Category Archives: Boston

While my favorite concerts by Madonna remain her Drowned World Tour and the Confessions Tour, her current Celebration Tour may rank as a tight number three, and the residual glow and high from that night carried me through the days in Boston that followed. Normally I’d have returned to work and real life the day after such a concert, falling as it did on a Tuesday night, but by some strange auspicious stroke of excessively indulgent planning, I’d taken off three days. Work has been so busy that if I didn’t get a break I might have broken. Sometimes we don’t see such things until we add some distance and then assess what we’re doing. Bottom line: this was a much-needed escapade in the city I know and love.

Boston was busy making its own sort of magic. After a brutal rainstorm event that almost took us out on the night of the Madonna show, only some wind and an occasional shower bothered the city the next day. Between the clouds, there were brilliant peeks of sun and blue sky, and the light painted shifting scenes throughout the afternoon. 

Boston isn’t particularly renowned for its architecture but I find many of its buildings beautiful. Maybe that’s because it remains a home for me, and we always have a soft spot for home. On this blustery day, it retained that beauty, even as it tempered it with typical New England bite. 

As the afternoon unfurled, dusk fell customarily early for this time of the year. January can be brutal here, however, and since we stayed above freezing it didn’t feel so bad. Still, once the light left the sky, I hurried back to the condo for warmth and coziness and a hot bath. 

By the time August of 1999 rolled around, almost a year into my first office job, I’d made a name for myself in the research department at John Hancock, and more importantly to my young and foolish heart, I’d fallen in love and was set to leave the city of Boston for the city of Chicago and an apartment with my boyfriend at the time. It was time to move on from that job anyway – the research project on which I was working was entering the next stage, which meant our little group would be splintering off. There were whispers of permanent employment for those who did well and might be interested in such a thing, but that wasn’t me at the time. When asked if I wanted to stay on, I did what you’re never supposed to do: tell the truth. I was leaving, and no one could persuade me otherwise. The heart wants what it wants, and in some ways I was simply scared to stay. Immaturity works that way. 

Before my last day, I circulated a little velvet book that I asked all my co-workers to sign. Whether they, or I, wanted to admit it or not, we had formed a little work family. We also knew how to play when the day was done, and while our group was filled with all sorts of people from all walks of life, we became part of each other’s lives. Whenever you go through something at such a pivotal time of life, it informs your history, and at twenty-three years old, I was ripe for being influenced. I’ll let their words speak for whatever impact I left on them; they showed me acceptance and inclusion when I’d almost given up on both. 

“Alan, Well to top things off I would like to say “thank you” for I feel honored and privileged knowing that I am the chosen one to set things off. I would like you to know it was a pleasure working with you and sometimes hard but bearable. The advice you gave to me was a big help in some way… I wish you and P— the best wishes in Chicago. You know in a month or two I’ll probably be saying I’m manless but at least A—- is in the picture for now. Alan you are a great friend, a wonderful and crazy person, but most of all you are fun and an asshole and I love you.” – Tamekia

“Alan, I met you on January 5, 1999, my first day at John Hancock’s ADR project at 380 Stuart Street, Boston. My first job outside (full-time) the home in 16 years. You made me feel good about myself. You taught me to listen to my feelings, and show happy, sad, mad, glad. Your e-mails, signs, posters all showed me the same. Happy, you smile miles wide. Sad, you make faces (pouty) and make it perfectly clear your feelings. It has been a pleasure to know you and work with you. Your kind nature (sending my daughter a post card from Chicago) will take you far. Your love of writing (never stop) will pay your bills someday. You now need to cut the apron strings and fly on your own. Always take care of yourself first. Think before you get involved in a relationship. Best of luck.” ~ Marion

“Alan, I arrived here for my first day of work and met you. Alan, you were hung over from the weekend. Yes this is my first memory of you. Everyone asked, ‘Did you meet the Madonna fan Alan?’ Yes, I did and I’m glad I met you. You became the person I could joke with. Have fun in Chicago. It’s a fun city – you and P— should have a lot of fun. You were able to make this job fun. When you move to Chicago keep that sense of humor. Alan you were a great person to work with and call a friend. Don’t drink too much. Stay in touch, keep being that asshole you are, and never forget us in Boston. We will miss you. I will miss you.” ~ Craig

“What’s up Alan – it’s been super cool working with you. The only thing that wasn’t cool is that I missed your party and missed all that drinking (ha, ha). But on another note you’re a very cool person and I wish you the best of luck in the big Windy City.” ~ Will

“Alan, I have to say I will miss your one-of-a-kind attitude and overall personality… when you’re at your next job if you need to pull out a staple ask someone for a ‘staple remover’ – that’s what it’s called, not a candy opener.” ~ Shawn

“Dear Alan, We pretty much share the same qualities, so of course I am going to miss someone who has the wit, charm, personality and intelligence as myself! I wish you all the best in Chicago! Stay strong! For only the strong survive. Peace.” ~ Reggie

“Alan – How you ever survived a full year of this hell-hole, I will never know! You did it and you’re out – you should be extremely proud of yourself. It was wonderful having you at work everyday. You made me smile, which is hard to do… I rarely cross paths with individuals like you. I like your sassiness and your wit. Keep your head up and your spirit strong. It has been a pleasure talking with you and seeing that smile everyday. I wish we had more time to get to know each other, but I have enjoyed these past few months. If you ever need a helping hand or a listening ear, you can call or write anytime. I would absolutely love to hear from you! I envy your strength and pride, a few of the wonderful qualities you possess. You are wonderful. You have made my job more enjoyable. Thank you!!” ~ Jaime

“Alan, Alan, Alan!! It’s been almost a year now and I still can’t figure out how you stayed so long with such a good writing ability. Use those skills man and you will go very far in life, and hey maybe you’ll even met Madonna! (Did I tell you I have pictures of her house?) We have been through a lot together – Sandy’s belly-aching, JoAnn, Kira breaking the spreadsheet, but those experiences are nothing compared to what you’re up against in the windy city… [whited-out sentence] That was the most dorky sentence I ever wrote. In fact I think I might white it out. Now I bet you’re wondering what I wrote? Am I getting to you. Am I getting to you!!! But hey seriously, good luck and have fun. Send me mail, I don’t have any friends. Good luck.” ~ Shawn M.

Twenty five years ago I was working in the ADR Research Department of John Hancock Insurance. They needed people to delve into years and years of records to address a class action lawsuit, and that’s about all I was told. It involved scanning microfiche and writing down duplicate numbers and reporting our findings to people at the next level. To this day, I’m not sure what we were looking for or if any of our numbers made any difference, good or bad. All I cared about was that I was getting paid, and had some money to go out and party like I was twenty-three. (A twenty-three-year-old like myself was too busy discovering the city of Boston, seeking out love, and hoping to get past all the shitty things that could and did happen to a young gay man in the 90’s. Simple survival was a feat in an of itself.)

It was my first office job, and after working in an orchid greenhouse, a hospital cafeteria, and a store named Structure, I embraced its regular hours and laid-back requirements. Showing up on time and simply doing what you were told to do puts you ahead of the majority of people in my experience. Not being a complete dick helps too, as does some wit and style. All in all, I learned what an office was like, and it quickly became clear that it wasn’t so much the work that mattered as it was the group of people with whom you did it. Being a nameless cog among many nameless cogs was a strange and surprising comfort to me; standing out takes a greater toll than anyone who doesn’t often stand out could ever understand. 

Our office was not in what used to be known by all as the John Hancock Tower, but right across the street in a much smaller and nondescript building. While our work was done there, our lunches were mostly taken in the expansive cafeteria in the basement of the main tower, and we also had access to the observatory if we wanted to show the city off to any visiting friends or relatives. Working for a company so emblematic of Boston didn’t thrill me anymore than working for a retail store did, but it did make me feel like I was genuinely part of the city at last. And slowly, I made a few friends, and impacted the dull office that had never seen the likes of someone like me… 

For the majority of Bostonians, the tallest building in the city will always be known as John Hancock Tower. When I worked at John Hancock, we would eat lunch in the basement cafeteria of that building, but our actual work location was across the street in a much smaller building on Stuart Street. My job was technically a researcher, which at that time consisted of seeking out information on microfiche, an antiquated form of data storage. (I couldn’t tell you what I was researching because I honestly don’t know.) It was a temporary gig, and at 23 years of age, it was all I really wanted. After a few years of grueling but rewarding retail work, I was due for a change. I also had retail burnout, because for an anti-social introvert like myself, dealing with people on a daily service level was debilitating. That said, my retail job at Structure absolutely taught me how to interact and engage with strangers in a way that college never could, so by the time I walked into Bertucci’s for a pre-interview interview with someone who worked at John Hancock, I could hold my own in a conversation and give the impression that I was a sociable person. 

My friend ‘Ben’ (lean in a little – his real name is being changed to protect what he may not want people to know) whom I had dated briefly (and to whom I was largely awful in the wake of previous dating disasters) had been kind enough to keep me in mind when he knew I was looking for a job. He knew someone named ‘Mike’ (also a fake name to protect his own part in this story) who worked at John Hancock and might be able to get me a job in their research department. Ben told me that Mike wanted to meet with me over lunch to see if I might be a good fit. 

To prepare myself with any and all background information I could find, I asked Ben what he knew about Mike – how they had met, how long they’d been friends, the basic shit – not expecting anything all that interesting. Ben paused, and was suddenly skirting the simple question of how they met. Exasperated, and annoyed (and you might see glimmers of why my relationship with Ben would never have worked out) I finally just blurted out something like, “What?! Did you meet in a sex club or something? How difficult is this question?!”

Ben’s silence spoke incredulous volumes, and for someone who had seemed as basic and boring as vanilla, he suddenly became one small bit less annoying to me. He confirmed that yes, he and Mike had met at a sex club, but it would probably be best if I didn’t mention that. 

(There was the annoyance again, as even I understood not to mention such a thing.)

Back in the 90’s, there was a place called the Safari Club in Boston. I wasn’t yet 21 to gain access to, or even knowledge of, the place, and by the time I was old enough and brave enough to entertain such entertainment, it had closed. It was a sex club – a gym/sauna/workout scene that was a merely a front for a place where guys could hook up for an entry fee. Back then, Ben and Mike had met and struck up a… conversation in those hallowed halls, and from that was born a friendship that brought him to mind when I indicated my search for a job. 

At Bertucci’s, sitting across from Mike (and probably scarfing down a Silano pizza because they were the best) I nervously made small talk about my employment history (HA!) and a brief description of myself (HA HA!) while Mike sat in soft-spoken elegance and office wear. He was not at all a man I’d have considered a sex club kind of person, an early lesson that it was almost impossible to determine who was a sex club kind of person based on appearance and demeanor. His erudite way of speaking, and a charmingly disarming wit, did not hide his homosexuality, but neither did it reveal it to anyone other than those who had been briefed beforehand. 

After feeling me out and likely realizing how harmless I was, he leaned in and whispered conspiratorially that he assumed I knew how he and Ben had met. Since he brought it up, I merely confirmed that I knew. While I was crazy curious, I decided not to pursue the line of questioning that I so badly wanted to pursue. Our lunch ended on a good note, a hopeful note, and a few days later I got a call from Mike with a contact name at John Hancock. From there, I went for an interview and got my first office job. 

Sunday dawned in sunny fashion – more spectacular than November has any right to be – and we had an early brunch date with two other dear friends – Anu and her daughter Riley (my spirit animal). It was a last minute addition to our Friendsgiving weekend – and a very happy one at that. Riley was looking at three of the schools that I considered in my college search: Boston University, Boston College and Tufts. A legendary trajectory indeed. We had a lovely brunch at Mooo… in Beacon Hill, taking our time to catch up before sending them on their way to BC. 

Kira and I walked back through the Common, but turned out of it before the Public Garden. The sun was strong; we’d been lucky with the weather the whole weekend. I’m not sure our hearts could have withstood any rain or clouds. Sometimes the universe eases up when you need it the most. 

Here is some music fit for a Sunday morning stroll, as much as for a Saturday night lounge session, and one of the only artists who can span such a marvelous spread is Shirley Horn, who has provided the soundtrack for this entire Friendsgiving weekend. Here’s looking at you!

We stopped to look in at the recent-revamped Four Seasons Hotel overlooking the Garden. Designed in whimsical fashion by Ken Fulk, it looked like a promising environment for some future holiday fun. We still have our Holiday Stroll reunion to look forward to in a couple of weeks – something we haven’t been unable to pull together since before COVID. How much has happened in those years… and how much we still had to share…

Suddenly it was a mad dash for Kira to make her train in time, and I was back on the Massachusetts Turnpike, already missing my friend. A Boston weekend had ended much too quickly. The memories, and these posts, will have to sustain us. 

As we near the final portion of our Friendsgiving weekend adventure, we return to the preamble that started it all: a pause in our walk back from a reunion dinner at Reunion. At this juncture, Kira and I had made our way into the sumptuously-lit environs of the Mandarin Oriental on Boylston. The lobby was adorned in its customary elegant splendor, with a fireplace flicking white flames into the air, but stepping outside of tradition, we bypassed that space for a quiet and or intimate second floor sofa, where we took a load off our feet and paused for brief respite. 

A slow jam then – and super-slow at that – to commemorate this stop. Obscure hotel hideaways are my favorite part of any city adventure. There is something intoxicating about being half-hidden from the world while sharing a moment of rest with an old friend. It always goes to my head. 

Our wild nights now consist mostly of such moments, followed by the hurried scuttling through windy weather to reach the warmth of the condo. There we light candles, listen to Shirley Horn, sip tea, lounge languidly on the couch, and give silent thanks for not wanting to be wild anymore. 

This particular night was not that different from any other in our long history of Boston nights – we followed the tea with a viewing of an old movie – ‘Mildred Pierce’ – and then it was time to sleep. Shirley sang us through to the morning, and the melancholy arrival of Sunday, always too soon.

A Boston evening arrives all too quickly in November – at least, the darkness of a Boston evening arrives too quickly. Where we might usually take a lovely, well-lit stroll to our dining destination in warm and still-sunny weather, was suddenly cloaked in the pitch-black of midnight, and it was only 6:30 PM as we left the condo. 

I’d made reservations at Reunion – the name was fitting, and it was a BBQ joint in the former location of Masa, which Kira and I once adored. One day we’ll do a proper homemade Friendsgiving meal – this was not that day. Kira doesn’t cook, and I couldn’t be bothered. A whole turkey for two people also felt a little excessive, I don’t care if it is traditionally a feast. I’ll have enough culinary work cut out for me when I have to bring the yams and tres leches cake to our family gathering. 

On this night, it was a Friendsgiving meal in the South End, so cue the food music of ‘The Main Ingredient’ by Shirley Horn, and peel me a grape!

Comfort food is ideal for a Friendsgiving night out, and Reunion served up a decent collection of pulled pork, tender brisket, mac and cheese, collard greens, and some margarita mocktails. Of course the food wasn’t the focus of this weekend, and we slipped back into the past, into the early days of working at John Hancock together. Kira had started seeing the man she would marry, and I had just begun dating the man with whom I would move to Chicago, and we were both too young to do anything but flounder our way through all of it. Not that they were bad in any way, but they were doomed, and we didn’t see it then. 

All these years later, we could look back without hurt, honor our pasts and our history, and find gratitude that all involved parties were still doing the best we could do.

A meal of thanks and a toast to that.

It invariably happens, especially as we get older, that our favorite moments of a weekend in Boston are not in new restaurants or visiting Broadway shows, but rather the simple in-between moments caught in a quiet side street, or the sun-soaked afternoon spell in the bedroom while the first half of ‘Meet Me In St. Louis‘ plays. Is there a more perfect segue into the proper holiday season?

When we returned to the condo, we had a cup of Earl Grey tea. We watched the fountain outside, now still and quiet. And we simply breathed, taking in the moment. 

A pause, then, in our narrative, in honor of that. Take your own moment now. 

The chill in the air was welcome, as I opened the window that looked out onto Braddock Park. At the fountain, a few people worked at either cleaning it up or closing it down for the season – I feared it was the latter, even as I knew it was later than usual to shut off the water. A late lack of freezing temperatures had kept it going this long, and as Kira came out into the front room, we watched as the last few drops of water fell for the last time this season. It was time for the fountain to slumber; we would see it open again in the spring, if we were lucky enough to be alive then. The notion of gratitude for the moment – and for this weekend together – kept us grounded and happily enjoying one another’s company. Despite the hint of existential pondering, the morning felt buoyant, and gleefully familiar. 

The sun was strong, though the day couldn’t quite be considered warm. It was fall – almost Thanksgiving – and the cool air kept our steps quick. Along the Southwest Corridor Park, flowers still bloomed, valiantly defying the colder nights, and richer in color for having made the effort. Zinnias chatted in their noisy cacophony of bright hues – a reminder of the summer we mostly missed, and the promise of another to come after we got through the winter. Pushing the thought of something so far ahead of us from my mind, I refocused on our day – which began with us riding the T to our usual shopping starting point: Downtown Crossing. 

With an eye on some gift-procurement, and some future planning for a holiday stroll, Kira and I quickly fell back into our usual rhythm, finding some presents for family and friends, and a few for ourselves. As we wound our way through the stores, treading those time-tested cobblestones, we paused for a brief break at the Omni Parker House, the place where I got Kira to try her first oyster probably a decade ago. That little bar/restaurant was closed now, to our dismay, so we simply sat near the hallway where a mirror reputed to be haunted by the image of Charles Dickens (who once had a room there). 

Other mysteries of fall would remain cloaked in autumnal splendor, before falling off their tree branches and rejoining the earth from where they came. Time with an old friend brought back memories and reminiscences, from our earliest days together right through the present moment. Descending through Boston Common and into the Public Garden, we discovered the lagoon was under renovation, and surrounded by a chain link fence. Some creative cropping later, we managed to find the beauty there, before heading in the direction of the condo… and our afternoon siesta.