Spent the day with friends, spent the evening with him, spent a lot of time seeing that my life continues to suprise me. Suddenly it’s Christmas and, while I usually get a little lonely every year around this time, I can’t seem to shake the smile off my face. It always suprises me when this happens, and it’s great.

Happy Holidays, winners!

Which came first, the chicken or the egg? Does the investor who owns the resturaunt deserve the praise for starting it up, or should Big Big Love go to he chef who actually cooks the food that makes it a success? or does credit go to the Concierge who builds the hype and lets the masses know about this random new hotspot? No clue, dude, but I sure as hell am reaping the benefits this week. I think every resturaunt, spa, car service, department store, florist, and club I’ve sent people to this year has sent me some kind of insane Holiday Thank You gift… hell, I’m getting shit from places I’ve never even heard of! Hefty giftcards, cash envelopes, all-comped invitations, and more bottles of champagne, liqour, and whiskey than a boy who doesn’t even drink knows what to do with. I swear, I’ve got more booze stocked up than that wino @ Columbus Circle Station.

I’ve been back in New York for over 2 weeks now and I’ve hardly had time to do a damn thing. I haven’t fully unpacked — I’ve charged my cellphone and gone to work a lot, that’s about it. Work is a madhouse lately, all kinds of tensions are everywhere and little mishaps/oversights tend to keep blowing up and getting me into trouble. Maybe my focus is elsewhere at the moment b/c of the holidays, or maybe I just keep having really bad luck. I had a bad dream the other day that I took the fall @ work for a really big fuck-up I had nothing to do with, and they ended up firing me… only it had been set up to fail on purpose so they’d have a valid reason to get rid of me. It’s a weird thought and only a dream, but it makes me a little uneasy @ work lately, especially in light of some new annoying instances. I just kinda keep waiting for the other shoe to drop or something. It’s an awful feeling and I hate being right about this type of thing, so I hope I’m wrong. But you never know.

So I’ve finished watching the first first season of The L Word on Netflix and Jennifer Beals is a braveass woman. Who knew 20 years ago that the little brown-eyed girl from Flashdance would later be fisting women on our TV screens? Lesbians don’t play, God bless them. I had no idea they all migrated to L.A., I guess that means they’re not in Brooklyn anymore? Oh shit, they’re in Texas too — and most of them are my little cousins. Color me baffled when I got home to Texas and found out FOUR of my (teenage) cousins are not only blissfully gay now but also enwrapped in casual lesbian romance. Homo’s were all up in the place and the best part is that I didn’t even know they’d come out… which is great. I can’t wait for when gay folks just start skipping the “coming out process” and just straightup start bringing home their boy/girlfriends like it’s no big deal, and nothing even needs to be said. Hell, it’s already happening in Houston, TX. I have baby lesbians in the family mix, it’s hysterical. What the hell? I love it.

The journey home was a really nice, by the way. I keep thinking about it. I did a whole lotta resting and eating, which is pretty much all you do when you’re in Texas (I smuggled back 15 lbs of chorizo, b/c I’m a pig). I grew up in a very urban area of townhouses (homes that all connect) just off the tollway but I never drove when I was a teenager b/c I commuted to private school way outside of town, so when I go back home I don’t have access to anybody or even really know what to do. Yeah, I spent a lot of time in my room, see? Anyway, this time around I spent a lot of time with my parents, which felt good. I spent the day with them in Galveston, where we used to hangout a lot when I was younger, and the two of them cracked me up all day. We hung out at the old Peanut Butter Factory, which is now a big antiques & malt shop, and my parents bought each other fudge and trinkets and just made me love them all over again. They’re such nerds. We got family portaits done @ Wal-Mart, where I ran into a girl from my senior class. At Wal-Mart. Where we took family portaits. Somebody shoot me in the face.

I strolled through Rockefeller Center the other night afterwork. I had a lot of shopping bags with me and was all bundled up. Was playing with my new digicam, kept clicking stupid pictures of pretty things… I felt like a tourist. It was fun.

Seems like there’s a hundred things I wanted to write about, my mind is always spitting out random bits that I wanna post up on here but I always end up falling out of the mode to share any of it. I’ll be better about updating this website in the New Year, I think. It’ll be fun again. Right now I’m just trying to get myself together and regroup, it’s amazing how hard it is to regain your grip after you’ve let go of shit. Christmas is this weekend and I’ll be @ work, which is fine. I haven’t really immersed myself in the holiday hype this year, partly just b/c I already got my family time in this year, and also b/c it’s been a long December and there’s reason to believe maybe this year will be better than the last (thank you, Counting Crows for burning that lyric into my head forever)… although I doubt much will top the “place” I was in last year around this time. So it’s really good I’ve got Mo. We’ll relax and make it a great holiday up in here. I’ll open the presents I got myself and he’ll shred the wrapping paper. Fun for all.

Hark! I spotted him @ 54th Street and was floored by how gorgeous he was. Embracing my inner stalker, I spent the next 25 minutes following him down midtown, jamming my way through the masses, beholding the beauty and snapping pictures when he wasn’t looking. Thank god for the zoom feature on my camera.

How many clicks does it take?

I know, I know. It’s becoming a very scary Christmas up in here.

But can you blame me?

I’m writing this entry from my dad’s home office computer (via dial-up connection) in my hometown of Houston, desertland of highways, humidity, car dealerships, and folks who wear their cellphones in protective cases clipped to their belt buckles. Man, I haven’t been back to Texas, or seen any of my family, in a year and a half… I tend to steer clear of this part of the map, for fear of dying from boredom and just plain alienating my loved ones (which I have a tendency to do sometimes). Nothing better convinces me that I’m a heartless judgemental monsterchild than a long weekend trip back home, where I’m faced with parents who support and love me unconditionally, a younger sister who hero-worships me, and crippling guilt over the fact that I rarely spend longer than a few moments wondering about them and their lives. Know what? I’ll skip the self-hate portion of this entry and move on.

It’s been a bittersweet trip down so far. Spent the afternoon @ the hospital in Lubbock, TX, where my G’ma is recovering from a recent stroke. It was weird seeing my only living grandparent in that bed today, hardly able to speak or move her left side, but she was alert and those eyes were busy. She was saying alot with those eyes. I’ve always known she’d run out of steam one day, but I always figured it’d be gradually and well into her 90’s… not due to a brain-damaging stroke that would just hit her one boring afternoon at home. She’s always been such a pioneer in my mind, and I could wax poetic over what a pillar of strength and grace she’s always been. I could toast and beautify and attempt to immortalize her to be this remarkeable force of nature that I was lucky enough to be genetically tied to… but shit man, so could you. We could all do this with each of our families. The simple truth is, my g’ma is a wonderful woman… flawed and real and now very weak.

I gave her a yellow LIVESTRONG bracelet — slipped it over her patient wristband — and explained how it helped me, that maybe it’d do the same for her. She looked at me and stumbled, “I’mma be alright, honey.” I smiled at her and said, “I know. Like me.” At one point, everyone left the room and it was just the two of us… I had no idea what else to say, so I just started singing this dumb song, one I sang when I was little, that she always loved. A song I haven’t sung or even thought about in at least 15 years, but the words just kinda followed each other out and my eyes were tearing up but I kept singing to her. When I was done, she squeezed my hand (rough texture, thick veins) and tried to nod for me, saying everything else on her heart with her eyes. I left the room and went out into the hall and just started bawling. Hard. For her, for my lonely and worried dad, for other things. Texas is really not the way I’ve recalled it to be and but that’s ok… I’m not really always the man I recall myself to be either.

My grandmothers were strong.
They followed plows and bent to toil.
They moved through fields sowing seed.
They touched earth and grain grew.
They were full of sturdiness and singing.
My grandmothers were strong.

— Margaret Walker, “Lineage”

I was pulled into the air by a supernatural blast of wind as I was walking across Prince Street this afternoon. One minute I was exiting the Apple Store and the next I was flying over the streets of Soho, swooping high and low across town and through today’s moody upper west side sky. I was cradled in the air — my feet couldn’t have touched the ground even if I wanted to come back down. I was searing through clouds, propelled by forces of wind way stronger than my might… just powerless and weightless, drifting where the breeze took me.

Bullshit. I walked determined through the streets today, pushing ahead and charging against those violent currents and gusts… ain’t no New York winds strong enough to push me anywhere. I can withstand whatever rough forces this city hurls at me, that’s for damn sure. Shit man, I’m still here, aren’t I?

Forgive the shameless pretense of this post, cuz I know I’m being self-praising and making about as much sense as Charo (I love that bitch better than bad sex, ya’ll). See, I’m working on getting back to good up in here, realizing myself, remember my spirit and all that shit (Oprah would be so proud of my ass — but would she buy me a car?), so this kind of fucking pomposity just kinda goes along with the territory. You know how we do.

… AND ALSO? I stopped into the hospital afterwork tonight to see him. It was way past visiting hours and I didn’t even know what his deal was, I’d only heard he was there, and I wanted to drop off some flowers and attention. Been a long time since I’d been to the hospital, and as hard as I fought it, I couldn’t help but have a tiny surreal moment standing in that elevator again. I got over myself and found his room. Bron was ok, he looked thinner and tired, all embarassed at not being his usual gorgeous self. We chitchatted about stuff, he bitched about his senile roommate, I filled him in on drama @ work, then I climbed onto the windowsill and fixed his broken blinds so he could see the church lights better (he flirted with me, checking out my ass while I did it, and it was cute). He was worried about his test results, worried that they’d found something too soon — that maybe his situation was too advanced to be an early stage of anything. I don’t really know what I said but there was lots of chuckling and teasing and lots of me saying, “Stop trying to get up, just rest”. I’m glad I saw him, and I think he’s gonna be ok. He can withstand these howling New York City winds too.

And I’m just kidding about the Charo-love equation… I don’t even have bad sex.