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2013 Roundup

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I felt both overwhelmed and liberated in 2013.  Simultaneously.

I spent the past few hours un-subscribing from 100 mailing lists from whom I receive emails begging for money.  All perfectly decent causes, gun control, black theatre, saving the ocean, climate control, Unicef, the world wildlife fund, democratic causes, mercy for animals, slow money…

I un-subscribed from cook shops, travel companies, furniture stores and fashion lines.  I spent a few moments each day erasing my name from the lists I added myself in the hope of being better informed, no more Gawker or Huffington Post or the Daily Beast.

It was an odd year.  It was unusually diverse.  I continued writing my film tho I stopped talking about it.  I met thieving producers and film industry liars.  I spent time with weed smoking Susan Sarandon in the back of her ping-pong club.  

Away from the film I travelled to Martha’s Vineyard, to Des Moines and over the Rocky Mountains.   I travelled by car all over America.  Los Angeles to New York and back again… three times.  I was constantly surprised by American kindness whenever I found it.  

I fell in and out of love with AA.  In and out of love with the gays tho… mostly out of love.

We are presently finalizing our divorce.

During the past months I began a strange adventure with a young man who I tentatively call my boy friend.  I began to dream again… of better things… even though I am still cautious and burned.  Erring toward single at all times.

I wrote a great deal but never published a word of it.

I wrote indignant things like this…

I am queer.  They are gay.  They are white and affluent.  They want to get married and join the army.  They want to assimilate.  That’s what they say.

When you question them… when you ask them what assimilation looks like… they still want to keep gay pride, gay bars, gay apps, gay film festivals, gay morality.

They want the gay section in the bookshop, the ‘gay voice’ section in The Huffington Post.  They don’t really understand what assimilation looks like because most of them are too comfy not assimilating.

He said, “This is all about your internalized homophobia.” I smiled.  “It’s not internalized, it’s externalized.”

One can devote ones life to betrayal.  Betrayed by parents, family members, institutions, schools, by loved ones even the country of ones origin.  I have felt a smidgen from all of the above.  Yet, I forgave my family, my school, the class system, my beloved country.

Because I wanted to be free.

I huffed and puffed about the NSA, I applauded Glen Greenwald and Chelsea Manning and Ed Snowdon.  I stopped worrying about who could read whatever I was writing privately or which ever websites I was wacking to because there is nothing private.  Not any more.

I met literary heroes on Fire Island like Andy Tobias and had breakfast with John Walters, I spent sultry nights on Cape Cod.  I started Anger Management classes and enjoy them tremendously.

My counsellor asks things like, “Where in your body to you feel the anger first?”

I began to identify the genesis of my anger and feelings of uncomfortability.  It usually starts with a demand for money from a worthy cause.  A picture or video of a screaming rabbit as it is having it’s fur pulled off or a pile of euthanized dogs waiting to be incinerated.

It was the hopelessness that infuriated me, the cruelty, the stupidity, the hypocrisy.

I came to conclusions in 2013.  That I do not, have never had, am not interested in… A CAREER!   Careers, I realized, are… for other people.  For those who may be interested in a legacy.  I stopped calling myself a film maker and started telling people, if they asked, that I do… nothing.

I understood that wherever I found myself both good or bad I was meant to be.  It was all for a reason.  A reason that would one day be revealed to me.  That my life was a series of choreographed moments. The life of a narcissist.  That the cameras I learned to love whilst in the reality show had always been there and had never gone away.

In 2013 I never gave up.  I waited patiently.  I didn’t worry about the future nor was I enslaved to the past.  For this I was grateful.

Occasionally I hankered to go home but knew that after a few days in Whitstable I would find my life shrinking and darkening.  I did not go home.  Though, I spoke more to my Mother this year and was curious about my nieces and nephews.

Finally the JB entanglement came to an end one nondescript day in November.  I wanted to write to him and make amends for the mess I had caused.

But I wrote this instead… it was never sent.

An apology is owed.

I was wrong to lie to you.  I was wrong to lose my temper.  I was wrong to fight you.  I was wrong to have asked for money to be paid when you owed me nothing.  I was wrong to have blamed you for any part of our unhealthy association.  The blame must fall squarely at my feet for everything that went wrong.   The moment you came out I should have politely walked way… I did not.   I was advised by everyone I knew and cared about… to walk away from you but chose to ignore their good suggestion.   I should have thanked you and walked away.  I regret very much that I did not.  I am extremely remorseful.  Due to my weakness of character I initiated a drama that harmed you and caused distress to your family.  I should have walked away.  The moment you told me you were gay.   I know that you are happy now.   I know that your happiness will continue.

It took two years to own up.

2013.  Un-subscribing to websites, making amends, keeping my side of the street clean, owning up, anger management.

Let’s see what 2014 will bring.

As the years pass by, unrelenting, amazing, fulfilling, desperate, happy, sad.

Even though I have filled my homes with art and furniture and friends and the lingering smells of delicious feasts… even though I have made films and plays and paintings…. all I have ever wanted, really craved… was peace of mind.

I’m getting there.  Slowly.  A Happy and Prosperous New Year everyone.

Categories
Gay

This is Nearly at an End

Dear Readers,

So, many of you have followed this blog since the beginning.  I don’t mean this time around but when I was writing in 2005/2006 before I shut it down.

I shut it down last time for the same reasons I am going to shut it down this time: because it suits me.  There is no pressure, no threat, no coercion from anyone in particular.  Not from slime ball or his slime ball family.  Not from anyone.

Even though my friend Sharon Marshall thinks I will never get another boyfriend when they read this..the truth is, I wouldn’t/couldn’t get another boy friend with or without this blog.

There are a host of other reasons not to be my boy friend other than what I have written here about Jake or others.  There are plenty of published reasons not to have anything to do with me what so ever.

I will list some of them:

ex con

Celebrity gossip

appalling reputation

don’t drink or take drugs

elitist

bad temper

Well, the list just goes on and on.  The blog merely let people know how shameless I am about all the above.

Those same people refuse to acknowledge any triumph I might have had.  It is as if I were only ever bad…well, my dears, you get what you pay for.

Nope, the blog is going private because I decided that on the 21st December 2010 I would cease to publicly blog.  It was on this day last year that Jake contacted me (see below) and my world was blown apart.

It was on that day that a man with shady intentions hijacked my life and for all the love I felt and all the hate I endured I wouldn’t have it any other way.   I am grateful to have been able to share with you what he and men like him try to get away with.

It is QUITE RIGHT that he is shamed publicly for doing what he did.  What he did to me and his girl friend of seven and half years is far worse than any crime I may have committed.

Ask any woman who has been lied to.

He will never face a court for what he did but he deserves to.

I am moved that so many of you shared your own stories of being cheated on and lied to.  He described you as sycophants.  I describe every one of you as my friends.  I want you to know that you have helped me tremendously.   I don’t know what I would have done without every single one of you.

Each anonymous message of support.

As of the 21st December I will set this blog to private and if you want to read what I have been up to you will have to subscribe.  This will please the 1000 of you who routinely log in every day.

Jake, only a few more days until your name, as you wished it, will be divorced from mine.  Your picture, as your Father wanted, unaligned to me.  How dare they ask me to remove pictures of him from my blog?  As if he deserved anonymity?  For all the world your ‘silly mistakes’ will be erased.  Your head resting gently on my shoulder.  How you must hate that picture!

I might remind you that this time last year I was really happy, enjoying my after sex rehab life.  Enjoying watching the show with Jennie at our new apartment in Hollywood.

But all of that came to an abrupt end.

The day before you wrote to me you were reading my blog assuming that my life as an out gay man could be yours.  That the people with whom I consorted, the locations I inhabited you might have.   You didn’t want me Jake.  You wanted my life.

Your pathetic half Persian therapist will never get the measure of you Jake because she is being paid by your parents to make it all better.  You need moral guidance.

So, this time last year I am in NYC interviewing agents, David Vigliano etc. and little Jake B the virtual Literary Agent in Arlo and Esme on 1st Street wondering why he is so damned shy and awkward.  Thinking it had more to do with me being on TV than what was actually going on..that he wanted me to fuck him behind his girlfriend’s back.

He told me later that he wanted me to take him downstairs and fuck him in the bathroom.   Now I know, of course, that the sweet little pussy I came to love had been shagged senseless a million times by Pal (amongst others) and his HIV cock.   His dear pussy that I loved, was just another New York City whore hole.

Without doubt my relationship with Jake prolonged a long-held misery that I had worked very hard in rehab to overcome.

I am an artist (try taking that away from me) and, though many will not agree, this last year or so of blogging has been my art, my catharsis, a continuation of the greater conceptual art of being in a reality TV show.

In no time at all every mean thing I have written here will be forgotten.

In earlier posts, where I have been vile about people, those gripes and recriminations vanished.  Time is a great healer.

Time will hush the screaming, resentful voice that propels us.

Resentment sucks the life out of a memory until it cannot be remembered.

Sorry Sharon, frankly my dear I don’t give a shit who reads about me or my life or what they think of it or, more importantly, how it might alienate me.  The damage is already done. It was done years ago.  When you came to Sydney to interview me about Hurley.  When I was sent to prison for over spending on my credit card…

This is what he wrote:

Hi Duncan,

I’m a literary agent with xxxx, based in NYC. Introduced to you courtesy of VH1. Read your article in The Daily Beast, which I savored for the honest details behind the show–none of which come as a surprise. Anyway, your article led me to your blog. I love the honesty in your writing (plus it’s also refreshing to see someone from a reality tv show who can form a coherent sentence), and I get the impression that you’ve been through a lot in your life. At the risk of sounding just like the opportunistic reality tv producers you’ve worked with, I will admit that a reality program is often a good platform for a book–but more importantly, you have an interesting story, voice, and you know how to write. I figured it was worth a shot reaching out. Perhaps you are already sufficiently represented on the publishing side, but either way I am wondering if you have thought realistically about writing a book.

Warm Regards,

Jake B

Dear Jake,

I am presently meeting agents with a view to representation. I have met with three so far and have not yet made any decision.

I and flattered that you contacted me and do feel free to call me at your convenience.

Hi Duncan,

Nice to hear back from you and sounds good…I’ll be in touch very soon.

Best,

Jake