Crushing Krisis

Comic Books, Drag Race, & Life in New Zealand

self image

by

On Monday Aim invited me to join her at a Radiohead concert. The concept of it nearly rolled my eyes back into my head; an arena of young urban hipsters as or more obsessed with their band as I am with Tori Amos, all with overt political or stylistic agendas, all of whom would undoubtably frown at me for having bought the new Michelle Branch album.

It sounded like a challenge, not to mention a good time.

Poured into my tightest blue jeans and snuggest brown t-shirt, as we walked to our seats i scanned the crowd of trendy young men and realized that i have resorted to co-opting a slightly queer style of dress and carriage because it just works for me … i am small-framed and relatively slim and no longer trying desperately to attract strange women wherever i go. If pressed i could not explain it; it’s just my need to feel wanted, i suppose. I’m not sure what stops me from showing up in cargo pants and a stained flannel shirt. Maybe it’s that i spent the 90’s wearing that, or maybe it’s that i like to approximate an accurate interior self-image so that i feel as though i actually stand out in a crowd as me.

Ultimately, all eyes were on the stage and none on my inanely logoed tee or my inordinately tight ass-hugging pants. I have rarely seen such a polite audience held in rapt attention at such a huge rock show. I am not good with Radiohead’s titles – ever since hearing Kid A their albums pass by me like symphonies – but some songs still stuck out just by virtue of how they were achieved. A hypnotic electronic piano version of “Like Spinning Plates,” a spastic and brittle “Idioteque,” chiming xylophone and the faint singing of the lawn section on “No Surprises,” and “Everything In It’s Right Place” prefaced as “this is a song about the good old days.”

As it echoed back at me from Thom, and then the effects pedals on the stage, i just thought … Yes.

https://www.crushingkrisis.com/2003/08/106140294589227633/

by

I was singing at the time.

I am getting used to her “hold it” as she tightens the focus and adjusts her shutter speed. I am beginning to learn to breathe down through my chest so that its expansion doesn’t ruin my pose. At the time i was just on Walnut street, though, with my extra black dress shirts slung over my shoulder.

So far Elise has mostly taken my picture while i’ve been playing guitar, or reaching for my guitar, or relaxing after having played my guitar. Last night was just me and the shirts, and a single red tie. Somehow the thought of it was a little threatening, as if i’m not worth photographing while i’m not running through my rock-star routine – which comes through alright in photographs even if it doesn’t sound up to par in person.


I needed to feel worthy of her photographs, and so i had my demo playing on my headphones during my walk to her room. I was really listening hard – wrapping my mind not around the lyrics and the guitars that are so familiar to be but around the arrangements that sprung up in the studio… the subtle changes i made to the songs on the fly that created the solid front they produced on the record rather than the random chance that they might turn out well when i play them live. I was wrapping my mind around the concept that i am worth listening to beyond the immediacy of my rhyming and strumming.

Somewhere inside of that thought i began to sing… not singing along with my record, but singing with it; adding harmony where i was too naive to place it when it was recorded, adding subtle changes in lyrics to deepen the songs that weren’t fully realized at the time. Just singing… singing out, singing loud …to songs that no one else on the street knew at all.

I’ve learned to turn off my peripheral vision in moments like that so as to ignore the bemused glances i draw from passers by, but i could hardly ignore the rumpled man on his ten speed bike keeping pace beside me. I am a jaded Philadelphian at best, and a guardedly hostile one at worst, and so when he motioned for me to take off my headphones i was hardly expecting anything other than him asking for directions or money. Possibly both. I slowed down a little, almost maliciously, since he would have an even tougher time maintaining balance on two wheels at such a slow speed. I offered him my attention.

“You should be a singer.”

“I am.”

Headphones back on, speed increased, and by the time he was out of my peripheral vision again i had paused just long enough to realize that i had said what i said not to put him off, but because i meant it. I was listening to honest proof that i am a singer, and was singing along. I am a singer.

Half a block later he waved again for me to take off my headphones. “I didn’t mean to be smart with you or anything, i just think you have a nice voice. You should sing.”

I replied with just as much ease as the first time: “I know. It’s just… that i am. I do. But, thank you.”

I am miles away right now, but she’s got my essence on paper right in front of her face.

https://www.crushingkrisis.com/2002/05/85103545/

by

On my lunch breaks i walk two blocks north of work to a corner store that has obscenely cheap deli sandwiches and 2-for-$1 packs of cookies. On Tuesday i was walking out with my sandwich and a quart of lemonade when two giggling Hispanic girls brushed by me to get into the store. I glanced back at them, perhaps to admonish them for their rudeness with a cross stare, and it was then that i noticed – round biceps connected to sturdy shoulders, lips widely enhanced with liner and gloss, and what was surely a painted-on Cindy Crawford mole. Neither of the two caught my glance as they moved deeper into the store, and i headed back to my daily grind of endless vinyl records.

It had just started to rain on Friday when the bus pulled up to the corner of eighteenth and Walnut streets, and clutching my brand new sheet music book underneath my decidedly non-waterproof jacket i stepped on to the crowded vehicle without taking much notice of what route it was. Only after i had dropped my last token into the machine and started moving up the aisle did the electronic announcement from the PA proclaiming the bus’s route number register with me: it wasn’t my bus, but it would get me to within two blocks of my apartment. A quick mental comparison of waiting in the rain for the next bus crowded with rush hour passengers or just sprinting two blocks after i got off left me resolved to stay on the alternate route.


The slight blonde girl in front of me smirked apologetically as the momentum of the bus forced her to lean back towards me; she was shorter than me, and pretty despite the dull red sheen of acne that followed her low cheekbones. She was too short to reach the over-head rail to steady herself, and so she gripped the back of the seat next to her for support. The bus was one of the new ones, with their strange dais of seats in the back, and i discovered that i was just barely tall enough for my hand to get a solid grip on the stainless steel bar that ran parallel to the ceiling. Sans my inhumanly large headphones and pressing the book against my chest with my left arm, i averted my gaze from the precariously balanced girl in front of me – letting it rest on the floor by my feet.

The shoes were wicker, like lawn furniture, with a chunky heel and an open front to reveal toes painted a shade somewhere directly between red and pink. My attention was drawn back up as the blonde girl excused herself again, this time to the woman whose seat she was standing next to, and when i swung my gaze back around i was confused. Confused, because it was the tired face of a man that stared back at me from the space approximately above the reddish hued toenails. His hair was a faded red and hung just below his ears, tucked back behind the left one. His shirt was tie-dye all in shades of blue and had a scooped neck that revealed skin once-fair but rendered ruddy from exposure to the sun. He was crammed into a pair of jeans that cinched him tightly at the waist, which created an illusion of the hips that he sorely lacked. My confusion was alleviated, for the most part, when at the tapered cuffs of his blue jeans i found the ankles that lead to those familiar toes sitting upon their wicker thrones.


They were the feet of a man, obviously, although i had chosen to ignore it when i examined them previous to give their owner the once over. My gaze swung back up to his face, sad and tired as he clung to the same overhead bar that i was using to steady myself. I imagined that my face looked not entirely different from his at that point, wearied from the day that had preceded it. That was all i had to be weary about, though – my slim frame and curly hair rarely draw any prolonged scrutiny from passers-by. His face, i suspected, could have been equally as weary of this as it was of the long week that was coming to a close.


With some amount of apology in my eyes i turned my face back towards the blonde, who was precariously advancing on a seat that had just been abandoned. I followed her towards a second empty seat across the aisle, forgetting for the moment about the painted toenails and their owner. When i finally took my seat i slid my cd player out of my bag and rested my giant headphones over my ears, and when i glanced up from my hands’ sure operation of the walkman i was encountered again my the man, this time with his back to me. His blue shirt had a similar scoop on its back, and it revealed a set of undisguisedly wide shoulder blades. His illusion was not as solid as the girls’ from the corner store… only as deep as his clothing, and his toenails.

As far as i’ve ever known, Philadelphia isn’t exactly renowned for its gender-bending community. Every so often i pass by a man with impossibly nice cheekbones or women with too-wide shoulders, but no so often that i’ve ever stopped to recollect it afterwards. I welcome the sight without any prejudice, but my reactions are inevitably bi-polar in nature. The girls left me grinning widely at their oblivious slide past me while glibly chatting and smiling; after all, i immediately pegged them as girls, and so they should be happy.


The man on the bus left me somber as i stepped off into the light rain, forgetting entirely about my planned sprint back to the apartment. There is something especially tragic about not being who you want to be to begin with, and not being able to turn yourself into that person even when you try. After all, i’m still mentioning him as “the man on the bus” when that was obviously not his intention. It was an inward sigh that greeted my smug thought that he might be happier with my malleable frame to work with rather than his own; just because i am not met with scrutiny doesn’t mean that people aren’t assuming i’d rather be in their place or shape if given the choice.


I’ve noticed that the ones that show you that they’re thinking it are usually the most wrong. My sprint began.

https://www.crushingkrisis.com/2002/05/385101074/

by

I have had my ups an downs with Dan Savage’s Savage Love column, and the particular letter that was pointed out in my comments the other day fits nicely somewhere in the middle. Specifically, the first half is an up, and the last paragraph is a down.

While Dan’s opening is indeed quite Savage, it’s also sadly true; the easiest way to stop being mistaken for a homosexual is to stop “acting” like one. Of course, the harder way to stop being mistaken for a homosexual is to only cultivate friendships with people that avoid such idle and generic stereotyping based on shopping, cooking, and Madonna. I enjoy shopping because i’ve had to shop with my mother my entire life, i enjoy cooking because i think it’s one of the sexiest things you can do with another person, and i enjoy Madonna because i’ve always loved music and she’s always been good. So, if those traits (and others) make me “gay,” then… well, then i’ll take the dictionary definition, thank you very much.

Savage hits the melancholy nail right on the head with his second paragraph… that most women would love to meet men like myself or the writer of the letter, but that they would love to meet them so that they could have them as friends. Witness this exact reaction in my friend Lisa, who refers to me as her sassy gay friend. When it comes right down to it, she doesn’t really care whether or not i’m gay — she’s just in it for the sass. The point that was brought to light that i never thought about is that women do want to think they’re bringing out the sensitive side in their men, and so a pre-sensitized guy can seem like sort of a letdown. Of course, not all women subscribe to both of these rules (thank god); some girls like a guy who’s a little bit ambiguous, perhaps for the exact reason that they bring out the guy in him rather than the sensitivity.

The down about this particular column’s closing is, for once, not one i have with its author. The letter writer in question is so superficial of a skirt-chaser that he’s “cultivated” the traits in question, and so Dan dismisses him by telling him to “[B]utch it up a little bit. Shop a little less, care a little less, and listen to Madonna a little less.” I would say the same thing to the man in question, maybe even adding “And try being yourself for once.” I’m sure he was thinking it, though. The down, for me, is that Savage isn’t really addressing the question in my mind, which is “What about if that is yourself?” I can surely be blamed for any sexual ambiguity i present in the form of lap-dances and suggestive commentary, but Savage is essentially endorsing that artificially touchy-feely men should drop the pretense, so i’d assume he’d similarly endorse laying off the pretense of being more of a guy’s guy as well.

So, what’s a girl’s guy to do? In my opinion, not a whole lot — other than believing in the things that make you yourself. No, most girls don’t find sensitive men overwhelmingly attractive (unless they’re fronting decent emo bands, and then it’s open for discussion). However, the girls that do tend to fall for the softer sort of guy are more confident about themselves, i think … enough so that that don’t need a alpha male to lead them around by the arm. This doesn’t mean they’re perfect, or self-confident, or what you’re looking for … but they are probably free from playing the more typical parts of the daily boy-girl game most people subject themselves to.


Mention Madonna a little less? Maybe. Give fewer lapdances to “Queer?” For sure. Change? Never.

https://www.crushingkrisis.com/2002/02/9792246/

by

I’ve had a very unusual audience reading me as of late, and i think it’s been having an effect on what i am and am not writing about. Aside from the multiple real-life entanglements i seem to have mired myself in with some of these new fans, i have also picked up a few erstwhile instant messaging pals from a ways back. It’s them that have been really making me think lately, about what i write and about myself. One of them has a lot more in common with me than i ever knew back when we were just casual writing associates, trading fiction back and forth. Talking to him recently has been a strange experience, much like when i first got to know Tony … feeling as though i am looking into a mirror and feeling only a slight dissonance between my own self image and the one being reflected back at me.

Two days ago i was chatting with all of the usual AM suspects when a new message window popped onto my screen from my old friend. It read: “I stopped reading your blog. It was getting depressing.” Upon questioning he couldn’t quite put his finger on what about CK was bothering him… whether it in itself was depressing, or whether the tiny contrasts between his own interior monologue and this exterior one of mine were what was wrong. He said he might start reading again after a few days of break, but tonight he had no idea that i had made plans for tomorrow night; he hadn’t started reading again.

Writing since our first conversation has been hard, moreso than avoiding publicizing my V-day plans for all to hear or trying to work Sara into a blog before she beats me to death with a stapler next time i show up in the office. Despite all of the filters i put on what i am and am not allowed to talk about, i hardly ever think about how and why anyone else reads it, and as such it is equally shocking to me to find out i am being depressing or funny or something else that no one can quite pinpoint.

It’s the same thing as my dissonance with a mirror, really, as seen from both sides — i am at once shocked that anyone cares enough to notice and skeptical that anyone notices enough to care. And, honestly, it’s nice to be a surprise to myself from both directions.

https://www.crushingkrisis.com/2002/02/9705383/