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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.

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Brooklyn Christmas Dogs Fashion Gay Money NYC Photography Queer

December 2013

Catie Lazarus, Lady Rizo, Our Lady J

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art Dogs Gay Love NYC Photography

New Museum/Mercer Hotel 2013

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art Dogs Fashion Gay NYC Queer Travel

October/November 2013

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The Little Dog is, as usual, very chill.  He becomes more trusting as he gets older.

One bright Sunday last month we visited the Brooklyn flea market and looked over the river to Manhattan.

I spent two days in the hospital having a stent removed from my gall bladder.  Yes, I did.

I had dinner with Fern Mallis… who, as you know, invented fashion week.

Duncan Roy Fern Mallis

After dinner we decided to attend the Giorgio Armani One Night Only event.

When we arrived we were whisked off to meet Armani who refuses to speak english but spoke english to Fern… because Fern is a legend.

On Sunday we went to the doggy Halloween parade in Tompkins Square Park but we couldn’t be bothered to wait in line.

In Woodstock we met a man wearing a lovely sweater.

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I met a friend of Wendy Asher’s.

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Lady Rizo and I went to a party in a penthouse on Gramercy Park.

The hedge fund billionaire who owned the apartment also owned a perfect Nakashima coffee table.

Lady Rizo Duncan Roy

The following week we sat with Courtney Love in the Baby Grand, a new lounge at the back of the TriBeCa Grand with Paul Sevigny for a Roger Vivier event.

The lounge is perfectly beautiful and looks like the Beverly Hills Hotel interior on Acid.

For Halloween proper we hung with Cynthia Rowley who looked like this and loved my Asprey tie.

This is my Halloween costume:

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It is a paper napkin with two slits torn into it.

The following day I went back to Woodstock to look at a lake house I want to buy.

This is me and The Little Dog in the view taken by Angelo:

Woodstock

Today we watched the NYC marathon. This morning at 7am we ate breakfast bagels in Crown Heights.  We ate two further brunches later on in Williamsburg.  After my haircut.

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Queer

September NYC 2013

I spent most of last week staying with friends on Fire Island.

 

 

The Island community has all but vanished for the season.  I spent my time writing and rewriting the script… exploring abandoned holiday houses and taking pictures of them.

 

Interior Island House Detail

 

I walked most days to the Canteen, a little coffee shop, and sat with a dwindling cast of island stragglers.

When I returned to the city I moved into my glorious apartment on Gramercy Park.

I am having a very Manhattan experience.  Doormen, broken elevators, great views, little old lady neighbours.

 

 

 

The best thing about this apartment?  It’s so damned cheap.

Returned to see Rufus Wainwright and support a friend’s charity.

 

 

 

I hung at SPiN with Franck and ate sliders and spicy chicken.

 

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I was invited to the RRL Motorcycle party and sank into a mire of Americana.

 

 

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Occasionally I would take the L to Brooklyn and see old friends.

 

 

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All in all it has been a very easy return to Manhattan.  Heading East.  Heading in the right direction.

At some point I walked the dogs and eventually I made it to my bed.

 

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Gramercy Park 2013

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Dogs

Veselka

NYC November. Beautiful day. Breakfast here in Veselka the polish restaurant on 9th Street then apartment hunting. I hope I don’t bump into him. I really do. I don’t know what I would do. Not angry with Jake today. Being back here in the thick of my life but laying on a bed where we had once been. I am getting over this so damned slowly. I keep wondering how many lies he told me? Who is this guy Richard Brooks who writes to me? His friend?

I remember him telling me that he would hang around his old apartment at night looking up at the window. Wishing that he was inside. That was when I gave a fuck. Now his behaviour just seems creepy and weird. A lonely drunk on the corner of a windswept street looking up at the window of someone whose life he had effectively stolen.

How would he feel if I hung out on the corner of his street in Westchester? Ewww.

Sometimes I wonder what it must be like to live such a lie, so complete, so utterly avoidable. Then I remember that for a few years I did..when I changed my name.

What must it feel like to wake up on the eve of your thirties and know that your conflicted life until that point had not been lived at all. Avoiding ones nature. In opposition to ones own nature?

Part of me wonders if Jake and I shouldn’t attempt to say that kind goodbye I so badly wanted in August but he dashed..then..the questions I need answering (haunting) one can’t imagine he would answer truthfully. He is such a fucking liar.

Sometimes I wonder if we will ever forgive one another? If that is possible?

I am looking at places in Gramercy Park and both East and West Village. Two bedrooms so I can have people stay. I am going to have what I want.

I left LA early yesterday morning. Ashley drove me to the airport.

I arrived in NYC yesterday afternoon, made my way into town, walked the dog. Met a man from off-line. Joan and Joe picked me up at 7.30. We had dinner in the West Village at the Little Owl. Met Amelia at the opening (soft) of the Derby. It was very shrill in there. The whole place needs calming down. Amelia very disgruntled. Used to having an audience of adoring fans she stands there miserably belting out songs for noisy, unappreciative diners.

Walked home at 2am and stopped in at the Phoenix. Sat with a friend.

Life becomes immediately full when I get here. January 1st I will be here full-time.