A petunia, pink and true, peeked out from the sidewalk and arrested me in my tracks. I backed up a few steps, stalling my Monday morning stroll from Starbucks to the office, and paused in its pink glory. It seemed to peer up and over the little sidewalk crack where its roots made their home. A hidden anchor that had protected its existence up until now. The early morning sun lit it from behind, throwing a shadow longer than the bloom itself, and illuminating its bright cream throat.
It was not a perfect bloom. How could it be, in such circumstances and harsh surroundings? Slightly tattered, spotted in pale splashes of something, and smaller than its more carefully-cultivated cousins, it would not win any flower show awards. Yet there was magnificence to it. Valiantly blooming in a well-tread spot that could have trampled less-resilient beauties, it held its colorful head as high as it could, and in a sea of concrete it was the one object that caught my attention and admiration. For such a tiny thing, it packed a powerful visual punch, aided by the sun and perhaps its non-descript background.
On a Monday morning, when downtown Albany was under siege by fumes of horse dung and college-kid vomit, made more unbearable by the heat and humidity already in effect before 8 AM, this little petunia was a bright spot of color. Of imperfect beauty and flawed nobility. It shouted “Look at me!” then tugged at the heart.
This August will see me turning 40 years old. While some may see no reason in celebrating such a milestone (and I may be one of them) I’ll be damned if I don’t take advantage of the once-in-a-lifetime moment and put forth a wish list worthy of such a fat number. This one is for my parents and husband, who, when left to their own devices, do their best but occasionally miss the mark when it comes to gift ideas. As in so many other arenas of my life, guessing what I might like for a present is dangerously difficult territory. I know this, I acknowledge this, and I apologize for it. Let this wish list go some way toward alleviating the pressure and the guess-work. (And they say I don’t care!)
First up is the most elusive and difficult to find. As of now, it is completely sold out everywhere, but whispers of it on ebay have reached my ears, and “if you want something badly enough the whole world conspires to help you get it.†These are the gorgeous  Jeremy Scott Adidas Wings 3.0 “Gold”, Size 9.5 or 10 designed by the brilliant Jeremy Scott (I will make either size work for a thing of such beauty.) Being the hardest to procure, by natural design they are the ones I want the most. If anything would mark my 40th in a special way, these golden wings would be it. (Again, Size 9.5 or 10 would work, and these are not to be mistaken for similar wing-tips that Mr. Scott has produced – these are the ADIDAS JEREMY SCOTT WINGS 3.0 GOLD SNEAKERS. No substitutes or frauds.
Second, as if on cue, Tom Ford is about to release a new Private Blend – Venetian Bergamot – and on paper it combines two of my favorite things: Tom Ford and bergamot. The former has long been a bastion of this blog, and the latter has been a favorite scent of mine for years. We won’t even get into the fascination and allure that Venice holds. (Surely you remember ‘The Venetian Vanity Ball’ we threw in 2005?) Another sign that this one is meant to be: according to Neiman Marcus, it will be shipped out on my actual birthday, August 24. Thank you, Tom Ford.
Finally, given that I’m about to go on my final tour, just send me somewhere fun and far. San Francisco, London, Miami, Chicago, Los Angeles – all would be welcome and fitting jaunts for The Delusional Grandeur Tour. It will be my very last stand, commemorated by my 40th birthday, and a guaranteed something to remember.
Henry James thought that there was no finer pair of words than ‘summer afternoon’ – but, as I often do with his writing, I also take issue with that statement. ‘Summer weekend’ has a much lovelier ring to it. This past one was just about perfect in every way. Our house was filled with dear old friends, and some youngsters, the weather was sunny and hot, and the pool was a perfect 85 degrees. I didn’t want it to end. None of us wanted it to end. Yet that is the very thing that makes a memory most happy. One last look back over the week that led up to it.
No more wars to fight White flags fly tonight You are out of danger now Battlefield is still Wild poppies on the hill Peace can only come when you surrender Here the tracers fly Lighting up the sky But I’ll fight on to the end Let them send their armies I will never bend I won’t see you now ’till I surrender I’ll see you again when I surrender.
The naming of a Tour is of paramount importance. It sets the whole tone for all that follows, for the themes that the Tour Book will explore, for whatever is on my mind of late. For one’s Final Tour, it becomes even more significant. This is how things will be remembered. The Final Chapter. The Last Hurrah. The Grand Finale.
The list of previous tours is evidence that the name is critical in conveying what will be examined and celebrated. Sometimes they are simple and straightforward, other times they are multi-layered and imbued with deeper symbolism and double-implications. All of them have meant something intensely personal to me, and hopefully to some of you:
Chameleon in Motion: The Friendship Tour – 1995
The Magical Mystery Tour: Master of Manipulation – 1996
The Royal Rainbow World Tour: Alan Is King! – 1997 (and oh how I regret that last part, with an exclamation point no less)
The Talented Trickster Tour: Reflections of a Floating World – 2003
The Divine Diva Tour: A Fairy’s Tale – 2005/2006
A 21st Century Renaissance: The Resurrection Tour – 2010
This time around, with the albatross of history languidly chugging alongside the desire for an unbound future, I wanted to do something that acknowledged the big reveal of this tour. It deconstructs all that came before, while simultaneously playing up the very notion it sets out to destroy.
In the end it could only come down to this:
The Delusional Grandeur Tour: Last Stand of a Rock Star
Make of it what you will…
And get ready to rock…
One Last Time.
I don’t want to be alone, that’s all in the past.
This world’s waited long enough, I’ve come home at last.
“It’s not a mad hatter’s tea party. It’s meant to be a sensual, erotic display. You’re there to get a new husband, a new boyfriend, a new girlfriend, whatever. And you can get it. The hat is a means to an end, a marriage contract. It’s everything. It’s a sensual thing – the idea of catching somebody like a spider in a web. It’s the old fashioned cock-and-hen story, the mating dance. Men love hats. They love it because it’s something they have to take off in order to fuck you. Anyone can wear a hat.†– Isabella Blow
Tomorrow, the New Tour is christened with a name. Come back for the big reveal.
How does the Naked Chef do it? There are so many dangers, so many burn risks. And sometimes an apron just isn’t enough. But sometimes it is. Especially in the summer. This brief collection of gratuitous gourmet shots is an homage to all those cooks who trouble and toil in the kitchen, like Martha Stewart, Jamie Oliver, Lidia Matticchio Bastianich, Joanne Weir, and Dinah herself (strumming on the old banjo).
I don’t get to cook as much as I’d like, and I’m actually pretty decent at it. (I’m less gifted at the cleaning-up aspect, as Andy will attest.) But the creation and the preparation? Absolutely. It satisfies some of my creative drive, and recipes appeal to my love of scientific order and transformation.
Some favorite dishes that I’ve succeeded in executing over the years include the following:
Rest assured, if I can handle them, you can. I prefer the simple, tried and true rather than the exotic and elaborate, so these are easy-peasy lemon-squeezy. Get your apron ready.
Rabbits are not customarily welcome in our yard, no matter how cuddly and cute they are. This year, however, we have so many weeds in the lawn they’ve been doing us a favor by keeping them at bay, and leaving our more precious commodities alone. This little guy/gal has been peacefully hanging around the front, nibbling on crab grass (and occasionally rising on his/her haunches to chew on some Clethra, which normally is not cool, but it needed to be trimmed back anyway).
I don’t recommend fostering this type of behavior, because it’s only a matter of time before the weeds run out and they discover the delicious sweet potato vines on the patio. Then the battle will begin. For now, though, I’m enjoying the cuteness.
Anything affiliated with Richard E. Grant simply oozes elegance and sophistication. Scene-stealing turns in ‘Gosford Park’ and ‘Bram Stoker’s Dracula’ along with caddish portrayals in ‘The Age of Innocence‘ and ‘Downton Abbey’ are what I remember most of Grant’s vast catalog (along with a hilariously-cheeky strut through the Spice Girls’ movie). I’m happy to report that his first foray into fragrance, ‘Jack’, upholds the sterling image he’s crafted for himself, while treating us to a remarkable cologne that reeks of classy potency, managing to be both refined and somewhat edgy. The very best of British attitude.
Opening with a lime and mandarin punch, it soon settles into something warmer, with notes of pepper, clove, and nutmeg. This spicy interlude then gives way to a richer layer based in vetiver, oud, white musk, tobacco, and olibanum resin. Orchestrated by Alienor Massenet, it’s a refreshing whiff of London gentility. Defining ‘dapper’ and ‘debonair’ with one sniff, ‘Jack’ attacks in playful prissiness, as fresh as a summer day, and surprisingly sinful as a summer night.
I’m hoping to score a sample of his follow-up frag, ‘Jack – Covent Garden’, named after one of my favorite places in the world. If it were possible to take a specific piece of a city as a lover, I’d make mine this delicious corner of London. In the meantime, there’s just ‘Jack’ – and I think I want it for my birthday. Parents and husband, take note.
There comes a time, usually around the age at which I now find myself, when you have to make a decision to keep fighting to carve out a place in the world, or to resign yourself to what you’ve been given and what you’ve earned, and make the best of it. At its essence, the decision is one largely dictated and designed by a society in which getting older is more frightening rather than something to be revered. Maybe it’s getting worse, or maybe I’m just noticing it more as the world around me grows younger and I go in the opposite direction. To be honest, age has never mattered much to me, and it never will, but that won’t make a difference to everyone else. Too much of our existence is based on perception, and once you hit forty, particularly among gay men, the perception is that you’re too old to play in the big league anymore.
THIS IS MY FIGHT SONG
TAKE BACK MY LIFE SONG
PROVE I’M ALRIGHT SONG
MY POWER’S TURNED ON
STARTING RIGHT NOW I’LL BE STRONG
I’LL PLAY MY FIGHT SONG
AND I DON’T REALLY CARE IF NOBODY ELSE BELIEVES
‘CAUSE I’VE STILL GOT A LOT OF FIGHT LEFT IN ME
Madonna has been attacked for it for the last decade or so, and I know my time is just around the corner. The gray hair has come, the stomach around me thickens, and it’s just a matter of time before I metaphorically disappear from society’s sight. It’s a world for the youth. Always has been, ever will be. When you’re young you don’t always realize that because it certainly doesn’t feel that way, but I had glimpses of it. I relished my time there, even as I guarded against giving into such a dreamer’s paradise. It’s the surest way of losing your footing, to lose sight of the future and gain glory for the moment.
I’ve seen it more as I get older, which makes sense. The college-age revelers I watch stumbling along the streets late at night get younger and younger – only they’re not. I’m simply getting older. They don’t see me, partly because of their drunken stupor, partly because I’m beyond their interest. At a certain age, we all become invisible. I don’t mind that – it’s the aggressive attacks against someone older than them that indirectly sting more.
I was never vicious that way, not when it came to age, or gender, or race, or religion. I’ll judge you for your crocs and capris, not for the God in which you do or don’t believe, not for the size or shape of your body, or the color of your hair or skin, or for how long you’ve been walking on earth. I respected and looked up to everyone who was older than me, and often the older someone was, the more wisdom I assumed they had. That’s a fallacy in itself, but a graceful one.
LOSING FRIENDS AND I’M CHASING SLEEP
EVERYBODY’S WORRIED ABOUT ME
IN TOO DEEP
SAY I’M IN TOO DEEP (IN TOO DEEP)
AND IT’S BEEN TWO YEARS
I MISS MY HOME
BUT THERE’S A FIRE BURNING IN MY BONES
AND I STILL BELIEVE
YEAH I STILL BELIEVE
AND ALL THOSE THINGS I DIDN’T SAY WRECKING BALLS INSIDE MY BRAIN I WILL SCREAM THEM LOUD TONIGHT CAN YOU HEAR MY VOICE THIS TIME?
As I approach the stroke of forty, that golden hour when you can’t really claim to be young anymore, not in any conventional sense, I find myself sidling slowly out of the race. That’s what it sort of feels like to me now: the race to stay in fashion, to stay in vogue, to stay relevant and popular and on everyone’s tongue. Part of me wants to fade away, leaving the party first instead of lingering, because there’s nothing worse than a party guest who doesn’t know when it’s over. Better to leave sooner than later, best to leave them wanting more, the hope that they might even miss you still a happy possibility. At those moments, I have thought of stepping down from this self-appointed/self-anointed throne, and letting someone else take on the mantle of all this nonsense. It’s a bunch of fluff and frivolity anyway, right? When dissected and broken down, there’s not much to any of it. Yet it’s all I have. It’s all that I’ve ever had. And it’s mine, and mine alone.
THIS IS MY FIGHT SONG
TAKE BACK MY LIFE SONG
PROVE I’M ALRIGHT SONG
MY POWER’S TURNED ON
STARTING RIGHT NOW I’LL BE STRONG
I’LL PLAY MY FIGHT SONG
AND I DON’T REALLY CARE IF NOBODY ELSE BELIEVES
‘CAUSE I’VE STILL GOT A LOT OF FIGHT LEFT IN ME
Then I think… fuck it. I’m still here. I still matter. I can still do ten times what someone half my age could only dream of doing, and that little fire burns a little brighter, and suddenly I’m mouthing the words to this silly empowering pop song, popular with a demographic of which I’m proudly a member (since 1975) and my fists are pumping in the air and the sparkle in my eye is a tear of joy, a tear of glory, a tear of reconciliation.
LIKE A SMALL BOAT
ON THE OCEAN
SENDING BIG WAVES
INTO MOTION
LIKE HOW A SINGLE WORD
CAN MAKE A HEART OPEN
I MIGHT ONLY HAVE ONE MATCH
BUT I CAN MAKE AN EXPLOSION
Whenever I’ve doubted myself, I’ve done it. Instead of hesitating, I’ve held fast. That won’t change as I round the corner to forty. Or fifty. Or sixty. And if at the age of seventy I still want to go on ‘tour’ and wear a cape and flash my ass on Instagram, by God I’m going to do it. You may remain seated and watch all you want. The ones who decry those older than they are usually do so out of deeper-seeded reasons: jealousy or fear or the insidious notion of not having the balls to do it themselves. Rarely is it as simple as petty meanness or small-minded cruelty (though sometimes it is). We each have our demons. They rear their ugly heads in different ways.
As for me, I’m embracing every step of this life. With age, comes wisdom, and with wisdom comes power. It’s not a power you can wield over others, it’s not a power that controls. It’s a power that is intrinsic to each of us. You will find it within, and when you do you will carry it with you through life. It’s not something you can give away, and it’s not something that can be taken. It’s an indestructible charm, a magic all your own. Find yours, and don’t ever look back.
THIS IS MY FIGHT SONG
TAKE BACK MY LIFE SONG
PROVE I’M ALRIGHT SONG
MY POWER’S TURNED ON
STARTING RIGHT NOW I’LL BE STRONG (I’LL BE STRONG)
I’LL PLAY MY FIGHT SONG
AND I DON’T REALLY CARE IF NOBODY ELSE BELIEVES
‘CAUSE I’VE STILL GOT A LOT OF FIGHT LEFT IN ME
Named rather obviously, if whimsically, for Queen Ann’s Lace, these tenacious wildflowers were a little too hardy and invasive for me to quite embrace as a child, but I’m coming around to them. In the Northeast, they are troopers in the extremes of weather we get here, surviving the winters with a long tap root and a hardiness at odds with their delicate appearance. I always knew of their survival instincts, I even saw them laugh in the face of fire.
In the fall of that year, a dried bouquet of seeds, intact in the skeletal umbrel of the flowerhead, had made its way into our garden, where it became brittle and bone dry. It was an ill-advised and unsuccessful attempt at transplanting one from the wild. As a rather dangerous experiment in easier brush removal, I lit one of them on fire, watching the seeds explode and disperse and then forgetting about them over winter. The next spring, a mass of fernlike seedlings had cropped up in the area, more than I have ever gotten when intentionally tending patches of perfectly-planted seeds. I knew then that this queen was far from fragile.
She is a signifier of summer, standing up to the most oppressive heat in the road-side stretches she favors. She also makes a decent cut flower, although when picked at high heat of day, she sometimes tend to droop, and may never recover. As with many things, timing is crucial. Earliest morning, preferably after a few days of restorative rain, is the ideal window.
The cream-colored lace, and soft green foliage, reminds me of summer. As heat-horny insects buzzed in hidden leafy canopies, and the sun moved directly overhead, the lace remained refined and elegant. It nodded its floriferous carriage, held stalwart in the face of strong winds and rains, and perhaps its very airy nature allowed it to deal with forces that would have crushed more solid floral forms. The lace of a queen sometimes needs to be as strong as it is pretty.
A perfect July weekend comes to a close, and I’m still hanging onto memories of all that I did (lounging by the pool, reading, watering the gardens) and mostly what I didn’t have to do (anything else.) It was [sigh] practically perfect. And like all things that good, it had to come to an end. But other weekends are bound to follow, and exciting things are already on the way, so let’s take one quick look back before we go forward into fabulousness.
The most important development of the week, however, came in the form of the first glimpse of the Final Tour. It’s what I’ve been working on for the past few months, and the reason why things here have been light and hectic and somewhat less than what I hope you expect. That’s all about to change. The reveals are about to arrive…
“A frivolous society can acquire dramatic significance only through what its frivolity destroys.” ~ Edith Wharton
March 1995: The first stop was my friend Ann’s house. As my manager, she would oversee this first leg of my first tour, ‘Chameleon in Motion: The Friendship Tour‘ and we were departing for a weekend in Potsdam, NY. From the bleak winter doldrums of Boston and Brandeis, I was headed into bleaker terrain. Someone hadn’t anticipated that early March was still winter, so with a torn vintage faux fur coat, and a colorful silk scarf tied to the antenna of my parents’ Blazer, we began our trek northward. I hadn’t been that excited and happy in a long time, and my giddiness now was mostly because of Ann, and our destination of seeing another friend, Missy.
The roads were caked with dirty snow, while more pristine expanses of white stuff stretched out in the distance. We stopped at the edge of a little lake at one point, and somewhere there’s a photo of me in a sea of white, arms folded across my chest to keep warm, but smiling a broad and genuine smile for Ann, and for the hope of a tour.
Back then a tour was just my way of emulating Madonna in a mostly-delusional manner. It consisted not so much of performing, though in some way everything I did back then was a performance, but more of traveling around the Northeast visiting my friends at their respective universities. From Cornell to the Crane School of Music, from RIT to U of R, and from Brandeis to SUNY Albany, it was more properly a college tour, but it was becoming something more. On each stop, prompted by me or gleefully taking the reins themselves, my friends had the generosity and good hearts to treat me like a visiting celebrity. Everyone should be so honored at some point in their lives. Because of this, the notion of being on tour was more than just a whimsical fancy (even if not by much.) For that, I owed my friends much. They didn’t know how much they saved me, mostly from myself.
As we wound our way along the curving roads to Potsdam, listening to Aretha Franklin and laughing our asses off over nothing, my very first tour began. It would be one way of coming into my own, even in the adopted emulation of an idol, and it would be the state in which I flourished. In running away from every home I’d known, I found a way of making a home within. That has proven to be just as valuable now as it was back then. In the quiet, snowy start of my first tour, all that lay ahead.
This time around, things are decidedly different, but in many respects I’m still the same person who set off with my friend Ann to parts not-so-unknown. The Tour Book is a bit better (professionally printed, and a whopping 232 pages – a far cry from the hastily-assembled black-and-white photo-copies from the basement of the Brandeis Library) and my style is slightly more refined (never again will I be mistaken for a clown at Ponderosa), but the same wonderful cast of characters awaits my arrival, and the same joy I felt at seeing friends and family in the heightened sate of Touring is about to be revisited.
The Final Tour.
The very last time.
And you’re invited to come along for the journey…
“You’re not well enough for the story they’ve planned.” ~ Isabella Blow
When someone as physically fine as Pietro Boselli poses for an Attitude cover story, it deserves a post of its own. Mr. Boselli is the math teacher who took the gay internet by storm with his banging body and dreamy good looks, and he’s going even further in this photo shoot for the popular British rag. Of course he’s already been named a Hunk of the Day, but he’s likely due for a second run any day now. Enough of my yammering, you just want to see the goods.
