner, less handy than I think I am, toiling away at an ever growing stack of chores nestled in a quiet picture postcard version of suburbia. In the other world, I swirl in the heights of Manhattan gay social circles, hobnobbing with the sexiest and most famous members of the modern homo set. It would be an exaggeration to say that I have any real comfort in either one, but they both shares dueling sides of my personality. One assumes the quiet side will win out in the end, but in the meantime, the rowdy crowd is putting up a game fight.

I spent Saturday lifting sixty pound bags of gravel and sand, Ethel Merman blaring the opening lines of “Hostess with the Mostest” permanently looping through my head. I am building a patio in my backyard after watching a two minute video on About.com that made it look surprisingly easy. It isn’t hard, per se, but laying 108 tiles evenly and accurately is a duty I don’t have the constitutional aptitude for. I had hoped that roommate would help me out, but he threw his shoulder out and that is only half of his excuse. I think he is tired of my endless folly of half-finished home projects and it amuses him to see me struggle in a perpetual episode of I Love Lucy during the season they lived in Connecticut. If only Tallulah Bankhead was my neighbor! She wouldn’t be any help either, but at least she would be hilarious.

In the late afternoon, I ditched the soil and toil and hopped on a train down to Manhattan. I agreed to arrange a meeting between Ronnie, late of Make Me A Supermodel, and my friend Matthew Kelleher, arguably the most connected gay man in New York City, which frankly means the most connected gay man in the world. For some reason, Matty was in a sensitive mood on Saturday and when I would say compliments like that, he took it to mean I was implying he was a slut. It’s not OurChart.com, Matt! Matty was waiting for me outside the David Barton Gym where Ronnie was working out before our dinner. Matt and I debated the pros and cons of exercising at the most notorious gym in a most notorious neighborhood; while a parade of just stunning men stumbled in and out of the building.

While waiting, Erik Rhodes and former boyfriend Danny Dias walked down the street toward us. I had earlier sent Erik a text message inviting him to dinner, but he was already eating when he got it. They had just been working out themselves beforehand and joined our discussion about the perils of David Barton. They waited around wanting to meet Ronnie, but he was taking his sweet time and they ended up moving on to whatever else they were doing before Danny headed down to the Village to bartend. Finally Ronnie emerged and the three of us took off down the street looking for a dinner place. While we walked, Matt explained this day was the only day each year where the sunset could be seen directly down Manhattan cross streets and it was a perfect sunset for it too, casting a magical mood over the city as the light of the day dimmed across 23rd Street.

After walking down 8th Avenue through a sea of Matty devotees and Ronnie watchers, we settled into a cozy dinner at a French place that opened onto the street. Dinner was charming and Ronnie and Matty got along great. Ronnie actually seemed to enjoy us telling all the dusty old stories about how we know each other and the outrageous antics we got into in the intervening years. After dinner and looking for a place to cocktail, we eventually ended up on the patio of the Maritime Hotel. It was a warm night and the patio, upbeat with happy straight patrons and dotted with Chinese lanterns, ended up being the perfect nightcap to our low-key evening.

Ben Harvey joined us, along with the ever elusive Ryan, and then later, Hottie Zach dropped by. I tried to get Roommate to come since he was in the city too, but he begged off and headed home. It was too bad because it was finally an evening he would have enjoyed. Our tiny café table with six chairs jammed around it was a beehive of cheerful gay laughter and witty banter. It was just heaven for me. Shiny, happy people. Matty was wrecked about not having an iPhone, having accidentally dropped his into the sink at his gym the day before the new ones went on sale and crushing lines wound around the block day and night. Saturday was day two of the melee and day three without a phone with no hope of getting one in the foreseeable future. He was jonesing like Courtney Love and Amy Winehouse going cold turkey together on a dare. But otherwise he was having a good time.

The Maritime was magic but nothing is forever. We headed out with Ben Harvey and Ryan opting to head to the East Village to the bar that Danny Dias was working. “Tell Danny you know us!” we urged them with the hope of scoring a free drink by proxy. Ronnie pulled me, Matty and Zach off to someone’s apartment. The apartment was in the heart of Chelsea, across from ELMO, and no doubt an outrageous fortune despite its postage stamp qualities. The party quickly moved to the roof, which was spectacular. The four of us threw ourselves on the mercy of a giant outdoor canopy bed, like Stevie Nicks in an old Fleetwood Mac video. More drunken laughter ensued until once again, I made my hasty departure back to my other world.

I love fabulous rooftop parties in Manhattan, and pretty reality show contestants, and cocktails on hotel patios, but for me, it is like going to an amusement park. The rides and food are fun, but I couldn’t do it every day. I need quiet and simplicity. I need to feel the earth in my hands and the sun on my face, and the sense of accomplishment that can only come from building something solid. Connecting Matty to Ronnie and Ronnie to Zach is easy for me. It’s a great skill I have, and there is satisfaction there. But it is as satisfying as a funnel cake and a rollercoaster. A thrill, but if I did it every day, it would lose its appeal, the wonderment of it. So back I go to laying tiles. To gravel and sand. To reality, my other home.

I Am A Camera

I bring my camera out with me on nights on the town like this because I always intend to take photos to better commemorate the evening. After talking to Gary today about his lost camera and the contents of our first fun night together, I am a little sad that my blog and my own memories are all we have left of it. It helps that I was spending tonight with two of the most photogenic and photographed friends I have.

Shaun McCarron, along with his boyfriend Paul, is a model, most recently featured on the Janice Dickinson Modeling Agency. I think the show is a fine diversion thanks to its ample mixture of hunky horseflesh and outlandishly phony drama. It isn’t going to win a Peabody Award anytime soon but it’s always good for a late night zip through on TiVo, scanning from underwear photo shoot to brief moments of mild tension teased and slo-mo played ad nauseum. It really fills the time.

After being on the show Friday and Monday, I told Erik Rhodes that even though we don’t like the same food, go to the same places or have any friends in common, we really should hang out more. He heartily agreed and we decided to go to Bowery Bar tonight, and drag Shaun along with us. So I slipped my camera into the pocket of my cargo shorts and headed downtown. I wore a cute shirt from Old Navy that cost me $6 when I bought it in Utah back in January. It is the perfect thing to wear to a place like BBar, I thought as I passed the French Connection store around the corner, because I am guaranteed to be the only gay there in it. True enough, while someone at the bar was wearing my favorite Club Monaco shirt, I was the only one there in Old Navy.

There was an insane line outside. So long that if I wasn’t meeting several people at the bar, I would have turned and walked away. This is Roommate’s biggest pet peeve with me. He doesn’t understand the point of having a national radio show if it can’t get me to the front of lines at trendy places. But I relish my anonymity in the city and part of me thinks that if I don’t start pressing doormen for favors, I can still hold onto that feeling, even as the phone numbers of the callers creep closer and closer to home. My friend Dan who agreed to meet me out was the first to arrive and he had the same reaction to the line I had. “Don’t worry,” I assured him. “As soon as Erik Rhodes gets here, we won’t be in this line any longer.” Sure as shooting, Erik arrived and hurriedly whisked us to the minor mob of impatient gays in tight t-shirts waiting at the main door.

“This is where all the fags who think they deserve to be inside already stand and wait.” His dismissive attitude of the pretentious boys at the door made me love him even more. Going to a gay bar with Erik Rhodes is like going to the prom with the captain of the football team, and where he thinks the whole high school thing is one big joke. It’s twice the delicious. Naturally, we were swept into the bar faster than you can say tank top weather.

I was glad to be out of the line. Not just because it is humiliating to stand in a long line outside of a virtually empty bar. But also because I was in the line for all of one minute before the homos behind me started the worst conversation I ever had to hear with the opening line, “How was Fire?” The kid meant Fire Island, but after I told occasional Fire Island share veteran Dan that story we both agreed that no one calls Fire Island “Fire.” In one word, they managed to take something that was already obscenely obnoxious and shoot it off into a whole new orbit. I don’t exaggerate when I say they should be stoned to death in the streets.

As much as we trash “the scene” at Bowery Bar, the guys who go there, fueled by the patented blend of drugs, liquor, desperation and sardine-like proximity that has kept it a downtown staple for more than a decade, are surprisingly chatty and friendly. Most gay bars in New York, no one wants to talk to anyone, with the exception of happy hour at Therapy which is so spontaneously kissy at times that it constantly threatens to make mono Manhattan’s most common communicable disease (second only to rudeness to tourists). On my first trip outside to rescue Shaun from the long line, a guy tapped me on the shoulder and told me I had a nice body. I stared at him blankly, asked him where it was, and then kept going. Later a guy walked up to me and said, “Someone put a roofie in my drink. Can you believe it? Come see me later. I’ll be over here.” I am certain I would not get this reaction if I went to Bowery Bar often. It is only because I make an annual pilgrimage that I am greeted as fresh meat.

The same cannot be said for Erik. He could go to that bar every single night and still be a hot property. First he ran into his friend Phil, who threw a birthday party for him two years ago. Phil is a photography student and a “prodigy” according to Erik. I was tempted to do that thing where you pretend like you don’t know someone is a famous photographer and ask them to take a picture of you and your friend in front of something. My camera was in my pocket and I did want a picture of me and Erik since there isn’t one that I can recall, but I got shy and thought better of it. Even Shaun ran into people he knew at the bar. So did Dan and later so did I when the DJ Keo Nozari swept in with his ultra low key cool vibe and sweet smile.

The place was also awash in reality show people. Erik Rhodes of course made a famous splash on My Life On The D List last year when Kathy Griffin ever so patiently stripped him of nine layers of clothing at the GayVN Awards. Shaun was on last season of Janice Dickinson, his ass so delightfully cupped into tiny underwear like two ripe peaches wrapped up in a very expensive napkin. Keo ran into his friend Ronnie who had been one of the contestants on Manhunt, the Bravo male model series (not to be confused, as Keo initially was when I asked him if Ronnie was from Manhunt, with the dirty hook up website). I even saw Project Runway reject Milan sitting at a table, not looking rejected so much as tired and in need of one of those five minute face lifts they are always advertising on late night TV.

I suppose it is too bad that I only took one photo all night. Waiting for the train in Times Square to go down to the bar, I snapped a photo of some funny graffiti scribbled on an ad that I will put in my ongoing New York photo project that I not-so-ironically call “Advertorial.” So this will have to be the only record of the event. The sight of Erik Rhodes putting his head on my shoulder so sweetly, the bags under Milan’s eyes, and the Long Island gay Guido poser who tried to blend in between Shaun and Erik who were oblivious to his presence will live on only in my mind. Maybe Christopher Isherwood was on to something. We are our own cameras, viewing life, shutters open, through our own lenses and filters, and recording. But I am thinking, about the antics we see from our single perspectives, and knowing that we view only what we want to see.

Icon Nicht Anders

I really like Erik Rhodes. I think he is a decidedly misunderstood figure in the world of gay porn. To me, he has the most clear-eyed view of any performer I know. His blog is like Martin Luther posting his grievances on the door of the Catholic Church. Some people think it is all an act, which leaves me incredulous. It’s like the fag-haters who think people choose to be gay because they like being alienated from their families and fired for no reason.

He guest hosted on the show tonight while Romaine is in Denver, visiting her family and emceeing PrideFest. As usual he was filled with truly amazing stories from deep inside the porn world, starting with rimming a straight guy in Las Vegas on camera who thought cleaning his ass meant spritzing it with Polo Sport to closing out the show with a shocking revelation about accidentally shitting himself inside his apartment. His candor is at once alive and heartbreaking and altogether real. A refreshing change from the familiar false notes the gays are always trying to hit in their quest to be accepted and adored.

After the show, we went to Vinyl for dinner. I have been there a few times and mostly I like it because I am addicted to thai iced tea and it is virtually impossible to find. If they sold a mix at the supermarket, I would drink it by the gallon. Erik was starving, downing four energy drinks during the course of the show, and ready for a juicy steak. Like most gay places, the food is fine but the atmosphere and crowd is what you really come for. There was something weird stuck to my knife and I think our waiter was understudying in Avenue Q around the corner in between popping by our table, but you can pee to Viva Las Vegas in the Elvis-themed bathroom and frankly that always gets my juices flowing.

At dinner, I got a text message from the original Jonathan wondering what I was up to. As it turns out, he was in the restaurant, heard a laugh that sounded like mine (it was mine) and then started to wonder what I was doing tonight. He was dining with some skinny friend of his whose name I forgot the moment I heard it. No matter, he was struggling to the point of exhaustion to act nonchalant at the sight of Erik Rhodes. I almost offered him a chair and a cold compress. They ran off after I promised to call them later to join for a drink.

As anyone who reads his blog knows, Erik has had some relationship trouble of late. This has made me very sad because I knew and really liked his now ex-boyfriend. I thought those crazy kids made a fun couple, but then again, I didn’t have to live with them, so I have no idea what life at home was really like. Great couples are always a mystery to outsiders but lousy couples are easy to dissect. I don’t envy Erik out on the dating scene. His massive Godlike frame is intimidating, made even more hulking in the presence of the lithe gays who swirl their way through the Manhattan cocktail scene. Being a world famous porn star doesn't help either. And even though he hates going to gay bars and being with the gays even more than I do, I managed to coax him into joining me and Jonathan for one drink at Vlada.

The Bolsheviks were revolting in my favorite vodka haunt. For some reason, Erik insisted on walking in behind me, leaving me to shove and fight my way through the crowd. When you are out with Erik, honestly he should be the one bulldozing through the crowd. The gays are far more likely to move out of the way and cower in fear when he plows through. Instead, sharp elbows akimbo, I jabbed my way through the downstairs and then made my way up to the second floor. The stairs were a brief respite before we returned to the crowded fray by the upstairs bar.

Jonathan’s favorite bartender (aka the one who gives him free drinks) was working, much to his delight. He didn’t have the ingredients to make the drink I wanted but he made Jonathan happy so that is all that matters. Jonathan was feeling sensitive all night after he asked me at Vinyl if I liked the new thing he was doing with his hair and before I could stop myself and pretend for a moment I was a human being, I tossed out a terse no. He tugged at his hair self-consciously for the rest of the night and laboriously explained that it was in an awkward in between stage before it could finally become the tussled surfer mess he was going for. After my initial rudeness, I attentively engaged him in a much too lengthy conversation about his hair, hoping he would relax for five seconds and stop thinking about the top of his skull.

As promised, we finished our one drink and headed out of the bar. It was a nice cool summer night and Erik and I walked to Grand Central Station, where I boarded my usual drunk train home and he hailed a taxi back to his apartment. As I always do when I see him, I asked him what his post porn plans are. After all, he is the one who told me that no one should stay in porn too long because “once they have seen your pussy, what else do you have?” His post porn plans seem as limited as his dating prospects. He is so iconic in his porn life it is almost impossible to imagine him in any other context. I looked up at the Chrysler Building from 42nd Street and wondered what it must be like to be an icon. In some ways it must be great to be such a gorgeous shining individual, towering majestically over everyone, though it probably gets pretty lonely up there, shimmering in the night sky.

The GayVN Awards

This summary is not available. Please click here to view the post.

Alive For Now

Well, I passed another birthday and nothing horrible happened. A few years ago, while doing a News Google search on myself around this time, I discovered I was dead. A man with my name in England (there are apparently many) was murdered, but nothing makes you more confident growing older than seeing yourself dead. This year, another Derek Hartley in England didn't die, but he was missing! I have been anxious for weeks hoping I would be found safe and alive, not dead in a ravine somewhere. Then, on Monday, he was found alive, starving, and somewhat mentally ill. Thin and crazy? Sure beats dead!

Originally, I had planned to join some of the gang from work at Six Flags today. And as much as I love a rollercoaster (and using my season pass), it just didn't feel like how I wanted to spend my birthday. Roommate works Sundays now and I shoved off any real birthday celebration plans to next Saturday when I wouldn't have to compete with Halloween. Being born three days before the notorious holiday, my mom has often joked that if I had been born three days later she would have named me Jack O'Lantern. Except I don't think she was kidding.

Last night, Roommate and I hauled our old selves down to Manhattan to see The Kingdom, which wasn't nearly as bad as the miserable box office and tepid reviews would have you believe. It was directed by actor turned director Peter Berg, whom I have had something of a slow burn crush on since Linda Fiorentino grudge fucked him in The Last Seduction. He was also quite frequently naked (especially for a ski movie) in his big break movie Aspen Extreme. If he could spend twenty minutes of that movie stark naked in the snow, I think the CW can find a few minutes for those Supernatural boys to shower off.

After the movie, we decided to take the late drunk train and have a quick drink before we left town. We wandered down to Barracuda, which was packed to the rafters with gays. It wasn't so crowded that Terry Goldman didn't find me. He kissed me and his lips tasted like strawberries, like he was wearing lip gloss made for a nine year old girl. But he tasted good, so who am I to complain? But we immediately decamped from the madness of Barracuda and made our way to the relative quiet of XES, somewhat around the corner.

During the summer, I forced Erik Rhodes and his fabulous boyfriend Danny to meet me there for a quick post-show drink. They live not far away and they thought I was joking at first that there was even a bar at that location since apparently their dog has crapped outside it a thousand times without them noticing it. Once inside, Danny still thought I was joking, but the upscale dankness and casual neighborhood vibe I think won him over. Then again, it was the last time we went to a bar together, so maybe he thinks my taste is permanently suspect.

While at XES, I had my usual Sex And The Beach after first checking my look in the mirror. I spent a few minutes staring at myself in the bathroom mirror, reviewing the merchandise and giving a buyer's assessment of the bill of sale. Not bad I thought, for something that has been in the bargain bin for so long. Mike and I parked on stools, transfixed by the horribleness of a shitty horror movie playing on the flat panel TV over the bar. We decided it was probably The Hills Have Eyes since it was terrible, just terrible, and neither of us had seen it before. The sound was muted so we had the distinct pleasure of reading the dialogue as it scrolled across the various dismembered performers. The screenwriter clearly loved movies, as the internal movie references were seemingly endless, and I wondered why, if he loved movies so much, that he had inflicted this particular piece of garbage on the world.

While wrapping up our drinks, a listener, who had recognized me, came over to wish me a happy birthday. This is extremely rare in NYC and, as has been the case in the past, he was originally from Miami but had recently moved to the area. He was very nice and I will be honest that it did make me feel good, almost like a real celebrity, on my birthday. But the drunk train was calling and we beat a hasty retreat.

Once home, I couldn't fall asleep. It was already several hours into my birthday and I considered just not sleeping at all for the entire 24 hours. I spent a fair amount of time wading through the seemingly endless birthday wishes emailed and posted to MySpace, corresponding with the adorable, argyle-loving Jackenroth, stars on his elbows and in his eyes as he awaits the upcoming season of Project Runway and texting at 4am with an ex-boyfriend actively sorting out his emotions after a break-up earlier in the evening. Then, I decided to watch Mrs. Miniver, which I had DVRed from TCM.

I haven't seen Miniver in 20 years but I had remembered it fondly. I was struck however by what a horrible performance Greer Garson gave in the movie. Her bizarre expression rarely changed and she seemed to be Acting with not just a capital A, but also with lights around it and a brass band. But you have to love MGM at the height of its power. There wasn't a close-up where she didn't look like a million bucks waiting for change. Teresa Wright was terrific and it seems crazy to me now that she could have been in three of the biggest classic movies of all time right in a row (Miniver, Shadow of a Doubt, Pride of the Yankees) and then had very little else to show for her career from then on out. The movie itself was a good story to watch on a birthday and in the midst of a war. An important reminder that life is short and at all turns unexpected, but there is still time in between bombing raids for a flower show or a little romance.

It was well after dawn that I finally threw in the towel and went to sleep. Promptly at 11am, my cell phone started to ring with calls and buzz with text messages. Wisely my mother waiting until 7pm to call. "I didn't wake you, did I?" I barely had the heart to tell her I was just up from a nap. Whatever. It's my birthday.

So what if I puttered around the house, hammering on the keys of the piano trying to learn "I'm Old Fashioned", trying to meet the neighbors by hand-delivering some misdirected mail (they weren't home), and grilling up dinner outside in a parka for likely the last time of the season? No one said you have to celebrate a birthday in only one way. I like being alone. And having the house to myself on a beautiful fall day to wander around in my underwear and eat ice cream was just what the doctor ordered.

Stars Fell On Alabama

Someone's friend, by way of getting to know me, recently approached at some night out and said, "I hear you know every gay celebrity." While it is true that I am a shameless name dropper, especially in my blog, it sort of surprised me. When I reflect on my life, it is always the quiet moments that ring out the loudest for me. In biographies, it is the stories of stars meeting stars at cocktail parties and movie sets and the like that pad the otherwise dull adventures of a life lived. But when I think back on my own life's biography, it is rare that a celebrity encounter or friendship leaps out as a defining moment.

I think about the many overnight trips I took driving at night alone from Los Angeles to Salt Lake City, my car winding through the darkened canyons that make up the narrow Nevada/Arizona/Utah connection, dramatically illuminated by my headlights under a starry night sky. I think about the dead kittens I found in my barn in Michigan, ripped to shreds, and kneeling alone in the yard to bury their tiny parts behind the abandoned chicken coop. I think about riding the rockets in Tomorrowland with my friend Geoff singing "Fly Me To The Moon" at the top of our lungs. But tonight I think about Danny Roddick.

I never really knew Danny. I met him briefly a few times, most memorably earlier this year at the GayVN awards. He sat behind me during the show, making catty gay comments about people that I strained to hear over the noise of the crowd. I don't think he knew I was eavesdropping but I doubt he would have cared.

There was a screening tonight of Brotherhood, his last film for Buckshot Productions, over at Jerry Douglas' perfect New York City apartment. When I called Jerry to RSVP on Friday, he said something about "concerns about exploiting the situation with Danny" but I had no idea what he was referring to and I made a mental note to ask him about it tonight at the party. Before the screening, Jerry said a few words, as a director is wont to do at their screening, and it was then that I learned that Danny Roddick was dead. Moments later, there he was, youthful, smiling and beaming on Jerry's TV, as though nothing had changed.

Tonight I came home and decided to look for some information on what had happened. He was so young and it seemed such a surprise. Drug overdose is the apparent cause, although according to some, it was the porn industry itself that took him to the edge and beyond. I don't work in the porn industry so I only know what I have seen first hand. It's a business, and one in which the performers have a very short shelf life, and I don't mean that in a callous way. Erik Rhodes is right. Once they've seen your pussy (Britney!), what else do you have to show them? Those who have stayed in the industry for decades have done so because for them it is a career, and not a short term ego boost, an infusion of quick cash, or publicity for their escort business. I don't think the porn industry has a drug problem. I think the gay community has a drug problem. And having the kind of job where you can make a grand in a single day is just the kind of work drug addicts love: short hours, quick money and plenty of time off.

It would be impossible for me to know every gay celebrity, or even most of them. Not really know them anyway. After all, how much do we really know about anyone? Even in our tabloid culture, we still know more about Britney's pubic hair than we do what's going through her mind. Danny Roddick's MySpace page lists "Children: Someday" but that someday is never going to come. It's just too late now. Maybe I should have turned around in my seat at the Castro Theater, introduced myself, and gotten to know him better but I always assumed he would be on the radio show on that very same someday and I would have gotten to know him then. Then again, Reichen Lehmkuhl and Jenny Shimizu were both on the show on Friday and even after 40 minutes, I can't honestly say I know the two of them either. I even spent some time with them later in the VIP room at Splash, putting them on the spot to spell each other's difficult last names (they both succeeded with flying colors). But I don't think I understand them any more now than I understand why, among the DVDs and VHS tapes of Madonna videos and camp classics that Splash had a copy of "Schindler's List" on the shelf.

Maybe I will never really know anything or anyone. The late Gene Siskel used to end every celebrity interview he conducted with the same question, "Tell me something you know for certain." The answers would often be something like "I know that I love my children with all my heart." One thing I know for certain: I will never know Danny Roddick.