#hamlet's generic white boy energy was too powerful

[whenyoulosesmallmind]

@impossible-rat-babies tagged me to make some of my ocs in this piccrew! and since i am still dragon age trash, i made my boys in modern setting

morred mahariel (da:o) | hamlet hawke (da2) | arvaari adaar (da:i)

tagging: @mocha-writes @helvetin-venus @darkspawntaxcollectors @whattimewriter @echigo825 and whoever else wants to have a go at it ;)

[wordacrosstime]

Shakespeare and the Goddess of Complete Being

[Shakespeare and the Goddess of Complete Being. Ted Hughes. 1992. Faber & Faber Ltd, London. 504 pages]

I do not think it an accident that Ted Hughes was brave enough to tackle this subject.  An award-winning poet himself, Hughes was husband to the poet Sylvia Plath, and seems equally at home in drama and mythology. Plath’s artistry and suffering must have informed and influenced Hughes, whose book tracing about a dozen Shakespearean works focuses on the tragic hero’s terrible relationship to women. This deeply disturbing and yet mythological theme in these plays, Hughes reduces to a Tragic Equation and compares this Tragic Equation in terms of psychology and even psychobiology, a term new to me. It is interesting that Hughes does not describe his Goddess Of Complete Being as a Supreme Being, but rather more like the Mother Earth, or Mother Nature Herself, or even Plath’s White Goddess, all of which Hughes mentions as examples of female divinity. For Hughes the ultimate truth is bound up not with spirits hovering magically in the forest air, but to be found in the bosom of women. Not that Hughes’s equation is formulated from a woman’s point of view; no, rather from the point of view of the boys who become men, that is warriors, monarchs, poets, and playwrights. Hughes draws our attention to the one thing the tragic heroes have in common in the Shakespearean tragedies, behaviour towards women that is brutish, if not violent. This is a brave thesis, and probably not one that would have been published if proposed by a woman. He calls this theory the Tragic Equation.

The Tragic Equation begins, according to Hughes, when the adolescent who is precariously independent from the Mother Goddess and the paralysing force of her love, as a aavaictime of new and uncontrollable sexual energy searching for union with an unknown female, and in Elizabethan society that female is bound to be fairly unknown. Hughes declares the origin of this Tragic Equation is the severing of the emotional bonds with the mother. This emotional recoil which coincides with the first sexual urgings, he believes results, for the man of leisure and intelligence, in a ‘madness’. He convinced me that this ‘madness’ is substantiated throughout the oeuvre. We cannot deny the fact that the infant male, for many years, is in the powerful kingdom of the female, who has miraculous powers to give birth to a human being, must be affected in his search for his male identity. For Hughes this is an adequate reason to explain distrust and hatred of women that Shakespeare’s tragic heroes experience before their final downfall. So it is a kind of revenge Tragic Equation, where the female ends up banished, abandoned or dead, which brings the hero to his knees.

Hughes begins his thesis with the two poems,Venus and Adonis and The Rape of Lucrece.  Hughes feels that these two poems are the beginning of the tragic hero who features in the rest of Shakespeare’s works. These heroes, according to Hughes, are tortured by their blind lust, either unconsciously or consciously, and are really seeking a kind of divine love. He makes a good case for his thesis as he convincingly traces the love affairs from the bestial in Venus and Adonis, right through to The Tempest. Interestingly, the process begins with the lust of a woman, the Goddess Venus, who is blamed for lust in general. This lust is transferred, as it must be for the Tragic Equation, to the rapist Taquin. In the male, bestial lust quickly becomes violent. I think Hughes convincingly traces, through the works, the fate of love from its source in confused bestiality to the pursuit of a woman who ideally embodies divine love.

I think contemporary psychology theory agrees with him, and that at the mercy the natural surging of his hormones, the young man is in an unstable emotion state and can reject the object of his desire who is always a young virtuous woman. This is the woman who our tragic hero desperately wants, but can easily hate. Hughes quotes a number of tragic heroes as victims of this ‘irrational madness’, the foremost being Hamlet, and the most irrational being Leontes in A Winter’s Tale, but there are many instances of the hero abusing his most loved woman. Hughes thinks this is purely a psychobiological trait, mythologized through the centuries. He does not relate it to being an English subject in the reign of a powerful queen.

For all lovers of Shakespeare Hughes’s book is delightful reading except for the number of folkloric references which are confusing. Hughes desire is clear; to trace a path from bestial to divine love in the entire Shakespearean oeuvre and he begins this journey with the boar as symbolic of male desire. The book cover is a drawing of a boar. In Hughes’s Tragic Equation, the hero who chases the chaste woman, invariably comes to a sad end himself, and I find this supported by at least ten of the plays in the Shakespearean oeuvre. Hughes also insists that the plays portray a penitent hero who can transcend his madness and trade in his lust in order to reach a more spiritual love. Unfortunately, while this may be neat and psychologically sound, Hughes then goes on to confuse the boar with the Queen of Hell. This particular myth, or effigy I found difficult to accept since there’s only one character who could rightly be called that, Lady Macbeth. What is easier to accept is the raw youth at the mercy of his hormones in All’s Well That Ends Well, evolving into the wise old man, Prospero, at the end of the cycle who cares for his daughter so lovingly.

While agreeing in general with Hughes’s thesis, that the plays represent a growth towards spirituality, I think Hughes relies on psychology more than sociology or political impetus. Sociologically there is a very potent reason for the overbearing mother and her frustrated sexuality, namely, the oppression of women in the sixteenth century, especially aristocratic and landed-gentry women. They were inevitably bartered away and invariably ended up with an arranged and loveless marriage. Thus the problem of imposed ‘madness’ but Hughes does not credit this new interest in the relationship between men and women with the powerful rulers who are women. This very emphasis and criticism of male behaviour must have been inspired by the very powerful female monarchs of that era. There was the first ever queen of England, Queen Mary, a hated first English Queen, Mary Queen of Scots, who claimed to be queen of Scotland, England and France, and of course the omnipotent Elizabeth the First. Subjected to such powerful women must have been the source of much internal and external conflict. All three women must have ushered in a new sensibility, not necessarily in the portrayal of women but in the portrayal of men’s behaviour towards women who, for the first time had political clout. Hughes makes no reference to the possible influence of these monarchs. He also omits to note that these inner conflicts about the opposite sex, however common they are among the commoners and even aristocracy, are never described as the fatal flaw of the reigning monarch, or the  paternal Dukes that pepper the plays. Perhaps Elizabeth would have more than frowned on portraying royalty with this fatal flaw. The most insidious male monarch who subdues a woman is, of course, Richard the Third, who is deliberately being maligned. Prince Hamlet is a great example, of someone who cannot become a monarch after his ‘madness’. The Winter’s Tale proves to be the exception, but that is because he becomes a penitent and is forgiven by the statue of his victim wife. Towards the end of the cycle, King Lear’s aggression is relatively mild against Cordelia, and he too repents.

Hughes does, however, make some historical explanation for the sudden emergence of scholarship of such profound depth and meaning. He credits the conflict between the Papal Church, personified perhaps by the Virgin Mary, and the rapacious Henry VIII. Hughes neglects to mention the protestations of Luther which made the intelligentsia (not the monarchs) question the Divine Right of Kings. These are powerfully conflicting elements which reach right down through every strata of society, and were represented in the person of Elizabeth the First; a rebel female and ‘unnaturally’ a scholar, who used the divine right of kings to rule. Hughes does mention that Queen Elizabeth had a keen interest in what was being dramatised because she was aware of the support she needed and appreciated the theatre as an instrument of propaganda.  She headed an aristocratic class with leisure to reflect on the nature of women, and to believe that it was patriotic to do so. England was finally emerging from the brutality of the Roman Empire although English scholars had no desire to avoid the civilizing influence of Italian thought, language and painting. Dante and Boccaccio were influential. Elizabeth the First spoke Italian fluently and probably read Castiglione’s prescription for the perfect courtier and Machiavelli in the original. Even Mary Queen of Scots had her Florio.

When Hughes drew my attention to the Tragic Equation and even to his theories of psychobiology, it made me realize that the aristocratic, and characters who feature as leaders and celebrities in the plays, were probably always raised in dysfunctional family circumstances. Interestingly, they have this in common with the aristocrats of the day who supported the theatre and followed the Shakespearean oeuvre and argument on behalf of the conflicted tragic heroes. At the mercy of suppressed mothers, they must have felt like tragic heroes themselves.

Hughes does not need to mention the fact that Shakespeare is very popular today, but I think it is pertinent. Violence towards women is still with us and the reason why is still a subject of contention and endless theorizing. Jonathan Fast explores this violence in young males in his two books, Ceremonial Violence, A Psychological Explanation of School Shootings, and Beyond Bullying, Breaking the Cycle of Shame, Bullying and Violence.  Interestingly this shame is not racial, or even competitively nurtured, no, it is learned in the heart of the dysfunctional (to a nth degree) family. Apparently Jeffrey Dahmer’s mother made him eat all the food she cooked, rotten or not. .  Feminists may run from facts like these, by pointing out to the use and abuse of women which is responsible for such dysfunctional families. I agree with this position. Family dysfunction can easily be socially approved, such as in the suppression of women’s sexuality and ambition. I’m sure women’s liberation and the respect women are now acquiring in the public and private sector, will go a long way to reducing the effect of this trauma.

Hughes’s analysis of the tragic hero was long-winded but still left me wanting more, and a little sceptical of his need for formulas and theories. He focuses on the dramatic characters’ violence, rather than their passion for words and joy of life, notably absent from this didactical tome. But I want to thank Hughes for pointing out the ‘scurvy’ males in the Shakespearean oeuvre, and tracing the cycle of plays where the hero evolves towards some veneration, it not worship, of a divine being that is female in nature like the goddesses in The Tempest’s marriage ceremony.

[images copyright to publisher & photographer]

Eliza Wyatt

Words Across Time

17 March 2020

wordsacrosstime

[theuncurrentdispatch]

“How long did it take to grow that mustache?”: Gender identity in Napoleon Dynamite

This summer marks the 15th anniversary of Napoleon Dynamite, a film so unique and divisive that computer scientists now use the term “Napoleon Dynamite problem” to describe the difficulty of predicting an eccentric movie’s likeability. From thrift-shop chic to nerd culture, Napoleon Dynamite lingers in the millennial identity— for proof, check out the comic book sequel coming this September. 2019 feels like the right time to analyze how the movie portrayed gender and sexuality to a generation that has since navigated high school, pushed for LGBT rights, and championed the #MeToo movement. 

 In this essay, I rely on the fraught, stereotypical terms “feminine” and “masculine”. It’s an imperfect schism-- women don’t have a monopoly on emotional sensitivity any more than men hold a lease on courage. But these terms accent how the adolescent Napoleon forges his adult identity through gender performance and subversion of stereotype, and I wanted to exploit those connotations. Subvert gender stereotypes, and all your wildest dreams will come true.

***********

After the opening sequence of hand models presenting food (MTV insisted the casts’ hands were too ugly), Napoleon Dynamite boards a school bus of children. The ages are uncertain, but the age gap is obvious. (It helps that Jon Heder was 27 during filming.) The gap in maturity is less apparent with the film’s first lines. “What are you gonna do today, Napoleon?” “Whatever I feel like I wanna do, gosh!” Then, in the movie’s framing thesis, Napoleon throws a toy wrestler out the window to drag it behind the bus with fishing line, an adolescent boy exercising a cathartic sadism on the image of masculinity.

Napoleon is frozen in a boyish immaturity, and he is crushingly isolated. At school he’s bullied, taunted and laughed at by various incarnations of that plastic wrestler, until he calls his brother Kip to plead for rescue. Kip is just as important to the film’s point as his titular brother, because his quest offers an inversion of Napoleon’s journey. Kip is Neville Longbottom to his brother’s Harry Potter, his quest foundering in delusion while his brother successfully marries his masculine and feminine identities. The Dynamite brothers embark on separate journeys for the film’s central motifs: companionship and, most importantly, adult masculinity. The two grails overlap frequently in the form of various role models and gender performances the brothers engage with.

While Pedro and Deb are vital to Napoleon’s journey to selfhood (and one wonders whether Kip wouldn’t have gone astray if he’d had friends like them), the critical intrusion into the Dynamites’ stasis is Grandma’s removal. Grandma has been the orphan brothers’ anchoring role model, a sexless matriarch providing shelter in a sea of gender performativity and social isolation. The brothers’ first conversation shows the stark contrast of these two worlds as the wounded Napoleon seeks refuge with the school receptionist (herself a Grandma-type haven) to call Kip at home, where he “chats online with babes all day” and revels in the freedom to remotely assume an identity so far from his real-world grasp. When the hypermasculine Uncle Rico replaces Grandma (an unwelcome intrusion in itself), he reveals that she’s been adventuring across dunes with a secret boyfriend. Now lacking Grandma’s ostensible solidarity, the Dynamite brothers begin their quests to find the companionship and adulthood they’d convinced themselves they were successfully living without.

Napoleon latches onto Pedro. The day after Rex Kwon Do’s emasculating karate demonstration, Napoleon echoes the macho-man and asks if Pedro has his back. Pedro’s confused “What?” evokes a rare moment of vulnerability as Napoleon looks off and breathes “Never mind.” To Napoleon, Pedro is an enviable specimen of masculine maturity, possessing bike pegs, confidence with women, and the ability to grow a mustache. When Pedro says he intends to ask Summer Wheatly to the dance, Napoleon attempts to match Pedro’s masculinity by showing off his made-up girlfriend. “I like her bangs,” Pedro says. “Me too,” Napoleon replies, staring at a picture of a stranger.

Kip’s identity is even less stable than his brother’s. Despite being older, Kip is physically and emotionally weaker than Napoleon. Uncle Rico becomes Kip’s first stable companion and masculine role model. Kip, happy to play the toady instead of the victim (voyeuristically watching the steak hit Napoleon rather than receiving Rex’s slap himself), becomes a tool for Rico’s deluded ambition. Rico’s masculinity exudes the usual toxicity: Self-absorption, disrespect for women, a desire to get ahead. His fixation on his life’s masculine peak as a young athlete is particularly telling, revealing both his worship for manhood and his own stunted maturity. In their first one-on-one hangout, Rico and Kip talk about women, and it’s Kip’s turn to try on masculinity as he describes his own incredibly suspect girlfriend. She has a vague, “pretty good-looking face,” as well as “sandy-blonde hair” that Lafawnduh doesn’t have.

Like so many “Magical Black” characters, Lafawnduh is interesting and underdeveloped, entering the story to provide solutions for White characters. In this case, it’s Black identity itself that offers Kip an answer. Just as Rico’s retro style embodies his antiquated vision of manliness, Kip’s transformation reflects the widespread early 2000’s appropriation of Black fashion and music to express White masculinity: Third wave ska bands like Reel Big Fish, clothing trends like pants-sagging, and white rappers like Eminem all brought Black culture into vogue to an extent unseen since the 1950’s.

Meanwhile, backed by the proper companionship and cultivating a respect for the feminine, Napoleon continues to hone in on his adult identity. Napoleon’s companions, largely devoid of the White (or Black-appropriated) masculinity Kip is chasing, are feminine archetypes, compassionate and artistic. The duo serve as surrogate parents for Napoleon, with Deb demonstrating the power of feminine vulnerability and creativity and Pedro teaching Napoleon that a mustachioed, socially confident man can exude femininity. Pedro’s head-shaving provides a key lesson in Napoleon’s education. The replacement wig, provided courtesy of Deb’s pink-draped studio, exposes gender identity as performance, malleable and superficial. “I think this matches your season,” Deb declares. Pedro responds with a soft smile.

The next day brings another lesson as Napoleon offers a bullied student one of Deb’s boondoggles to symbolize Pedro’s protection-- A feminine craft symbolizing a masculine strength. The boondoggle’s promise is quickly called upon, and Pedro’s cousins chase off the bully. Napoleon witnesses the paradox of masculinity, one that CJ Pascoe observes in her theory of “fag discourse”: Though masculinity offers endless ways to dominate and police others, even the manliest identities are never secure. Masculinity is a never-ending performance, a contest that can’t be won. (Uncle Rico learns this lesson as well, and his broken arm, along with his broken masculine delusion, ushers a female energy into his life that the gentler Rico welcomes with Pedro’s soft smile.)

Napoleon’s perception of Rico and the adult manhood he represents continues to sour as the adolescent realizes what misery and delusion the grown man brings in his wake: Clogged toilets, electrocuted groins, and superficial relationships. Rico shames Napoleon for not having a job, and the subsequent chicken-cooping work earns Napoleon a dollar an hour and a Hamlet-level resentment toward his uncle. He courts Summer’s popular friend Trisha, only to find the relationship with her brand of femininity unfulfilling and unsustainable. When Napoleon and Rico finally come to blows in an impasse that can only be described as Oedipal, two important revelations emerge. Napoleon realizes he has reached his tolerance for toxic masculinity, and that that toxicity is, when elbowed, vulnerable to Napoleon’s own masculine strength. Napoleon is no longer willing to lie about wolverines or supermodel girlfriends to survive within masculine discourse-- now he knows he can harness the power of his emotions. (It’s been suggested that the Tree of Knowledge provides Eve not with a magic apple, but with the indelible knowledge that she has the ability to disobey. Does it seem fitting that Napoleon initiates this confrontation by throwing fruit?)

The identity struggles within Napoleon rise up for a final confrontation at the school election. Napoleon’s relationships with his masculine and feminine pillars, Rico and Deb, have been thrown into jeopardy, and Napoleon realizes which character’s energy is most important to him. With proper guidance from his companions, his masculinity has taken the form of a quiet strength that protects others and knowingly performs gender (i.e., the brown suit he takes off a female mannequin), and his femininity carries an emotional intelligence that can’t be acquired from Uncle Rico’s herbal supplements. And once again, Black gender identity arrives to save a White character, but now Black femininity rather than masculinity supplies Napoleon with the tools for victory. D-Qwon’s dance tape gives Napoleon the feminine power of dance as physical expression (contrast this with Kip’s physical outlets of Rex-Kwon-Do and cage fighting), and Lafawnduh herself gives Napoleon the soundtrack he’ll have on hand at the election. (That said, I’m aware that Napoleon’s dance moves are incredibly White.)

Napoleon’s dance, a triumph of femininity over masculinity, performs a vulnerability that brings the previously blank-faced student body to its feet. The students see themselves not in Pedro’s or Summer’s campaign speeches, but in Napoleon’s harrowing self-expression. Napoleon gambles his physical and emotional self on his friend’s behalf, in an act so free and selfless that Deb realizes this person would never fall prey to a “Bust Must+” brand of femininity. But the fact that the audience connects with the dance, the fact that it wins Pedro the election, doesn’t matter. What’s important is that, like Spirited Away’s Chihiro or Russian Doll’s Nadia, Napoleon confronted a final test and produced a correct answer. The prize is an immutable inner truth that will endure any bullying or masculine taunts.

After the climax, with one at the end of his journey and the other hopelessly lost within it, the Dynamite brothers cross paths one last time. (The wedding was a campy, fan-service ending tacked on after MTV’s acquisition, and I don’t consider it canonical.) Kip, in full hip-hop regalia, doesn’t notice his brother as he and Lafawnduh board a bus (in an ending reminiscent of Ghost World). Napoleon watches helplessly from across the street. This scene always makes me sad, partially because we don’t see Kip telling anybody he’s leaving-- it seems like another confused, uncharacteristic move. These brothers, having started the story together in their sexless grandma’s stasis, have ended in completely different worlds, and Napoleon, after painstakingly forging his adult identity, can only watch as his lost brother continues his own quest for meaning.

This article has been published in Entropy Magazine.

[2dudesgethitched]

Spelling Dad from ADD.

  “How do you feel about children?” he asked me on that magical Christmas Eve in 2008. We are at too large of a table for two people on a patio of ribbons, decked halls and twinkle lights. Ooooh, pretty lights sparkle so. We waited for our coffee drinks under trimmed trees, gay apparel donned. The crowd at Aroma Café was heavy with packages, burdens from the shopping that is a draw to the Tujunga Village part of Studio City. I love the idea of a hamlet in the land of hams. I need more irony in my diet. People banged about like cattle down a chute. Calling Temple Grandin.

 My ADD is self-diagnosed and provides me ample amusement; sometimes others get to share in the joy that is my rambling. The stream of consciousness that I surf regularly makes me a fine Improv actor but an ineffective bureaucrat. Years later someone would shout “Squirrel” and I completely understood a cartoon dog’s pov.

 Christ, he just asked me something. Focus, Hubble, focus. If my self-narration annoys feel free to substitute Neil Patrick Harris voice or Sara Jessica Parker’s. My patter might be more palatable. How do I feel about children?

 Michael’s bright blue eyes, red cheeks and pale pallor defined the ‘Richie Cunningham’ description our mutual friend Rob had promised. Ha. Red, white and blue. He’s pretty cute, shivering in his p-coat. The lyrics to “American Boy” popped up. Stifle, silly ADD, stifle. Listen to the cute boy who is saying all the right things. I had arrived early to the date. I had armed myself viewing all the pictures he had posted on his MySpace. He had a butt-load of friends and loved the beach. I knew we had at least that, Tom & Rob as common denominators. He was tall, handsome and quirky. Our previous phone conversation confirmed quirky.

 “Hello, Villa Cosa Nostra, Michael speaking, how may I help you?”

“Is this Michael Vinton?”

“Tis I” Tis I. Tis I? I’m calling a boutique timeshare and got transferred to a Renaissance Faire Restaurant?

“This is Tony Spatafora, Rob Hahn’s friend.” Beat. Beat.

“Oh. Hi..”

“I know you’re at work, is this an okay time to talk?”

“Let me put you on hold for a second? Thanks.” Boom. Gone.

 He is so Googling me now. I think. Or he’s shuttering his work-hag so he can come back to the call a little more centered. I can’t wait to hear what comes back on the line.

 “Heeeeyy, “ a much cooler cat returns. “How ya doing?”

“Fine. “ Eyeroll. Stop Spats, don’t be such an egotistical putz. “Rob Hahn said to give you a call and that we should probably get together.”

“Yeah. He said.” Ice, ice baby. Who sang that, I wondered “So, what’s up….”?

Saints preserve me.

“Listen, I know you’re at work. Why don’t you give me a call when it’s convenient and we can set something up?”

“Cool, man.” Oh, this kid is killing me. Did I mention that my angel is 14 years my junior? Yeah. Apply considerable mockery here, I deserve it.

“I’ll just get your cell, and get back to you.”

“Fine, ” I’m not finished playing with my food, “but let me ask you three things: Dog or cat?”

“Dog.” He’s confident.

“Boston or New York?”

“…New York.” He vacillated.

“And finally, like garlic or love garlic.”

“LOVE garlic.” He wins. I spit game like no other. Who sang that damn song??

“Okay. You may call me back.”

Laughter.

 I thrive on acid tests and omens. I believe The Universe will give you signs when you are falling behind in it’s choreography. You are encouraged to free style only so often. Don’t waste your moment to jump in the abyss. Your pants can only get wet one of two ways when you dance. Go big or go home, I think I’d read that on some ones Friendster. I am so full of myself I should hang Charmin off my belt.

 I had seen him heading to the café from a quaint store in the Village. In fact he had stopped in the window in front of my to check his hair. The afternoon was windy. Norman Rockwell snow falling lightly would have completed the picture. Oh, my. He is a cutie. Those eyes were so blue. I stalked him down the sidewalk praying there would be more preening to mock later to my besty Sue. He walked like a man, firm and grounded while sporting an angel’s face. These omens are good. I couldn’t wait to hear from ‘Tis I’ what made this guy tick.

 Michael turned around in front of Aroma to find me, hot on his heels. He laughed and I gave him the big loving hug I like to share with my nearest and dearest. I wanted to warm his heart on this holiday night before we both had to race back to work. I would learn later that he really welcomed that hug as it was to be his first Christmas away from his wonderful family in Charlotte, NC. He was a little sad and in need of some familiar love. The guy has the big heart of a softie I would learn. Tick tick tick, boom goes the heart.  

 I thought he was shivering. He kept squirming over his shoulder then craning his neck back to me. Does he have a tic? He kept exhaling over his shoulder. I was intrigued; did I step in something while hunting my prey down the mean streets of the San Fernando Valley? He finally calls out the chair dancing he’s doing as being gassy today & also he is from a very gassy family. I got a fuzzy image of the holidays with the family. He was trying to subtly burp. I got that. Cool.

 “How do I feel about children? You mean as a family or laborers in my families sweatshop in New Haven?” More Charmin, senator? Truth was I did want a family. More than anything else I have ever wanted. I wanted to focus all that I am into people who would hopefully, one day, go out and use their powers for good. I have the biological family, the chosen family, the work family, and the Partridge family. I had a lock on “Back-up singers” and caregivers that all had a special place in my heart. I was finally ready at 40 to have a family unit. Children, progeny attendants whatever you want to call them. I was ready to raise.

 I hoped that in raising children, I would raise myself. I had always been a selfish impulsive prick. I could leave disaster in my wake better and brighter then most boobs my age. I’d been there, done that and brought back the t-shirt in two sizes (for my fat + fit days) Glib is an understatement to describe me, Crazed is another. Children would allow me to put all the attention I had put into myself to a positive end. My epic life experiences and families would help lift the children up; it takes a village I have been told.

 I had always seen myself with a large family. That was how we grew up in CT and I wanted to create something similar. Economics and Biology being what it may, it was going to take extra work and love but above all it would take the right mate to accomplish this with. Michael told me he had seen a similar vision but did the typical blanch one does when finding out there might be five more just like me out there in the world. Silly man, he has no idea.

 All of my wonderful family had paired up and reproduced. There are thirteen amazing nephews and nieces with birthdays to remember and events to celebrate. Being as far away as I am in Los Angeles can fray the nerves. The day to day growth of the kids gets away from you when updates aren’t delivered regularly. It is much easier to share around a family dinner table or a get together in state. Time flies and raising kids seemed to occupy and awful lot of it. Notes for later, I would record. I wished for a village that can act locally and think globally I guess.  I have a Village People cd I haven’t played in a while.

 And sometimes it takes a Village Idiot. Burpie and me made nice and I dropped a few more witty pearls of banter. We clicked on many levels. We had both thought we would have been priests, except for that annoying celibacy thing. We loved music. Our families were the most important things in our lives. Our dreams were huge. We wanted to see the world but above all wanted children. Oh, and grandchildren too.

 Well this was going to be tough, being two men and no little lady. We appear to be Biologically Adjacent to speak Angeleno, in the act of conception. There were to be a few extra steps to get our family unit to the amazing holiday card ready cast that my friends had biologically created ad nauseum. We would have to decide about Adoption; Domestic or International? Foster to Adoption; how old the child will we go? Surrogacy; who’s friend to raise a turkey baster to in this above generous gift they were providing? Surrogacy when not related in love or blood; do we find these people on Craigslist, Angie’s List, Facebook? There was to be much to learn but I had a feeling that Michael was the one to make the journey with.

 Real it in Spats, I chanted. Let’s not put the station wagon in front of the horse. If this really was a ‘traditional valued’ gay man I couldn’t rush the situation and would have to let this unfold. Guys like this were few and far between. Chill baby, baby, chill baby baby. Really ADD? Vanilla Ice? I’m hipper than that.

 Actually, I’m not getting any younger as people would tell me and FYI get a move on when they stop telling you this. It might be the Universe giving you a reality check to start listening and fall into line. Tick Tock, Tick Tock goes the biological clock. Wait, what? I was forty but determined. Many great people I knew personally had started their families late in life. I have energy to boot and an inner monologue that wouldn’t shut up. I am going to rock this fatherhood thing into the next stage of my life and hum show tunes for lullabies.

 I held his hand as we walked out of the café. It was in part a thank you for sharing so much of his sweet soul as he had his time on a crazy Christmas Eve. His eyes are illuminating. There was a sense of promise in one so gassy. I saw a fuzzy family unit off in the future, a pin prick of light, each day growing closer and larger. It came into frame and I saw the tall person in the image was wearing a p-coat and an enormous, toothy smile.

 OH, SNAP! It wasn’t Vanilla Ice, it was C & C Music Factory. Mmmmm. Things that make you go Mmm mmm mmm mmm mmm.  I am too old for ‘oh, snap’ I remind myself. Yet I’m not too old to learn. Papa, Dad, Daddy; I like it. I wonder what I’ll be when I grow up.

 Cue the music.