Assholes in Drag

I had little drive yesterday. I did not feel like doing anything, so I wasted the day and didn’t post.

Sunday, however, was a lovely, calm day at Pinecone Park. I just chilled all day, except for when I took Sheba out for a good walk and then to the park to fetch the ball. Fetching exhausts her. I wanted her good and tired before going to Kris and Steve’s for dinner. By tiring her out, she just sleeps when I leave her alone.

It was glorious outside Sunday, even though it rained lightly all day. It was 13° and I loved being out walking with Her Highness. But the day ended early as I had to be at Kris and Steve’s at 4:00 pm. Dinner was an early one because two of the guests had to catch a ferry home.

The evening at Kris and Steve’s was spectacular. Stacy was there and sat beside me, and Kris and Stacy’s cousin, Karen, and her hubby, Nick, were there. Karen and I share scores of friends. It was amazing to discover all our connections. I am such a lucky guy to know all these friends.

Today, I have a lot to do. I have to clean-up, bake cookies, and run my lines many times because tomorrow I have guests coming to watch me do the monologue. That’s why I wanted to be idle all day yesterday.

•

It’s very interesting to me that I suddenly had this idea of having a Halloween party, and that I’m creating a community of support for the idea and then executing the project for public consumption. This is me; this is how I worked (on and off) through my whole professional life producing public events. The difference between the Halloween party and working for the clinic is that when I work on the party, I’m working on my idea and I’m the boss.

I’m embarrassed to admit this about myself. With PAL, I worked very effectively with an amazing team that was led by a brilliant leader (Jane Heyman). With PAL, though, I worked independently, thinking up parties and events, marketing tickets, and producing them at minimal cost—all profits going to PAL. I raised 100 grand doing PAL events. They trusted me and respected me and that’s why I believe I could work with them.

My first job was to teach in the high school I attended. I signed a 2-year contract. I honored the contract, but I knew I would not extend the contract 6 months into the job. I loved teaching—particularly teaching theatre and putting on shows. I was good at it, the kids liked and respected me, and I loved the kids very, very much. But I hated being a teacher. 

I was independent in the classroom, and so creative we were featured in the media, and invited to Simon Fraser University to talk to student teachers about our class process and objectives. But I was a very uncomfortable fit with my fellow professionals. 

I need to be independent. That is clear, but it embarrasses me. I feel ashamed of being like that, so I search for answers about why I am this way. I think I know why—as, usual, in the context of someone raised without a bond, a person abandoned by everyone who owned him. My situation forced me to rely on one thing: Me.

My breakdown led to three years of close association with a psychiatrist. She took a broken person and helped me rebuild myself with a new understanding of my history—specifically, the relevance of my upbringing to my new altered state. Sunday, my day off from life, was the 7th “anniversary” of my breakdown.

My breakdown started many years before my emotional collapse in April of 2016. It began one night when I was living with Steve. This was the time of slides—coloured film transparencies in cardboard casings that went into casettes. The casettes worked with projectors that sent the image onto bright and enlarged images onto a screen or wall. People would gather in darkened rooms to watch ‘slide shows’ flash before them.  

When I slid into the bathtub that night when I lived with Steve, it was like I was in a darkened room seeing a slide show. I saw several images that I couldn’t understand before I realized what I was seeing were images of memories past. I was shocked by what I knew were scenes from my childhood that had long, long ago been forgotten.  

That experience changed my life. I effectively started becoming a different person … because I remembered. Then, when I met Dr. Shoja, and heard how she understood the narrative of my life, I had to accept the consequences of those memories.

And now, after seven years of life with those consequences, I feel as though I have transitioned into a person again. The onset of my condition, the siezures and poor speech, was a rough ride. But now, I feel all my symptoms have become ‘regularized’ as a comfortable part of me. I’m doing things again—things like I used to do.

Om my seventh anniversary, I can say that the worst part of my breakdown was having two very dear friends of over 50 years reject me because of my condition. They ridiculed how Dr. Shoja accounted for my condition; they shamed me and walked out of my life. That has been a lingering source of emotional pain. But you go on, right?!

You go on.

•

RuPublicans on Instagram used AI to transform today’s most powerful fascists into powerful drag queens. Incredible work! Spread the love and give them a follow.

Welcome to the stage: 

1. Anita Filibust-Her (Mitch McConnell) 

2. Cruzela Deville (Ted Cruz) 

3. Lady Graham Cracker (Lindsey Graham)

4. Claretta Corrupta (Clarence Thomas)

5. Bombshell Bannon (Steve Bannon)

6. Hawl About Me (Josh Hawley) 

7. Speaker Sparklebottom (Kevin McCarthy)

8. Rhonda Shanty (Ron DeSantis)

9. Mother Pence (Mike Pence)

10. Rudy Garland (Rudy Giuliani) 

(My friend Lani alerted me to these images. Thank, Lani.)