NOBODY PASSES, darling

One day

2012-02-27T13:17:00.000-07:00

I wanted to go on a walk before dark, but now it's dark. Now I will go on a walk after dark. Or, not yet. When I'm ready. Yes, I'm still at the computer. I was going to put the feldenkrais CD on, but then I thought wait, let me keep writing, this is relaxing, this writing, I need more of this, this relaxing. Just lean back in the chair, close my eyes a little, and keep writing. Breathe. Keep writing. This is practice. I'm practicing breathing. Relaxing. This is breathing: my chest. This is writing: my breathing.

Awareness: my head leaning up, maybe that is why my jaw hurts? Lower back pain: maybe I'll sit up. Scratchy throat: yes I need more water.

Yesterday I posted on craigslist for the first time in a while. It was that moment of horniness that needed to be met, just a moment and then I stayed on the computer for too long and nothing happened except more pain and eventually I jerked off on the phone sex line just listening to some guy's voice and leaving him a message. A connection request: that's what they call it. A connection bequest: one day we will give. A connection inquest: in quest. One day I will learn what it is that I need. Find: need. Need: find. One day.

Yes, my jaw still hurts: not a good time for sucking cock. Not that that's what I'm looking for now, here in these words, but it came up. Two feldenkrais appointments in a row before I leave, that sounds exciting. My jaw: speaking. These words: my jaw. Speaking need. What we will find. One day.

Writing

2012-02-26T19:35:00.000-07:00

Wait -- what happened to writing? I wanted to write first, but then I got caught up doing everything else on the computer, everything else that I need to do when really I need to write, but first I was exhausted and frantic, probably stopped breathing and now my whole face hurts and I feel like I should just go to sleep right now, but first I need to do a feldenkrais lesson to try and leave some of this pain behind.

Writing is hard when I'm traveling, harder still when I'm on a book tour and trying to keep everything flowing -- trying to figure out where the hell I'm staying, and keep in touch with all the publicity, keep it going, I mean it's all going well but so much ends up happening online, right? Online where everything hurts me, or not everything because I get excited by a new article, yes, a new idea for promotion, another insight from a review, yes many insightful reviews this time, how exciting and that keeps me going.

But then I'm back on the computer, what happened? I was just going to do one thing, do one thing and then take a break, but then I thought wait, I better do that thing, and then take a break, and then that thing, and then yes, I'm there in that place where I'm not breathing, just trying to get it all done, trying to get it all done when really I wanted to write. I wanted to write, and now I am writing.

Maybe at some point

2012-02-25T12:53:00.000-07:00

I was going to tell you how I'm feeling, but then I checked my email and started feeling something else -- that frantic excitement of publicity taking me out of the exhaustion in my head, body -- and then I came back, to the way I'm feeling: broken, overwhelmed, how am I doing this? Like yesterday when I was on the way to Sonoma with Randy, we started with so much extra time but maybe we were too relaxed and then we took a wrong turn and we only had the exact amount of time it was supposed to take, which wasn't enough because then we couldn’t stop so that I could stretch, go to the bathroom, relax and when we arrived into this auditorium actually packed, a queer studies class and I'm not sure if I've seen a queer studies class like this -- probably more than 150 people, some of them standing in back or sitting in the aisles.

I rushed to the bathroom to shit, as then back into the sweltering classroom and the funny thing is that as soon as I started my talk I felt great or okay not great, but calm, energized, excited, interested, glad that I was there talking to a roomful of mostly gender-normative straight women I would imagine, but a room definitely engaged with what I was saying, which felt fine and important to me. Randy said something like that afterwards, how it felt crucial and rare to talk to that audience.

Today is how many days later? That drive ruined my life. What was it that I almost felt like I was back to my normal exhaustion overwhelm? Anyway, now I'm back to the place of how can I get back to that normal exhaustion overwhelm? When do I get to rest for six months? Why doesn't rest ever work?

I can't believe how warm it is here -- or, maybe it's not that warm today, just sunny so that it feels warm in this apartment. But, in general, it's been warm, honey, warm. Good thing I'm getting my sun before Seattle, right? I'll be arriving at the perfect time -- maybe just three more months of rain and dark before a lovely summer, a chance to get ready for the approaching nine-month darkness. I think I'm looking forward to Seattle -- starting to, anyway. I just wish I didn't have to deal with all this travel first.

Oh, travel -- that first train, from Santa Fe to LA, ruined my life. I know I just said that about the drive to Sonoma and back, but that first train was the one that started this mess. In a few days, I'm taking another overnight train -- it's that recycled air that destroys me. Hopefully I'll at least sleep well like last time, and then maybe feel a little delusional that I'm okay, and maybe at some point I will be.

A great interview in the SF Weekly!

2012-02-24T14:45:00.001-07:00

What does the title mean?
Gay culture has become obsessed with normalcy at any cost. There's so much denigration of anything that doesn't fit into the sort of white picket fence "We're just like you" message of the gay movement or the hypermasculine extreme consumerism and throwaway mentality of gay cruising. Camouflaged underneath all that is this really intense fear of anything that doesn't fit in, whether that be femininity or flamboyance or freakishness or an outsider sexuality or promiscuity or public sex, even just intimacy and love outside of dominant norms. And so I wanted to investigate where that fear between fags is coming from. How do we explore that, talk about it in all of its layers and contradictions, and how do we try to imagine something else?

2012-02-23T20:39:00.001-07:00

A great interview over at Kirkus Reviews...

2012-02-22T18:13:00.001-07:00

As a tentative answer to the question of your title, I would humbly offer the possibility that masculinity is so much more rigid today than femininity is simply because feminism opened up our gender to a conversation, whereas masculinity just remained the norm. And the norm is always resistant to change.

It's interesting, because feminism is where all my politics start—the feminism of challenging power, not accessing power. The feminism of destroying all hierarchies. The feminism of radical dykes and outcasts and freaks and whores that I first encountered when I moved to San Francisco at the very end of my teenage years in the early-’90s.

Yes, I think that feminism has opened up more possibilities for gender, sexual, social and political self-determination. But, I think that, although gay liberation emerged from feminism in many ways—as a rejection of organized religion and the nuclear family, a rejection of police and state control over queer bodies and lives—now, there is a conscious rejection of feminism in most gay male cultures. To me, this is tragic and horrifying.

In some ways I think that gay liberation made it possible for straight people to be more fluid in their gender, sexual and social identities, while gay people are busy salivating over participatory patriarchy and Tiffany wedding bands. And so, part of what I want to do with this book is to bring a queer feminist analysis into gay culture. As an intervention.

Yes -- fantastic press for Why Are Faggots So Afraid of Faggots keeps rolling in...

2012-02-20T18:02:00.001-07:00

A wonderful interview in PQ Monthly, Portland's brand-new queer paper...

A great review over at Lambda Literary...

And, a lovely piece in the East Bay Express, just in time for my event in Berkeley tonight...

Oh, wait -- did I mention this article in the San Francisco Foghorn, USF's student paper?

Here are the remaining events on my tour -- please spread the word...

Pegasus Books Downtown
Monday, February 20, 7:30 pm
2349 Shattuck Avenue
Berkeley, CA 94704-1552
(510) 649-1320
www.pegasusbookstore.com
with Horehound Stillpoint, Matthew D. Blanchard, and Jaime Cortez

Sonoma State University
Stevenson 1002
Thursday, February 23, Noon
Rohnert Park, CA

RADAR Book Club featuring Mx Justin Vivian Bond & Mattilda Bernstein Sycamore
Hosted by Michelle Tea
Saturday, February 25
Viracocha
998 Valencia St.
San Francisco, CA 94110
$15, Doors 2:30/ Show at 3
Limited seating. Advance tickets available
https://www.brownpapertickets.com/event/220670
Books available for sale courtesy of Modern Times

University of Oregon
Thursday, March 1, 7 pm
Eugene, OR

Powell's on Hawthorne
Monday, March 5, 7:30 pm
3723 SE Hawthorne Blvd.
Portland, OR 97214
(503) 228-4651
with Ezra RedEagle Whitman and River Willow Fagan
www.powells.com
http://www.facebook.com/events/238569422900064/

Olympia Timberland Library
Wednesday, March 7, 7:30 pm
313 8th Ave SE
Olympia, WA 98501
(360) 352-0595

Little Sisters
Wednesday, March 14, 7pm
1238 Davie Street
Vancouver, BC
(604) 669-1753
www.littlesisters.ca

Elliott Bay Book Company
Tuesday, March 20, 7 pm
1521 Tenth Avenue
Seattle WA 98122
(206) 624-6600
www.elliottbaybay.com
with Booh Edouardo

University of Washington
Monday, March 26, 6 pm
Allen Auditorium, North Allen Library
Seattle, WA

I love this interview with Kate Raphael of KPFA's Women's Magazine from a few weeks ago!

2012-02-20T12:30:00.000-07:00

The interview starts just after the intro to the program

Try something indirect

2012-02-20T12:08:00.000-07:00

Waking up with the most horrible intestinal pain, clenching deep sadness aching horror just pain pain pain and I'm wondering why today, why today? Maybe I shouldn't have rolled over onto my left side. Maybe I shouldn't have eaten that quinoa around 7:40 pm or whenever that was, that's when the bloating started but then it always starts around then, right? I mean it goes on all the time, but it gets worse at night, and sometimes it's like there's a button right before I get in bed, when suddenly it's horrible, again. Even if it wasn't bothering me at all beforehand.

Could it be from rubbing flax oil into my belly and chest like the naturopath suggested, so that I can try to get omega-3 fatty acids through my skin? Maybe I shouldn’t rub it that close to my digestive system. And, just the other day, two days ago, the treatment that was supposed to help -- strain/counterstrain visceral manipulation. Is that what’s causing this horrible pain, worse than it's been at any time on this trip, so far, so bad that I feel like I didn't sleep, can't figure out what will help until I try one of those feldenkrais tongue lessons -- try something indirect, tongue connects to sphincter, right, digestive system in between. Something clears -- now maybe I can walk or sit or stand without too much pain and I'm thinking about how last night Randy asked if I was looking forward to my reading. I was too tired to look forward to anything, which is so often the case and still so often overwhelming. Please don't ask me that question.

Should I get back in bed? But: bed is what brought me here. Maybe it's time for a walk in the chilly fog, maybe that will help, now that I can walk.

Again

2012-02-19T13:58:00.000-07:00

There's a whole story I was planning to write, planning to write right now, but right now I don't think it's possible. Maybe it's possible to start, but my brain just fogged over and I don't know how to turn the defrost on -- I'm not a car, right? Good thing I'm not a car. I don't like cars.

When I woke up I thought yes, this is the day, you know how that works: this is the day when I finally feel human, alive, calm and ready to create. And then I ate, and crashed. Did some laundry. Now I'm sitting here, thinking about the story I was planning to write, planning to write right now I mean I was planning it out in my head, taking my time, thinking there's no rush, all of this happened several years ago and I didn't really write about it then so there's no rush now, right? Except that it's in my head -- I mean, it was in my head. Now I guess it's time to eat, again.

Exactly

2012-02-18T21:31:00.002-07:00

A sense of history

2012-02-17T18:42:00.000-07:00

Maybe it's redundant to say that I feel a sense of history at the GLBT History Museum but, well, I feel a sense of history. I'm not talking about the exhibits, but the conversation we're having about the past, present, and future of public sex. Three different people saying that they want to talk about the elephant in the room, after my intro and the readings by Tommi Avicolli Mecca, Jaime Cortez, and Horehound Stillpoint: first it's the internet, then public sex for queer women, then AIDS. Interestingly, although all of these might be elephants in the room of this particular conversation, the internet, fear and hatred of femininity, AIDS, and race (an elephant no one declares in this particular conversation, perhaps because race comes up in the excerpts the contributors are reading) -- all of these are centerpieces of the book.

But, let me try to evoke this conversation better -- something about the histories of the people in the room, most of whom are fags in their 40s through 60s, some in their 20s and 30s too, a sizable genderqueer contingent, and the woman who speaks about hanging out in public sex spaces in Atlanta and the gay men there thinking maybe she's a little strange -- she is a faggot-identified femme, I believe that’s the term she uses and I'm using the pronoun “she” because that's the pronoun I imagine a faggot-identified femme would use, but of course I could be wrong. But I wanted to say something about how everyone is immediately so present, laughing, cheering, adding in their own comments way before the Q&A begins and I love that: we are in this together. I'm adding pieces to my intro from things I've glimpsed on the street on the way -- the rainbow lights illuminating the outside of the Diesel store, the clothing store that's replaced the gay bookstore. It's me and the audience: we are all in this conversation together, we are in this world, we are in these gay spaces that we crave and despise.

So great when you don't have to argue about gentrification or assimilation necessarily because everyone knows, everyone feels it, is angry and lost, hopeless but sometimes hopeful and this is one of those moments, maybe. Most of the men and queens and queers in this room are older than me, probably half by several decades and it makes me think about something Sarah Schulman said about how so many people she’s looked up to, many people a generation older than her, are dying now, or are already dead, and how she doesn't know who she can look up to anymore. The way experience is passed down through generations, and passed up -- that's the part that sometimes people forget: I've never looked for role models or mentors, I've only wanted peers and that's what it feels like in this room, somehow, in spite of our different histories, so that when the glamorous person with red curly hair and lipstick raises her hand to say she is a faggot-identified femme looking for public dyke cruising and many of the gay men in the audience laugh, but they are laughing with her, we are laughing with each other.

Some people are angry too, as we should be -- about the disappearance of cultures that matter, about the way the gay movement has become antithetical to gay liberation, about how public sex spaces are targeted in so many gay people are part of the targeting, they want these places closed so they can be removed from the imagination. One person says: everything can be private, but only for the people that matter. And, the way sex has become privatized through the internet, a private public, and Jaime says something about how many people write "no games" in their posts, and this means they actually want to hook up, or they think they want to hook up, but most people online are busy not hooking up and maybe that's the sex they are looking for, even if they don't want to admit it. And I think about how "no games" to me also indicates no fun, right? Because there is so rarely any fun in internet hookups, or even cruising spaces -- it's all supposed to be primal and distant. This is just in my head, maybe after, more ideas. Here at the GLBT History Museum we are trying to engage in a conversation that rarely happens -- I think that's why several people have come to multiple events, and some of the same people are commenting again, different comments: we need this conversation. We need more, and we are only given less.

And then I'm in a car, someone I just met giving me a ride home but we have a mutual friend, they lived near on neighboring communes in rural Tennessee and when he asks about Santa Fe I say something about how there’s a small queer world but there are no fags in that world, none, do you know what I mean? And he says something about how sometimes fags will be anywhere but queer worlds and dammit that is so true. I love insight like that, coming from someone you've just met. I want to map the way transmasculinity and/or a genderqueer analysis marks this conversation, but I'm not sure whether it's necessary for you to understand. In the backseat is Gina, one of my closest friends in all the world, Gina who flew out here for my book launch events and you see how that's another history -- a history of care and comfort and glittering intimacy in a broad atmosphere of disillusionment.

When I get home I look at the sky from my window, this purplish reddish sparkling mass just above the buildings, leading up to what you generally describe as darkness and I’m thinking about the possibilities of intergenerational conversations, the possibilities of faggotry outside of male socialization, I'm thinking about the possibilities in San Francisco that are so rarely actualized, I'm even going on a quick walk down the street so familiar yes there's something I love about this familiarity and cooler air blowing in at night even if the streets still smell like cigarette smoke, car exhaust, piss, vomit, pot smoke yet still fresher, fresher than before, no fabric softener laundry detergent smell at the moment but I don't think of that until I smell it again and for the first time in a while I think maybe I have energy after a reading. I mean I'm completely exhausted but not entirely drained. My body hurts but I don't feel like what the fuck did I just do, how on earth will I ever do that again, is it worth it, can it ever be worth it? Because I know that it is, tonight it is.

This view, again

2012-02-16T16:12:00.000-07:00

The ways desire is regimented in gay male sexual spaces, distance enforced, masculinity required, silence a given: I've been talking about this a lot since I've been on tour, but it's worse: I'm at the Nob Hill Theatre. Randy told me how they changed the downstairs so it's not just video booths, more like a sex club with a back room and you have to pay $10 to get in but then the video booths are free. The guy working there is actually friendly, can I call him a receptionist because he's behind a big counter? They even check your coats and scarves, kind of exciting and I'm downstairs and there are definitely guys there who I'm attracted to, first I have to go to the bathroom to shit -- yes, glamour comes first. And then I'm back in the hallways of longing and loss and yes, there are other words starting with lo that could go here but they never will, I've already realized that, no problem there exactly but the problem, you know, I already told you: the ways desire is regimented, distance enforced, masculinity required, silence a given and there is no space, none, none at all, for me here. Sure, I can dance in the empty back room, I could approach all the guys I'm attracted to -- mid-40s full seventies facial hair V-neck T-shirt hairy chest; tall skinny guy giving Milk, yes the movie, that's the one I'm really hot for and he’s the snottiest, no surprise -- those two are white, then there’s the Latino pretty boy who pushes you away before you even get to him, I guess he's the snottiest, actually, maybe there's a contest. There's always a contest. Then the mixed-race guy with a few facial piercings, can't tell what he's looking for, and the white indieish tweaker who keeps talking about how old everyone is here, he's the only one who will talk to me since, well, he's tweaking, right? Oh -- and, the bigger tall mainstream gay butchish Latino guy. Yes, I approach all these guys, but no luck, and then I’m there way too long and I get even bolder, using words, can you imagine, words? Do you want me to suck your dick? Thinking really, these guys are just walking around in circles, or standing looking grim, consciously and unconsciously -- and yes, it is grim here, there will never be anything fun, that word has been banished. Do you want to watch me jerk off? No luck there either -- there is no luck here, somehow the fact that the video booths are free makes people close the doors and keep them closed, so that there is even less possibility for interaction without the glory hole intermediary, can we really call that interaction? Distraction: sure, it can be fun, but then what? There is a whole open back room, and nothing happens there for the whole 10 1/2 years that I'm in that terrible place where I thought I would only be for a half hour max.

It's getting too late, I'm ready for bed -- I tell the tweaker that but he says it's only 9 pm. No, it's 11 -- I mean I know he's not going to go to bed, but I need to. Sometime I will ask myself: what are these people looking for? I've asked myself before. I will ask myself again. Sometime I will marvel at the fact that, aside from a glamorous and mischievous queeny demeanor and style marked by something other than what I'm supposed to be, you know, I'm actually somewhat conventional in the ways these people are looking. I lived too long in other people's desires to work the masculine realness these tired bitches require, or at least I can't go so far as to show up in khakis and a pea coat or black Sta-prest and a bomber jacket like I did for so long with my paying tricks. Not a bomber jacket -- what is that brand-name that can signify off-preppy gaystream, punk diffidence, indie angst, worker chic or just plain I'm-not-even-concerned-about-fashion even though I'm always there, somehow, just there -- you know, there are many. Brands: this world is made for that type, and yes eventually I'm outside yelling and sing-shrieking I’m one of those people everyone is trying not to notice and what am I yelling about exactly except, I don't know, trying to express the anguish and pain and exhaustion and overwhelm and over-it, over, over, and over over over over over it. All I know is that when I get to the bottom of the hill I'm talking quietly, repeating I hate my life I hate my life I hate my life, and then I'm ready to get Superglue to fix one of my earrings, and some computer ink for Randy, maybe a mousepad but they don't have one and then I'm at the next store buying water before heading up into the apartment where the sky is stunning, somehow the clouds are illuminated a deep blue and that's when I realize I love this view, again.

Effortlessness

2012-02-15T18:22:00.000-07:00

Feldenkrais can be so amazing -- before I was stuck in doom and gloom, shitting non-stop in that way that happens when my sleep gets wildly interrupted again, why again, I thought I was getting to a better place but then my mind is racing and it feels too early to get up but maybe I'm wrong, maybe it isn't too early at all and I look at the clock and it's 4 am. Effortlessness: that's hard to pronounce. Harder to achieve when everything in my life is about effort, pushing through the doom and gloom to get to that place of stunning achievement -- last night at the launch it was packed, and remember how, before I started this tour I was worried that I would be doing readings, and there wouldn't be any faggots any audience and that would kind of prove the point of the book, right? So, even if it was packed, I might feel lonely.

But this audience was almost all faggots, all ages too and most of the people I didn't know, which is always kind of exciting, right? That the book is reaching people in the way that I want it to. A beautiful event and then I'm stuck in the aftermath of knocked-down sadness leading to the doom and gloom, sleep first but that didn't help. Until -- yes, feldenkrais. Yes, feldenkrais, please. That moment when he's holding my head at the end and I just fall right into rest, I wish I could figure out a trick for that in bed and afterwards he says that thing about effortlessness, so hard to pronounce but there it is, walking on the street letting the light flow over and into me and yes I'm tired but not destroyed, effortlessness until it's time to get ready for another event

Uphill...

2012-02-15T14:56:00.000-07:00

Two more events for Why Are Faggots So Afraid of Faggots in San Francisco this week -- please spread the word...

2012-02-15T14:46:00.001-07:00

City Lights Bookstore
Wednesday, February 15, 7 pm
261 Columbus Ave. at Broadway
San Francisco, CA
(415) 362-8193
www.citylights.com
with contributors Debanuj DasGupta, Harris Kornstein, Booh Edouardo and Gina de Vries

GLBT History Museum
A Panel on the Past, Present and Future of Public Sex
Celebrating the release of Why Are Faggots So Afraid of Faggots?
Thursday, February 16, 7 pm
4127 18th St.
San Francisco, CA 94114
(415) 621-1107
www.glbthistory.org/museum/
with contributors Jaime Cortez, Debanuj DasGupta, Tommi Avicolli Mecca, and Horehound Stillpoint – hosted and facilitated by Mattilda Bernstein Sycamore
$5-10 requested donation, no one turned away for lack of funds

A little press about tomorrow's book launch at the San Francisco Main Library -- from New Zealand!

2012-02-13T18:14:00.001-07:00

Here you go...

The way the sand glistens

2012-02-13T12:17:00.000-07:00

Randy and I drive to the beach for her birthday – ZipCar realness, okay? The most glamorous part is closed for construction so we park on the side of the road just past and oh, a beautiful sand staircase leading down the cliff to the ocean yes ocean rough today and pounding against the rocks and yes so much air finally air and the sand is moist on this moist day which makes it easier to walk on and one of those moments when you look up and how, how could we be in San Francisco really, with this cliff covered in red, yellow, green succulents and over there sage and other kinds of brush and then, second time to the beach after walking back up the cliff, time for bed is what I'm thinking but that happens so many times a day anyway and when is time for bed if bed doesn't provide what I'm looking for, rest, although it's getting better so let’s cross our fingers and hope for no more interrupted sleep.

A detour to the health food store in the Outer Sunset, Randy’s never been and I’m always in the mood for a health food store -- some cute collards, right? Randy gets tabouli that expires on 2-29, but she thinks maybe it was really 2-29-11, tasty. Back at the beach for a second go-around, a different beach not as pretty but still that same ocean and we walk all the way out to where the sand glistens and those big chunks of foam everywhere and the sun is setting but you can't see it because of the fog I love this fog even though my jaw always hurts when I go to the ocean in the cold, something about the moisture but still the way the sand glistens and I take a deep breath.

Another great review -- this one on Truthout...

2012-02-12T18:55:00.000-07:00

Of course I don't agree with the last paragraph, but the rest is fantastic, so I certainly can't complain...

A beautiful window display over at Books Inc in the Castro!

2012-02-11T14:32:00.000-07:00

How you follow

2012-02-11T13:11:00.000-07:00

Sometimes I walk outside, and I feel like I never left San Francisco. It doesn't feel bad or good, just familiar but more frantic, like my life has sped up and the things that give me energy -- press for the book, interviews -- still leave me in that fallen-down aftermath. To tell you the truth, I'm surprised at all the good press, but it doesn't stop me from feeling caved-in every day and so much to do, to keep it all going, to keep myself going.

Click file And then the events -- beautiful while they're happening, but then there's the aftermath -- no, not fallen-down, more broken-down. The exhaustion becomes that pain in my sinuses, between my shoulder blades, the way I wake up in the middle of the night thinking about an interview, one that just happened or one that might happen and I dread leaving, having to travel more, before rest I hope rest yes rest is what I'm after, even if this satisfaction comes from non-rest I mean I'm trying to rest but it doesn't quite work. Now I need to go back to the laundromat, to get my laundry out of the dryer -- it didn't seem as chemically horrifying as before -- it's the same laundromat, since I'm staying on the same block. The other night I walked right past this building, and I was almost at my old building before I remembered. The people who were in front and then behind me thought I was following them, or wait though they were behind me and then in front of me, right? That's how you follow.

A fun interview on Out in the Bay...

2012-02-10T21:36:00.000-07:00

Here it is...

Practice with premise

2012-02-10T13:57:00.002-07:00

I don't know how they do it, but some of these health food stores in San Francisco manage to have terrible produce. Not all of it, of course -- but, often, it's way worse than the produce in New Mexico. And, get this -- almost all the produce in New Mexico comes from California! And, even better -- they like to give you bunches of greens that are half the size here, for the same price.

I feel like I'm always rushing around here -- I guess that's big-city life, right? I enjoy the convenience, the way I can just walk out my door and soon I'll be somewhere, but the awful air still feels like an assault. My sinuses are a catastrophe; my voice is getting raspy, and I’ve only had one event so far. Another event today, I guess I should get ready.

The other night, I gave a talk for Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz's class at the California Institute for Integral Studies. Or, I thought it was going to be her class -- she asked me to talk about Nobody Passes, since she's teaching it, so that's what I prepared for, but then it turned out that most of the people there were instructors at the school, or people from outside -- the director of the school too, I guess. It was pretty interesting -- I gave a bit of an introduction to the book, and then I said well, since we are at the California Institute for Integral Studies, where I'm guessing part of the goal is to integrate practice with premise, I thought perhaps we could go around the room and each of us to talk about one way that we are passing today, the comfort and discomfort this is giving us, and what it would mean to let go of that passing.

This allowed for me to talk about how awful I feel, to talk about fibromyalgia and chronic pain and exhaustion and doing these events anyway, and then I thought people brought really interesting topics to the conversation -- intellectual, intimate, political, poetic. About class privilege, Southern hillbilly identity, aging and not having to pass as much as not hating this country, needing to pass as a grad student, flaunting wealth in order to protect oneself from bullying at school, being a psychologist and choosing when to share your own mental-health struggles, motherhood mythologies, existing in feminine spiritual spaces while seeing oneself in between categories of women, feminine, female. The violence of the male/female binary, passing as different racial categories but always getting to a place of not passing -- "the non-passing of non-passing, passing of passing" -- leaving people behind based on educational attainment and searching for connection, leaving locations behind, assumptions based on male presentation, refusing to pass as invisibly HIV-positive, the idea that passing lies in the eyes of the other, the psychiatric industry and its violence, gender analysis of passing that erases racial passing histories, passing as turning one's back on one's community, people who don't have the luxury of passing, colleagues of an African-American professor who want him to pass as anything but African-American, passing as human, hidden homophobia, racism, and classism; passing as male even though identifying as trans, or as a particular kind of male.

The best part is the way that this opened up the intimacy of the room. Then people wanted me to talk about Why Are Faggots So Afraid of Faggots, which brought on a lot of discussion, and one thing I noticed is that I got much more relaxed when everyone else was sharing too, I mean that part didn't hurt my body so much. Once we got into the more presenting/discussing part, I got more exhausted -- also, there's a point around one hour where I always suddenly lose all my energy. But have to push forward anyway -- that's always during the Q&A, and the Q&A is important, or it feels important to me. Things to think about, as I get ready to do more events.

A wonderful post about the book launch event on the LGBT Resources Blog of the San Francisco Public Library -- don't forget, if you're in the Bay Area, it's Valentine's Day, next Tuesday, 6 pm at the San Francisco Main Library!!!

2012-02-09T21:55:00.000-07:00

Well, of course. We’ve always been here, flipping through dusty page after page, trying to find representations of ourselves that were honest and unafraid. Before we went to the bars or took a peak in the bushes, we turned to books for inspiration and stimulation. The books we found were often filled with stereotypes or, even worse, bad writing. But we’ve kept coming back, and even today, when the Internet is supposed to make connecting so easy and online cruising has become so respectable (and horrible), we’re still searching the library for those revolutionary texts that are going to let us know that we are not alone, and give us the tools to challenge the status quo. And now, finally, a book that is not afraid to flaunt its faggotry in all its flaming glory

A great review in the New York Journal of Books!

2012-02-09T15:44:00.000-07:00

From its provocative title onward, Why Are Faggots So Afraid of Faggots? is the sort of book that confronts its reader and makes demands of him. It asks him, for at least a moment, to open his eyes and see the world from the point of view of the authors of any of the 29 essays collected here, and in doing so risk being offended, angered, saddened, entertained, pushed, throttled, frightened, confused—or all of these things at once.

Why Are Faggots So Afraid of Faggots? comes at the reader like a sudden slap, a sucker punch; it holds nothing back. It is a collection in which the individual life experiences of the authors become, in the reading of them, universal, in that they have the power to move, to communicate, and to educate anyone experiencing them.

What the reader will not experience in reading this volume of well written, passionate, even hectoring essays is boredom. For each of these essays represents terra incognita, an unknown realm ripe for discovery.

Read the rest here

Wait -- I was so excited about getting a photo shoot on this corner but then dammit it got painted over -- please, homophobic graffiti artiste, please return so I can get my glamour points, okay?

2012-02-09T12:20:00.000-07:00

Yay -- Emerson Whitney's interview about Why Are Faggots So Afraid of Faggots heads over to the Huffington Post -- I'm sure the comments will get, um, interesting...

2012-02-08T15:00:00.000-07:00

Here it is...

Yay -- the official San Francisco book launch is coming up next Tuesday -- Valentine's Day, indeed!

2012-02-07T15:42:00.000-07:00

The romantic details:

THE BIG BOOK LAUNCH
Valentine's Day 2012 – Tuesday, February 14, 6 pm
San Francisco Main Library
100 Larkin St
San Francisco, CA
A delicious discussion with contributors Jaime Cortez, Tommi Avicolli Mecca, Debanuj DasGupta, Booh Edouardo, Eric Stanley, Harris Kornstein, Gina de Vries, Horehound Stillpoint, Matthew D. Blanchard, and your lovely host Mattilda Bernstein Sycamore

And yes, the Facebook invite

Please tell the world!!!

A pretty good day

2012-02-07T14:59:00.000-07:00

As soon as my doctor's appointment is careful, I feel better. I mean: my sleep was so awful last night, it just seemed too overwhelming to go to a two-hour doctor’s appointment to talk about how awful I feel, trying to feel better. I scheduled the appointment a month or so ago and it was hard to get, supposedly the doctor will have more information about heavy metal toxicity, but hopefully I'll get that information another day.

Today I just want to rest. It's a good day for resting -- cloudy and cool, better without plans. Although, I called my new feldenkrais practitioner, just in case he was available, and he is -- now I just have to decide whether I want to go in. I guess I do. Maybe that will help the pain between my shoulders. I just did a breathing lesson, and that did calm me. I thought maybe I would go to that weird thrift store on the upper Polk, to see if they have some cute blouse/vest-type things to wear for my events. I realize that the ones I usually wear actually hurt my body because they squeeze too much and are too short really, then I hold everything up and it hurts so I guess I only have one special outfit with me that doesn't hurt, definitely need a few more. Okay, I'll go there first, then to get some produce down the street, and then to feldenkrais. That sounds like a pretty good day.

A great review in Richard Labonte's syndicated "Book Marks" column, including a lovely excerpt from my intro at the bottom -- thanks, Richard!

2012-02-06T21:31:00.001-07:00

"29 visceral essays celebrating defiant nonconformity and subversive flamboyance – writing that afflicts the gay mainstream while comforting the outcast rebels, fierce queens and gender-redefining queers who birthed Queer Lib but are now forsaken by it"

The second breath

2012-02-06T14:42:00.000-07:00

I can't sleep here; my life is a mess. Lying in bed every night so far at 5 am wired to all hell. Before I got to San Francisco I was sleeping; I need my sleep in San Francisco. I wake up into headache and gloom, but then somehow on the fire escape something shifts -- this is the second time today of the fire escape, and I'm doing my morning meditation scanning the horizon away from the sun, which means towards the wall of this building and there’s that brick building next door, all the colors of red and gray and black and putty, turn more and the blue sky, that triangular shadow I remember from my other view, the one from my apartment before and then back across the wall of this building, sunny shadows of fire escape ladder and maybe the air is okay, soft even if it still smells like fabric softener on the second breath.

A wonderful write-up on Why Are Faggots So Afraid of Faggots over at Wild Gender...

2012-02-06T14:28:00.002-07:00

Here it is...

A review of Why Are Faggots So Afraid of Faggots in the national UK gay glossy magazine Gay Times! (thanks to Andy for the photo)

2012-02-05T21:58:00.002-07:00

Softness

2012-02-05T21:56:00.000-07:00

After feldenkrais, I'm walking down Market Street and I notice the arches of my feet hurt -- I haven't felt that in a while, and I realize it's from walking on so much cement, asphalt, hard flat surfaces and I start to miss my walks down dirt alleys in Santa Fe. I guess that's one thing that helped -- this particular pain went away, used to hurt me especially whenever I walked downhill, happens a lot in San Francisco. And the air: it's disgusting. Even when I got to the top of Nob Hill, where I always felt the air was so fresh, yes it’s moist and blowing in from the bay, but still there’s that underlying smell of car exhaust -- I guess I'll have to get used to that again. It's not like the fresh air and Santa Fe helped me in any meaningful way, but my eyes did get used to looking at everything in a different way, softer, the sky a part of what’s down here.

I guess it is pretty here when I let my eyes roll over the sun onto buildings, oh there’s the blue sky and even the moon, the views of hills and the downtown skyline. Noe Valley, a neighborhood I've always hated because of its cultural hideousness -- affluent and trendy straight couples, babies everywhere, retired New Agers -- not a good combination. But it is beautiful -- all these neighborhoods are beautiful, but so gross in their varieties of class striving and that's why the Tenderloin was the neighborhood I liked the best. Still like the best, even if one thing I notice about San Francisco everywhere is the fashion consciousness -- aviator and wayfarer sunglasses everywhere, nerd chic, an endless variety of ‘70s and ‘80s tragedies. Preppy with facial hair in all different varieties -- just back from the mall; just back from Paris; just back from the sex club. That one at Whole Foods is pretty cute -- the kind of form-fitting khakis that probably cost $300, a blue button-down shirt fitting just right, another $300, trim facial hair, smooth hairstyle that emphasizes a softness. That's what I'm attracted to: the softness. At least in this case.

Nerd chic also comes in all different varieties: grade school with the big glasses and cobalt blue leggings; those square Gucci black glasses on the high preppy fashion types; the oversized ‘70s glasses on the fashionistas and everyone else really, trickle down trickle up it's all fashion -- interesting to study, and not interesting. But what about doorman nerd, pompous preppy nerd, punk nerd, serial killer nerd, nerd diva -- and, of course, old-school briefcase nerd!

To get ready

2012-02-04T13:26:00.000-07:00

First impression, driving into San Francisco from the train station at night and yes, in spite of the grossness of what all the buildings represent, this skyline has gotten more attractive. Nearing Glen Park and we aren't even in the city yet really, and I'm noticing that every space is taken, little houses and apartment buildings squashed right against one another, no space left. I'm starting at Katia's house for the first night, when I go on a walk the air feels so fresh, views from every corner because every corner is another hill. When I wake up, there's a garden in the back and I step onto the deck moist from the morning fog or maybe this is a drizzle, whatever it is I love it.

This is a different San Francisco, not the one I ever lived in. After 10 pm there's no one out on the street; even in the middle of the day it's almost quiet. But then I'm back to the San Francisco that's familiar, a sublet on the same block where I used to live. Walking around, I don't really find it pretty anymore -- yes, there's amazing graffiti; yes, there are a lot of interesting people to look at; but also I notice that the only trees look stuck, and there’s that thing about no space between buildings again, somehow now that seems strange. The air is disgusting -- car exhaust and laundry detergent, even in my seventh floor apartment. Especially in my seventh floor apartment.

That same view that I used to love so much -- now I'm not sure. Yes, I can see far away, but even when it's quiet there are kids screaming on some rooftop playground, police sirens, trash chutes, someone yelling, pounding of metal against metal in the distance, closer now. But, it's amazing how I can go outside and find what I need, I mean I know where in the neighborhood or at least nearby to go to get drain strainers, probiotics, a soap dispenser, toilet paper, water, a replacement for one of my favorite CDs that got scratched up when it got stuck in my stereo.

Familiarity: I haven't gotten to the top of the hill yet, where I know the air is fresher, coming in from the bay. Donna, the feldenkrais practitioner who I planned appointments with a few months in advance, to save me from falling too far, calls to cancel all the appointments. They installed six smart meters in front of her door, and the radiation from the meters or whatever it is made her so sick that she has to leave the city for a month to figure out what she's going to do. This world that we live in can be so hideous, so heartless in the details, relentless in its pursuit of poison, poison at any cost, poison me and now I need to find another feldenkrais practitioner, so much for advance planning to take care of myself.

I do like this apartment -- except for the fabric softener and car exhaust and smoke and tandoori ovens in the air. I climb out on the fire escape just like in the old days, good or bad I'm not sure but at least I have sun. There's a sun deck on the roof here, but I started to get paranoid about the building manager seeing me out there and I'm guessing he doesn't know I'm subletting, right? Not sure if I should ask the person I'm subletting from or just avoid the roof, the fire escape is more convenient anyway, right? Reminds me that I need some sort of place to sit in the sun in my apartment in Seattle.

Oh, did I mention this headache? This headache. This headache, this head, ache. I did find a feldenkrais practitioner, not just in between these paragraphs but before really, I mean there are a lot in San Francisco but some of them don't call you back and most of them are hard to get to, so hard that I wonder whether the struggle to get there and back cancels out the positive effects. This one is in walking distance, even though I think he just finished his training. I'm going this evening, that's pretty exciting.

Oh, and my sleep -- suddenly it's worse: all wired in the middle of the night, what a mess. Makes me think it's something about the electrical grid or cellphone towers, everything concentrated together downtown because otherwise my sleep has been kind of okay on this trip, saves me from complete catastrophe but now. But now. But now hopefully it's about to get better.

Yes, sitting at the computer ruins my life, that's another thing I notice. But I need to sit at the computer. In a week or two I'll probably be used to San Francisco, maybe sooner even, but I'm starting to think that Seattle will be a good balance for me now -- a balance between the convenience and excitement of the city, and the calm that I need. Better air quality -- that's for sure, I'm going to love the air when I arrive. And, maybe I don't need a view of the skyline, that's what I'm wondering -- a mountain view might be even better. Funny, right when I wrote that I started to miss the city. Here I can see the San Bruno Mountains that used to amaze me, but now they just look like nothing. In comparison to what I used to see. The light glitters off all the car windshields on Potrero Hill in the distance and I'm not sure whether I think it's pretty but then the light starts to soften, the sky gets misty and I watch the pigeons and seagulls on the tops of buildings: maybe this is pretty, just let my eyes relax and see it.

I'm so glad I'm here for a month, time to maybe recover in one place, at least in some ways. And then more travel, I'm already sick of the travel. Sick from the travel. Not sick -- worn out. Sometimes hopeless. Too much pain. When I get to Seattle I will rest, yes, rest. Although I guess first I need to find an apartment. My neck hurts -- my back, jaw, head, shoulders. Time to do some feldenkrais, to get ready for feldenkrais.

Arriving at Katia's for my first night in San Francisco, a different San Francisco than the one I know best...

2012-02-03T17:09:00.001-07:00

Honesty in a place of pain

2012-02-02T17:54:00.000-07:00

One more time at the beach and I want to savor it, this feeling under my feet, chilly air and then the water, not as chilly as I thought, so soothing the water that little kid feeling yes that little kid feeling yes. I wasn't planning on bringing the computer out on the train, but then they advertised WiFi in the parlor car -- really, WiFi in the parlor car? No, not really. But now I have the computer out.

Thinking about this sinus headache in the recycled air. Thinking about traveling and how it destroys me. Thinking about why. Why? I just want to go home. I don't have a home.

Soon, San Francisco. I'm not looking forward to San Francisco -- a month in San Francisco, what will that feel like? Will it feel like home? I don't have a home. Not now. When?

A month in San Francisco, Davka asked if it felt haunted. I'm not sure yet. I mean I'm sure, but I'm not sure what it will feel like. Staying on the same block where I used to live, a sublet. I did like that block: where I used to live, it felt like home, at least in my apartment, or sitting on the fire escape in the sun.

A relationship with the clouds, that's what I'm developing. What I developed in Santa Fe: hopefully this will help in Seattle. On that fire escape in San Francisco I used to watch the clouds too, so it started before, before Santa Fe. On the beach in Santa Barbara, watching the sky blend with water blend with clouds and then I'm gone, on the train, moving too slowly towards a place where I don't even want to be really. Maybe after I rest? What does that feel like -- rest?

Actually I slept well in Santa Barbara, but every time I check in and think how do I feel: sadness. Sometimes relaxed and sad, those are the good moments. Not usually. Travel: but then the train station with Davka, you see how travel can bring you to these people. To you. To me. To us.

I want to dream, but I am traveling. Travel is the place for dreams, like when the train starts and we are on a cliff overlooking the ocean and suddenly I don't feel so awful. For a few minutes. And then. I feel awful.

Davka says such beautiful things -- about me, about my work, about honesty in a place of pain and I am hopeful. I want to be hopeful. I try to be hopeful. Sometimes I am not hopeful. Davka and I take pictures -- the two of us together, some of them I don't like and some of them she doesn't like and some of them neither of us likes so we delete most of them but now I'm hoping that I still like the one that we liked. The most.

Maybe that's part of the train starting, on a cliff overlooking the ocean and honesty in a place of pain but suddenly everything brightens. And then it's gone.

A great review of Why Are Faggots So Afraid of Faggots in 2B Magazine...

2012-02-01T15:16:00.000-07:00

Here it is...

Santa Barbara, in case you were curious...

2012-01-30T22:02:00.002-07:00

Sand under my feet

2012-01-30T16:02:00.000-07:00

Waking up into that terrible sinus headache familiarity which means I guess it went away for a while, since the summer maybe, but now, now will it ever? Go away. Rushing out of bed for diarrhea -- oh, I need a vacation from this vacation. Outside, someone’s smoking in the designated smoking area, help -- that's where I wanted to sit in the sun to welcome the day, but then I realize oh, I'll just walk to the beach -- shorts and a hat, nothing else, not even contact lenses and as soon as my feet touched the sand I'm somewhere else, I mean here.

Everything looks more beautiful than yesterday -- sure, muted because of my vision and maybe that makes it all softer too. I did this in San Dimas too -- went on a walk without my contact lenses in. Actually it's kind of fun. As long as no one tells me they want to kill me, it's always important to know where the threats are coming from.

Oh, the beach -- I wish I could live on the beach. I've gone through in my head, but no, I don't think there are any beach towns that are culturally bearable really. It's always been my ideal space, though -- and then I moved to the desert: plenty of sand.

Santa Barbara doesn't seem as tacky as yesterday -- in Santa Fe, everything is fake too, but it tricks you with the weirdness and wildness. Here it's all Spanish colonial palm tree California capture. Somehow there are still too porn shops, though. In one the employee is an unfriendly woman who looks at you like you’re trash, and the wrong men in a dank hallway smelling of smoke with a sign that says no smoking, big rooms too where you could fit 10 people comfortably, but not these 10 people, please. At the next one, there's a friendly guy working, flirting with a girl who acts like she's never been in a porn shop, but no one else. You can walk out the back, or the front.

On the main strip: sports bars and places that look like they sell vintage clothes but actually it's just costumes -- flashy facades, cheap interiors. Or, cheap facades, flashy interiors -- what's the difference, really? The air is thick with the highway nearby, actually now I'm walking underneath it, and even when I get to the beach everything still feels clogged.

But then there’s today -- this is after State Street, fog or clouds rolling in and I need to get back to the beach, get as much sand under my feet as possible, while I'm here.

The best part

2012-01-29T22:06:00.000-07:00

Now I know why I don't eat canned beans -- because they taste like a can. Doesn't matter how long you cook them -- it's been three hours with these adzuki beans -- forget it, time to cook the dried mung beans. The fluorescent lights in this hotel room -- ground-level, facing a parking lot: you get the point. I can see the neon sign of the Lowe’s, that's my view.

But then there are the train tracks, behind the hotel and that's where I'm walking, shirt off in the sun it’s just me on the side of the tracks, wrong side which means the right side, whatever side I'm on -- gravel and dirt that feels like sand and for a while I wonder why, nowhere near the beach I mean probably 50 or 60 miles, right? But then I remember: this was desert, before it became farmland feeding and draining the whole country. Gravel and dirt that feels like sand in my body in the sun, suddenly there’s desire too and I'm touching my skin, a hard-on even and I wonder about jerking off here on the side of the tracks where jerking off was meant to be but then I'm tired again and back in fluorescents.

Sundays in San Dimas, sung in my head over and over to the tune of Sundays in Savannah, one of Nina Simone's most beautiful songs, even if it is about church. Even if I won't be in San Dimas on a Sunday, I do understand these towns more, after Santa Fe -- you look up at the mountains, past strip mall hell, and you wonder. Back on the train tracks, maybe it's the next day or maybe it was earlier, I watch someone scale the wall behind Lowe's, climb up to her bike, sunglasses half on and half off and she waits a full minute or two to catch her breath is what I'm thinking, catch her breath from whatever she’s obtained in the best way possible, before riding off.

The Claremont event is fantastic, soothing actually – yes the space is gorgeous and I am relaxed, but more than that it's about the way the audience is breathing and laughing and learning with me, that's what I'm feeling anyway, especially afterwards at the reception, where people come up to get their books signed and tell me stories about my work, their work, to dream about public sex spaces and spaces for the intimacies we all crave and that's what I feel somehow, these intimacies.

Oh, the air conditioning on the train -- yes, I wish I left that car with all the air conditioning and my head, today, my head, but also there’s the exhaustion, my head, today my goal is to go to the beach, feet in the sand, sun on my body and that I already did but yes I need more except my head: so hard to feel anything like pleasure, this exhausted, this drained, the train, even with the ocean on my feet, soft wet sand, now I will lie down.

Wait: not just air conditioning, but the horrible toxic floral scent in the bed, why the bad why I should have run into one of those department stores Davka and I drove by and bought a new bottom sheet I mean I thought of that, but then I thought no, that's not something I need, is it? It is. It was. It will be.

I mean I travel with a top sheet, for that exact reason, and who knows if just getting rid of the bottom sheet would have gotten rid of the horrible toxic floral scent anyway, didn't I ask about that ahead of time? I must have, right? But let's get back to the beach: the second time is more exciting somehow, turning the corner and there are the mountains. Yes, an endless row of hideous palm trees too and straight people playing volleyball, soccer, golden purse swing-about, someone whistles at me but still, the rocks in the wet sand and my feet in the water oh my feet in the water I didn't realize that would be the best part.

San Dimas...

2012-01-27T14:53:00.000-07:00

Goodbye LA...

2012-01-26T14:11:00.001-07:00

Well, I went up here to see the view, and look, look...

2012-01-25T16:34:00.001-07:00

Oh, but the award for the question of the evening last night at USC goes to...

2012-01-24T21:10:00.000-07:00

When did it become so heartless?

Oh, by -- what a good question!!!!

A video surprise (for me, at least) over at Wild Gender...

2012-01-24T16:11:00.000-07:00

Imagine my surprise when I clicked play on this video over at Wild Gender, and realized wait -- that's my voice! Remixed from the interview on Uprising Radio from just the other day, I love it...

Fresher

2012-01-24T14:41:00.001-07:00

In LA, people apologize about the weather: sorry it's raining! But the rain rain rain, I love the rain, what could be better in LA? Especially on this cold day where I can wear my red wool coat, hat and two scarves, and walk outside on Hollywood Boulevard and the air actually feels kind of fresh -- there's no one on the street except a few people with umbrellas, it seems like so long ago when I could use an umbrella, I mean when it wouldn't hurt my hands too much -- 11 years I guess, but now I'm used to the hat strategy, and I wonder if Seattle will actually turn out well -- I'll have to get some more rain hats to go with these sun hat collection, maybe it will be fun.

Of course, eight or nine months of rain is different than a few hours, way way different, but still that freshness. Darker too, way up north in Seattle, I mean here at noon in the rain it's still kind of light, not as light as in Santa Fe I mean I don't need sunglasses. But way way lighter than Seattle, that's for sure, but still this freshness, way way fresher in Seattle of course I mean here the next day after two days of rain the air is already gross, clear to see things in the distance but nothing much to breathe. I guess the fresh air didn't work too well in Santa Fe, right? But what about the fresh air in Seattle?

Intimate and intoxicating

2012-01-23T11:09:00.000-07:00

It's funny -- with my Santa Fe reading, I arrived right as it started, so I avoided that edgy nervousness that always happens when I arrive early, can't relax my body, can't really talk about anything, keep rushing to the bathroom to shit. I don't know what it is really -- I'm not worried that I'll fuck up, really, so what is it exactly? Maybe I am worried that I'll fuck up, somewhere deep down that's very physical, instinctual or something -- I know I worry about whether people will show up, whether it will be packed, that sort of thing.

People do show up, it's a great crowd, really varied, and they actually sell out the book again -- two in a row, this doesn't usually happen. I also have to say that I'm really excited that fags are showing up -- I was a little worried that I would be on tour for this book called Why Are Faggots So Afraid of Faggots?, and there wouldn't be any faggots in the room -- since, for my last book tour, the audience was overwhelmingly dykes, queer women, trans guys, people on the transmasculine spectrum, and then a few fags thrown in for good measure -- which makes sense because my politics come from those cultures. But this book, of course is for fags -- for everyone else too, but especially for fags -- and so I might get kind of depressed if there weren't fags in the audience. Thankfully, that hasn't been the case -- I think press coverage really helps to bring gay men out for the events. One person wrote to me about driving in his car from Cathedral City to LA, hearing me on the radio at heading right over to Stories to buy a copy. Someone else in the audience last night told me how he was in the Gay Liberation Front in LA in the '70s, and he heard me on the radio and thought yes, this is what I've been thinking for all these years and finally someone is saying it!

And then all my friends, writing colleagues, my sister, people who have read my books in college, younger and older queers rounding out the audience to make it intimate and intoxicating at once. The store had a great microphone also -- that's certainly not always the case. I wish wish wish, though, that they had a podium of some sort -- without one, ended up holding the book with my hands for way too long oh no pain pain pain pain pain but I have my feldenkrais CDs, listened to one last night right before bed and I think that really helped. For some reason, whenever I call feldenkrais practitioners in LA, they don't call me back. I would love to see one, that's for sure, but I guess for now I'll stick with my CDs, and hope that I can avoid a pain catastrophe.

I have another event today, and then I go to Claremont later in the week -- here are the details for the next two events:

University of Southern California
VCK 100
Monday, January 23, 5 pm
Los Angeles, CA

Claremont Colleges
Scripps College, Balch Auditorium
Thursday, January 26
7 pm doors, 7:30 pm talk
Reception and book signing to follow in the Hampton Room above Scripps Dining Hall
Claremont, CA

Oh -- and, apparently there's been a bit of controversy at USC about my use of the word faggot -- I wonder what will transpire...

Sea level

2012-01-22T14:34:00.000-07:00

Leaving Santa Fe, I think about how I will miss the clouds, and how people will not understand what the hell I'm talking about because of course it's cloudy all the time in Seattle, right? Sea level: what will that feel like? Why a stomach ache almost immediately after I get on the train, the desert flowing into night and, to tell you the truth, I actually sleep better on the train than I do in general, if only they could leave me alone for another two hours I might actually feel good, or something.

Except for my sinuses, right? All that recycled air and then there’s what they call air in LA, which actually is much much better than usual because of the rain yes rain, but still, it is LA. On a side street everything can feel kind of calming, fresh almost in the rotting suburban urban way that is LA, all these weird things growing and how? Birds chirping and why? But still.

I settle into this apartment where I'm staying, convenient and comfortable almost like my own place I mean it is my own place while I'm in LA, but then there's this pain in my sinuses, pressure in my head, is this the pressure of my sinuses or the pressure of sea level, dizziness, sudden confusion when everything rushes around me and I look up at the sky to see what it is, yes it looks like sky, different, not as dramatic, the sunset happens so fast you can miss it, the apartment buildings alternate between rundown and overpriced, and upscale and more overpriced and actually it's kind of quiet too you when you're not on one of the thoroughfares with cars zooming into my head at that sudden burst of pollution overload and I wonder about the train, or actually when we stopped in Albuquerque and this guy in tie-dyed shirt with big curly hair came up to me and asked: are you tripping, you must be tripping.

Projection: we all do it. It's funny how that walk through Albuquerque surprised me more than LA -- skateboarders, someone kicking a soccer ball, homophobic snickering at the bus station, what are all these people doing out? I mean Albuquerque is pretty abandoned for a so-called big city, but still a city and then I came here, driving crosstown with Campbell, driving driving driving which was actually kind of interesting because I could sense the sprawling geography at the different way, I don't think I could ever relate to it really because I don't relate to sprawl, but it started to feel more familiar, rundown stripmalls blending into opulence. People on the street: curiosity and disdain. A nice comment here and there. Somewhat surprisingly friendly; somewhat predictably snotty; someone surprisingly snotty -- somewhat predictably -- no, friendliness is never predictable, unfortunately.

Yes, more rain, I think, did it rain again last night? A construction drill outside, but then it stops. Looking out the windows at these impossibly wild palm trees, walking around and seeing those evergreen hedges that grow so tall and skinny, how? And then you turn on the street suddenly so wide, palm trees arranged like sticks on the sidelines and there’s a dieting store called Organic Liaison. Kirstie Alley started it.

Back on the train, the guy with the big hair remembers my name, comes up to me in the lounge car: hey Mattilda! Tells me about this drunken guy who was bothering him, and the conductor called the cops and had him thrown off the train. But then this guy’s stuff disappeared -- the conductor said it was the drunk guy who stole it, mostly this guy was worried about his hat, sentimental attachment. So he called the cops to ask about it -- no, they said, there wasn't any hat. When this guy confronted the conductor, the conductor said are you calling me a liar? I'll kick you off this train.

Sea level: are we there yet?

And then when I wake up, can you believe it -- yes yes it's rain rain raining -- thank you, LA, for bringing me some rain to clear out their air for a little bit, thank you!

2012-01-21T21:45:00.000-07:00

Arrival in LA...

2012-01-21T15:10:00.000-07:00

On the way...

2012-01-21T14:47:00.000-07:00

A quick walk through Albuquerque, and yes, this building, yes!

2012-01-21T12:35:00.000-07:00

A great interview from today's Uprising Radio on KPFK-LA!

2012-01-20T21:32:00.002-07:00

Here it is -- and, if you're in LA, don't forget my reading on Sunday:

Stories Books and Cafe, Echo Park
Sunday, January 22, 6:30 pm
1716 West Sunset Boulevard
Los Angeles, CA 90026-3225
(213) 413-3733

As I get ready to leave...

2012-01-18T20:36:00.000-07:00

For some reason I wrote this down months ago from a movie I didn't like that much...

2012-01-17T19:04:00.000-07:00

Except for the final scene where this is the conversation that happens between mother and daughter, and suddenly it was incredible the way the mother who paid no attention to the daughter suddenly heard her and said the right things -- oh, the movie was/is Tiny Furniture...

I had sex with him
In this house?
No.
At his house?
No, he has a girlfriend.
On the street?
No, worse.
What’s worse than the street?
Inside a pipe on the street.
Were you cold?
No.
Did you use protection?
No.
I want you to take care of yourself.

Do you hear that sound?
Yes, it’s the alarm clock.
Can you do something about it?

I moved it in the other room
I can still hear it.
But not as much, right?

And, the Why Are Faggots So Afraid of Faggots tour information – updated for your viewing pleasure – please spread the word…

2012-01-16T11:02:00.000-07:00

Prepublication launch party (books will be available almost a month early!)
Sunday, January 15, 2 pm
op cit books
930C Baca Street (next door to Counter Culture Cafe)
Santa Fe, NM 87501
www.opcit.com
(505) 428-0321
http://www.facebook.com/events/139120089533419/

Stories Books and Cafe, Echo Park
Sunday, January 22, 6:30 pm
1716 West Sunset Boulevard
Los Angeles, CA 90026-3225
www.storiesla.com
(213) 413-3733
http://www.facebook.com/events/348593838486877/

University of Southern California
Monday, January 23, 5 pm
Los Angeles, CA

Claremont Colleges
Scripps College, Balch Auditorium
Thursday, January 26
7 pm doors, 7:30 pm talk
Reception and book signing to follow in the Hampton Room above Scripps Dining Hall
Claremont, CA
Friday, January 27 publishing conversation
Pomona College, Queer Resource Center, 3 pm
Snacks provided
Pomona, CA

University of San Francisco
Wednesday, February 8, 5 pm
University Center (UC) 4th Floor Lounge
San Francisco, CA

THE BIG BOOK LAUNCH
Valentine's Day 2012 – Tuesday, February 14, 6 pm
(come early for heart-shaped refreshments)
San Francisco Main Library
1100 Larkin St
San Francisco, CA
A delicious discussion with contributors Jaime Cortez, Tommi Avicolli Mecca, Debanuj DasGupta, Booh Edouardo, Eric Stanley, Harris Kornstein, Gina de Vries, Horehound Stillpoint, Matthew D. Blanchard, and your lovely host Mattilda Bernstein Sycamore

City Lights Bookstore
Wednesday, February 15, 7 pm
261 Columbus Ave. at Broadway
San Francisco, CA
(415) 362-8193
www.citylights.com
with contributors Debanuj DasGupta, Harris Kornstein, Booh Edouardo and Gina de Vries

GLBT History Museum
A Panel on the Past, Present and Future of Public Sex
Celebrating the release of Why Are Faggots So Afraid of Faggots?
Thursday, February 16, 7 pm
4127 18th St.
San Francisco, CA 94114
(415) 621-1107
www.glbthistory.org/museum/
with contributors Jaime Cortez, Debanuj DasGupta, Tommi Avicolli Mecca, and Horehound Stillpoint – hosted and facilitated by Mattilda Bernstein Sycamore
$5-10 requested donation, no one turned away for lack of funds

Pegasus Books Downtown
Monday, February 20, 7:30 pm
2349 Shattuck Avenue
Berkeley, CA 94704-1552
(510) 649-1320
www.pegasusbookstore.com
with Tommi Avicolli Mecca, Horehound Stillpoint, Matthew D. Blanchard, and Jaime Cortez

Sonoma State University
Stevenson 1002
Thursday, February 23, Noon
Rohnert Park, CA

RADAR Book Club featuring Mx Justin Vivian Bond & Mattilda Bernstein Sycamore
Hosted by Michelle Tea
Saturday, February 25
Viracocha
998 Valencia St.
San Francisco, CA 94110
$10, Doors 2:30/ Show at 3
Limited seating. Advance tickets will be available
Books available for sale courtesy of Modern Times
www.radarproductions.org

University of Oregon
Thursday, March 1
Eugene, OR

Powell's on Hawthorne
Monday, March 5, 7:30 pm
3723 SE Hawthorne Blvd.
Portland, OR 97214
(503) 228-4651
with contributors Ezra RedEagle Whitman and Willow Aerin Fagan
www.powells.com

Olympia Timberland Library
Wednesday, March 7, 7:30 pm
313 8th Ave SE
Olympia, WA 98501
(360) 352-0595

Evergreen State College
Thursday, March 8
Olympia, WA

Little Sisters
Wednesday, March 14, 7pm
1238 Davie Street
Vancouver, BC
(604) 669-1753
www.littlesisters.ca

Elliott Bay Book Company
Tuesday, March 20, 7 pm
1521 Tenth Avenue
Seattle WA 98122
(206) 624-6600
www.elliottbaybay.com
with contributor Booh Edouardo

University of Washington
Monday, March 26, 6 pm
Allen Auditorium, North Allen Library
Seattle, WA

Thank you again, Santa Fe!

2012-01-16T10:56:00.000-07:00

What an incredible reading in Santa Fe last night – the store was packed, and such an amazing variety of people. Dana and I arrived right at 2 pm and the parking lot was filled so we had to go across the street, but that parking lot was filled too. When we went inside, everyone was sitting patiently waiting – I couldn't believe it, usually no one shows up on time to readings!

It was so great to the see my close friends in Santa Fe, a few friends from Albuquerque, some acquaintances, a few people from Occupy Santa Fe, a few people I'd seen around, a few from the Gay Men's Discussion Group, and then plenty of people I'd never seen before – the questions were great, and the discussion inspiring. And then, so many people came up to say hello, and bought books – I always like those one-on-one conversations too, and especially the anecdotes, like Sheridan who bought the book for her closeted ex-husband who didn't support his gay son. Or, Jerry, the person who started the Gay Men's Discussion Group, who bought a copy for himself, one for his lesbian daughter and her lover, and a third for his straight son.

So many more stories – and, such a beautiful store, the light streaming in during the day – everything felt supportive and intimate and explosive – thank you, Santa Fe!

And, I know that op cit only has a few copies of the book left at the moment, but they will definitely be getting in more soon so do support the store! And, I've heard that Collected Works ordered a few copies, so if you're in Santa Fe then that would be another place to go until op cit gets more in…

The reading in Santa Fe was AMAZING – thank you thank you thank you!!!

2012-01-15T18:54:00.003-07:00

Something bombastic

2012-01-15T10:47:00.002-07:00

Classic: I sat down at the computer to write this wide-ranging and flowing, bustling and booming – bombastic, even – maybe even bombastic piece about media and gender and explosion, but then. But then all the energy was gone. Is gone. Just this cloudy head, thinking where, where did it go?

Or even: what was that? I mean, I woke up excited, excited about this prepublication book launch today – Santa Fe, better show up at 2 pm at op cit books next door to Counter Culture, okay? So I want to hold on to that excitement – so often people ask me if I'm excited, and the truth is that I'm not. I mean I'm too exhausted, too exhausted to be excited.

So I woke up today thinking yes, this work is important – I'm excited. And now it's gone. I want to hold on to it, but it's gone. Maybe I can bring it back. I mean I know I'll bring it back at the launch, but I want it to be something that builds and doesn't just crash. Something that flows from energy and not just push. Something that holds me when I'm holding it, holding me holding it, holding and now I need to eat.

If you can't sleep, don't count sheep

2012-01-14T18:23:00.001-07:00

This might be one of the best quotes ever from a doctor – and you know there are a lot of good quotes out there, right? But, check this one out: "you're abusing my medical privilege." What do you think?

Well, actually, that didn't come from the doctor directly – one of her assistants called me to say that the doctor thought I was abusing her medical privilege, because I went in to get blood drawn for two tests, and when I got there she had three test kits out – what's that third one for, I asked. Testing for a bunch of chemicals in my body – she explained it, kind of. I wasn't sure I wanted it, but I said yes anyway. Then, after she had drawn my blood, she said I needed to pay ahead of time, which had never happened before – usually they just bill me. I hadn't brought any money or methods of payment – how much is it, I asked.

$700. For that one test. $700 – I don't want that test, I said. Definitely don't do that one. The other ones I know you can bill me for, because they're the same companies that we've used before.

Then, a few hours later, when I checked my voicemail, it turned out that the doctor had called my mother to tell her that I desperately needed this test. My mother does usually pay for my medical bills, but of course I didn't authorize the doctor to call her at all. She had no idea what the doctor was talking about.

And so, as you can tell, I was abusing the doctor's medical privilege.

I love that line – I really do. And, it came with a directive that, because I was abusing her medical privilege, I really didn't need to come in for my final appointment, she didn't want to see me ever again, I could just have my new doctor call her to fax the paperwork.

Right – that doesn't sound suspicious at all. I'm sure she wasn't the slightest bit worried that I might tell her that she hadn’t been of any use to me at all, that I feel worse than when we started, that her office is totally incompetent and disorganized and frantic and that's her responsibility, that half the time she doesn't even listen to me, that she’s smart and has a lot of information but she doesn't follow up on things – you have to keep reminding her, no matter what, and when you're there for a chronic health problem it's kind of annoying to keep reminding the doctor of what she's supposed to do, right?

Remember when she called in the wrong prescription, and it took me a week to figure it out? When she prescribed a drug that didn't actually exist, and the pharmacy was looking all over for it. When she kept asking me useful questions, like: do you think you would know what it would be like to feel better?

Do you think you would know what it would be like to feel better?

Do you think you would know what it would be like to feel better?

Or, on our last appointment, no before I was abusing her medical privilege I guess, the appointment before: do you think you can get better?

Oh, I'm sorry – I thought I was in a doctor's office. I thought you were trying to help me get better.

And, she even asked, eight months into seeing me: do you smoke? Really? Have you paid any attention to me at all? Do I smoke? Do you breathe?

I'm going to have to use that line, though – stop abusing my medical privilege, okay? It's almost as good as that sign outside a church that I've seen a few times, but every time it rings as true as the last – but, dammit, somehow I can't remember it exactly now – something like this:

DON'T COUNT SHEEP
WHEN YOU'RE TRYING TO GO TO SLEEP
TALK TO THE SHEPHERD

But better – I’ll have to go back there to get the exact wording – the ending I know was definitely that, because I kept thinking talk to the hand, right? No, honey – talk to the shepherd.

Oh, wait – I think I remember – here you go:

IF YOU CAN'T SLEEP
DON'T COUNT SHEEP
TALK TO THE SHEPHERD

Words to live by!

Somehow this storage space always feels kind of peaceful…

2012-01-12T19:24:00.000-07:00

Yay -- some love from the local media in Santa Fe…

2012-01-11T16:49:00.000-07:00

Perfect timing – the Santa Fe Reporter chose the prepublication book launch for Why Are Faggots So Afraid of Faggots as the pick of the week!!! The article includes a delicious half-page image of the glamorous cover – Santa Fe, I hope to see you this Sunday, 2 pm at op cit books -- spread the word...

A gift from my therapist at our last session – she made it in response to meeting me the first time!

2012-01-10T12:42:00.000-07:00

One of my favorite stories is in the new Best Gay Erotica…

2012-01-09T20:52:00.000-07:00

It's true -- my story is called "Before the Plane," and it's all about New York, New York, and New York (and cocksucking, of course). Details are here – and yes, that cover is a bit scary…

Yes, of course, I will miss the authentic adobe architecture…

2012-01-08T13:40:00.002-07:00

And, yes yes – an update on the glamorous mail art – the bachelor girl, indeed!

2012-01-08T11:19:00.000-07:00

Well, I certainly don't usually like Christmas wreaths of any type – but, well, this one is kind of cute…

2012-01-08T11:12:00.001-07:00

Ha -- what's yours?

2012-01-07T12:38:00.003-07:00

Another scary moment for "family reunification"

2012-01-06T11:34:00.001-07:00

The case of Jakadrien Turner, a 15-year-old US citizen deported to Colombia after a shoplifting arrest, is certainly horrifying, but it seems to me that this piece on Democracy Now misses a key point – by focusing on the argument that US citizens (or veterans) shouldn’t be deported to foreign countries, and making the argument for family reunification in the case of Turner, the fact that this teenager ran away from home, and even perhaps chose to be deported rather than returning to her birth family, gets lost in the picture. While it now seems that she will go back to her birth family, is this just another tragedy piled onto the whole hideous ordeal?

Time to get ready

2012-01-04T12:30:00.000-07:00

I wake up today with those little bumps on my hands, the ones I got from the dryness last year, that I've mostly avoided so far this year by slathering coconut oil and shea butter and an endless variety of salves on my hands. But then, suddenly, today, my hands are back to that place where anything I touch might injure me. Is the weather suddenly drier, or is this because of the homeopathic sulfur I took to help the bloating and the sores on my feet? I look up the humidity: 33%, that is a little lower than it has been recently, but not that low, right? Not like those horrible days of 8% or whatever.

Actually the air incredibly fresh – I don't know if I notice it more because it's been warmer out – in the 40s lately – so I can actually breathe deeply without my nose kind of freezing. Whatever it is, yes this is the air I came for – the air that hasn't done anything for me, I guess, unfortunately. But yes, it is amazingly fresh and soon I'm on the way to the doctor for a vitamin D shot and maybe some blood work, but why am I sweating so much in this chair? Two weeks, and I have to get everything packed – it's coming together, but now is the time when I start to feel frantic in my head I guess, will it all get done? What the hell am I doing? No, I know what I'm doing – I know I can't be here, that's for sure, I'm certainly not worried about that. Just the process, the process of getting away and then this book tour and then a move and then it looks like I'll be doing more traveling at the end of May and oh, I'm still waiting for that water test to come back, to see if that's where the thallium is coming from – first they said I didn't send enough water, then they lost the second sample, and I would say that it's northern New Mexico realness, but actually the lab is Illinois. Time to get ready for my walk to the doctor.

I almost moved into this apartment...

2012-01-04T10:46:00.001-07:00

Now, this is the best way to tell if it's real adobe…

2012-01-03T12:17:00.000-07:00

That window

2012-01-03T10:56:00.002-07:00

Okay, it's one of those days when I actually have energy – at least now, at the beginning of the day, before eating anything. Correction: I just ate nine cranberries. Maybe I should only eat cranberries. But, after 10 or 11, I would probably have a stomach ache.

Okay – back to energy: I actually have it, so I get kind of excited about all the exciting things that are going on in my life. Of course that sounds logical, but I rarely rarely feel that excitement. I just think oh, how the hell am I going to be able to do this, any of it – go on this book tour, move, find a new apartment, edit this new anthology.

Well, I'll admit it – now I'm feeling tired again. Let's just think about that energy, the light, the lightness in my head, the excitement. But now I'm thinking about going back to bed. Do you see how fast it fades? Still I have that window, I'll think about that window, as I start the rest of my day.

LA and Vancouver events for Why Are Faggots So Afraid of Faggots!!!

2012-01-01T20:20:00.000-07:00

Here they are – please spread the word…

Stories Books and Cafe, Echo Park
Sunday, January 22, 6:30 pm
1716 West Sunset Boulevard
Los Angeles, CA 90026-3225
213) 413-3733

Little Sisters
Wednesday, March 14, 7pm
1238 Davie Street
Vancouver, BC
(604) 669-1753

It's officially a new year – and so, time to make the official announcement that…

2012-01-01T13:13:00.001-07:00

I'm moving to Seattle!!!

My official/unofficial welcome party will be the Seattle book launch for Why Are Faggots So Afraid of Faggots:

Elliott Bay Book Company
Tuesday, March 20, 7 pm
1521 Tenth Avenue
Seattle WA 98122
(206) 624-6600

And, I'm officially looking for a one-month sublet starting March 16 – ideally on Capitol Hill near Pike/Pine, so I can find my "permanent" apartment nearby – any ideas, send them my way...

Oh – happy new year, if you think of such things in that way...

Without the way

2011-12-31T20:24:00.001-07:00

It’s these tiny things that play out in my head, like my mother keeps calling, leaves a message like we didn’t just talk a few days ago, it’s that urgency in her voice like she needs me to call. Tomorrow. But why? Why the urgency, why tomorrow? Doesn’t she realize that I'm moving in 18 days, that I'm planning my book tour and a new anthology and I don't even want to mention what else, I mean it would all be great if I just felt okay. Not amazing – just okay. I mean, amazing would be even better, but the truth is that I feel awful, nothing but awful, and then I leave a message from my mother saying happy new year, but please don't call me and tell me you need to talk to me unless there's a particular reason, I feel free to call anytime but tomorrow I don't think I'll be available.

And then I feel like I'm a horrible person – I mean I left that message so that I would feel better, but then I feel worse. And, talking to her: how it always leads to me feeling hopeless because of that place before words, that time before safety, the hopelessness before hope, the trap of the place where I grew up called home that just meant help, help me, there is no help, there will never be help, and this happens just from nothing, right? This feeling of. This feeling of. This feeling.

And then: like I need to call her back and cancel that, I mean I already tried but her voicemail didn't have that option: I couldn't re-record. I wanted to change the tone in my voice, so that I could say the same thing without. Without the way I'm really feeling.

The sky outside my window

2011-12-29T17:20:00.000-07:00

Before, there were words, and I was going to write them. Before there were words. There are words, but now I will write different ones, this headache. This exhaustion. I wrote exhaustion instead of the sea because the voice software wouldn’t type fatigue. The sea: the key.

Oh this is so annoying, even if poetic. The sound check failed – it always fails, for some reason, on this computer. Let's try it again: fatigue. The sea. The key.

Oh, that's much better, even if the sound check failed I mean I think it didn't really fail, for some reason it can't register success, or communicate it to me, all these difficulties. All these difficulties that started when there were words, and then there was just my head, trying to get those words back but remember I already gave up, focused on these other words. Focusing.

But, did I tell you about this guy outside my window – no, this guy. This guy. This guy. This guy. This guy. How do I get the computer to recognize the sky? Okay, it worked that time. The sky outside my window: violet a few moments ago.

Before I leave Santa Fe – a special advance launch for Why Are Faggots So Afraid of Faggots!!!

2011-12-27T19:09:00.001-07:00

That's right – come see me read in Santa Fe for the first time – and, bid me goodbye as I prepare my departure: two-in-one, what more could you ask for?

Oh, I know – that the book will be available at this event before anywhere else (a month before the publication date) – it's true! An event not to be missed – here are the details:

Prepublication launch party for Why Are Faggots So Afraid of Faggots!!!
Sunday, January 15, 2 pm
op cit books
930C Baca Street
next door to Counter Culture Cafe)
Santa Fe, NM 87501
(505) 428-0321

Please spread the word far and wide – and, if you're a fan of Facebook invites, here you go…

If you do it again

2011-12-27T10:58:00.000-07:00

And then the good song comes on: "if you do it again, I'm going to freak out." If you do it again. I'm going to freak. Out. The cold air outside, and I'm thinking let this wind blow it at all out of me – the pain, the exhaustion, the bloating, this sinking sad feeling I woke up with, the wondering if I'm dying, the wondering why no one seems to care about this thallium that’s in my tissues, the wondering why I keep seeing this doctor except desperation, that's it desperation, the desperation, I'm thinking let this wind blow it all away. But then it gets too cold, and I go back inside, wondering if I should get back in bed, but it's too cold, too cold in bed, or in that room at least – at night I like to go to sleep in a cold room but not now.

And then this song, the good song comes on, okay, maybe this is what Davka means about how hope emerges from my writing about feeling hopeless, that's not what she said exactly what I feel: hopeless. What I felt, when I woke up. What I feel, thinking about this thallium, what is it, does it matter? Can’t something get better? I'm leaving in something like 24 days; I wanted to feel better before I left, I mean at least better than this. But then there's the song, all the drumming at the end, all the drumming at the end, all the drumming and I need to eat but at least I have this song.

We look for what we can find – and, what we can't find…

2011-12-26T11:06:00.000-07:00

It's beginning to feel a lot like…

2011-12-25T21:12:00.000-07:00

Never too late

2011-12-24T17:05:00.002-07:00

Is it better to wake up in the middle of the night with horrible clenching pain, pain so bad that I can't find any way to lie down comfortably? Is it better to wake up in the middle of the night, sleep interrupted, ruined, destroyed, just waiting for another horrible day trying to feel like something is possible? Is it better to wake up in the middle of the night with all that pain, or to sleep through the night, and then wake up in the morning thinking maybe today is okay, I mean I’ve slept later and I feel awful, but at least I didn't wake up in the middle of the night, right?

Except then I get up, and there's all this pain, so I guess this was going on all night, right? I guess this is why I feel ruined anyway, destroyed, thinking about all the things I was going to accomplish today and maybe I'll still accomplish them, but I'll feel this awful. Hard to stand up because of the pain, hard to sit down, and then somehow I'm going to eat? And eat again. Yesterday as soon as I ate everything faded away: it was like my day was over, just like that. Today my day is already over, I mean even though it just started: what will happen when I eat today? Yesterday I asked Paul Pitchford if he had any ideas for the bloating, he said: you could stop eating.

Right: I could stop eating. Do you ever ask yourself that question: is it better to jump off a cliff, or fall? IT'S NEVER TOO LATE TO FIND THE RIGHT HOLIDAY GIFT. This guy wants to know if I'm tired in my dreams, a good question – somehow is comforting to realize that I'm not. Before I was looking at the maps of all the cities, somehow I was in Burma discovering the underground music that everyone knows about but doesn't say, you know – like, in the back of that store, late at night – but, what did it sound like?

Jingles and shingles – can you hear that? Yes, shingles, that's what the doctor thought the blisters on my toes looked like. What do you do for them, she asked. Oh, sorry – I thought I went to the doctor. You see – every day, I'm getting a little bit better. Someone else: have you thought of living in a smaller place? It was Heather actually, the therapist, she meant a smaller town because of the fresh air. But I'm already in the smaller place, because of the fresh air, and it didn't help it didn't help it didn't help it didn't HELP. I can only imagine what would happen if I went further out, waking up in the middle of the night and someone would be burning their trash on their front lawn.

And, can you imagine trying to get somewhere, anywhere? I shouldn’t say that I will never live in smaller place, but I can certainly say that it’s unlikely. I mean, I wouldn't mind a smaller place if everything was within a few blocks – theoretically, I mean – instead of the hideous sprawl that every smaller place has become. Maybe a bunch of tourist shit in the middle, but I don't even know where that thought came from – I'm not moving to a smaller place, that's for sure – give me a city, any city, now.

Or, soon – no, not any city – not the ones where the hideous sprawl connects with hideous sprawl connects with hideous sprawl, but IT'S NEVER TOO LATE TO FIND THE RIGHT HOLIDAY GIFT – if we were in New York, we could go to Macy’s together, right? Today I woke up thinking about the ultrasound, maybe I should do that ultrasound exam before I leave, just in case it reveals something. Supposedly my gut health is fine, did you hear that? From the tests, I mean. What would the ultrasound reveal?

Then I worry about cancer – don’t people wait too long to find out, and then that's where death comes in, right? Like my father – his cancer started in the gut. Not a good thought process in the morning, I just have to keep remembering that IT'S NEVER TOO LATE TO FIND THE RIGHT HOLIDAY GIFT – I'll go outside to try to find some fresh air, sit in the chilly sun looking towards the snow to see the brightness reflected but not directly into my eyes, it's later today, later than I would like, I mean later wouldn’t matter if I could just wake up feeling better and will that ever happen? Something's burning on the stove.

Alignment

2011-12-23T10:26:00.000-07:00

I do like getting up in the nines better than in the tens – and, maybe this switch in my homeopathic remedy is helping to lighten my head, give me a little more energy, lessen the bloating at least a little bit, make my sleep at least somewhat restful, can we hope for all this? What was the word from therapy? Because Heather was asking me what it would mean to feel better – you know, I wouldn't feel completely horrible all the time, right? I would wake up and feel rested. I would feel like all the care I take for myself – the way I eat, the way I rest, the projects I work on – that somehow something would make me feel okay, energetic, excited even – not just drive, everything guided by the goals I have and the push to survive, thrive even, but no matter what exciting things happen I still feel horrible because my body is so draining, always. Even the best moment is just a high for a minutes before the crash, disastrous crash, always disastrous, that's how I feel, like a disaster, or just barely averting disaster, always. And then: disaster.

But, what was the word? Oh – I remember: aligned. I want to feel aligned. Like, if I lie down to go to sleep and stay in bed for as long as feels possible, then I want to wake up feeling better, right? If I go outside to go on a relaxing walk, I want to feel relaxed. If I sit down to rest because I'm exhausted, I want to feel better from the rest. If I cook a delicious healthy meal, I want to feel calm and soothed and energized by it. If I decide to go to a movie or a performance or reading, I want to feel like it could possibly be fun, not just something I'm doing in light of the pain. When I give my own reading, I want to feel like that excitement, that engagement, that intimacy can last, and that I won't end up a catastrophe afterwards. Do you see what I mean? Alignment: I’ll have to keep thinking about it.

So soft and quiet that you don't even notice, until you open the door and -- look!!!

2011-12-23T10:25:00.000-07:00

Some amazing dream

2011-12-22T11:25:00.002-07:00

I wake up earlier than usual, and I can't tell if it's a good sign. It does mean that my sleep wasn't interrupted in a dramatic way, or it doesn't necessarily mean that, but in this case that happened to be true. Do I feel better? That's what I can't tell. So I close my eyes, to see if I need more, more of my eyes closed. And then I still can't tell, a half-hour or so goes by and then I force myself to get up.

Lethargy: that's what started to happen a few months ago, or maybe it was a few weeks? No – with the start of winter, that's what it was, less light, wanting to stay in bed more. Now I'm up earlier, and oh no – horrible horrible bloating, so much pain and I go outside in the cold to sit in the morning air and light anyway. Oh – it's snowing – those big chunky flakes that blow with the wind this time, into my face, so soft. And then the sun's out too, reflecting off the snow and I can pretend this is some amazing dream I mean I don't have to pretend, for a moment at least, because that's what it feels like.

Sadness and snow

2011-12-21T19:02:00.000-07:00

Oh, no – construction next door at some hideous time in the morning, why the fuck are they starting so early? At first it seems like an okay time to wake up, but then it's not, no not at all, and I start wondering about all the noise in bigger cities, what will it be like in Seattle? In the past I always thought of Seattle as quiet, but now I'm sure it will seem like total insanity, at least at first, although actually I'll be in San Francisco for a month beforehand, in a sublet on my old block, and that will definitely seem like insanity so maybe Seattle will feel calm.

I remember when I got to Denver, and I couldn't believe how many people were out of the street – I couldn't figure out if there were actually a lot of people out of the street, or if I was just so used to seeing no one. I mean there were a lot of people out on the street, and actually lately I've been missing Denver – it was easier to get there, I would go on a trip before my big trip, because who knows when the hell I'll be back in the South/Southwest trajectory once I leave – too late now. But, if you ever want to feel worse than you're already feeling, I have the perfect doctor to recommend – yes yes, my very own doctor, remember how she likes to ask: do you think you would know if you felt better?

Really? But, this time, she says: do you think you can get better? Um, I’m here at the doctor's office, right? To hear you say this shit! Like we’re on some New Age quest – but yes, really, I do everything I possibly can to try to feel better, and nothing helps, especially not listening to you! I wish I said that, but instead I listened to her lack of ideas – this time it actually felt like she had given up – in a month I'll be gone, time for more useless doctors. No no, let's have a useful one, okay? First a shot of vitamin D, and then a walk home through sadness and snow and oh, oh, oh.

Call for submissions!!! – WE ARE NOT JUST THE 99%: Queering the Occupy Movement, Reimagining Resistance

2011-12-20T20:57:00.001-07:00

Please forward far and wide…

WE ARE NOT JUST THE 99%:
Queering the Occupy Movement, Reimagining Resistance
Edited by Mattilda Bernstein Sycamore

*CALL FOR SUBMISSIONS*

Ignited by the Arab Spring, uprisings in Greece and Spain, and protests in Wisconsin, Occupy Wall Street has brought corporate greed and structural inequality into the spotlight while claiming public space and refusing hierarchical models of resistance. "We are the 99%," the central slogan of the Occupy movement, has been crucial in rallying mass support. And yet, this slogan invokes a vision of sameness that stands in stark contrast to a queer analysis that foregrounds, cultivates, and nurtures difference. From Mortville, the queer camp at Occupy Baltimore, to the Feminists and Queers Against Capitalism bloc at the Oakland general strike, queers are playing central roles in Occupy spaces. But, what would it mean to bring a queer analysis to the forefront, going beyond the politics of inclusion to question the very terms of the debate?

For the first time in decades, perhaps there's a possibility for a mass movement demanding radical social change in the US. Still, most Occupy spaces remain straight, white, and male-dominated: how do we prevent the power imbalances intrinsic to previous movements? What about accountability within the 99%? How have Occupy spaces addressed (and failed to address) homophobia, transphobia, misogyny, racism, ableism, imperialism/patriotism, police brutality, anti-homeless territorialism, sexual assault, and other issues of structural, personal, and intimate violence? As struggles emerge to confront the colonial rhetoric of “occupying” indigenous land (and to address this history), what can a queer analysis bring to this challenge? What do queer struggles have to learn from Occupy/Decolonize movements, and what can Occupy/Decolonize movements learn from queer struggles?

I'm interested in missives from queers involved in Occupy/Decolonize movements, as well as from those veering between skeptical and inspired. I would love to hear about queer challenges within Occupy encampments large and small, across the country and around the world. Bring me your explosive analysis, your rants, your manifestoes, your journal entries, your rage and rigor and hope and heartbreak. In addition to written nonfiction work, I'm also interested in art, photography, posters, flyers, and other forms of visual documentation queering the Occupy movement – its goals and aspirations, its impact, its perils and possibilities.

Mattilda Bernstein Sycamore is the editor of five nonfiction anthologies, most recently Why Are Faggots So Afraid of Faggots?: Flaming Challenges to Masculinity, Objectification, and the Desire to Conform (AK Press 2012), and the author of two novels, most recently So Many Ways to Sleep Badly (City Lights 2008). More info on Mattilda at mattildabernsteinsycamore.com.

Please send essays or written materials of up to 5000 words, as Word or text file attachments only, to nobodypasses@gmail.com. Include a brief bio. Please send a query before submitting visual work. The deadline is March 20, 2012, although the earlier the better. Any questions, send them my way!

The book tour for Why Are Faggots So Afraid of Faggots!!!

2011-12-19T14:02:00.000-07:00

Here are the dates, so far – more info to come…

University of Southern California
Monday, January 23, 5 pm
Los Angeles, CA

Claremont Colleges
Thursday, January 26 lecture
Friday, January 27 workshop
Claremont, CA

University of San Francisco
Wednesday, February 8, 5 pm
University Center (UC) 4th Floor Lounge
San Francisco, CA

THE BIG BOOK LAUNCH
Valentine's Day 2012 – Tuesday, February 14, 6 pm
(come early for heart-shaped refreshments)
San Francisco Main Library
1100 Larkin St
San Francisco, CA
A delicious discussion with contributors Jaime Cortez, Tommi Avicolli Mecca, Debanuj DasGupta, Booh Edouardo, Eric Stanley, Harris Kornstein, Gina de Vries, Horehound Stillpoint, Matthew D. Blanchard, and your lovely host Mattilda Bernstein Sycamore

City Lights Bookstore
Wednesday, February 15, 7 pm
261 Columbus Ave. at Broadway
San Francisco, CA
(415) 362-8193
www.citylights.com
with contributors Debanuj DasGupta, Harris Kornstein, Booh Edouardo and Gina de Vries

GLBT History Museum
A Panel on the Past, Present and Future of Public Sex
Celebrating the release of Why Are Faggots So Afraid of Faggots?
Thursday, February 16, 7 pm
4127 18th St.
San Francisco, CA 94114
(415) 621-1107
www.glbthistory.org/museum/
with contributors Jaime Cortez, Debanuj DasGupta, Tommi Avicolli Mecca, and Horehound Stillpoint – hosted and facilitated by Mattilda Bernstein Sycamore
$5-10 requested donation, no one turned away for lack of funds

Pegasus Books Downtown
Monday, February 20, 7:30 pm
2349 Shattuck Avenue
Berkeley, CA 94704-1552
(510) 649-1320
www.pegasusbookstore.com
with Tommi Avicolli Mecca, Horehound Stillpoint, Matthew D. Blanchard, and Jaime Cortez

Sonoma State University
Stevenson 1002
Thursday, February 23, Noon
Rohnert Park, CA

University of Oregon
Thursday, March 1
Eugene, OR

Powell's on Hawthorne
Monday, March 5, 7:30pm
3723 SE Hawthorne Blvd.
Portland, OR 97214
(503) 228-4651
with Ezra RedEagle Whitman
www.powells.com

Olympia Timberland Library
Wednesday, March 7, 7:30 pm
313 8th Ave SE
Olympia, WA 98501
(360) 352-0595

Evergreen State College
Thursday, March 8
Olympia, WA

University of Washington
Monday, March 19, 6 pm
Allen Auditorium, North Allen Library
Seattle, WA

Elliott Bay Book Company
Tuesday, March 20, 7 pm
1521 Tenth Avenue
Seattle WA 98122
(206) 624-6600
www.elliottbaybook.com

Residue

2011-12-19T14:00:00.000-07:00

I wake up and pull the curtain back a little, oh it's cloudy out there, maybe there will be snow. Walk into the living room, open the door and yes – everywhere, white! So soft and cushy – they call it a blanket, but it's thicker and everything feels quieter except the crows cawing to each other.

Yes, walking is a bit more difficult in this thickness, but more fun too – except for the icy parts in the road, those I could do without. The air so fresh, except for when someone’s chimney blows my way. There's always an except.

Remember when I had a cold, about a month ago? And then, whenever I wake up, it feels like there's still some residue – yellow phlegm, dry throat, almost a cough. More like choking. Maybe it's because of all the smoke, the dryness, the bloating leading to all this interrupted sleep. When do I get some rest, some rest from this interrupted sleep? Oh, no – here comes another chimney, into my house. I wonder what would happen if I kept the windows closed, would I feel more air or less? One more month.

Oh, I almost neglected to mention the Band of Thebes "Best LGBT Books of 2011" list...

2011-12-18T17:47:00.000-07:00

I always enjoy participating in this list – this year I chose Zipper Mouth by Laurie Weeks, and said:

Laurie Weeks’ Zipper Mouth is a novel so lush with language that casual neurosis and intimate decay take us skyward instead of sinking us, a bubble bath in an elevator. Listen: "Has it ever happened even once that she pushed the sheets off, bitter they weren't me, and moved around her kitchen making coffee in a haze, unhinged by love, brushing her teeth with Neosporin?" Also check out Captive Genders: Trans Embodiment and the Prison Industrial Complex, edited by Eric Stanley and Nat Smith, and A Queer History of the United States by Michael Bronski.

Browse the rest of the list here.

Dashing through the snow…

2011-12-18T15:29:00.000-07:00

"The white spaces of time"

2011-12-18T14:03:00.000-07:00

That calm moment before bed, where is it coming from? Maybe the book I'm reading, Dream Boy, which I always avoided before because the title made it sound trite and hackneyed, but actually it's stunningly gorgeous the way it mediates us towards doom. The narrative of young male love or lust or friendship and the specter of Christian homophobia could be seen as clichéd, but the writing is so pared-down, incest and fear woven into the prettiest moments. I wait for the fallout, and somehow this makes me calm?

No, it’s phrases like this: "The inside of the bus is like the sky this morning, the silent condensing around every sleepy face." Or, "it is a moment of poise, in which he must balance between what he knows and what he should not know." Or: "Tonight he avoids the window, and Nathan watches his shadow undress." Or: "the white spaces of time in which his Dad falls on him like snow."

And so, the next day of awful brain-slamming exhaustion, I wait for the end of the day, when I can read more.

Ruined

2011-12-17T20:07:00.002-07:00

These days I can't tell when I should stop eating, I mean by what time. Because it's seven and I haven't eaten in over an hour, but I don't feel hungry, which seems strange, but then 7:30 and maybe I am hungry? Maybe that's why I feel so awful, because I haven't eaten? Although the bloating hasn't started, maybe I'm done – because my rule is to stop eating by 8, even though this hasn't helped me at all, but now I'm worried that I'm going to get wired if I don't eat so I put a little bit of wild rice and steamed vegetables on a plate, and some adzuki beans, but then I put the adzuki beans back in the pot and eat the vegetables and rice, and sure enough there's the bloating again. Then I'm so angry I'm screaming at my apartment, whatever that will do, even though my head feels calmer my body is worse and then I'm so sad and tired again, tired too early, tired like I'm just waiting to go to bed, tired but it's too early to go to bed, tired but I have to wait another few hours because I just ate, because I wouldn't fall asleep this early anyway, or I would fall asleep and then I would be wired, I want to go on a walk but I don't have the energy to go on a walk, all the fireplace soot is filling my apartment but I don't have the energy to get the air purifier out of my bedroom and turn it on. I never have the energy to do that. I'm leaving Santa Fe in a month and a day, and I hope I have the energy then, still so much to plan and will I wake up in the middle of the night ruined again, ruined in the middle of the night and the next day ruined in advance, even with all the time I don't have energy to do anything and no one calls, so I call people, but that's just more exhausting, everything is more exhausting, maybe I'll go outside on a walk anyway, just to see, although my throat is starting to feel scratchy again and every time I forget scratchy I think I'm still fighting off that cold from a month ago but actually I think my throat is scratchy because of the fireplaces. Oh, the fresh air – why I came here, right? Now I know, know know know know know, now I know, no no no no no.

Sixth grade math class

2011-12-17T16:03:00.001-07:00

Oh, my poor feet – swollen toes, red painful sores. Of course I get up and look online to see what syphilis sores look like – oh, horrifying, now I'm going to have nightmares. I guess I better get an STD screening, just in case. We don't have an STD clinic here, so it's harder. I mean, I got that HIV test at pride, that was convenient, but the only STD they were testing for was hepatitis C, because so many people have it here, especially in prison, but I didn't feel like I was really at a risk for hepatitis C. When was the last time I got it STD screening? Over a year ago, I guess.

I had these sores last year, though, around the same time, so I think it has something to do with the dryness, the way my feet get swollen when they’re warm – and cold, I guess. Swollen: that's the theme of the day. Lying in bed in the middle of the night with this swollen belly, wondering if you could die from bloating, can everything explode? Not a good question to ask in the middle of the night, there's always the specter of Tycho Brahe who died in the 16th century from holding his bladder too long at a banquet, that's what I learned in sixth grade math class anyway.

The next day

2011-12-15T18:29:00.000-07:00

How do I describe this horrible place in bed, in my head? Yes, the bloating woke me up, nowhere to turn, as they say. I keep turning anyway, sitting up, lying down, it's all pain – not just in my belly, I realize, but my whole face hurts now, shoulders, arms, and this is when I start to panic, will I ever fall asleep. I mean I go I will fall asleep but will I ever feel better? I came here to feel better; it didn't work. Now I'm leaving. Will that help?

How will I go on a book tour, why am I planning a book tour? How will I get to feldenkrais tomorrow, I need to get to feldenkrais because it will make me feel better but already I'm afraid of how awful I'll feel when I get up, after falling back to sleep, eventually. Sitting up, lying down, rubbing my belly – still more bloating. Is this because of the goldenseal I took earlier, worried that the cold that never quite went away was coming back? Goldenseal is endangered, they say; I feel endangered. Why the goldenseal? Because it's the only thing I can think of that I did differently.

Eventually, yes, eventually. And then. The next day. A shower. I'm going to get my hair cut, and even that sounds awful. I guess I'll get ready, anyway.

Suddenly an adventure

2011-12-14T13:01:00.000-07:00

It's fun walking in the fresh snow because you can be on so many levels at once, so many textures too and yes there's that sound almost like chalk on the blackboard and maybe the scratchy feeling of cotton balls on your finger but somehow soothing too. And the air, yes fresh and moist and crisp and everything feels somehow more still than usual, even the leaves swaying in the breeze it's because of all that white, gray sky too and the soft sculptures of trees and walls and grass, even.

And yes, the tiny birds chirping from inside brown skeletons of bushes, crows on top of the tallest snow-covered pine trees, even the spaces in the sidewalk that have been cleared are suddenly an adventure, new textures.

So beautiful.............................

2011-12-14T12:53:00.000-07:00

Look, the snow is back!!!

2011-12-14T10:58:00.000-07:00

Another day

2011-12-13T12:18:00.000-07:00

Oh, no – another day. What happened to yesterday? Another day. Will I ever understand why I wake up feeling so awful on a day when I didn't actually sleep that badly, or it didn't seem like I slept that badly. Until I woke up.

Today it's raining out, and I'm not sure that I like the rain, even though it's good for the desert, that's for sure, but I'm going to have to get used to a lot more rain, right?

Today's not a good day to judge whether I like the rain – I'm not sure that I like anything today. Another day. Today. Soon I'll be waiting for the bus in the rain, or actually maybe the rain stopped. I'm glad it's cloudy, although this doesn't make me feel less cloudy, which is what I would like.

Tomorrow. I'm already thinking about tomorrow. No, not tomorrow – let's think about today, maybe something good will happen. I'll go to therapy, that will be okay, maybe I'll even feel better, briefly. This feeling-better thing is always so brief, another day.