Beauty Beauty Look At You

I've been thinking a lot about beauty. After all, it is my business. Or is it? Maybe it's none of my business. Maybe our definition of the word, beauty has become stretched so thin that the line between beautiful and grotesque is fading as we speak. Beauty as defined by modern standards can be found in anything. A collection of lingerie can be seen to some as beautiful. A collection of knives can be seen as beautiful to others. A woman is beautiful. But a woman, wearing lingerie while being hacked to death by a knife would be distasteful to many. Would the addition of blood be the culprit ? Would turning a lovely scenario of a scantily dressed woman laying next to a knife be just as scary to the voyeur without the presence of blood? It seems that with the addition of blood the viewer is no longer in control of distinguishing that line between what is pleasant and what is horrific. Each of us perceive the world differently in terms of pretty/ugly...happy/sad...sweet/sour..etc. I find extremely idillic beauty in humans a bit scary while I find some tragic deformities to be rather thought provoking and quietly beautiful. The photographer Diane Arbus captured on film this ugly/beautiful world with her view of people outside the fringe. Another photographer, Joel Peter Whitkin took this idea to the extreme by setting up still lives with corpses and amputees. The pictures are disturbing but the beauty is overwhelming. Perhaps the fact that both of these artist chose to print in black and white removes the color of fear and let's the viewer decide the tone of the piece.
So, it is true that the old adage," Beauty is in the eye of the beholder" still holds true. Even if the eye has been gauged out and replaced by a daffodil.

Back In The Saddle

Hi Kids, I've been away but now I return with stories from The New Depression. Tune in, Turn On, Throw Up!

Hot For Jesus

I never really liked church as a kid. It seemed like a stupid way to end the weekend and had a fun factor rating of about a 1. It only got a 1 because of the occasional fainting of an old bag parishioner or a fart, burp or any other unidentifiable bodily sound. The thought of getting up early and putting on a scratchy, hand-me-down suit and a clip on tie was enough to make me fake sick weekly. My mother, who was a nurse, would tell me to get dressed and go because if I was gonna die I should die in church.
Around the age of 13, while sitting there staring at the piece of lint dangling on the back of the sweater in front of me, I glanced up at the giant image of Christ on the cross in stained glass. I looked at the faces of the people at his feet sobbing and mourning his death. The bleeding nails in his feet and then up his legs.....his strong muscular legs that lead the eye to a rock hard thigh area and across a scantily draped loin cloth up to a perfectly proportioned stomach and ripped abdominal area and then finally to the chiseled pectorals and bear daddy beard..............what the fuck was happening to me? Was I hot for Jesus? I didn't even know what gay was. All I knew was that that image in the glass was making my boy weenie tingle. I was going to hell for sure now. Then I saw a picture of Satan and thought he was even hotter. Naked and red, goutee and horns.....very humpy. Hell wouldn't be so bad if it weren't for the eternal damnation and the heat.
So years later, as I look back, my very first boyfriend looked just like Jesus, but my current boyfriend looks just like the Devil.

I Love Long Walks On The Beach....

Hello. My name is April and I am looking for someone who is looking for someone with something missing. As you can see by my photo, I am currently living without feet but that does not mean that I don't have soul. Ha Ha! I march to my own drummer and feel as though God loves me just the way I am so why shouldn't you? I have a great personality and really enjoy long walks on the beach although my wheels tend to get stuck in the sand. Many guys like giving me piggy back rides instead. I still consider myself to be very active socially as well as physically so please don't worry about me being dead weight at a party. I can hold my own, I just can't stand up on my own. And I'll never walk out on you even if I get really mad. Ask anyone. They can't get rid of me! Ha Ha!

My story is a common one. I was operating a tool press machine at the American Tool and Dye Co. in Spokane, WA. and, while attempting to recreate a scene from Norma Rae ( I love acting!) I slipped off of the table and into the tool press where my feet were stamped into the shape of a hammers. Ouch! The doctors felt that amputation would be the best way to go because, well who wants feet that look like hammers.

So, anyway, I would really like to meet someone who can appreciate a woman who, although she may lack feet, makes up for them in personality. I hope to meet you soon.

BILL WILL BE ON VACATION FOR 2 WEEKS. YA'LL COME BACK NOW, YA' HEAR !!!!!

A Letter From Buffy.

Dear Fans,

Thank you so much for all of your cards and letters concerning my death of an alleged drug over dose. While it is true that I was using massive amounts of heroin and other illicit substances, my cause of death is due to one person and one person only, Mrs. Beasley, my long time companion, pimp and lover. Many of you are not aware of the circumstances surrounding my death and I would like to take this opportunity to set the record straight.

Beasley and I go way back. She was my best friend and confidant after my parents died and My brother Jody and sister, Sissy were sent to live with our uncle Bill in New York City. Having only known the small town of Terra Haute, Indiana, the city was an ominous an scary place to a small girl. Mrs. Beasley was always there with a kind word and gentle hand and our love for one another was a bond that would one day become my spiral downward and eventual death. With each episodic-like life experience, we started drifting into a sick world of control, abandonment, lost spectacles, and jealous rages.

My life took a change when our uncle Bill, married a woman and we were cancelled. What you don't know is what happened to us when the production crews left and the lights went out on our artificial penthouse on Park Avenue. Sissy went off to college in California, and Jody became a Mormon clothing designer. I was left to my own devices and, with the help of Mrs. Beasley, got a small apartment in Hell's Kitchen and did occasional work in commercials. It was Beasley who had the idea of me doing," guest appearances" at bachelor parties and strip clubs. It wasn't long until I was selling myself on the street. My nickname was BJ Buffy and I became quite popular with the fetish set, charging $300 just to say," Give it to me hard, Uncle Beeeeeuull!". Beasley hooked me up with the johns and took on others to work for her. Chatty Cathy had the west coast operation and Kitty KarryAll was in charge of drug distribution on the east coast. Eventually, in order to control her girls we were all introduced to heroin and that was the beginning of the end for me. I became just another hooker with a habit on the streets of Hell's Kitchen until I decided to numb myself for one final time.

So yes, I did die from a drug over dose, but I wanted you, my fans to understand that it was partially due ti the manipulations of Beasley the Beast. I've heard that she's still out there on EBay trying to get into the arms of collectors. Beware! Once she gets in, her charm and power starts to infiltrate into your household and before you know it your 8 year old daughter is selling more than cookies outside your neighborhood grocery store.


Take care and once again, Thank You, Buffy.

I Want To Live!

I live in Central Florida, a beautiful oasis in the burgeoning pubescent growth spurt that the state of Florida has been experiencing for the last few decades. My home is situated in a Cleaver-esque neighborhood downtown populated by an amalgam of residents from all walks of life. We share a common love for culture, food, nightlife and the convenience that urban living affords. On any given weekday morning the coffee spots are latte-ing and the buzz of laptops is everywhere. On the weekends, things don't really stir until 11 am and that is only to get up and collectively get a glass of water and return to bed until 12.
The suburbs, on the other hand, are a land that one only travels through to get to someplace else. This rich tapestry of all that is unholy breeds the likes of a Casey Anthony or any other frequent guest on the Nancy Grace show. The inhabitants of suburban Orlando are a classless cesspool of crackpots and lowlife that appear frequently on the local news offering descriptions of suspects or opinions on deadly intersections with their 3rd grade grammar and their Super Cuts hair do's. It's as though our fair kingdom is surrounded by a river of snot. When ever a local crime begins to grow into a full feature, I cringe when I turn on CNN knowing that the Pinheads of Pine Hills will be offering their 2 cents worth of insight into the situation. Phrases such as," I ain't never seen...", and " ...this guy come runnin' through my yard" will be spewing out of the mouth of some greasy shirtless moron as he bats at flying insects. How proud I am that search and recovery teams are on speed dial. What a thrill to see sheriff deputies fishing out a suitcase from a retention pond filled with the body parts of a missing prostitute. All just minutes from The Happiest Place On Earth, Walt Disney World. Visitors, make sure you pack plenty of sunscreen and extra body bags because standing outside your motel rooms in the hot Florida sun while a forensics team removes what's left of the tourists in the room next to yours could take some time and you certainly don't want to return back to the UK with sun poisoning.
I guess it's not that bad. I lived in New York for a few years and heard my share of horror stories. But, in New York, the crazy people and murderers are out in plain sight. They are an obvious fixture in that urban landscape. Here, your next door neighbor could be an axe murderer and you would never know it until a Fox News crew is interviewing the man across the street and you hear him say," ...and then this guy come runnin' through my yard".

The New Gay Family

About a year ago my partner Steven decided to take some writing courses in New York. We rented an apartment in the Greenpoint neighborhood in Brooklyn. Greenpoint, a predominantly Polish area near trendy non-affordable Williamsburg was a delightful change from the screeching loud of Manhattan and came with the extra bonus of being known for having the highest stomach cancer rate in the country due to toxic waste oozing into the ground from ancient subterranean pipes. Plus it was close to the train. I enjoyed the smallness of the community and the blurred lines of sexuality. There seemed to be a veil of mystery around the young and androgynous inhabitants. Tattooed and skinny or bearded and looking like really cute hillbilly lumberjacks, there was certainly a difference between them and the Chelsea Boys. On Sundays when I would visit, I would insist on brunch in the city and then some light shopping followed by drinking. This was best accomplished in Chelsea.
Just a short 15 minute commute by train and you were transported from the Land of the Lost to the Day The Earth Stood Still thanks to Botox and David Barton's Gym. In Chelsea, the home of Gay Face the social vernacular and attitude would best be described as" LYING". When you run into someone you had just seen at 5 am in the back room of a bar you tell them how well and rested they look. If you spot someone from your AA group sipping a mimosa you politely turn away and order one for yourself. If your X walks in with the young Latino boy who happens to be wearing the Prada mules that you lost in the divorce, your only way out is to confront them with warm greetings and then excuse yourself from the room telling them that you must dash to meet with the adoption people about your chinese baby. The chinese baby has become the new Jack Russell in Chelsea. Couples parade up and down the avenue as though they are pushing a wealthy old aunt around 12 Trees eating BBQ , tipping the hat to all who pass. " Mornin', mornin'" they say as they acknowledge the muscle boy and his older boyfriend that they had had a summer share with 2 summers ago. Now they will have to share with another couple with a baby and split the cost of a nanny so they can go to T dance and get shitfaced. Life is different now. But they still have the newest diaper bag from Marc Jacobs and their kid is on the list for Dalton. All I can think of is that the drag performer and 70's legend, Sylvester is twirling in her grave, honey. Do you wanna funk?......won't you tell me now?.....if you wanna funk, let me show you how...do you wanna funk with me.....and my chinese baby?

A Message From Mom.....

This is an actual note my mother sent to me more than a few years ago. She was just beginning to show signs of Bipolar Disorder and up until this point we always looked at our mother as an enigmatic elf-like creature that was not like any other on our block. I was living in a " deficiency " apartment in NYC and life in Hell's Kitchen was strange enough for me there. My next door neighbor wore a flannel shirt wrapped around her entire face and head each and every time she left her apartment. There was a deaf homeless woman who would bang on an old non-working electric piano wearing a moth eaten faux ermine cape and a Burger King crown. On the front of the piano was a sign written in what appeared to be either fingernail polish or blood that read," I Rote thiss". My mother at this point was one of the most sane people I knew.
My father, an architect and my mother, a musician turned hausfrau, lived in the midwest at the time and were parents to 4 children that had scattered in the wind like milkweed spores around the country. A brother in Vegas, a gay sister in Denver, and a gay brother in Oklahoma City. Yes, 3 gay children out of 4 dispelling the idea that being gay is a choice. In our case the common denominator was terrible cooking and weekly trips to family burial grounds. But these stories are for another time. We were the family that Norman Rockwell forgot to paint. My mom truly enjoyed writing wether it be correspondence or just small stories or verse. I remember one time my sister and I were digging through one of mom's bottomless boxes of photo's and clippings in an attempt to put them in some sort of order. Hundreds of photographs of various family members, some we recognized, others looked like they were either members of Ma Barkers clan or were the next door neighbors of Mr. and Mrs. Abraham Lincoln were in there. There were also various photos of grave sites. When we were placing the pictures in file boxes, I asked mom what these photos should be filed under. She thought and said, " Just write down Dead People". My sister then found a poem that mom had written when she was a teenager. It was entitled," I Knew A Little Black Faced Girl". Neither of us said a word but we were both thinking the same thing. When did my mom find the time to be a civil rights activist?
On one hot, sticky July day in the city I received my weekly letter from home. These were usually filled with the minutia of my parents day to day life going from doctors appointments to the grocery store to a doctors appointment to the post office to a doctors appointment etc. Todays letter was shorter than usual but, well..... here it is.


Dear Rocky, What a beautiful day it is here today. I've decided to hang the wash out on the line like grandma used to do but we don't have a clothes line so I just got on a ladder and pinned them to the gutters on the house. It took me awhile but I got everything up there but your dad's socks. I hope they don't blow into the Vandergraffs yard( smiley face).
Your dad and I have been down with colds and the dog is sneezing too. The cat seems to be alright but the parakeet was sneezing as well. I hope we all make it ( smiley face).
How are you doing? Is it hot there? How is school? Are you coming home this summer? what color are your sheets? Let me know.
Well, better go check that laundry. Sure don't want it all over the neighborhood( smiley face).
Sure do love you, buddy. Take care, Mom


P.S. Your sisters girlfriend shot herself in the chest ( frowny face).

Dead Woman Acting

" I've killed a lot of johns, done a lot of time, even died by lethal injection but now I'm back and on Broadway starring in the hit musical, "Legally Blonde" at the Music Box Theatre. Come see me before I kill again, or I'm replaced by Betty Buckley.