Biscuits and Davey

       I realize that my blog posts ebb and flow like the bi lunar ocean tide and that my moods change like an inconsistent weather radar reading during the stormy season. Hurricane David is by far one of the most dangerous types of atmospheric local chaos. Board up the windows folks and lock down the hatches. Whenever I'm stumped in my writing confessionals I tend to look back at the roller coaster of a ride I've been on for some time now. Could the silence of a rural environment actually be deafening to the point that I have to listen to a CD called 'Sounds of the City' a collection of horrible urban taxi honks and angry turnstile clicks and subway rumbles just to get myself to relax? I need a balance. Can the city of angels and demons be calling me back home after I wrote about my great escape for months on end?  Silence...Check. Quiet...check. Recording a CD...check! Finally paying off my Sallie Mae student loans that have been hanging over me like a cloud in the antidepressant commercials...done!!!
    Tennessee. It all started with a humming that morphed into words; words that evolved into lyrics to a country song and I'm taken away every single time. There's something new in me like a confidence I can't fully explain and I feel the need to not only acknowledge it but celebrate it with a dirty Actors Equity Les Mis call in Chelsea. My career won't be complete until I die on the barricade at some point. What's wrong with me? I have a beautiful one bedroom nest for dirt cheap...a rock star performing job at the biscuit ballet where I'm Rudolf Nureyev as far as the locals are concerned. But most importantly I've had the time to hear my voice clearly for the first time ever in my life without the oh' so familiar fall out of epic vocal judgement. Again I stand at the crossroads of leaving and it feels like I'm gonna throw up in my mouth a little. Or maybe it was the cherry cheesecake Yoplait Whip I just ate two days past its sell-by date I don't know? A pirate plank might be the best comparison (swirling sharks and all) to the rat race I'm considering doing a swan dive back into but it's worth it. It's a familiar tune I wish could forget the words to but I sing it in my sleep nonetheless. It's definitely time to reconsider a new approach to your career when your big Mary Poppins number follows a ventriloquist name Bob who literally uses a sock puppet! 33,000 dollars in debt paid off  in full to Sallie Mae can't justify poop and dick jokes to me at almost 35 years old. I mean an actual sock puppet in 2013 can you even imagine?! And I can't forget to mention the Stunt Dog Snickers I had to follow at my last gig. Is this success I wonder? I'd say yes without hesitation because of the peace I've found exploring the scary, untouched depths of myself that compare to the uncharted deep sea dives only black light cameras can catch. Daddy would take even a lateral move at this point.

Miss Understood

  

         The classic mystery of Monogamy...does it exist in the dirty dog-like inner workings of a gay man's DNA? Am I supposed to put that huge piece of me on a shelf to ignore every time I consider letting myself be open to a new relationship and the idea of love? Is it a theory or can you get everything from the same person? So many questions! I like to think that you can. The guy that inspires such blatant and carelessly dangerous consideration in my mind will make me french toast in the morning and spicy Bloody Mary's on a blustery and cold rainy east-side day; in between playing renditions of Claire de Lune on an slightly out of tune piano while I shower! Too much? Absolutely! Expectations too high you say? I know. But maybe I missed the boat in this case and that's all she wrote folks. I like to think timing is key when it comes to rekindling an old flame. Hopefully all the previous baggage can be set aside or forgotten and the lessons been learned already so you can take that first step all over again. Its not the great guys I'm falling for....its me friends. After all, I'm the only common denominator in all of my failed relationship attempts. So how long can I go on pointing fingers and placing the blame on everyone else but myself? I could have walked down the path more traveled and had the picturesque white picket fence with a beautiful show girl wife popping out pale, plump, red headed grand babies, making my mother bubble over with peels of grandmotherly delight. Should that be the case my life might look really good on paper. But alas sexuality is not a choice. I would've chosen invisibility and normalcy over anything on the check list. Don't get me wrong, my life has unfolded beautifully with twistsssssss and turnssssss that no one ever saw coming. Even with the understanding that I was genetically designed to color outside the lines, unfortunately my personal demons involving unnecessary jealousy have begun to cloud my already cloudy mind and eat away at the trust I've found with my new man and every man before him. I can dish it out but I can't seem to take it so to speak.

        The years are seriously flying by like subway stops on an express train. It was crucial for me to find peace in this redneck environment for my already fragile sanity.  Perhaps it's way too late for that. And since I find myself plopped down in the middle of the ridiculous American bible belt I proudly smooth out the little bubbles on the Obama bumper sticker I permanently placed on my conservative parent's soccer- mom minivan. Oops....It sits right above my dads sticker that says "Rim to Rim.........the Grand Canyon!" No kidding! Each corner of my presidential 2012 sticker has been frantically scratched at on every side by angry Republican hillbillies and scooter-bound ladies in the Walmart parking lot, desperately trying to remove my Democratic pride before getting caught "red" handed. Waves have been made with the locals inadvertently. Its my small attempt at a strangely successful rage. Some Romney sheep is going to definitely tailgate me now and lay on the horn or drag his angry key across the ol' Green Hornet's paint job that's been so good to me. It's a truly trusty war horse that has served me well for a very long time.  All driver's forgiveness aside, my trick to avoiding the impending parental backlash of my mother's wrath in regards to the Obama bumper sticker was placing an ugly inspirational Christian theme-park magnet over it temporarily for quick home visits. So far so good....until she finds the blog!

The Imaculate Misconception

     When do you tap out of the New York City fight I wonder? And when do you stop pounding the fruitless pavement and celebrating the occasional bread crumb mercifully dropped from a midtown casting agency? The thick 33 year old denial clouding my pursuit of genuine happiness reminds me of that Lunesta commercial where the cartoon character walks around all day with a dark little rain cloud tightly tailing her every move. That can’t be 34. I need to sit into my decision to relocate for two years, uprooting myself from everyone and everything I’ve known for the last 14 years I rode the one train uptown to Harlem. You don’t shake the city angst that easily. To this day I still get the shakes whenever I think about going to an Equity Principle Audition at six am and waiting outside in the biting New York cold hoping to get the chance to belt out at least 32 bars of some obnoxious musical theatre song I’m not entirely comfortable with anyway. 

      I always hang on way too long to all things broken if I know it or not, relationships, jobs, apartments, grudges, ideas. The urban adrenaline that used to pulse through my veins like lightning has hardened into a thick glue making it impossible for me to move or give a shit anymore. I want my ashes spread over the hard wood floors of Pearl Studios where daddy’s been getting cut from the dream countless times leaving all dignity in the room should the word “Improv” be dropped! Not to mention the ol’ hamster wheel of required six month Wicked calls...my dream. Little fish? Even a good Sex and the City marathon couldn’t blow a little life into my broke city soul and wallet these days. I like privacy and walking little Harley off leash without threat of getting run over, being ticketed by a bored New York City bike cop, or harassed by another homeschool fellow dog owner! For the moment I’d rather be stuck traffic hopelessly gridlocked than being smashed like sardines on the dirty train if it comes at all.  Among the long list of things that tip the scales, Im cool with saying adieu to the amputee legless guy that drags his torso across the filthy train floor begging for loose change with hands stained solid black with unspeakable grime. I'll never forget the pathetic crackle in his voice that took the saddness of it all to a whole new level. Or the homeless woman rubbing her invisible bed bugs all over my jacket as she forces her way through a tight rush hour crowd like a bull. No thank you. Other than barely coming up with my epically unattainable rent due by the first of the month and the eight AM Spanish mariachi band splitting my head wide open, inspiring an emergency run to the local pharmacy to grab a fistful of Excedrin Migraine, I think my list is almost done. SSSSSShhhhhhhhh New York. It’s quiet time.

       Now I’ve traded in my ghetto mansion on 156th street for the bottom floor of a house that sits in the clouds atop one of the highest points in Pigeon Forge. Scenic loop circle is private and picturesque and as far as I’m concerned it’s Cinderella’s slipper. The deafening silence makes me wonder if my hearing is going sometimes. No hospital ambulances racing past my bedroom window blaring sirens at all hours of the night or firecrackers being popped by little punks in the courtyard, startling the hell out of me because they sound like gun shots. I clearly watch way too much Law and Order. How about another rainy marathon Tankersley? I can still hear the clicking subway turnstiles and people screaming "TAXI!" penetrating my dreams the way I can hear Paula Dean's horrible accent even if the television is muted. That woman is a terrorist of the English language. No wonder my anxiety level floats at around the boiling point. Anger management alone was enough reason to run for the literal hills. It’s crucial for me to sit with this quiet and suck down the crystal clear Tennessee air that’s so pure my brain is actually thanking me.
      Friends and VIPs keep asking me when I’m coming back to the dirty thankless grind of screaming high G’s at ten am that get harder and harder to reach, much like my leg to my face! My answerer to these doubting Thomases is “Whenever my therapist gives me a hall pass.” All I know is that simplicity suits my 33 year old bones at the moment and having some semblance of quiet stability has been paramount in me finding any peace at all. My writer’s inspiration comes and goes like the tide and my fingers miss the fiery tap tapping away of all my sarcastic rants in the dry periods. The occasional threads of juicy thought all too often get caught in my widely cast nets of personal judgment and never see the light of this laptop monitor. Even if this blog contains waaaaay too much information it’s better
in the end to let it rip because it would be a crime if some of this shit was forever encased in my IPhone notebook App. The tomb of doom. So...........POST.