General KoS's Open Salon Blog

Homecoming

Mon, 13 Feb 2012 15:02:38 -0500

Super Bowl Sunday marked three weeks since a conversation with my mother revealed that my grandma was in very delicate condition. Mom's choice of words, like “do not resuscitate” and “living will” caught my attention. Grandma had been hospitalized for pneumonia again—the second time in two months. The previous hospitalization had involved congestive heart failure as well, and the sum of these elements set off maximum alarms in my head. I didn't need a doctor to tell me what I already knew: grandma's ninety-two-year-old body was finally exceeding the manufacturer's warranty on her parts.

Although I'm not at liberty to discuss my actual age, I can tell you that I'm damn lucky to have had grandma in my life for as long as I have. From sci-fi bookworm to brainy skate punk to atypical FiDi professional to merciless cultural outlaw and beyond, my various incarnations never phased her one bit. Through them all, she saw and heard me for what I have always been: her grandson. As she got older and I got more experienced, I frequently had to break down complex situations to their root elements so that she could absorb and process them. Her thoughts and words carried more weight with me than anyone or anything else. She'd watched the world for decades, and was never short for an opinion. A grounded, working-class opinion that had endured wars, fake presidencies, collapsed economies, nuclear terrors, domestic tranquility, medical incompetence, and personal indifference. One that had outlived her husband, her brothers and sister, her friends, and her nursing home companions. She is truly the Omega.

My first memory is of looking out the window behind the kitchen sink of her old house. She was giving me a bath in that sink, quietly whistling some song under her breath while she made sure I was as clean and pure as she could make me. The world beyond that window was often grimy and foul. Two blocks away, a railroad box car factory churned out product around-the-clock. Smoke and soot and sweat and blood powered the American Dream for its workers and owners. In there, boys became men on the trick of a shift. Before child labor laws took effect, it wasn't uncommon to find children under the age of ten working lethal machinery amid even more lethal environs.

Grandma hailed from a hellhole of coal mining poverty in West Virginia, where Black Lung littered graveyards with old men who weren't yet thirty-five. Child brides were wedded off at fourteen and fifteen to become seasoned mothers by eighteen. Her escape from there was the Chickasaw Shipyards, in Mobile, Alabama. World War II required submarines. Submarine construction required tough, fearless welders who could fit into the cramped framing and hull confines while wearing oxygen rigs and slinging fire on steel. The window to her freedom was dirty with soot and toxic metal shavings. But it was freedom, nonetheless. She wanted a better kind of freedom for me.

Despite this noblesse oblige, she did buy me my first toy pistol. Mom and dad had a strict NO GUNS philosophy that flatly prohibited any kiddie arsenal whatsoever. Grandma didn't agree with them, knowing full well that their best efforts would result in a less well-rounded man. The blue plastic .45 replica she bought me fired yellow Zebra pellets and came with three cardboard targets that stood in plastic bases. Less than ten minutes after we got home with it, I marched into the kitchen and said to her, “Grandma, I need a new gun.” She asked me why, inquiring if the gun had broken. “No,” I answered, “It doesn't shoot far enough.” True. At its maximum range, I was hitting the three targets way too easily.

Grandma understood completely. In Hell Holler, WVA, she and her three brothers hunted game to put food on the family table. On one such hunt, she hit a wild turkey through the neck, while it was on the fly, from over 50 feet away. Her weapon? A Stevens-Savage double-barrel 20 ga. For my 5^th birthday, we went to a Western Auto and she bought me a cork-firing replica of her .30-.30 repeating rifle. Thereafter, range was never a problem. Nor was my wicked accuracy.

Grandma married three times. Her first husband was seldom, if ever discussed. He was from Hell Holler, too. Didn't last long. Contestant No. Two was a fine enough fella, except that he was also a solider who spent his time on the front lines of the Allied campaign in Europe. In 1943, on a break from the shipyard, grandma visited her sister in Pennsylvania. And got fixed up on a date with another fella. He was well-regarded and hardworking, if somewhat tragic. His wife, and mother of his two sons, had died of cancer at 26, leaving him devastated and alone. Not for long.

I've seen photos of grandma from that time period. She was absolutely stunning. A femme fatale before they knew their own power. I'd bet 7-2 that more than one bar fight started over exactly who was going to dance with her. Grandpa was no slouch, either. Dark, handsome, and toned from years on a production line, his manners and refinements gave him an air all his own. Grandma was immediately smitten. He was, too. Johnny Cash would later call this a Ring of Fire.

Grandma and grandpa kept up what we now call a “long distance relationship.” His responsibilities as a foreman at a wartime industrial production plant prohibited him from extended breaks or getaways. She visited as often as she could, taking buses and trains between the Gulf of Mexico and the Shenango River. On one of those visits, he proposed. She accepted, but there was a complication: Contestant No. 2. In those days, divorces couldn't be done through the mail. So, she waited until he got back from the war, in 1946, and had him sign the papers the day he returned. Tom, I'm sorry that my grandma broke your heart. Truly, I am. If it's any consolation, she gave my grandpa back his for the rest of his life.

The Chickasaw Shipyard bid its Rosies adieu when the boys came back home. Grandma transitioned from welding warships to handling explosives. At a TNT factory near my hometown. TNT had to be shipped here and there for various purposes, and grandma made sure that the packaging was secure on each order. Otherwise, those deliveries might have gone KABOOM at improper, inconvenient times. On an average day, enough high explosives passed through her hands that she and the other folks in her department were required to shower before leaving the factory. Skip that shower and your hands or clothes might detonate from a loose cigarette ash or jostle on the road. KABOOM!

One of the many things that the first three waves of Feminism totally fucked up was the Spectrum of Women. Our simplistic needs of bipolar This OR That American life require that our freedom of choice be broken down in a few rather pathetic options. The self-degrading dogma of late-20^th Century Feminism had reduced women to either corporate conquerors or submissive housewives. Two sub-classes briefly emerged: the Riot Grrrl and the Working Mother. Riot Grrls were expected to grow up and either assume the position of corporate cannibals or calm the hell down and squeeze out a few soccer puppies. Working Mothers were the bisexuals of the Feminist movement, attempting to have a foot in both worlds without fully committing to either. Lost in the cacophony of the above discord was the Broad.

Broads were never gonna' go to college. They were bored in (junior) high school and didn't want anything more to do with education than they absolutely had to. Big tits and a bawdy, bossy attitude were their hallmark. They smoked, they drank, they hung out with Bad Boys. When the war opened doors to economic equality and independence via industrial production and other related jobs previously held only by men, Broads suddenly didn't have to resort to unsavory lines of income or surrender to ogres who would breed them, beat them, and ignore them, in order to stay “alive.” But, even sweet, underachieving girls with bra sizes lower than 34DD could become Broads by contact. All they had to do was work in factories.

Grandpa didn't want to be married to a Broad. Grandma's experience in the shipyards and in the explosives plant inured her to the feeling of her own money in her pocket and control of her life in her own hands. What she was eager to do next was work as a welder's trainer in the same plant as my grandpa. He was always a soft touch with her, and went the distance to ensure her happiness in any situation. Not this time. Grandpa wanted a full-time mother for his boys, and more of a lady for himself. Grandma didn't see this as oppressive or degrading in any way, and the decision involved a lot less sturm und drang than couples these days perpetually whine about facing. It's easy to say, “Times were different then.” Truth is that they let love make the call. Grandpa got the wife he wanted, the boys got the mother they needed, and grandma got into the business of family. A few years later, my mother entered that family.

The cavalcade of happiness that my grandparents brought to my young life should never be underestimated. Summertime weekends meant trips to campgrounds with the Winnebago camper club to which my grandparents belonged. Or Conneaut Lake. Or flea markets where grandma and her sister dealt a wide assortment of antiques. Grandma and grandpa's Christmas tree produced gems like my first 200+ piece Lego set, a BlasTech E-11, and model kits of the starship Enterprise and the F-104 Starfighter. I woke on Sunday mornings to the smell of grandma's impossible-to-duplicate pancakes frying up in a cast-iron skillet and her patented, reanimate-a-week-old-corpse coffee percolating in a coffee pot on the stove. When I think back on those years, wave after wave of love rolls off them like a perfect surfing afternoon on glassy waters.

That afternoon was rudely interrupted just before my ninth birthday. Dad had seen the writing on the industrial wall: our area was dying, and soon to be dead. He landed a job as a newspaper editor at a well-respected outlet in a southern state. We'd be moving nearly a thousand miles away from grandma and grandpa. Too young to appreciate dad's foresight and dedication at the time, all I felt was the impending anguish of being cut off from my grandparents. The last stop before mom, my aunt, and I hit the highway out of town was grandma's house. As we pulled away from it, she and grandpa stood outside and waved us goodbye. I looked out the hatchback window and kept eye contact with her as long as I could. Our faces were both a free-flow of tears. Mine didn't stop until well after Pittsburgh.

The physical distance between me and grandma grew as the world opened itself to me. College was my escape from the abrasive, socially-suicidal enclave of lingering Revolutionary War romance and bilateral racism in Virginia's southeastern corner. To the abrasive, socially-suicidal enclave of lingering Southern Gothic romance and trilateral racism that was Florida's southeastern corner. To this latte island San Fiasco. Telephone calls were poor substitutes for live contact, and even those could be few and far between on my end. I'd become what she bemoaned to me in my early years: so far away and busy that I never came to see her.

I can actually count the number of times I went back to Pennsylvania after college. They almost fit on one hand. Each time, the injustice of age had robbed grandma of something else. Macular degeneration stole her sight. Boredom and fear stole her energy. We're not yet sure which thief made off with her hearing, or how much if it will return. Despite those deficits, grandma's mind has remained sharp and engaging. To me, that's what truly mattered. And so, I flew out last weekend to see her.

My cousin, who visits with grandma several times per week, felt that surprise was the best medicine of the moment. I knelt beside her recliner, thumbed the volume control on the device connected to her earpiece headphone, took her hand, and told her it was me. A jolt of recognition swept through her, lighting up elements I hadn't seen in way too long, before resonating back through me. Connection made, time irrelevant. If a picture is worth a thousand words, the right touch at the right time must be worth several million, at least.

Five days, five visits. Each one no longer than a couple hours. On the fourth encounter, I broached the subject no one ever wants to approach: mortality. Her life was hers to live for as long as she decided to live it, I said. She understood perfectly. Lingering between this world and the next, in her condition, is tantamount to a purgatorial curse. Grandma had never done anything to deserve that. My entire purpose for making this trip was to deliver the peace she'll need to embrace the end of her life when it comes. The payback for the love she funneled into me throughout my life. That love has always kept me free, and let the strength of peace run through my hands. The hands that held hers and caressed her cheeks during these last visits. Delivery made, time irrelevant. Another love supreme, cleared for flight.

The Impromptu Erotic Photo Shoot

Mon, 23 Jan 2012 21:01:25 -0500

Cathy and I were lovers for a few weeks, back in the early summer of 2011. We'd met through one of the more alternative online dating sites. She reached out to me first, with praise for my photography skills and an interest in the play I was writing at the time. We met twice in San Francisco before she kidnapped me away to the house she shared in Pinole, 20 miles north of Oakland. The encounter inspired an outstanding photography shoot at a lethally-dilapidated former military armory. Despite the artistic chemistry, the personal chemistry didn't work out too well. Until two days ago.

We'd stayed in touch since ending our foray as a couple. She found a guy that she loved and enjoyed, and he loved her enough to give her the freedom to be as she will. Cathy's a latent sexual dynamo, hitting the stride in her early 40s that most women hit a decade earlier. An earlier bad marriage took that time from her. Now, she's getting it back. With interest. A routine, Happy New Year text from me to her got the ball rolling this past weekend. We agreed on a date together. She left the details to me, and was careful to inform me that her new boyfriend would let her do !whatever! she wanted.

!Whatever!. I love that kind of license. A recent outing had me exploring the Embarcadero Center after dark, climbing its various staircases, traipsing the pedestrian bridges over streets below, and absorbing the sculptural and architectural elements. The public restrooms at the Center's four buildings are notorious for hosting raunchy, downtown sex breaks all day, every day. Add all those elements together, multiply by some audacity, and the potential results of a photo shoot could be staggering.

Cathy's the type who likes to dress up. She's got elegant, sexy tastes, and enjoys composing provocative ensembles that invite appreciation and test abilities. I planned to have her in 40s-style stockings and shoes, in a skirt/blouse/jacket ensemble from the same period. No hat. Her chestnut hair's got enough natural body and curls to make most women commit suicide. And she knows just how to do her makeup to complete the image. Dangerous. Willing. Able. Yes, I planned to fuck the shit out of her in front of a camera or two. Our cameras. Our images. Our lives.

“Erotic photo shoot,” she asked. “Sure. Where?” Alluring as the concept was, she demurred for a different location. She and her boyfriend, Will, were living in a tremendous Victorian house, over in a dangerous section of Oakland. “Why don't you just come over here. We can have him work the cameras after we set them up.” Sounded fine to me.

Understand something: we were not aiming for some commonplace porn shoot. Nor was this a ruse for her and me to simply get naked. There's a slim, fading line between erotica and porn, which most people have forgotten, if they ever knew it at all. Which isn't to say that Cathy and I weren't actually going to be fucking, sucking, kissing, and/or cumming. I'd never done a shoot like this before, and can't profess to have any familiar influences in the erotic photography field. That didn't worry me at all.

I grabbed a couple different outfit elements from my closet, without overthinking how they would all be used. They went into a backpack, along with my camera, buds from a newly-arrived sativa strain, a pack of Dunhill reds, a mini-tripod, and an extra battery charger. The other bag I took was full of sex toys, bondage cuffs, and two slave collars (his&hers). Those, plus my regular-size tripod fit perfectly onto the back end of my motorcycle, and I took off across the Bay Bridge without a single idea in mind for the project.

Will and Cathy's house is a time/space junture originating in 1908. Will has spent the last year renovating one room at a time, using fixtures and other elements from that same period. In addition, he's got a keen eye for decoration. Each room is a visual treasure trove, without being too busy or overcrowded. Antique chests, cabinets, and desks hinted at what awaited us in their bedroom, and I was not disappointed. A queen-size Mahogany sleigh bed occupied most of the space, and left only narrow lanes around it for our tripods and cameras. But the tech aspect wasn't what concerned me the most.

Will's a gregarious, if slightly reserved, fella in his late forties. Long-haired and well-weathered, he has the quiet intensity of deep waters on a calm morning. Our conversations were relaxed and non-frivolous, putting us both at ease pretty fast. Which helped us avoid the dependably awkward, “So, are you okay with me fucking your girlfriend in front of you while we take some raunchy, yet tasteful pics of ourselves being savagely unrestrained,” moment. In less than twenty minutes, we'd made an impossibly smooth, nuanced transition from our first contact to me selecting Cathy's stockings, underwear, and shoes.

The outfits and accessories I brought tickled her imagination. She immediately cooed about wanting to give me a blowjob while I wore the late 60s era American gas mask and black, knee-high John Fluevog boots. I responded with some thoughts about a dildo in her pussy and my lips on her clit. Mutual visions of entwined bodies and passionate kissing spontaneously emerged, as did notions for a foot worship series. Just like that, we had a four-movement outline.

By manipulating the single curtain over the window, we were able to take advantage of indirect, diffused, natural light from an overcast afternoon. I set up the mini tripod and my Cannon (sx30is) atop some books on a dresser, checked the angle, set the shutter speed, aperture, ISO, color, and timer, and hopped on the bed for a test shot. The outcome produced the standards we used as a baseline: black-n-white, low contrast, sharp focus, single shot, 2-second delay. We asked Will to be our shutter release operator on both cameras.

It's no secret that creativity and sexuality play off of each other. Watching Cathy flitter around the room in her vertically-striped auburn stockings, black bra, and black satin panties while she adjusted her Nikon's settings and felt out the light's influence more or less exemplified all the reasons why I came to California, and Northern California in particular. Moments later, we dove into the outline we'd sketched and filled in the details by improvisation. With Will taking our calls for shutter intersection, Cathy and I could fully jump through the rabbit hole and lose ourselves in each other. No acting, no pretending, no pouting for the lens. Raw. Real. Fun.

The session lasted for over two hours. Between the two cameras, we over 200 images. The final set, involving the fourth movement in the outline, as shot entirely by Will, who took Cathy's camera in hand and shot what he saw. When we three sat down and looked at what we'd achieved, we were completely blown away. Every single risk we'd taken had paid off, and so had the “happy accidents.” Composition, balance, provocation--these images would sell. Not on a fetish porn site, but as tangible, framed prints. Some of them in sets.

At San Francisco street fairs later this year. We like sex out here. A lot. It's common to find erotica like this on display in people's flats or lofts or studios. Signs of life, sans mass culture conformity surrender. It might not play out there in the 'bubs, where y'all pretend that finger vibrators and Cosmopolitan sex tips will keep either of you happy. As much as I've decried the City's loss of wildness and character over the last two years, things are changing. Those of us with the spirit and the will are taking up The Way. We see no need to compromise. We'll put ourselves on the line, if for no other reason than to show you where it is. One frame at a time.

Beyond Resolution

Sat, 14 Jan 2012 23:01:50 -0500

2012 seemed like the perfect time to start a motorcycle club. Last year, I pushed myself in new directions by establishing this blog, taking to the airwaves as an underground radio DJ, and writing/directing/producing a new play. Repeating myself year after year was never very comfortable for me. As an explorer in the further reaches of experience, I demand more. You should, too.

The impetus for the club wasn't some hackneyed New Year's resolution. Not even close. The suggestion was made to me almost five years ago, by members of an international motorcycle club. I would never have thought of it myself. It was one Hell of a compliment. One I have spent the last four-plus years considering.

That's right: FOUR-PLUS YEARS. I've been a biker for nearly a decade. Japanese cruisers, mostly. The second of them gave me the privilege of a trip from San Francisco to Sturgis, S.D. and back, as a ride captain of four bikes (seven people total). Other accolades include Hollister, a full riding season with the San Francisco Motorcycle Club, and more trips over the Bay Bridge in sideways, .45 caliber rain than you really want to think about. My Pennsylvanian values prohibit me from disclosing other trips, affiliations, outrageous parties, and un-fucking-believable experiences, out of respect for less adventurous eyes and minds (San Franciscans tend to fry both with ludicrous ease).

Why not simply join a club that already exists? Already tried that. Holding my personality down to a modest 30% of normal, one of the oldest clubs in the country felt that I was too much for them, only to admit less than a year later that they'd badly misjudged me. I considered going back, running through the process again, and taking up their patch. There are several people there with whom I thoroughly enjoy riding, drinking, and carousing. But, in truth, I'd rather not compromise my expansive, life-sculpted, iconoclastic sense of liberty for any club. I've earned the right to be a total individual. Who wants the company of other total individuals, in a club that cuts its own standard.

Recruiting the second club member proved easier than I expected. The natural choice was an international traveler whose most recent passport stamps include Israel, Syria, Portugal, and India. She won't have her first bike much longer. A year on it has shown her the need for more power and capability. Connecting her innate spirituality, honed in temples and taverns alike, to the open road made perfect sense. After mentioning it to her some months ago, we formed up a plan to make an initial run up the coast, to Ft. Bragg, along Hwy. 1 only, just after New Year's Day. Like, the day after.

Full disclosure: the club's VP is no slouch in the affiliations/outrageous parties/un-fucking-believable experiences department, either. In fact, I arrived at the fourth party of my NYE/NYD schedule this year, around dawn, to find her already present and target shooting from the hot tub. We wound out that party out until 1:30p.m., then split our respective ways. Our stated departure time was 10:30a.m., the following morning. Hey—I said this was a motorcycle club, right?

Like fucking clockwork. I rolled up to her cottage, near Muir Woods, at 10:05a.m., and we were at Stinson Beach by 11:00. She got her first eval right then and there, which was 86%. Basic road skills and riding style. The score held until a couple hours later, when we climbed the side of a ridge, 200 vertical feet above the Pacific and ensconced in various coastal pines. A thick, cloudy mist turned the road into a slippery roller coaster composed of hairpin, switchback turns and 20ft visibility, not to mention the hindering accumulation on our helmet visors. Mist also gathered on our necks, resulting streams that found their way into the protective jackets we both wore. VP lacked insulated gloves and boots, exposing her hands and feet to a slow, thorough soaking made worse by wind chill. She never flinched or failed—even when we rode into a white-out. Thirty miles like this. Most people wouldn't have made it ten. Finally, we made a health-and-safety-inspired, unscheduled stop for the night. VP's final ride score for day: 99%.

Starting a motorcycle club brings a tremendous license for possibilities on the road. VP and I are both single, sexually dynamic, and unafraid to go for what we want. Believe me when I tell you, fellas, there are distinct advantages to having randy women as members of the club. Like inviting other women to join us for a night of unrestricted pleasures. Unfortunately, the story of what my VP and I accomplished on that first night is now a matter of club business, and not yours. All I will say is that another female was present, and each of us got exactly what we wanted. A surprise reward for our health-and-safety overnighter.

By morning, the weather had cleared. Sunny skies with 20-mile visibility were the order of the day. VP was already awake and engaged in her hour-long morning prayer, out on the oceanside balcony. Waves were rolling in at 12-15ft heights, thundering on the water and shore alike. Deeply respectful of all life, as well as the natural elements that sustain it, VP never fails to give thanks and request blessings in a language that I don't speak, yet completely understand. I am, after all, an ordained minister. Who knows enough to keep the prayers brief and the rides interesting.

Day two provided another set of appropriate challenges. VP's bike died a few miles outside Point Arena. A quick check of its systems revealed that it had little, if any, oil in the engine. So, we left it parked on an access road, buddied up on my bike, and rode to a hardware store I'd seen a ways back. Two quarts and a funnel made from a paper bag later, we were off and running again. Recovering the bike was a real mood-changer, and VP dove in with the requisite enthusiasm. “There is no lying on the Road: it will always bear you out,” I'd said to her before leaving her house the prior day. We were two-for-two on the Road.

And it paid us back mightily for our faith. The remainder of Hwy 1, to Ft. Bragg, treated us with a variety of swooping dives and turning rolls that would test any biker, at any level. Warm sunshine perpetuated the common myth of California's ubiquitously mild winters. Our arrival in Ft. Bragg was full of giggles, satisfaction, and grins. The previous few days' rock-n-rolling caught up with VP as soon as we booked an inn for the night. Already riding a down wave to an extended sleep, she opted for the expressway to dreamtime known as “Mexican for dinner” and collapsed in bed, done for the night. So, I took off on my own, to see what Ft. Bragg's got to offer after dark.

Ft. Bragg is an old logging and railroad town, and has the requisite eccentricities that one would expect as such. It's Old Town section boasts the best drinking, and the liveliest taverns are all within walking distance of one another (and your bed, if you plan correctly). On the Tuesday night I was out and about, the pickins for a single fella were a little slim. Little, slim, young blonde and brunette, who were still young enough to keep cutesie stuffed animal minis clipped to their purses. Or a pert, tough-n-tender bartender. Or the late 20s businessgrrrl cruising for action with a stranger in town. Rough choices, fellas. Damn rough. Saturday nights are even worse.

Day three involved blazing through California's coastal mountain ridges, with their vaulting canyons of trees and ferns. Absolutely no one else was on the roads. Inland zig-zags cut through wine country and redwoods, allowing for illegal indulgences of a potentially fatal nature. The hills alone could kill you., never mind the mile-long flats and 16% downgrades. Out there on your own, out of sight between riders, out of help's immediate range, you find out who and what you really are. Some of you know exactly what I mean. We want riders like you.

Back in SF, I wasted no time researching what the next move for a budding MC. Answer: more research. Like all other forms of existence, motorcycle clubs have their nuances. Patch designs and the number of rockers speak volumes to other MCs. You'd rather not be sending the wrong signals through ignorance. Or misconduct by your members. The latter can be ameliorated with the proper set of bylaws, to which every member must agree to abide (if not sign). Bylaws are, essentially, a constitution for a club—governance, conduct, membership criteria. They should be carefully considered and fully enabled before the first full-patch club ride. I've ordered a set from a MC that's over a hundred years old, and will use theirs as a foundation for ours. The goal is to have our first nine riders patched, signed to the bylaws, and on the road for an Independence Day run.

Recruiting has, so far, been pretty easy. We're a selective club, and the first nine memberships are by invitation only. After that, any applicant to the club will have to go through a six-month prospect period, followed by a vote of all members. The piece you are reading now is not meant to promote the club, and I won't disclose its name. We'd prefer to meet you, go on a road trip, and see if you have what we want in our ranks. Motorcycle clubs, like every other aspect of culture, need an update every so often. New manifestations of classic principles alloyed with modern framework and unleashed at will. I'm going to take this privilege and run as far and hard with it as I can. Why the fuck not? Everyone has their version of Legacy Desire. This one's mine.

A desire to reclaim and expand the dwindling liberties we too readily sacrifice in the name of whatever excuse is offered. This motorcycle club is not a substitute for my other passions. Global affairs, the spirit of radio, energy exchange between stage and audience, and connecting with people via this medium will all remain integral to my personality. They're simply being taken to another level, on the highways and byways that are the central nervous system of this country. Out on the Road, we are true and free. See you there.

Whose Side Are You On?

Wed, 10 Aug 2011 18:08:48 -0400

The downgrade of America's credit rating by Moody's and Standard & Poors was the ultimate admission of failure by Corporate America—particularly its Financial division. The financial industry did its best to sabotage and cripple any long-term economic engine that would have led America out of the Great Collapse. Decrepit corporations themselves eagerly resisted the absolute need for a revision of consumerism and the products thereof and thereto. Instead of substance, they gave us gimmicks; instead of taking responsibility, they flung blame and excuses; instead of stepping up to the truth, they cowered behind lies. All of which are symptoms of an extinction agenda in a slow, dumb animal that's just too stupid to live.

Nothing proves this more clearly than the attempted snow job by Francesco Guerra, of the Wall Street Journal. In it, Guerra admits that capitalism needs governments to stimulate their economies because corporations and their bankers cannot. As if this wasn't embarrassing enough, Guerra honesty tries to convince us that bankers and markets are victims of the very governments who have done their bidding. Reality check: We're in the fifth year of the Fed giving the financial industry free money to loan back, at highly profitable interest rates, to the country, states, cities, and a few lucky people. Yeah, that sure sounds like the dictionary definition of “victim” to me.

Seriously. Take a look at the earnings statements from the Too-Big-To-Fail set over the last year. Their biggest moneymaker is public debt, which you tax-hating morons know as “bonds.” If it wasn't for those bonds (which always cost taxpayers more than a project-specific tax), bankers would be even bigger losers than they are right now. The only sensible thing for them to do was to put this cash cow on steroids.

The net result? Everything you take for granted and rely on to keep this nation functioning just got much more expensive. Your entire convenience culture depends on on highways, roads, and bridges being maintained in optimal condition. A few breakdowns in that system, and you can kiss your Super Wal-Mart and Safeway low prices goodbye. Along with the year-round bounty of food they stock.

Same goes for the public education system (grades K-12). It still enjoys a very wide margin of enrollment over its private counterpart. And, like the road/highway/bridge system mentioned above, it needs constant maintenance and upgrades. Everything, from buildings to books to athletic fields to computers, course options, and teacher training. Everyone says they want the best for their kids. Time to put up or shut up. Either way, the bankers win.

Who do you have to thank for all this? Corporate America. According to the fundamentals of capitalism, industry and service sectors create jobs, and the role of the government is minimal. Instead of adhering to that fundamental maxim, American capitalism is now dependent on the government it has spent the last fifty years trying to destroy. Inasmuch, American capitalism has been reduced to state sponsorship, and will die without it. Creepy, eh comrade?

Capitalism is an organic being, just like its creators. It is subject to the same rules of evolution—and extinction-- namely, evolve or die. Corporate America is still in its Neanderthal phase, despite the encroachment of Homo Sapien challenges. Ample opportunity for crossing over into a more evolved state has been willfully bypassed. By downgrading their own species, Moodys and Standard & Poors have validated what many of us already knew: they're not meant to survive.

Then again. maybe you aren't, either. This nation arrogantly brays its revolutionary pride every single year on July 4^th, which was barely a month ago. Yet, you have no concept of how to resist and overthrow the tyranny you face now. Partisan politics is merely a game meant to keep you all fighting against yourselves, helpless and dependent on those who control the game. All around the globe, revolutions are breaking out against this very kind of oppression. People are putting their lives on the line, facing guns and tanks and planes because they recognize that enough is enough. They're the real thing, and you aren't. Or are you?

S. F. Gay Pride Mellows Out

Mon, 27 Jun 2011 16:06:34 -0400

It's Sunday morning. I'm watching the sun rise from the southeast side of Nob Hill, just outside of downtown San Francisco. In a few hours, roughly a million people will sort of go berserk on Market Street. By floats and balloons and roller skates and bicycles and convertibles, lucky throngs from the Bay Area and beyond will ride the Great Rainbow Way as a million onlookers cheer the parade towards America's purported Gay Mecca: the Castro District. On the weekend when the new heroes of the gay matrimony revolution are three Republicans in the New York Senate. Predictably, we're not so much a party out here as an “Also Ran.” With the ultimate court decision on Prop 8 hanging in the balance and a new emphasis on “family friendliness” San Francisco's annual gay bash, has taken a decidedly more conservative direction.

If the vaunted, pre-parade Pink Saturday night party is any indication of how the parade will unfold, I won't feel any guilt for not showing up. Liquor was banned from the event, the music ended at just after eleven, and the lines outside every club, bar, tavern, or pizza joint in the Castro were enough to make crowds amble towards the Mission (not known for its gay bars) or SOMA (fairly good gay bars/clubs and host to most of the better dance clubs, but further away) in search of other entertainment. That all said, the crowd was remarkably well-behaved, even if a substantial percentage of them were flying aces high on meth, coke, Ecstasy, LSD, 2CB, or some other exotic analogs. No one shot anyone at the party, nor was anyone stabbed. The one smack I saw leveled on someone was quickly subdued by friends and other revelers. What was the vibe that was missing? Life.

I spent Friday night on the phone, calling the seven people in my Contacts who were most likely to want to run amok on Pink Saturday and had done so previously. Of the seven, two actually made it to the event. One of them was DJing a dance area near Moby Dick, and was committed to going. The other had agreed to meet me at the party after attending a play earlier in the night. It hadn't been unusual for people to book more than one entertainment stop in their Pride Weekend nightly schedules, and this friend had a solid pedigree of urban, woodland, desert, and oceanic recreational experiences (some while on drugs, somen not). Her apartment's on 15^th, near Castro—a few blocks from Market Street. She should have been easy to get to the party.

Not this time. She hemmed and hawed by text message, took the most ridiculous walking detour possible, then whined about the crowds and music volume. Moments after her arrival, as we made our way towards the dance area on upper Market, she simply disappeared. I doubled back to find her but she was gone. Which was when I decided to just let her go and do what I'd come to do: celebrate. For all twenty or so minutes that remained in the “official” party.

Up closer to the stage was the San Francisco scene I'd come to experience on the tenth anniversary of my last appearance at Pink Saturday. Slithery, drenched in sweat, undulating in complimentary waves, and united in the sheer joy of being. Men, women, gay, straight, bi, young, younger, old, older. Search light quartets whirled translucent pillars up through the night sky from several locations and the city glittered like a long-absent raver welcomed back to the fold. A sense of transcendence ripped through us all in those precious, fleeting minutes before the absurd witching hour. It was glorious.

And then, it was over. At eleven-fucking-fifteen. On a Saturday night. How embarrassing is that? Is this any way to truly celebrate?

The DJ replaced the UNSK-UNSK-UNSK dance beat with a down tempo ambient track that could have tranquilized a coked-up pit bull. The crowd began to drift apart. Since my straight friends had lamed out so badly, I decided to give my gay friends a whirl. By text and phone, email and hook-up site, I pinged them all. They'd mostly abandoned the Castro for the night and were pretty evenly split between a few overpriced parties, underwhelming smut gatherings, and being in bed early so they could be on Market Street for the parade, sans hangover. To quote The Thing, from the Fantastic Four: “What a revoltin' development.”

As the masses roamed the streets of the Castro after midnight, in search of something to replace that delicate, delicious, ubiquitous vibe we'd all been sharing under the unity of UNSK-UNSK-UNSK, the police and security guards remained low-key and unobtrusive. Billows of pot smoke sweetened the air, the occasional cackle pealed out, and salacious “Hey, bay-bay” taunts from man to man peppered the overall murmur. But there was no doubt about it: our uproarious resonance was fading by the minute.

And fade, it did. All the way back to my pad on Nob Hill, by way of a few other interludes (which spanned several hours). Believe me when I tell you that those interludes don't merit the words to relay them or your time spent reading those words.

The big, new buzz term in San Francisco is “family-friendly.” The latest Board of Supervisors roster has expressed their dismay over a recent report that verified what long-time City denizens take as rather obvious: families with post-toddler kids are a rarity here. They tend to be predominantly among the Latino and Chinese populations, while WASPS depart for East Bay suburbs when the need to breed takes hold. Unfortunately, the rush to make the City “family-friendly” has meant the eradication of many edgy, provocative San Francisco events and their replacement with orderly, predictable, and mundane “fun.” The message is inescapable and tragic: export and exile zaniness to Burning Man for seven days to preserve the popular image of San Francisco, then keep the home fires at a gentle smolder. Yes, ladies and gentlemen, San Fran Frisky has been re-set for “smolder” so that y'all will stay and raise your babies here.

Credit the Gay Adoption and Family Rights movements of the 90s with this atrocious makeover. Success on those fronts was a fantastic breakthrough for gays who had always wanted kids but lacked the social and legal standing to adopt or engage in unique, procreative arrangements with friends or total strangers. Parenthood certainly had its privileges and rewards. Suddenly, newly-minted daddy-daddy and mommy-mommy nuclear families frowned on their former excesses or anyone else's right to enjoy them. The victorious staked their claim to status as upstanding, if somewhat boring, citizens. As toddlers got to be a more and more common sight in the risque Castro, the rowdiness died down and a revised, respectable community sprouted from the backyard gardens, front porch hedgerows, and pot smoke.

Never was that revised community more on display than today. New York may have legalized gay marriage but San Francisco is rapidly setting the national standard when it comes to family values among gay couples in urban areas. Amazingly, those values are nearly identical to the ones found in the tranquil 'burbs. Except that sex toy shops and porn outlets are still okay in the Castro. For now, anyway. Who knows what will happen to their ilk in five years? If the district court decision is upheld by the Ninth Circuit, and the Supreme Court, in the Proposition 8 matter, a wave of gay marriages and subsequent baby boom in San Francisco could irretrievably alter the landscape of Castro liberty the way Rudolph Guliani remade Times Square in his own image. That sure seems to be the direction of things. We're validating the decision of those three Republicans in the New York Senate by showing that we know how to tone it down and be the gay American Gothic out here.

Yep'er. The San Francisco Gay Pride Parade 2011 will be over in a few hours. The million visitors will break their separate ways to daytime dance parties, brunches, tours, sex toy shops, walks on the chilly beaches, or strolls through the MOMA. It's going to be an uncharacteristically gorgeous summer day in the City, without a cloud in the sky; temperatures will be near 80 degrees. Yes, you read that right: sunny and 80 degrees in San Francisco, with less than a week to go until July. The visiting million will go back home to their various cities and towns, telling their friends and families about the marvelous time they had out here. I wonder, though, how many will have noticed our degraded standards for wanton sexuality and indulgence during formerly epic celebrations, and San Francisco's slide into irrelevance as a third-rate party international party town. Will it make them more likely to start and raise their own families here, or will they simply seek out a better, bolder, wilder celebration in another city next year?