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This morning's Chronicle has an article on a new report by the Human Rights Watch on the harassment of gay youth in schools.
31 May 2001
As usual, work's been fairly all-consuming. Lots of tasks, so little time. My most recent "free" time was spent joyfully shopping with the grand for her summer wardrobe - which was actually a lot of fun as I got an opportunity to look at the selection at the Crossroads in downtown Berkeley. Of course, here it was budget considerations, not time, that dampened my enthusiasm.
I was really happy that the Lesbian and Gay Film Festival schedule finally made it to our East Bay shores. Now come the really hard parts, deciding what to go see - and - finding out what's still available come June 1st when us film-going proles can make our purchases.
Reading-wise, I'm almost done with Tobias Wolff's awesome memoir of his experience as a soldier in Vietnam, "In Pharaoh's Army". It's quietly eloquent and well worth a look. I picked it up after seeing it mentioned in a recent article about Francis Ford Coppola's restoration of "Apocalypse Now".
Therapy's going along okay. Last week felt something like a respite, but from what? I chattered on and on, determined not to respond to the inner voice telling me that I was chattering on and on. T listened, asked questions, I chattered on some more. Suddenly it was time to go. I have to remember to talk with her about the thought I had, about the importance of her waiting room as a buffer against the demanding world that pursues me right up to its door.
29 May 2001
Thanks to Flip's links at east west I've been introduced to the writings of Barbarella. I've been enjoying reading her entries and I've thought, more than once, how easy she makes her writing seem, how enchantingly personal. Today's entry closed very vividly. I savor her words. Go ahead on, link to her.
Meanwhile, the beautiful mystery passed me in the hallways, again.
15 May 2001
I've read several writings recently that have given me some insight. The first was a snippet from Fritz Perl's book, "In and Out the Garbage Pail":
"In working with a patient or whomever I meet, I am especially alert to whether he wants to please or displease me, whether he wants to play the good boy or bad boy...
The good patient, like the good boy, wants to bribe with his behavior. If the therapist is interested in childhood memories, he brings memories galore. If the therapist is problem-oriented he brings those, and if he runs out of problems he creates new ones...
We are back where we started from, the problem of identification. Do we identify with our true self or with the demands of otherness, including the demands of a self-image?"
The second was from Gregory Bateson's "Mind and Nature":
"What happens when, for example, I go to Freudian psychoanalyst? I walk into and create something which we will call a context that is at least symbolically (as a piece of the world of ideas) limited and isolated by closing the door. The geography of the room and the door is used as a representation of some strange, nongeographic message.
But I come with stories-not just a supply of stories to deliver to the analyst but stories built into my very being. The patterns and sequences of childhood experience are built into me. Father did so and so; my aunt did such and such; and what they did was outside my skin. But whatever it was that I learned, my learning happened within my experiential sequence of what those important others-my aunt, my father-did.
Now I come to the analyst, this newly important other who must be viewed as a father (or perhaps an antifather) because nothing has meaning except it be seen as in some context. This viewing is called the transference and is a general phenomenon in human relations. It is a universal characteristic of all action between persons because, after all the shape of what happened between you and me yesterday carries over to shape how we respond to each other today. And that shaping is, in principle, a transference from past learning."
I've also been reading through Anne Fadiman's award winning book The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down", a marvelous read on culture as a shaper of context...and the tragedies that can occur when even well meaning folk are operating from within vastly different contexts.
12 May 2001
This past weekend I spent some quality time with JS and of course we had to go see the new mega blockbuster "The Mummy Returns" not once, but twice. It was enjoyable in a LOUD sort of way and fairly derivative of blockbusters of summers past. A little bit of Indiana Jones (actually a lot), a snippet of E.T., a dash of Baron Munchausen and the ghost of George Zucco from "The Mummy's Hand" all WRAPPED UP in a neat package. And it really is LOUD. My humble office is close to being directly beneath one of the two theatres where it is playing. When the soundtrack raises the volume for dramatic emphasis I can hear the throbbing bass lines denoting screen action.
10 May 2001
Sunday evening I spent with DK and BJ. Was that my first drag show? Yes, I think so, unless we count the evenings I spent hanging out as a teenager watching the queens enter the bar next to the theatre where I used to go to the midnight showing of experimental movies in Atlanta. Or my own countless amateur solo productions in front of the mirror...arranging the hair just so...
Anyway, it was neat to meet Rula and I enjoyed the show. We stayed until half-time and then split. Not a reflection on the fabulousness of the show, but we were a trio of tired boys who had to get up early the next morning. I hear we might return for the next engagement.
10 May 2001
Tuesday, the fab JM treated me to lunch at La Note. We sat outside in the back, ate good food and had a nice converse about work, life, and her upcoming vacation with her family. She works hard, she's smart, beautiful and cares deeply about important things, yet she carries her seriousness lightly, unemcumbered by ego. That's rare. I'm glad she remained with the City, even happier that she's found an enclave of productive, nurturing souls to work with. Note to JM, next time it's my treat.
10 May 2001
This Wednesday I discovered the perils of word association resulting in an interesting session with T. Okay. It was awkward, interesting and productive. On one hand I am tempted to expouse the opinion that I should have more caution in what I write publicly - not least because I sometimes print out these pages and share them with T. On the other hand, I greatly prefer the role of a lazy editor...putting as little effort as my tentative self will allow into censoring my words. But even writing this is a bit nonsensical as the fact is that tentative self has a newsroom full of editors working nonstop to shape things up before the impulse to type this word or that word even moves from my brain down to my fingers. To get through this, do I need developing a tic of self-revelation? I think so. I think it takes a certain discipline or a certain controlled recklessness to strip away the defenses of the self. Writing about what needs to be done or what it takes to get it done is not the same as doing it, unless you are willing to use your own words against your own "self". I feel safe enough in the room with T to talk around these issues, perhaps even to move through them. But do I feel safe enough with myself, in my own skin...mmmmm...that is a question.
10 May 2001
...paper, rock, scissors...and now, via the Village Voice, this grim tale of the continuing efforts to recruit innocent young minds to hetrosexuality ...
I've been very busy with work...too busy to do much other than feel guilty about not updating and feel envious of all the beautiful young men and women, digital cameras in hand, so diligently updating their blogs. Poor old me. Sigh.
So another month has arrived. I'm looking forward to some time off in a month or so. Time to catch up on movies and books. And of course the 25th Anniversary San Francisco International Lesbian and Gay Film Festival beckons, calendar in May, films in June! As in the past years, I expect to be in attendance, mainly in the tranny ghetto at the Victoria and Roxie. Look for the gender confused older person with (probably) pink hair and cute glasses...maybe I'll paint my nails to match my hair. More updates on my looming fashion (disaster?) later.
In addition to ignoring my self-imposed web mystress duties, I've gone terribly astray in my reading. I'm trying for a little momentary redemption by sticking with one book all the way through, Gregory Bateson's "Mind and Nature".
On my social calendar (for those few who care), this coming Sunday I'm scheduled to go with DK and BJ to see Rula Planet. Omigod...so young...so blonde. No wonder I'm in such a jealous mood.
Well we can't be seeing green all the time. Especially with our new environmentally minded president whose idea of a pristine wilderness seems to be a Tosco refinery at dusk. Tonight's therapy night. Hmmmm...whatever will we talk about.
Oh...one more thing (although I wish I could put it out of my mind!)...today's the Goober Queen's last day at work. All hail the GQ!
2 May 2001
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