SHAVINGS FROM MY HEAD

After probing the streets of Hollywood for a spot to park, my friend, and fellow lover of old movies, Jeff and I hurried into The Egyptian Theatre to see a screening of Douglas Sirk’s 1959 remake of Imitation of Life—starring Lana Turner and Sandra Dee.

A favorite for years, the film, part of Turner Classic Movies first-ever film festival, was elevated to must see status—due to its campy, melodramatic acting and Lana’s Technicolor Jean Louis’ wardrobe—when we found out it was going to be screened. To add, like many of the films being shown throughout the weekend-long festival, post viewing, various still-living and available actors were to show up and discuss the film. For IOL, the film’s mother-daughter team of Juanita Moore and Susan Kohner were slated to appear. We were excited.

Once inside, and seated, Ben Mankiewicz came before the crowd to share a few gossipy factoids about the film: A mother daughter triangle-tale of Cheryl Crane, Sandra Dee and Lana Turner along with other tidbits about the director. Then, the lights went down and the film began. Since we were in a “real” theatre our usual banter was verboten, so Jeff and I exchanged mime, dragish parody at each of our favorite, and the film’s most exaggerated parts. We were nearly alone in our perspective. Everyone else seemed as if they were viewing a Nazi war film. And then, came the “tragic” ending, (I won’t ruin it for you if you haven’t seen it) filling the theatre with teary viewers. All around us were gaggles of homos in various stages of grief, grappling with their Kleenex.

What’s going on? I thought and looked over to Jeff. He shrugged in response and offered a contorted face—similar to some of the ones Lana portrays throughout the film when needing to appear distraught.

And although I applaud the film for its pioneering of controversial racial struggles, still, the campy melodrama and horrific “acting” that emotes from Lana Turner hardly formulates a film to weep about……Or maybe it’s just me?, I thought.

****************************************

The lights came up, the stars came out and feeling disconnected Jeff and I fled.

As a result, although it was great to view the film on a massive screen—taking me away from usual home-viewing and into a crowd—like so many other pockets of shared experience, it left me, yet again wondering: Where do I really fit in?

Why? Because, although I love old films, and Jeff and I are constantly viewed as “boys who know too much about old movies” (which is accurate…although also relative) while I sat there, bathed in Technicolor, as the heavyset homo to my right convulsed and cried at things that were sooooo over the top, I felt as if I were missing the joke..or the point..or perhaps, a life dedicated to melodrama. I was definitely missing the connection.

Possessing that ever-so-gay trait of loving old movies (and some of their stars), enough so, that I was motivated to attend the film festival. Aside from seeing the movie in all its glory—elevated onto the screen at one of (in its heyday) Hollywood’s infamous movie theatres, I also expected to feel akin with the viewers, be in the company of other like-minded homos. Instead, sans Kleenex, unless you’re reading this and have come to know me a little better, I suppose I’m back to A Little Imitation of Gay Life…

Call of Duty

Like dodging a bullet or avoiding the draft, 49 years managed to pass before my number was up. After a lifetime of avoidance, when the rigid official-looking document came in the mail, there was no getting around it, I’d used up every excuse possible, jury duty was inescapable.

As My awfully BIG adventures include anything virginal, since I’d never “served”, I figured I should attempt to chronicle something about the experience. But, as “they” have reiterated, over and over, we cannot discuss the case. So instead, I shall share my observations of a day-in-the-life of duty.

Said service began with sitting. Lots of sitting. This remained consistent and plentiful throughout the duration of my nearly two-week obligation. And if my ass could talk—farts aside—after sitting on a hard, cold terrazzo floor, a cement bench, an extremely jankety swivel office/jury chair (masked with the appearance of comfort by a thread-bare cushion), cement steps and row upon row of “connected” seating in the jury room, my ever-aging derriere would scream: FUCK OFF!

To avoid an accompanying numb brain, I realized early on that I needed a diversion. I chose to focus on fashion.  The most obvious was not a stream of shady characters dressed in atrocious ensembles, but an ongoing parade of practical women’s pumps—leaving the term “high” heel entirely out of the equation. Said parade brought thoughts of a (20-year-old) commercial where a (now retired) supermodel plays basketball with a gaggle of—I’m not kidding—nuns. The accompanying tagline = “Looks like a pump…feels like a sneaker”. To the aforementioned commercial as well as the bevy of “pumps”, comfort and practicality paramount, suffice it to say the footwear choices appearing each day successfully thickened the ankles and stunted the legs of every female attorney in the building.

To make matters worse, the unflattering footwear was more times than not, combined with an equally unflattering 27” skirt, an ill-fitting jacket marked by dreary tailoring details and each and every look finished off with a nude stocking.

Suffice it to say the women who work in this building—while attempting to be “professional women”—set their sex appeal back about 100 years.

My only respite from the parade of unsavory shoes was my daily jaunt in the elevators. Each day, quirky combinations of mankind would pile in for the one-floor-at-a-time ride up and down. This usually took about 15 minutes—allowing me to enjoy the combinations of people in conjunction with their fashion choices. (Too much to chronicle in this blog)

And sadly, since I cannot share the trial, its particulars, my vote, all I can say is this: if you poke at something relentlessly and from every angle, eventually a hole will appear. It’s called reasonable doubt. So after days of deliberating, I am still left wondering…

….was justice served?….along with Bad footwear?

“Just follow my lead,”…she said to me.

“Fifty is not, what it used to be!”

She passed me a hat and some steps to follow…

“You won’t make the cut, if you sit there and wallow!”

“Now on my count, kick your leg in the air…

….like you’re sculpted in plastic…

…..and you haven’t a care!”

So I bent my bod, round the bentwood chair…

….I figured I’d dance, to avoid the despair!

With B teaching the steps, and a hat top my head…

I discovered new posture, could be easily led.

With each number that comes, best to try it with two…

…it will help with the steps, in your “character” shoe.

Hence, here’s my decree!

Best to change up the steps, for how to be….

…half a century is just, a number you see!

Part 2…..

 …..With microphone in hand, primed to report (part deux) on all of the elegant aspects of this years Academy Awards, now on the other side of the event, performance accolades—deserved or not—aside, my only question is this: Seriously?

From Jay Manuel—literally and figuratively—drawing on everyone with his “glamastrator” and emoting statements like “everyone’s a winner on Oscar night!” to the sponsored commercials ranging from a Miss Dior-looking ad for cervical cancer to J C Penny’s. Seriously?

There is no reporting to be had. My job is done.

Gone are the days of understated elegance, of Grace Kelly and life-long designer/actress-muse relationships, of long sleeves and chocolate brown clothes.

The following statement (although I will give her a break as she is young) says it all: 

“If my dress was porn..this would be the money shot!”

So….I shall return to my original statement: I’d like to blank the Academy! And, oddly….I’m missing Robert Verdi….

    Every year around Oscar time, I’m often compared (by the women at work—god bless them) to Robert Verdi. To them, this is a logical pairing—two big queens that shave their heads and work in fashion. Naturally I consider him to be a bigger queen. But, I suppose to a straight woman, we are one in the same: shiny, colorful homos with opinions about mode.

So whenever I hear, “Hey you remind me of that guy…you know…the one from….”

“Fashion Police?”, I add briskly—to quickly move away from the red carpet comparison.

Said comparative usually occurs around the office color-copier within days of the Oscars, because Mr. Verdi has emerged again, featuring a pair of over-sized sunglasses stuck to his head (his signature), and with microphone in hand, gets busy with the big queen task at hand: scrutinizing Hollywood stars and their red carpet catastrophes. 

 Once my co-worker has moved past the, you’re-two-gay-men-with-shaved-heads, and I’ve renewed my mental reminder to n-e-v-e-r wear sunglasses on my head indoors, we get down to the gowns.

Past years have gone something like this:

“So….who was your favorite?”

I know she is expecting big-fashion-queen-statements, each accompanied by a magnificent sweeping gesture. (Think Kay Thompson in Funny Face—Toooo the women of America..noooo…make it to the women e-v-e-r-y-w-h-e-r-e! )

You get the drift.

Thus, in the name of good employee relations, I pony up—disregarding my copy machine obligations.

“Well”, I begin, elevating my index finger to my chin and raising my eyes to the (unfinished, industrial ceiling) of “the design center”/my office, followed by a long pause.

“I l-o-v-e-d Hilary Swank’s navy sheath!”

Before I’ve even embarked on my inventory of additional favorites, (which decreases every year) I‘m met with dissolution, and then served a vacant stare.

Here I should note that, loving a dress with long sleeves, a high neck and no slit, (the color is debatable—since most women consider navy a slimming color) is like asking her to compare me, to say, Brad Pitt—as opposed to Robert Verdi.

 My love for understated clothes is unrequited in today’s red carpet world, and these copy-machine Q and A’s are generally followed by equally minimal dialogue—as I am unwilling to offer accolades for some flashy, cleavage-promoting, cake topper-of-a-gown. 

Akin to those bad judgment booty-calls—upon discovering that the blowjob wasn’t worth it, or that I’m no Robert Verdi—my copy machine co-worker begins plotting her escape.

She pinches out a polite, “Really?”, followed by a bogus search for a missing, nonexistent photocopy.

“Yeah” I counter—knowing I’ve already lost her.

I try to regain her interest, issuing a signature Fashion Police citation regarding the accessories and hair, but it doesn’t help. Understated has lost again. And like the aforementioned bad booty-call, she dismisses me with a wave of her paper and disappears into the maze of cubicles.

Left alone, I swear that next year I’m going to blank the Academy.

Yet…here we go again.

So stay tuned for part two…..my-er, Oscar Weinners from this year. I’m praying for lots of tailored, elegant, lady-like clothes in shades of brown and navy…

If you’ve been following The Awfully BIG Adventures of MiniMe, then you know I’m attracted to things that address…ummm, playing with scale.

Last week I attended the opening of an exhibit called Curiouser & Curiouser—a show inspired by Alice in Wonderland—at the Nucleus Gallery. Prior to discovering an amazing collaborative display of artwork, I had to find my way to Alhambra.

Somewhere w-a-y on the other side of Los Angeles, as I made my way along the 10 freeway, I felt akin to Alice…like I’d fallen into a dark rabbit hole and would never find my way.

But….eventually I made it, and was able to interview artist (and friend) Neysa Bove’ who contributed to the exhibition.

MM: Neysa great to see you!

NB: Hi MiniMe. Glad you could make the show. You’re looking awfully shiny this evening.

MM: Thanks Neysa. You’re looking as cute as ever. So, are you excited to be part of this wonderful wonderland collaborative?

NB: Yes. To be showing with so many artists from around the globe. It’s great! Inspiring!

MM: Your work looks fantastic. Was it difficult to get into “Alice” mode for this show?

NB: Actually, the theme of the show fits great with my style, my work. I like to work with a lot of pastel, pastry colors and well, it was perfect for the theme of this show.

MM: Beautiful! Well, great to see you….keep up the good work!

NB: Good seeing you as well. Keep it little.

Nucleus Gallery exhibits both local artists and artists from abroad, and catering to an international customer base, they offer an extensive collection of original contemporary, illustrated, graphic, commercial, and narrative art – all of which are carefully catalogued on their website. With the opening of Alice in Wonderland this weekend, you might want to check it out @ www.gallerynucleus.com. I bought two things—one BIG and one small….

                                                                                      Neysa In Wonderful

Targeted Love

The fourteenth of February, had become something strange…

…like his heart had been placed, on the firing range.

He wondered and he questioned: Can my affections attach?

Would there ever be another…

                           …..to become his love match?

Should I take another shot, at an interesting buck?

And hope for a hit, to improve on my luck?

Now a year had elapsed, while he thought that he might…

…start reviewing new men, for their bark or their bite.

With the hopes that his heart, might emerge from its tomb…

…he took another shot, from his circular room.

As he searched for a match, just like Noah for his Ark….

…twas’ dogs he loved more, for their bite and their bark!

So the fourteenth of February, now became something stranger…

 …had his heart been attacked? Would it always feel danger?

Their relationship had always been competitive.

For as long as Elaine could remember, whenever the pair came together things became unbalanced, out of proportion.

One could only focus on the little details, while the other was eternally consumed with BIG thoughts.

But…there was one thing she knew they both loved, one thing that could lure them together: potato chips! Whenever the occasion arose for consumption of the starchy crisps, nothing, no matter how big or how small, could restrain the duo. 

 Remembering the iconic slogan, Betcha can’t eat just one, Elaine dangled the bag of Lays sour cream and onion potato chips in front of the feuding pair.

“Go ahead try one” she coaxed, hoping for the best.

 Maybe it would finally crack their rivalry, she thought. Or perhaps it would instigate more crummy behavior—producing a shattered aftermath. But somewhere at the bottom of their crunchy demeanor, Elaine figured she had to chip in…

…because a life ruffled has a lot of ridges!

Ebony N' MiniMe

   In the spring of 1968, small clumps of buttery crocuses burst onto the landscape of our yard, while feather duster-like clusters of violet hydrangeas—ones my mother favored for her massive arrangements—began to form on their bushes in unity. All obvious, albeit beautiful displays of escape from a winter-filled exile. It was that same spring that my eight-year old head bloomed with dreams that integrated other boys. And as vividly as I can recall their vital push into my everyday existence, like being present at the funeral of someone well-liked, I can also recall the stench of death that grew alongside those flowery thoughts. For as vibrant as those hydrangea plumes were, there was also a palpable unhappiness that spring over the difference of color and the conflict of segregation.

                                                                                      *******************************

 “Lock your door,” my Aunt Regina advised, as we drove around Dupont Circle in her VW bus before heading up Connecticut Avenue toward home. Up and away from the shouting and overturned cars. Away from the fires and broken storefront windows. Away, it seemed, from angry urban outbursts, away from a retaliation to hate and prejudice and back to the safety of Chevy Chase. Back to the all-white world of manicured shrubs and pedigreed educations, back to the blooming crocuses and bursting hydrangea bushes. Back to accepted color.

It was not long after that prejudice-laden spring, the spring Martin Luther King was shot, that I learned another facet of black culture: I learned to pass. I quickly discovered that although I too had a dream that was diverse, it was also an unacceptable elementary school aspiration. If I talked about my dream, it brought with it hate and prejudice, taunting and bullying, whispers and slurs. Even in elementary terms, what was paramount was taught in black and white, illustrated with chalk against a blackboard. I learned to be a quiet observer.

 I learned to pass for straight.

                                                                                        ****************************

 Many years passed—decades really—before I sincerely considered there might be a realization to my dream. It had a different angle, a more worldly perspective, but it was still the same “brightly colored” dream—now, unfortunately, deeply rooted within (the right-wing views of) the American dream. I was forty-eight before I ever spoke of my dream aloud. Subsequently I wrote columns about my dream—the dream of my people. I congregated with others who shared the same dream, picketing, yelling and marching toward the hope of realization.  I even attended friends’ (realized, but not always) variations of that dream. So much time had passed and yet my dream had remained as simple—albeit flowery in execution—as it had always been: to be married to another man. Maybe he would be Black, or Hispanic, or White, but a man.

                                                                                 *********************************

 So on this day of remembrance, the fiftieth in my life, from one ordinary, everyday little queen, to the King: it is because of you, forty-two years later that I am still able to dream. And along with all those years of colorful, elaborate, covert dreams, today I shall dream out loud in a great big cyber-world—where anyone, like it or not, can equally observe my dream…..

 …and from this day forward:

Let freedom ring in black and white newsprint in the wedding section of the Sunday Times.

Let freedom ring in a band of gold on my left hand.

Let freedom ring with me in a white tux, my husband in a black one….

…..and a string of bridesmen—each clutching tasteful bouquets of violet hydrangeas.

This is another tale from The BIG life of MiniMe. This one is @ Sea. A Story that includes One Princess (the Coral Princess cruise ship—a close relation to the Love Boat), eleven queens (10 couples and Me), sixteen days at sea, nine destination points, and w-a-y too much food. 

Plane…but never simple

Off we go…here I am @ LAX—headed for Miami, where I’ll board the ship headed into the Caribbean. First stop Aruba, then a few stops in Columbia, through the Panama Canal, a couple of stops in Costa Rica and back up through Mexico with three stops before home. My traveling companions are all coupled: several close friends and an extended gaggle of queens—men who know men who know other men…who all travel together.

I’ve just gotten through the nightmare known as check in and security. Since I was flying coach, I got all New York and stuck myself in the First Class line with my friends Tom and Ed—two elegant older men. I pretended to be a member of their staff, diminished to coach by my cheap employers. Works every time. The check-in lady even checked my bags for free! 

…here T and E and (Mini) Me at the Miami airport. E booked us this huge limo! Suddenly I feel v-e-r-y small. Hummm…I wonder what life would be like driving around in one of these every day. A worthwhile wish?..or maybe I’m just being plastic. 

…that’s the shoreline of Florida in the back. Out on the balcony for departure. Out to sea to see new things in the great BIG world….

…after a few days at sea…just chillin’ with a brewski….

…first stop Aruba. It was Christmas Day and NOTHING was opened—so I just took a few pictures. That’s the boat behind me. Pretty big huh?…

…here I am in Cartagena Columbia. When we got off the boat, these lovely (dancing) ladies were there to greet us. They let me take a photo with them. I thought their colorful outfits matched my shirt perfectly….

…here I am in front of a church in the Old City (section) of Cartagena. There was a wedding that day and I lost my friends just after taking this photo. I think they were getting annoyed with all my picture taking…

…just chillin’ and drinking and working on my tan around the pool. A plastic tan never fades….

…here we were going through the Panama Canal. Very cool. I learned that the canal is often called the biggest ditch or the World’s Greatest Shortcut! Construction of the Canal started in 1904 and took ten years to build! The first ship sailed through on August 15, 19914! They are building a second one now…go figure. It took all day to go through. 

…here I am after the most amazing day and my favorite of the trip! We spent the day horseback riding up in the hills and then we all zip-lined back down through the mountains—stopping at a few waterfalls to swim. Amazing. Heading back to the boat. Don’t I look happy?…

…a little snorkeling off the coast of Mexico. Good times, except my head kept filling up with water….go figure. My bathingsuit is vintage….cute right?

….and last, but not least…a farewell drink, our final day at sea. Back in L.A. tomorrow. Gonna miss this boat, the adventure and all that time with friends. I read 5 books and ate nonstop—I think I gained about 10 pounds…my molded washboard abs are gone! An amazing excursion! Stay tuned for more adventures from The BIG life of MiniMe