Another Queer Jewish Buddhist

Today is the 28th day, which makes 4 weeks, of the counting of the Omer: Malchut of Netzach

Sovereignty in Endurance. Sovereignty is that one pointed concentration when all the fragmented bits of your consciousness have come together and are aligned, awake, collected and focused -- in this case toward the goal of endurance, and towards victory.

So tomorrow morning at 4am I'll be awake and on my way down to board the Empire State Pride Agenda bus up to Albany with members of my synagogue, Congregation B'nai  Jeshurun, to lobby the legislature for Marriage Equality.

May our love, our discipline, our hearts, our intention, our humility and our connectedness all unite to give us strength of purpose, give us strength to endure the inevitable setbacks until the day that we prevail. For prevail we will.

What do you see when he gets out of bed? Its got a mind of its own, eh?

The motto of the ancient British Order of the Garter is "Honi soit qui mal y pense" which is sometimes translated as "Shame on he who thinks evil" and sometimes as "Evil is he who thinks evil [of what he sees]" What do you see when the boy gets out of bed?  What do you think when his third arm is standing straight up? Or when you hear the lyrics that "he likes them big and juicy?"

Just what is the hunger we're talking about here?

Reverend Bill would have a field day with this. Conflating sexual desire and hunger (for food, things) is what advertising does. And you know the agency had lots of fun with this. I just wish I could have been in the meetings when the creative team first presented this work to the account team -- and when the agency presented the work to the client. As an ad man, I love this work. As a gay man, I think it's both funny and filled with interesting moments for psycho-social analysis. As a Buddhist, I find the grasping hand connected to personified Hunger a scary image of the Hungry Ghost. Interesting on so many levels.

The Most Important Gay Memoir of the 20th Century — A Conversation with Stephen Pascal, Editor of The Grand Surprise: The Journals of Leo Lerman

Mae West is reputed to have said, “Keep a diary and one day it will keep you.” While Leo Lerman never published his journals and diaries in his lifetime, it has enough naughty gossip, hidden history and sheer human insight to find itself on the bestseller list for a while.

Mae West herself doesn’t show up in the book, though several drag versions of both Mae and Marlene Dietrich to name a few do turn up in passages about gay speakeasies in the 1930s. And of course, the real  Marlene Dietrich is everywhere in The Grand Surprise, along with Maria Callas, Truman Capote, Cary Grant, Philip Johnson, Greta Garbo, Josephine Baker, Henry Kissinger, Jackie Onassis… well just about every major figure in art, music, film, theater, fashion, politics and literature in the 20th Century.

The press has already started to feed on the revelations about the bisexual affairs of Steve McQueen and Yul Brynner. And while the book is chock full of the guilty pleasure of this kind of gossip, the book is a revelation deeper and more moving for those who are willing to read it from start to finish instead of browsing the index for celebrity names. 

Stephen Pascal, who worked for Lerman for 12 years as his assistant, has edited the 50 years worth of journals into a coherent story. And he knows that many people will be tempted to simply browse, or compulsively browse. Over dinner and a bottle of fine Bordeaux last week we talked about Leo’s story, and the story of his editing the journals.

AQJB: I have to admit, I haven’t been able to avoid browsing the index looking for names. There are just so many, and so many juicy tidbits. And it’s a long book, over 600 pages. What will people miss if they just browse for these stories?

SP: They’ll miss some of the most important stories as they develop over time — starting with the Leo’s life story, and the story of his 47-year relationship with his lover Gray Foy. As well as his relationships with those “sacred monsters” Dietrich, Callas, Capote and others he knew intimately from the start of their careers all the way to the end.

His journals tell their stories with the immediacy of one who was there, the insight of someone who could see what was really happening, with all the bitchiness and compassion of a true friend. So you feel all their, and Leo’s, full humanity.

And Leo’s story itself is a particularly American story — the child of immigrants who worked hard, he moved to the very center of American society, and helped shape taste and culture for four decades.

AQJB: Let’s talk for a bit about his relationship with Gray Foy. This is a journal that tells the story of a loving relationship between two men that lasted almost 50 years. That lasted through major changes in the lives of gay men in America. First, how have people, readers and reviewers, responded to this story? Have you noticed a difference in the way the gay press or gay readers have responded from the mainstream media?

SP: Well, one thing gay men have been responding to has been the depiction of this relationship. — Gay readers have  told me how moved they are to see such an intimate relationship develop over time. There are so few examples of this in fiction or in other journals. One  reviewer in the mainstream media (whose gender preference I certainly don’t know) referred to the writing about this relationship as the “mushy" and uninteresting parts, but for gay men, who rarely have their relationships reflected back this way, well, it stirs up a lot of emotions.

The mainstream reviewers, so far, remember the book has been out about a week, but for the most part they’ve not really made a big deal about the gay relationships It’s just been acknowledged without smirks or insinuations.

But let’s face it, the mainstream reviewers, given a choice between writing about Marlene Dietrich’s affairs, or Maria Callas — or writing about Leo’s relationship with his lover, they’re going to focus on the gossip because it’s what interests people and what will get the reviews read. Really, Leo’s relationship with Gray was like any conventional marriage, except for the gender of the parties involved.

AQJB: Early in the book, Leo tells of his coming out experiences, going to speakeasies, back rooms and drag bars. I was stunned to read of a back room bar on West 72nd Street in the early 1930’s — and then of course I remembered the old chestnut that every generation believes it invented sex, and I guess I’m just as guilty of that as anyone. But I have to say that Leo didn’t seem to suffer the oppression that we associate with being gay, or for that matter, Jewish, in the early 20th Century. How did he manage to succeed and rise to the rarefied circles he did?

SP: As someone who must have been excluded from many places for being gay or Jewish, he very rarely writes about it. Really the circles he chose to move in, publishing, theater, art, were some of the more open places to be. And while his background made him an outsider, he lived his life pretending to be the consummate insider that in fact he became.

AQJB: Wasn’t there an incident in the 40's at the writer’s colony at Yaddo where he came up against homophobia?

SP: Well, he was certainly hurt an anti-gay comment made by the director of Yaddo, Elizabeth Ames, and it shook him up. Despite his membership in this elite young artistic circle (Carson McCullers, Truman Capote, and Marguerite Young were also there at the time), it reminded him of his precarious position in society and made him so uncomfortable he considered leaving early.

AQJB So everyone knew he was gay, he was out, whatever that means for the time.

SP: Well he chose not to hide, even though it wasn’t something he talked about unless you were a close friend. I mean, he was such a dandy that if someone thought him gay it would hardly have been a leap. And he lived openly with his lover, inviting everyone to their home. Yet few spoke with him about his relationship; it was a simple fact that was unmentioned.

AQJB: Sort of the way some reviewers in the mainstream media have dealt with it.

SP: Except for the fact that some gossip columnists have been running with some of the information about “stars.” That’s what sells papers you know.

AQJB: I loved that Yul Brynner had an affair with Hurd Hatfield and Marlene Dietrich. I guess that when she sang “See what the boys in the back room will have, and tell them I’m having the same,” she was not unaware of the double meaning we’ve always laughed about...(continued)

Today is the 27th day of the counting of the Omer: Yesod of Netzach

If you've been following this blog's omer count you know that while some may look at Yesod as Bonding, I see Yesod as connecting energy that will go in any direction if it isn't being directed consciously. So that Yesod can be the seat and seed of all addictions. Think of it this way, just below Tiferet on the Tree, (which is the open heart, open to Divine Love above and Human Love below) Yesod, if frustrated in its need to connect up, will connect anywhere. And the result is what the Buddhists call a Hungry Ghost.

So this is a day that can be very unhealthy if the energy is unconscious. The sefirotic combination of NEED to the level of commitment that is endurance creates a deeply addictive quality. A stubborn attachment to unskillful means. This is the dark side of this combination. The shadow side. And it pays to pay attention to that shadow, since we ignore it at our own peril...

Today is the 26th day of the counting of the Omer: Hod of Netzach

Earlier I mentioned how white-knuckling is antithetical to the kind of endurance in Netzach. Today, when we feel the energy of Hod, surrender, in endurance, we can actually feel how surrendering to a situation is how we endure. Accepting reality as it is. After all, in an argument with the universe there is no question who is going to lose. It's interesting that Netzach is also known as Victory, as Hod is Surrender. So that one can see how within the true victory comes in surrender. Certainly when encountering the Divine there is nothing to do but surrender, to give up the small cup of our ego, and be filled with the victory of love with a capital L!

The Sexual Exploitation of Teens is Fed by Silence

In the United States, even as teens are commercially sexualized at an early age, witness Britney Spears, we pretend there is problem. No, the problem is not teen sex. The problem is our society's hypocrisy in the face of it: how we sell out our youth to a consumerist approach to their bodies, their self worth, and their sexuality. And while we flaunt young semi-nude bodies on TV and in magazines, in programming and advertising, we play the puritan when it comes to really talking about it seriously. Case in point: A report released Friday by the New York State Office of Children and Family Services estimates that New York City is home to more than 2,000 sexually exploited children under 18. The researchers who compiled the report were surprised how many were male or transgendered. Hell, that seems like an underestimate to me. According to a 2006 study conducted by the National Runaway Switchboard, 42% of the 15,000 to 20,000 homeless youth in New York identify as lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender. And I can do the math.

In Britain, they are not afraid to talk about this in commercial media. There is a campaign to reach out to teen runaways who may be surviving on the street through prostitution. It actually speaks from the

understanding that many of these teens probably left home due to abuse or because their sexuality made them less than welcome at home.

It speaks from an understanding or reality. And the visual is way too shocking for a bus shelter on Broadway. But for the kids in the shelters this is an image that is simply everyday life.

Hell, in some shelters, they know this is how you get preferential treatment. Some of us still remember the scandal of Bruce Ritter at Covenant House.

YES, NYAC, and The Ali Forney Center and MCC's shelter named for the fierce Sylvia Ray Rivera all do what they can to provide safe space. But they don't have the beds, the money, the full resources themselves to address the sheer numbers.

And in fact, the recent report wasn't really about homeless youth, it was about young people who feel they have no other way to earn money, no other value or way to contribute to their family (especially when abuse begins at home).

This is where poverty, racism, religio/spiritual abuse, homophobia and our culture's commercialization of sex all come together in a very smelly stew. There are those in the GLBT community who prefer to keep their activism focused on GLBT equality issues. But an issue like this shows how really everything is ultimately related. The new activists of the Queer Justice League might take note and consider ways in which their activism would serve one of the most under-served and despised communities in the city. And when you consider it, the community that lit the fires at Stonewall, since the riot was started by people like Sylvia Ray Rivera — homeless, poor LGBT youth, often of color.

Today is the 25th day of the counting of the Omer: Netzach of Netzach.

Hmmmm. Endurance squared. I mentioned earlier the endurance I discovered on my first ten-day Vipassana meditation retreat. How I learned that I could endure more than I thought, and I had inner reserves of strength to call on that I did not know about. This was a great lesson that I keep in mind every time I come against a wall of resistance when I want to give up on anything. It brings to mind what the Showa Emperor (known to us poor gaijin as Hirohito) said when he agreed to unconditional surrender: “We must bear the unbearable.” An interesting thought, since tomorrow is surrender in endurance. But I digress…

Of course, the product of this sefirotic square is a different equation when applied to human relationship. How much pain can we endure in relationships and still remain connected? How much of our own mishegoss (that’s a technical term dahlink) do we have to wade through in a relationship, and the other’s mishegoss must we deal with, and still keep our hand in the game without folding our cards? Or knocking over the board? Taking back our ball and going home? An important point to consider when home happens to be with the one we’re getting all bent out of shape over. Or as the song in A Chorus Line goes…”What I did for love”

Queer Product Watch: Pecker (And We're Not Talking John Waters' Films)

When you slide a pecker in your mouth do you prefer to suck it or chew and bite? A tasteless question to introduce another tasty snack from Japan:

Note the little inset on the lower right. They're hollow, and seem to have something inside. I hesitate to even hazard a guess, since my Japanese is rather rusty. So I leave it to your imagination. But since the product is a kind of pretzel, it might very well be salty.

If only Johnny Depp was in that box.

All right, I'll stop.

Your submissions for Queer Product Watch are always welcome, from anywhere in the world.

How Many Times A Minute Does A Man Think About Sex?

The joke answer is, I could probably tell you but I'm too busy thinking about...something. And of course, good advertising starts with a human insight, a truth we can't deny even if we don't talk about it much. Thus this cute print ad for a condom emporium from Barcelona, via Ads of the World.

The headline?

"If you only have one thing on your mind."

Certainly when I was in Barcelona it was hard to keep my mind on the Gaudi architecture with so many fine examples of Spanish manhood on the street. Dancing in the street in fact, since the last time I was there was the week that Spain legalized gay marriage. And in the gay district of town it was a party all night. And though I danced with a lot of handsome men way into the early hours, no one proposed. Marriage that is.

Today is the 24th day of the counting of the Omer: Tiferet of Netzach

How does one keep an open heart in a state of endurance? Endurance suggests closing down in a way, white-knuckling your way through something unpleasant. Gritting your teeth and bearing it. Yet today is about doing quite the opposite, feeling compassion for one's own suffering as one endures. Being patient with those one is often impatient with. Opening up the the feelings held deep to understand the origin of the impatience in a kind of reflective meditation.

Another aspect of the day's energy is compassion in victory. This is one reason I grew up feeling proud of being an American — I learned about the Marshall Plan and how after WWII, rather than pillage and impoverish our defeated enemies, we helped rebuild their societies. I only wish I could feel that pride today. That is an extreme example though. We all compete in our lives in many ways. Certainly in the business world I am an extremely competitive man, in the highly competitive business of advertising. And part of my practice is holding my competitors in my heart. Not always easy. This is close to the Buddhist practice of Metta. Or for that matter, the message of a rabbi 2000 years ago who seems to have been taken up as the teacher for a whole other family of religions.

And for those of you who have been counting along, and reading these meditative musings on the Omer, stop for a moment and have an open hearted experience of your endurance in keeping up this practice. And let me know how you're doing.