To Have and To Hold In Sickness and In Health

I should write about sex, I guess. If you're gay that's what everyone expects, isn't it? (An assumption that I find off-base and disturbing, since I don't believe sex in the gay community is any more superficial or casual than in the straight. Hedonistic sex is not a gay monopoly!) Anyway, here's my take on sex tonight - while I'm awake and can't sleep. I've been with my partner, Mark, for almost eighteen years. We are monogamous. We haven't always been, but we are now. It is the best choice we've made because it preserves and builds trust in our relationship and that gives room for intimacy to grow. Intimacy is the purpose of a long-term relationship, a marriage. The gift of marriage to each other is the committed and loving companionship of one other human soul who knows you as completely as you know yourself. This knowledge combined with earnest love, love which is not selfish but rather open and giving, creates a gentle harbor for the windswept, wave tossed bark we call our life. It is the greatest blessing of being together: the constant and true nurturing of you by one who loves you, and in return your true and constant nurturing of he (or she). This prime relationship, when tended and cherished, creates a stable foundation which will weather the storms of illness, financial changes, loss of loved ones, the responsibilities of parenting and those times when sex is NOT what you want. Yes! I said that. It is true. There are times when you or your spouse may not want sex and it's usually when you're partner most especially does. Until your relationship is visited with this difficulty you may laugh thinking it cannot be possible to ever not want sex. I'm going to tell you I think it will happen to every couple. What can cause it? Nearly anything. The list of marriage challenges I stated a few sentences back have, each one, the potential to provide a loss of sexual desire. My experience has been to see my sexual desire plummet when I was confronted with several major challenges in our life together. We have been confronted with several serious health issues all at once: HIV/AIDS treated with a broad spectrum of anti-virals daily (the meds can interfere with sexual desire), Mark's broken back requiring a disc fusion and my necrosis of both femur heads requiring a bilateral hip replacement, and lastly the onset for me of serious depressive illness which requires more medications and therapy - medications again inhibiting sexual drive. These serious health issues have also contributed substantially to the loss of work and primary income. So let me break that down a little. Statistics show that ONE of the major problems I've listed can strain a marriage to the point of divorce. Mark and I have had five. FIVE. Four major health conditions. Financial devastation. The loss of our home due to same. No employment prospects. Coitus Interuptus? Big Time! Who can't understand why?! One has to laugh, for the humor may save us... Seriously, I have to believe two things keep Mark and I going at this point. One. We both believe in God and His power to intervene because of His love for us. Two. A strong, intimate, nurturing foundation brought about by TRUST which is established, at least in part, through sexual fidelity. So, there it is in a brief superficial overview. This is the way I see sexual monogamy being integral to our lives. I think it's normal, healthy and not any different from a heterosexual relationship. Monogamous sex affirms for us that we are a better as a couple, and stronger, knowing the partner will be there for us, committed, not intent on escaping from reality, however painful, through the heady pleasures of hedonism. The most basic expression of our love and commitment for each other is able to be transformed from having sex to making love. This choice stabilizes us as a couple, providing the room for emotional trust and spiritual growth: two individuals who have chosen to be together, exclusive of all others physically, so that together we may know that we have the strength, with God's help, to not merely survive the trials of life, but perhaps even because of them, to thrive .

Proper Attributions!

My Dear Spouse, Mark, has informed me that it was his original comment regarding the importance of gay and lesbian, transgendered and bisexual persons being unable to marry and therefore being bereft of the ability to easily leave traceable documentation of their existence as a family which led me to contemplate the paragraph on 'Our Gay Tradition' (below). So, here it is, the attribution. I also must endeavor to relay to my dear husband that it was indeed his comment BUT in concert with having recently found the site Androphile.org which actually gave me enough pause to make the decision to WRITE it down! Love you, sweetie!

Our Documented Tradition

The gay community has a long history and it is documented culturally worldwide. In fact, as long as we have had a record of men, we have a record of homosexual men. While political and religious institutions attempt to eradicate our legacy and deny our constant and consistent presence we remain firmly entrenched. Literature, sculpture, painting, drawing, music, philosophy, drama, comedy, science and religion have all drawn upon the enormous talents and resources of our small but persistent community. The site, Androphile.org, The World History of Male Love, which I have linked to mine,(see Links sidebar) is a marvel of riches and documents our numerous contributions to the recorded societies of some three thousand years. This is a vastly important and fundamental exemplar of tradition, for it is tradition, as viewed by some, that supposedly limits our inclusion and equality in society legitimately.

Apple of My Eye

This is a charming image. They are as fresh as the day they were painted. One wishes to know how long the infatuation has lasted and at what moment the fruit of the tree of knowledge was plucked.



Crispin van den Broeck
Two young men.
Oil on panel, circa 1542 before 1591
Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge.

The Wedgwood Vase

The Wedgwood Vase

There stands upon my case of books
A Wedgwood vase
In Wedgwood blue.
Across it stray the Greek bearers bearing what offering I do not know.
To what altar they go I do not know yet
I suspect it is to Love.

The altars of Minerva and Diana have few offerings,
The wisdom of the hunt is doubted,
Apollo’s bright light, his melodies have no heat
Aphrodite’s graceful foam slakes no thirst
No, oh no, no incense or perfume or flower to them is carried thus

So quietly, so skillfully, around and round again upon
The Wedgwood vase
In Wedgwood blue
The Greek bearers bear their offering, yes I am sure, to a child
Fond of piercing games.
Always to Love.

D. Larson

Vin du Coucher Nuptial Wine Eros is Afoot!

Interiors and their design have been a keen interest since I was young. I constantly moved and rearranged my parents furniture, always to my father's consternation and dismay. I always was eager to try to improve the looks and feeling of a room. My own room was kindly given over to me to do with as I liked and it saw many incarnations. At one point I had a giant mural of my cat on one wall, another saw beautifully printed sheets in a classic eighteenth century tree of life pattern used to create a baldachin above the bed.

My first apartment allowed a greater range of choice and the first serious debt I ever incurred was to purchase a chic small sofa and a lovely Louis XVI style oval cane back chair. The rust color of the chair's suede seat and the over-scale magnolia pattern of the couch inspired the colors of cinnamon, navy and cream for the entire flat.

When Mark and I finally arrived in San Diego as a couple we took a great colonnaded house on Arista Drive. There I met again my first obstacle to design - another person's likes and dislikes! Through our years together, though, Mark, has taught me the value of comfort and the need for it to be integral to a home. I think I've managed to persuade him that proportion, elegance and style are the balance of the equation. I've had the good fortune, in one sense, to have moved frequently, thereby forcing me to use a budget, reuse many items in a new space and lastly selling and buying other pieces as dictated by the new floor-plan.

The house now has a look which is eclectic, though a strong neoclassical influence throughout adds masculinity and a sense of order to the disparate collection of furnishings. Mahogany and cherry woods add a subtle understatement to the bright and effusive exuberance of baroque objets d'arts and rococo mirrors, gilt bronze, zebra and cow hides, and bright silks and woven carpets. Various shades of green from leaf to olive and lusty wine reds are balanced by many subtle shades of ochre, gold and cream. Into this traditional mix accents of orange, lime and violet lend unexpected daring sophistication. A Tibetan altar, still smelling richly of the smoke of years of candles and incense burning is carved with bright orange and vermillion dragons.
It bears a large Portuguese or Italian majolica leopard, almost vulgar but not quite! It is accentuated by a gilt and carved wood French Louis XVI style mirror, a pair of Charles X candelabra. Porcelains in pale yellow, azure and lavender and bright gold gleam. This vignette is balanced by a large imposing provincial First Empire armoire in walnut, rubbed to a soft glow with years of waxing. This same half of the room is centered with a large glass-topped table, it's rich cherry wood hidden under yards of Italian striped gold silk, trimmed in bouillon fringe from Houles. Atop the table rests a French circa 1790 mahogany gentleman's toilet mirror, severe in its simple classical pediment and bronze Corinthian capital topped pilasters. It holds it's original key, blackened with time, in it's single drawer. Before it stands a late First Empire silk thread pendulum clock of gilt and patinated bronze, the figure of a windswept woman (Hiver?) so clearly derived from the style books of Percier et Fontaine. Louis XV and Louis XVI gilt bronze candlesticks and small gilt-pewter objects and a grand bronze copy of Pan with his pipes complete the display. The table is encircled with fine Louis XVI style armless fauteuils upholstered in a rich cognac and gilt stamped leather, cracking with age. The creamy white painted frames are also chipped with time. This feeling of the antique in gentle decline opens the whole space to the sentiment of place and permanence - two cherished notions so often lost in our frantic moving society.

The main seating area bounds the fireplace. The mantle is a simple cream painted wood. The color is echoed in the Barbara Barry divan, upholstered surprisingly in cream linen twill printed with various leaves and flower tubers. This fabric's motifs in golds, yellow greens, leaf greens, olive greens and ochre add more movement to the swirl of patterns we've established. The floor beneath is carpeted by a heavy wool woven check in wine and cream and ochre bounded by a wide four inch border of solid deep red in a heavily textured canvas. The coffee table has been usurped by a four foot square Vincent Wolfe ottoman, originally in a dove gray leather but which we had stained cognac. The leather is deeply tufted and the English feeling is unmistakable in its simply carved frame and rosette over double ring legs - quintessentially adorned with brass wheels. It is deliberately disarrayed with some of my most cherished art books, as well as a bronze wrapped black marble tray upon which rest a delightful, if smallish, pair of bronze and marble copies of the Marly Gate Horses, ever rearing as their nude Nubian footmen do their best to harness fiery spirits. Contemporary plates sit beside, their wax removal technique leaves crisscrossed lines of raised white porcelain swishing through the matte black china - echoing the zebra skin rug.

Facing the ottoman a late, circa 1860, round mahogany Biedermeier hall table stands. The table is fortunate to have fine companions including a pair of First Empire style mahogany fauteils with the seats and fronts amusingly upholstered in a fine soft brindle cowhide of white and brown. The backs in ruby silk play off the carpet. The contrast between rough hair hides and polished mahogany formal chairs is delightful. The pattern in the hides lends yet another element of movement and in its way is representative of the thought behind the entire scheme of the home. A steer horn legged stool covered again in the cowhide lends rest for my feet and a twinkle for the eye in it's silly charm. The table is topped by a hand thrown Asian ginger-jar shaped ceramic lamp in the deepest and glossiest shade of chocolate and is topped by a 'ball gown' of a shade in lime green silk, the shade being gathered and ruched on the bias, the frame reminiscent of the straw hats of Asian rice gatherers. The cord is silk wrapped. The finesse of small details reap the largest of rewards!

Upon my table I keep a charming pair of terracottas: a medallion of Petrarca, a doctor of the early Church. I hardly new of his historical status of dreadful religious conservatism, think Inquisition, when I bought him; but he is now adequately subdued by an exuberant Italian rococo terracotta figurine, eighteenth century, which we deduce to be the allegory of summer. He's scantily dressed and must surely be holding a half of a large scallop shell. Naked at the beach!

Upon all these surfaces are also to be found the drawings and designs and letters of my work, amongst alabaster jars of pens, inks and pencils, chalks, brushes and pastel crayons, my easel and case of oils and a few black crows feathers for luck. Mahogany tea caddies, circa 1780, hide treasures of smoking apparatus and bits of silk ribbon tied to clock keys. These rest next to ornate Victorian and contemporary enameled and crystal studded photograph frames which guard beneath their pomp photos of myself with my darling husband and precious daughter.

Pale cream sheers and voluminous olive silk drapes on gilt and carved wood rods with pompous finials complete the atelier, although you may stand and walk around finding little treasures all about. Two more French clocks, one made for the 1900 Paris Exhibition keep no time. The busts and torsos of Antinous and Eros, of Bacchus and Zeus gaze at you. A contemporary but very charming bouillotte lamp of gilt bronze and red painted tole bestows soft light. Glorious Chinese Fu Dogs, upon which swarm tiny milk-white toddlers each with a small top-knot of black hair on their otherwise bald heads. A small Japanese altar shimmers in it's thousand layers coat of deep and mysterious lacquer - the lacquer gathered from the beetles of Japan. It has been deliciously piled with Wedgwood basalt ware in the form of a engine turned creamer and six espresso sized cups and saucers. Each is emboldened with classical motifs of raised black jasper decorations, once again after Percier et Fontaine (The great design consultants to the Napoleon I and his family and courtiers. Above hangs a painting by Richard Titlebaum which subject warns us of those who would challenge the gods; his representation of the Flaying of Marsyas. Lastly, an oaken carved pillar, probably from a seventeenth century Dutch church, supports on its Ionic capital a charming marble torso of his 'mischievousness' self, the boy-god Eros. Or as he is more humbly known these days, Cupid.

He is a fine ending to this piece of writing for it is surely the arrow shot from the mischief maker's charming bow which has smote me hard with the love of excellent form in all my surroundings: the simplest tea cup to the greatest artwork of all - man himself. And in this regard I direct you to my own spouse most particularly. He has most beautifully, one may say exquisitely, exceeded the proverbial bar in excellence and beauty; for his face shines like Apollo, his brow like a crown of wisdom topped with the golden locks of pleasure, his sinewy limbs recall the athletes of Greece and his manly chest, his fattened rump, his strong steel legs all carry him with utter grace, and give proper housing for his kind heart and gentle soul. Yet he is a man of battle when battle is called forth, and a man of exceedingly fine pillage when he spills his 'treasure' into my loins in our bed. (A fine classical four-post bed, designed for Baker, Knapp & Tubbs by Parrish-Hadley, in soft black lacquer and gilt edging, crowned with patinated and gilt palm sprays. The headboard is surmounted by a very fine oval carved and gilt wood Swedish mirror, circa 1790, in the form of a pair of facing eagles' heads which terminate in very fine scrolls of acanthus leaves. Upon the hardwood floor a Persian woven carpet of vibrant colour: violet, cream and wine is surmounted by a red lacquer Chinese armoire holding media equipment. The walls have various classical and mythological copperplate prints of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries.) We shall expound upon the bedroom more in days to come, but I feel it, the bed, AND, Mark, my spouse, calling to me at this moment and I will oblige them!

Allen Ginsberg "Old Love Story"

OLD LOVE STORY

Some think the love of boys is wicked in the world, forlorn

Character corrupting, worthy mankind's scorn

Or eyes that weep and breasts that ache for lovely youth

Have no mouth to speak for mankind's general truth

Nor hands to work manhood's fullest delight

Nor hearts to make old women smile day and night

Nor arms to warm young girls to dream of love

Nor thighs to satisfy thighs, nor breath men can approve --

Yet think back to the time our epic world was new

When Gilgamesh followed the shade of his friend Enkidu

Into Limbo's dust to talk love man to man

So younger David enamored of young Jonathan

Wrote songs that women and men still chant for calm

Century after century under evergreen or palm

A love writ so sacred on our bible leaf

That heartfire warms cold milennial grief.

Same time Akilleos won the war at Troy

Grieving Patroklos' body, his dead warrior boy

(One nation won the world by reading Greek for this

And fell when Wilde was gaoled for his Bellboy's kiss)

Marvellous Zeus himself took lightning eagle shape

Down-cheeked Ganymede enjoyed God's thick-winged rape

And lived a youth forever, forever as can be,

Serving his nectar to the bearded deity

The whole world knew the story, the whole world laughed in awe

That such love could be the Thunder of immortal Law.

When Socrates climbed his ladder of love's degrees

He put his foot in silence on rough Alcibiades

Wise men still read Plato, whoever they are,

Plato whose love-lad Aster was his morning star

Plato whose love-lad was in death his star of Night

Which Shelly once witnessed as eternal light.

Catullus and tough Horace were slaves to glad young men

Loved them, cursed them, always fell in love again

Caesar conquered the world, top Emperor Power

Lay soft on the breast of his soldier of the hour

Even Jesus Christ loved his young John most

Later he showed him the whole Heavenly Host

Old Rome approved a beautiful bodied youth

Antinus Hadrian worshipped with Imperial Truth

Told in the calm gaze of his hundred stone

Statues standing fig-lefed in the Vatican.

Michelangelo lifted his young hand to smooth

The belly of his Bacchus, a sixteen-year youth

Whose prick stands up he's drunk, his eyes gaze side-

Ways to his right hand held up shoulder high

Waving a cup of grape, smart kid, his nose is sharp,

His lips are new, slightly opened as if parted to take a sip of purple nakedness,

Taste Michelangelo's mortal-bearded kiss,

Or if a hair-hooved horny Satyr happens to pass

Fall to the ground on his strong litle marble ass.

Michelangelo loved him! What young stud

Stood without trousers or shirt, maybe even did

What the creator wanted him to in bed

Lay still with the sculptor's hand cupped on his head

Feeling up his muscles, feeling down his bones

Palm down his back and thighs, touching his soft stones --

What kind of men were the Slaves he tied to his bed?

And who stood still for David naked foot to head?

But men love the muscles of David's abdomen

And come with their women to see him again and again.

Enough, I've stayed up all night with these boys

And all my life enjoyed their handsome joys

I came with many companions to this Dawn

Now I am tired and must set my pen down

Reader, Hearer, this time Understand

How kind it is for man to love a man,

Old love and Present, future love the same

Hear and Read what love is without shame.

I want people to understand! They can! They can! They can!

So open your ears and hear the voice of the classical Band.

Allen Ginsberg "Old Love Story",
White Shroud, Harper and Row, 1986.

Published!

Just a quick note today. I've been published in the letters section of the very fine English arts periodical, Apollo Magazine, The International Fine Arts Publication. The August 2005 issue contains my letter. The letter regards bats - yes, bats - which have been nesting and damaging historical art and architecture in England. They cannot be irradicated because of the endangered species act. The URL for the magazine is below. Happy Reading!

http://www.apollo-magazine.com/diary.php?issue=current&month=12&year=2004&id=usa

Dieux des Meubles - Les Ebenistes!

I am a devotee of eighteenth century French fine and decorative arts. It's been a consumming passion since I opened a library book when I was aged nine in my ol' hometown. I gasped when I saw the sensuous curve of a cabriole leg on a small Louis XV fauteuil, and I fell in love for the first time. Many years later I found a copy of that book - for sentimental reasons - and added it to my now fairly notable library on the subject. If I had money, I would have about triple the volumes I now possess I suppose. I've had for years a relatively good memory of where each particular item that has excited me is located in this reference world, and it is only now that I begin to wish I were better organized and had indexed my collection. As I attempt the feat now I find it very slow progress. Mais, c'est la vie!

Mark and I have assembled a small collection of furniture and objets d'arts over the years. Much has been reproduction, but of good proportion and line. That which is genuine is simple and pure for the most part. And there are those few mystery pieces which I wonder about - might it be the real thing? Possibly not, but it's fun to imagine having acquired that 'find' which is so much more valuable than your investment!

I practice reading French, avec difficile certain moi, in my monthly 'bible' of the French Arts: L'Objet D'Arts. This gem of a publication is all clarity and depth on these subjects. The French have a pride in their artistic heritage which is unprecedented. I've purchased children's books in France on the important stylistic changes of each period of furniture. Imagine American children being taught routinely about their decorative and fine arts history. We barely manage any art programs. We simply don't value the arts in this country, at least not in a manner which imparts their genuine baseline importance to society. Instead of being a foundation for broad intellectual achievement they are viewed as a superfluous luxury of the elite. But back to L'Objet d'Arts. I delight in each sweet tidbit. This month we have these articles: Masterpieces of French Painting exhibited at the Grand Palais, Two Centuries of Italian drawings in French Museums, the master works of the ebeniste, Pierre Gaston Brion, who worked for the first Empire through the reign of Charles X. Brion's work is fascinating to me, for he seems, to my eye, to be less skilled than his predecessors. The carving seems heavy and unaccomplished, in sharp contrast to the likes of Riesener, Weisweiler, Carlin, Levasseur or René DuBois - a favorite of mine for his whimsical concoctions of his 'secretaire abattant' and 'armoire secretaire', lavished with Chinoiserie decoration and Grecian motifs, mixed together on single pieces which should therefore not be a success - but they are!. Delightful fantasies indeed.

However, in my estimation, la creme de la creme is Jacques Dubois. Oh, Heavens! What an artist he is - I believe his soul surely lives on in each piece he laid a hand upon, and when you see them you may well sense his presence. It is potent. He loved this furniture with all his heart. It is exquisite, refined, tempting us to sin somehow in its delirious obsession with beauty. Ne'er a veneer of Japanese lacquer or slice of kingswood marquetry or twisted leaf of gilded bronze becomes heavy or cloying, no, never, not for a moment. The grace of the rococo is here portrayed as it was meant to be; light and airy and a reminderto me of a beautiful noble garden gone wild from neglect. A garden, slowly being brought back to it's formal glory. It is that moment when, ah-ha, you see the last of the wild ivy scrolling about asymmetrically, but thinned and trimmed and through it, now the gilt bronze, one peers into the hidden order of the formal garden, represented either with imported Japanese lacquer work or beautifully conjoined fine French marquetry, waxed to a gloss with layers of French polish, the sleek, smooth glow of the aged finish sparkles. The rich plateau resting above is of cool sleek and fabulously expensive marble (many of the great marbles were mined out at this time), as if it were the escallier d'honneur to the great house of this, this imaginary garden, oh, no - this commode. My heart swoons even from the photograph, and when I'm present before one of these temples to the high and holy arts of men I have sometimes wept from sheer delight, and quivered as if Mark were making love to me at that very moment. All becomes damp and moist! Should I touch a piece I shall surely be accused of an indecent public act...

There are others! Each strike a chord of their own, and when at a holy place of residence for a fine collection of these artworks, one sees, no hears the sumptuous harmonious concerto that has been captured, held at its utter-most virtuoso up-swell of strings and voices and cast in place for all time. This gives me goose-bumps!

There are so many more. Cressent, Gaudreaus, Latz - pour les pendules! Migeon, Boudin, Baumhauer... too many fine poets of the joinery of the finest woods. I will soon add photographs, in particular a set I shot at the Getty showing the construction of a fine Louis XV/XVI transitional writing table, petitely scaled for a lady. Magnifique!

I hear the voices - enough, enough. Twit boy, its your passion and few others... let the weary world be...

So, for tonight, I shall do just that. For tonight...

Barbarous Civility

The Air france disaster in Toronto today had a happy ending - as of this writing all the passengers and crew have escaped without serious harm. Such a relief! If we'd had a terror attack so close to home I'm sure Bush would have used it to edit out more of our civil rights as quickly as possible. Isn't it odd that one worries more about ones own government that the terrorists? My chance of being in a terrorist attack according to statistics, is less less likely than being struck by lightning. And that statistic is quite true for most of us in America who go about our daily lives. I do not make light of these horrible and unjustified murders of innocent civilians - all of them Fathers and Mothers, Sons and Daughters, friends and families. These barbarous acts are despicable and cowardly. However, I find it to be just as cowardly for Mr. Bush to force through political agendas and new laws allowing spying and search and seizure, not to mention the threat of being detained without access to your family or an attorney, and being held in limbo. However barbaric these Islamic stinkers become it will behoove us to always take the higher ground. We must not give up the free society we have built since 1776, nor must we cower in fear. Rather, lead our daily lives. And fight to get a Blue Bloody MAN back in the White House!

Thus the Moniker

Well, I've missed two days. No good excuse. Just difficult to make myself put down my thoughts. They all seem personal and private. Guess I should keep a diary instead.

Eros Binding the Hands of the Aged Centaur, After the Antique Greek Sculpture,
Donald W. Larson, oil on linen, 2001

Let's see. News. The daily battle with meds goes on. I mix the Fuzeon for two days at a time - four bottles for four injections. Plus about a dozen or more pills every night. Plus Mark's medicines. It seems completely overwhelming at times, and at the same time I know I'm one of the very lucky ones to have had the privilege of receiving these life saving drugs. I sound completely self-absorbed to complain about it at all. The downside of the medications is real, though. Witness the double necrosis of my femur heads and the two new titanium replacements. Almost assuredly a result of nearly sixteen years of anti-viral intake. Marks osteoporosis, his collapsed discs and surgery are due to the anti-virals as well. He's opted temporarily to go off the medication until his t-cells and viral load reach danger levels. When I lost my access to Fuzeon for four weeks - the cost of the co-pay is approximately $500.00 and was out of our reach - we watched my t-cells plummet. Much more than was expected for the short break. It was unnerving and a another good reason to stop complaining. The good people at Roche Pharmaceuticals helped me access their patient assistance program and the T20 flows again. I'll have a check-up this week to see if my immune system is bouncing back.

If I had been taught that I was worthwhile as a gay man and if I had learned about condoms would I still be in this predicament? It is a question I will never be able to answer. I do know that I taught my daughter that she is valuable as a person as she is created and that her health is worth protecting. Use a condom if you have sex before marriage. Period. It does not offer a guarantee, as refraining form sexual activity would, but it has a good record in preventing disease. That is what's important. I firmly believe knowledge of one's body and how to protect it are vital to living fully. I wish I had been taught that and reassured that I was important enough in the scheme of things to take care of all those years ago. I do think it would have made a difference.

As the religious right works to destroy my rights for equality under the law, and the rights of my family to exist as a legal entity, I wonder how many of their children will die because of the forced repression of the sexuality God gave them? Homosexuality is not an abhorration or a deviance from nature or God's handiwork. Rather, we have existed throughout the history of men in approximately the same percentages as far as can be told from historical records. It stands to reason for me that we are a normal divergence from the heterosexual which must exist as a stabilizing element of our joint humanity. We have a purpose to fulfill. Perhaps it allows us to focus on the arts, religion and the sciences without the distraction of maintaining a family - a task which I know from firsthand experience requires ones complete catalog of resources to provide and maintain to the detriment of all other pursuits. Perhaps, in our own way, we contribute to the advancement of our species by engaging in these higher pursuits and leave procreation to those for whom it is most suited. Or perhaps not. I will ask God one day why? Why be visited with a sexuality which is reviled, outlawed and spat upon by so many. What is the purpose of this gift - for it is I firmly believe a gift - if one is formally charged with burying, disowning, repenting and reviling this intrinsic part of ones being? I cannot believe God intends us to hate that part of us which He has made in His likeness. So, what is it for then? Is it simply the 'cross' I am given? I cannot think that a significant portion of the central core of my humanity is presented to me to be only a mortification. One rejoices in a gift for it celebrates the giver, in this case God, to do so.

Celibacy? It is taught that celibacy is also a gift. It is not a gift that I received. I could not have become who I am in life without my helpmate, Mark. He is my spouse in every true sense of the word. Companion. Comfort. Intimate. These are good and right things for which few, very few men and women are invested with the nobility to forbear.


The centaur, and particularly the centaur Chiron, are representative to me of the internal struggle for becoming a right and noble Christ centered man. You will find it interesting to visit http://ww2.netnitco.net/users/legend01/centaur.htm to see a discussion on the Christian metamorphous of the Greek being, and the dichotomy of spirit versus nature.

And, thus the moniker.

What to Do!

The New York Times, this morning, is reporting a statement from the Vatican that chastises Israel. In the statement Benedict XVI says, and I paraphrase, that Israel could not be included in his statement condemning the recent terrorist acts in other countries, like Britain, because, Israel often transgresses and crosses International laws by retaliating inappropriately to the Palestinians suicide bombers.

I am shocked. The changes already under this man's leadership are quite terrifying. He has, along with JPII, strayed far from the teachings of Vatican Council II. It is no longer correct, apparently, to seek to have open discussion between theologians and the hierarchy regarding differences of opinion. This is devastating to many Catholics who see problems with issues such as artificial contraception being condemned when it stops unwanted pregnancies and disease. Condoms are known to inhibit many sexually transmitted diseases and with the prospect of AIDS being substantially halted in its insidious progress in places like Africa many feel, as I do, that it is a death sentence to deny their rightful place in saving lives. Now this latest volley against Ecumenism, a charge close and dear to John XXIII and Pius XI, will bring a crashing end to the outreach between Faiths that I was taught to value. Additionally, and the issue closest to my heart, the terrible and erroneous statements regarding gays and lesbians as being "intrinsically evil" and "morally disordered" is a sickening blow of hatred towards the many, many good men and women I know who happen to have been born homosexual. it is impossible to have been made in the image and likeness of God and be 'intrinsically evil' to the point of permanent separation from God. This Pope also attacks the notion that the many men of goodwill who do not know of Jesus may be saved. this is directly opposed to the catechism of my school days when all men of good will were presumed baptized by desire, if not by the hands of a priest.

If we are to return to a purely legalistic and orthodox approach to our sacraments, disregarding the spirit, we are surely doomed to repeat many atrocities in God's name. A hard hand and a Latin Mass are not the answer to falling numbers at the altar rail, but rather a remembrance of Jesus' word about it all: "and the greatest of these is Love." It is a clear path and easily known, if not followed. Love. It is within our grasp for the knowledge of our hearts is known to us. If you cannot discern Love in this pope's actions then I suggest his actions are not of God but of man. We seem too ready to invest the Vicar of Christ with the divinity of God and forget his humanity, which is capable of every flaw.

If you think this is easy for me to believe, much less say openly, you are wrong. I was raised to hold the hierarchy of the Church in reverence and respect. Yet, I am also included in the literal definition of the Church: the People of God. I, too have an obligation and a duty to foster that which I have been taught is the Truth for my nearly fifty years. That teaching is being radically revised.

I suggest remembering in ones prayers the lives lost each day everywhere, with no distinction made to whom is right and whom is wrong in the conflict. All acts of terrorism are wrong, even those perpetrated against our enemies. Cardinal Bernardin, a loving follower of John XXII, reminds us that if we purport to care for human life from its conception as being a viable indefensible human being whom we are charged to protect than we surely have the obligation to extend that protection and respect throughout the life of each soul inhabiting this planet in all of its stages. We cannot overlook, then, the agonies of our gay brothers and sisters, nor the suffering of our Jewish and Palestinian brothers and sisters. We are duty bound to hold each soul as the repository of our Lord. As men far greater than I have said, I believe this Truth to be self evident.

Ah! Realize Your Youth While You Have It!

These widgets are a marvy thing. I've had a load of fun with them today, though very few actually do anything I require or desire, if truth is told. I do like the i-Tunes device which searches for the album covers to display. Many of my recordings in i-Tunes are from my CD collection and not purchased from the on-line store. This device allows me to recover these previously unavailable artworks for my viewing pleasure. C'est bon!

Oscar Wilde was a devotee of Antinous in his time, as well as Hyacinthe, and his poem the 'Sphynx' speaks of the boy made God. However, the 'spirit' of Antinous is better served in his 'The Story of Dorian Gray', the novel of the trajedy of seeking only the superficial in life. His moment of truth arrives as he views the portrait and realizes he shall indeed, one day, grow old. All this after Lord Henry pushes home the point with this little speech:

""Some day, when you are old and wrinkled and ugly, when thought has seared your forehead with its lines, and passion branded your lips with its hideous fires, you will feel it, you will feel it terribly. Now, wherever you go, you charm the world. Will it always be so? . . . You have a wonderfully beautiful face, Mr. Gray. Don't frown. You have. And beauty is a form of genius-- is higher, indeed, than genius, as it needs no explanation. It is of the great facts of the world, like sunlight, or spring-time, or the reflection in dark waters of that silver shell we call the moon. It cannot be questioned. It has its divine right of sovereignty. It makes princes of those who have it. You smile? Ah! when you have lost it you won't smile. . . . People say sometimes that beauty is only superficial. That may be so, but at least it is not so superficial as thought is. To me, beauty is the wonder of wonders. It is only shallow people who do not judge by appearances. The true mystery of the world is the visible, not the invisible. . . . Yes, Mr. Gray, the gods have been good to you. But what the gods give they quickly take away. You have only a few years in which to live really, perfectly, and fully. When your youth goes, your beauty will go with it, and then you will suddenly discover that there are no triumphs left for you, or have to content yourself with those mean triumphs that the memory of your past will make more bitter than defeats. Every month as it wanes brings you nearer to something dreadful. Time is jealous of you, and wars against your lilies and your roses. You will become sallow, and hollow-cheeked, and dull- eyed. You will suffer horribly.... Ah! realize your youth while you have it.""

I have lived with my dearest one and the quest for youth in medicine and diet and exercise are well known to us both, but none shall save us in the end. They merely extend the last flickering benfeits of the white hot coals before they expire and we are no more of this world.

Uuhgg!

I MUST EDIT! I MUST EDIT! I MUST EDIT!

I shall continue to humiliate myself to no end with this rampant lot of mis-spellings and non-capatialized words and miriad of other annoying syntac and grammar issues.... forgive me reader!

O comment je t'aime!

Antinous, Antinous - I keep thinking of all the new information which has been presented to me on some very formidable websites. The most involved is the one dedicated to Antinous as a deity one may still worship. It's very beautiful and romantic, and though it is not right for me, I can see the attraction. The worship of male beauty, youth, manliness and prowess of the the athlete and the hunter, the hand-boy of an Emperor. Yum! Check it out at http://www.antinopolis.org/, be properly respectful as this is a faith to these men... The Temple of Antinous. Beautiful. Another site give a clear and consice history of Hadrian and Antinous and their relationship and how Antinous, a humble village lad, becomes the last God of the Roman Pantheon...

Mark has downloaded the new Mac software 'Tiger' into my T. powerbook and I'm quite delighted with the new options and the new speed. Quickness! Lightfooted flying of HERMES seems to have inauguarated my tiring machine to a new existence. A super-deified computer, if you will...

Still the problems with the formatting for this site continue - I hope over the weekend to resolve some of these things and really be up and running. I need to focus more on the content as well. There should be a complimenatry theme with Antinous, I'm thinking religion and sex together. How they DO work together, instead of this hypocritical nonsense about ones sexuality, gay straight, bi or trans -it's an expression of the deepest workings of a person and one cannot attack it as though it is the choice of a lifestyle. As if you were decorating a house! Oh! Shall I have blue or lavendar silk in theis room as if you can translate that to Oh, can I fuck womwn and men or just one or the other, and when the silk and the present attraction are old hat one just tosses it aside and becomes sexually something else... preposturous!

I have been Queer from the moment I was born. At six I had a doll, very dear to me. In my teens I had great times with my sister and her barbies, and inventing stories. later we 'built' a restaurant, swagging bedspreads for drapes and table cloths to create an intimate Paris bistro. I love it all still today, I'm just considered good at design and it's not any longer a critiscm of my sexual being. Besides, screw them all if they can't take a china queen in allher glory. There problem these days!

So, if we meet and visit somdat you'll get atour of the old French armoire which holds my Bernardauad, my Sevres, my Wedgwood, my Met artist designed pieces, my Herend, etc. etc.

Billy, our roomate 1, has returned from ten days in Calgary for the MCC conference. he says it was marvelous, wonderful, and I'm very happy that he has had a respite from LA and a spiritual experience at services which moved him. These are the good things of life. I'm happy for the boy... man!

I have promises from my other roomy, Little Mike, in deference to our trainer who is "big Mike', of his modelling for me for some 'artitic' shots for my paintings. Very happy about this , um, comming up - he is striking and beautifull proportioned. he will be a truly inspirational subject to work with.

I've been presented with the following requests from my dear spouse, suggesting a VERY pleasent evening. Since it's a tad risque I will leave the translation to you...

"Je voudrais au va te faire foutre jusqu'à ce que votre âne ait été sanglant et vous m'avez prié de prendre mon robinet hors de votre âne. Je vous veux sur votre ventre avec votre âne magnifique rond offert jusqu'à moi. Ce qui précède est juste un début... parce que je veux faire l'amour avec vous pour des heures et des heures... jusqu'à ce que nous passions dehors dans les bras de chacun et le sillage là avec le nothingmore sur nos esprits que le faisant.

Oh comment je souhaite que je pourrais parler français ainsi moi pourrait chuchoter les phrases ci-dessus dans vos oreilles. comme j'ai mâché sur lui et nuzzled les... < grimace >

Oh comment je t'aime...

M"

So much for the world's turn today.... and damn swell after a seventeen year marriage! La passion n'est pas mort! A tout les glories de Dieu de mon coeur! Baisons>>> Adieu

25 Julliet 2005 1:00AM

I tried to rest, I petted the cat, in fact gave him a good brushing, but I am not able to dose off. So, as they say to do, I have arisen and am occupying myself instead of dwelling on the sleeplessness.

One of the reasons to write this online journal is to save the cost of a therapist! I've read in several other peoples' logs that it is very effective in providing a certain clarity and a perspective in evaluating their issues. I've decided it is worth a try. The trick, of course, is to make it a journey of Everyman so that it will be worth reading to someone besides myself. Humor, I've found is also key - that will be tricky for me! I have about as much natural humor as I have desire to sleep ( yes this is a euphemism) with a woman. I have nothing against women, I'm simply not attracted to them physically. Now, to their minds it's very different. I'm absolutely often enamored. My dear friend, Lisa, has a brilliant analytical thought process of which I'm in awe, and my darling Julia is capable of concise and pointed thinking which she maintains in her conversation making all our talks together most enjoyable. The only women I dislike cannot be grouped as their sex being the reason for the dislike - for I've certainly seen the behavior in gay men, and even straight dudes. The people who tend to irk me are those who are overly dependent, in a bad way and are needy to the point of leaving nothing left in me to leach out. They simply sap one of everything bit of energy: spiritual, emotional and even many times ones reason. When I wish to begin screaming at them to get the f*** out and never f****ing come back you know it's time to gracefully bow out before you allow yourself such a self indulgent and surely, very soon, regrettable act of surly unkindness.

RUN!

Doesn't Scripture say something about disengaging from those who vex your spirit. Well, those above are they.
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I'm puffing on my Gitanes as I'm writing and the smoke has a lovely way of curling and writhing about in the dim light. This tobacco is heavy and rich and very flavorful to taste, a sweet, dewy-earth sort of taste, which takes me back somehow to France, Provence in-particular and a little village called Le Baroux. It was a fortified hill town, now just a hill town with a castle. The Templars were residents at one time, though it is being gentrified these days into chic little getaways for Parisians and Ex-pats. At any rate a nearby Monastery had the most charming lavender garden, grown almost as a maze, and the heavy wet foggy air laid upon it, veiling it until the morning sun caused it's dissipation. It was the way the earth smelt at that moment, as the mist rose, that my smokes are able to remind me.
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More Regarding Antinous:

"And such a one is the new God Antinous, that was the Emperor Hadrian's minion and the slave of his unlawful pleasure; a wreth, whom that that worshipped in obedience to the Emperor's command, and for fear of his vengeance, knew and confessed to be a man, and not a good or deserving man neither, but a sordid and loathsome instrument of his master's lust. This shameless and scandalous boy died in Egypt when the court was there; and forthwith his Imperial Majesty issued out an order or edict strictly requiring and commanding his loving subjects to acknowledge his departed page a deity and to pay him his quota of divine reverences and honours as such: a resolution and act which did more effectually publish and testify to the world how entirely the Emperor's unnatural passion survived the foul object of it; and how much his master was devoted to memory, than it recorded his own crime and condemnation, immortalized his infamy and shame, and bequeathed to mankind a lasting and notorious specimen of the true origin and extraction of all idolatry"
Saint Anthanasius, 350 AD