Bareback Meditation

      Today, on a moment's notice, I drove my man an hour and a half west to drop him off at a 10-day silent beginners Vipassana retreat. That's right, for ten days, he will be sitting in meditation approximately ten hours per day, without being allowed to speak, exercise, stretch, write, sing, dance, or masturbate (though I don't really know how they could enforce that last one). Other than writing, that is an extremely long time for him (or anyone) to abstain from those things, and I commend him for his quest forward, to ease his cluttered mind, and to move himself closer to being the man he wants to be.
    The Vipassana retreat is by donation only, and you cannot donate until you have completed at least a 10-day course. The whole camp is run this way, with teachers, servers, and staff all being unpaid Vipassana students who are repaying their gratitude to the meditation technique through service. As he was preparing to go, we read all the info we could find on their site -- with some strangely irrelevant FAQs.
  Topping the list, was Why is the Course 10 Days? to which the response came that many different lengths were attempted and they found the 10 days being the most complete, and doable while still immersing the new meditator adequately to understand and use the technique in the future.

  While working at Club X, one of my "regulars" (meaning I saw him once every two weeks or so), was a lovely 70-something year old gentleman, soft spoken, with shiny eyes, and beautiful crows-feet that belied years enjoying the great outdoors and smiling into the sun. He always wore a floppy straw hat with a beautiful swath of fabric tied around it. We would speak at length about the status quo mentality in the country, and travel (which we both loved), and about the universe's plan, and how there are no coincidences.

  One day, he was telling me of traveling at length in Asia with some friends, and encountering a very enlightened soul whom he had heard spoken of by other friends. This stranger to him invited him to a Vipassana monastery in Tibet, and at first, our man thought it was silly, too difficult, and undesirable. As his journeys continued, he ended up temporarily parting ways with his group of travel buddies, and catching a ride cross country with a different group of hippies who picked him up on the side of the road in China. As it turned out, they were heading to the very same Vipassana centre, and at this he resigned to his fate and went along. At the time (sounded like the 70s from what I can recall), students stayed at the centre for months and months in silent meditation and work amidst the devoted monks.
  Our man was so taken by the silence, the beauty and the technique, that he returned many times for many years, and continued his practice at home in Australia, meditating daily for the following 30-some years.

  After his meandering story about his journeys into enlightenment, he asked me where the gay porn was and I pointed him around the corner to the section he desired. A few minutes past, I can only imagine in deep meditation about which movie to purchase, and again he returned to the desk to ask for my help in finding the bareback, twink porn. I came around the corner and we perused the section together, combing the racks for condom-free young men fucking, much the way Vipassana meditators comb their bodies for Senkaras. At last, we found two possibilities and in the end the film "Bareback Mountain", with its young supple Czech boys, its playful spin on the groundbreaking gay blockbuster, and its guarantee of nary a condom in sight won our enlightened, gentle septuagenarian over, and he was able to purchase the porn of his fancy, and leave the store a lighter man, smiling into the sun.

I'll let you know what parallels I can draw once my man is home from his 10 day course.
But I can bet that even if his mind is clearer, his loins will be soon to follow.

Habit, Routine, and Moving Forward

I was face-painting at my high school's Dry Grad this past Saturday, and in my kit I have a blue recipe box, that I was taught to use once at a Solo Show writing workshop, that has index cards with ideas. I keep face painting ideas there to show those getting painted for inspiration about "what they want". I noticed in it a card that held the names and ideas of the people I had encountered when I worked at Club X. The first name on the back of the card was Colin, and the second Darryl. Darryl was the boss. Colin was a longtime employee -- suspended in the patterns of an unconsciously mediocre life. I loved and cared for him dearly. Next to his name I have written " routines, the prince, e, cut weed".
  Literally every Friday after he finished work, for the past 10 years, Colin got off work, and walked the 8 blocks to The Prince in St. Kilda, had four pints of beer, smoked three joints (that were mostly rolled tobacco with little sprinkling bits of bud -- not enough to make up a quarter joint in my opinion...), flirted with the male bartenders,gossiped, watched people play pool, occasionally danced -- bobbing with tight hips, knees together. On Saturday, Colin woke up late, had brunch alone on his patio, got dressed, took half a tab of ecstasy at 2 hour intervals, and danced the night away, I neither know where nor how. Sunday, I think, was washing up day.
  On many occasions, I joined Colin after work, or he me on a Friday night. I enjoyed our connection, and friendship - from seemingly unconnected lives, needing nothing of each other but company, and enjoying whatever the other had to offer. Colin was a terribly nervous seeming man. He didn't stutter, but hunched in, with his hands holding each other close to his heart, or flopping about in front of him to make a point, which openly communicated his desire to become as invisible as possible. Occasionally, he would have a bender weekend, come in energetically reeking of shame, and endure the most horrific cystic skin outbreaks (requiring antibiotics) the following week(s). I forget what he would explain away the skin condition as, how embarrassed he was about it, and what caused it (which never had any link whatsoever to his recent indulgent escapade) but when it came down to it, I wished he would recognize the link and do something about it. Not about the behaviour, which is all one to me, but about feeling so deeply disgusted in himself for the behaviour. Instead, I sympathized with his physical pain, assured him it wasn't too awful, and that he was loved and cared for.
    My boss, Darryl, was (and is; I learn today that he's on FB) an obese, bald-headed, goatee-ed, motorcycle riding, teddybear of a man, who was a straight shooter, had learned to control a tempestuous spirit and had worked for Club X for many years, ascending to the rank of manager. He had a beautiful, sexual wife who immediately brings the colour burgundy to mind. He had Adult-Onset Diabetes, and continued to eat and drink (the same things everyday) in portion sizes equivalent to his volume. His legs were really bugging him. He wore compression socks and was dealing with painful ulcers on his leg, which shocked me one day to see -- the blotchy thick skin on desperate limbs -- as he displayed his chronic condition. But day after day, in he came, to sit in the booth and intake calories that were crying out for change.
   It was easy for me to see the patterns of these men's "stuckness". Yea. It's often easy for many of us to see where others are stuck, what they are doing that isn't working for them. I don't think it's often we come right out and tell the person (though maybe there are many who take pleasure in owning that duty), and if we did, we can expect the listener's ear is not primed for such an attack, and the message will be lost in the insult.
We have to be ready to change, through dissatisfaction, and already be asking the question. Then, the answer can appear.
   I say this, perhaps, as I am asking questions and waiting for my own answers. I am looking for the ways that I am stuck, and the little voice I so often repress, who is quietly crying out for help, needs some serious attention, a light to shine into the shadow, illuminating the closet. There are no killers here.
  Why am I cycling around, finding myself suspended, unable to really burst forward with the brilliance and potential I want to inherit as my gift to the world, my gift of purpose. Surely I'm not here to sit in a cold house, get high, dream about things that don't come to pass, feel lonely and disconnected, and have a visceral reaction to every time the phone rings.
  I know I love coming up with ideas and working towards them. I know I love research, and the outdoors, swimming, hiking, cycling. I know I love to play music and sing, to design, to play in the garden, to write.
Why do I put a million conditions before doing them? Why do I always feel "too poor" to do the things that would bring me the greatest joy? Why do I need weed to get through my life?

   Astrologically, we are at the start of a Grand Water Trine, which I know only enough about to say it is a time for our deepest emotional healing to come about. I recently met and connected with a talented, beautiful, and uproarious woman whose path and wounds comfortingly match my own. Something of those unhealed echos of the past is stirring, and I feel a bit like I have fallen in love with myself, motivated by how wonderful I think she is, and feeling like we are one and the same. It still looks like an awful lot of emotional work in front of me, but my sense of hope and positive outlook lead me to believe it will be easier than my worries allow me to believe. Regardless, I don't want to find myself in the same cold basement ten years from now, suspended in never doing what my heart truly believes I'm here for.

The American.

Today I started a new job. A job that I've never done before. I walked around the Sea Wall in a certain Vancouver riding canvassing in the sunshine with a certain colour-named party's Candidate for the upcoming provincial election -- MAY 12!
(If I even mention his name, will this be searchable on Google, and will he somehow have to resign for working at all with someone who writes an adult-themed blog? Politics is finicky!!)

I expected the experience to be horrific, door slamming in faces, yelling, obscenities. I expected no one to want to take signs, pamphlets, information. I expected all old people (especially white men) to be voting for the BC Liberals... oh boy! But what I encountered was totally different. Sure, lots of people feigned interest and were non-committal (The candidate was really great with getting them engaged), but lots of people took info, were concerned about the issues, and were actually not totally uninformed. It was a really positive experience.

The only two really negative experiences were two Americans, each on separate occasions. One was a cyclist even, and I felt ashamed of him. The other was unnecessarily harsh and dismissive for the benign-ness of the situation and Damian's requests. I wondered if they just didn't care at all about the place they were living, or hadn't picked up any of the "friendliness", or courtesy of their Northern neighbours.
I try not to stereotype but Americans in other countries seem to carry their American right-of-way attitudes with them. Not all Americans of course. But a distinct trend of US white men between the ages of 35 and 65 seems to crop up in many of the places I have visited.

For instance, in the sex store, we had one customer who we (the clerks) termed "The American". Funny, perhaps, because we had many americans come into the store. Even some american regulars (who often mistook me for an American, even when I say "aboat" instead of "a-bah-out" like they do), but we always knew who we meant when we said "The American".

He was maybe approaching forty. My height, or maybe a little shorter. Obviously some sort of business man, because he always came in wearing a suit, which wasn't entirely usual for our store (some stores downtown that had "Ram Lounges" upstairs, had judges coming in off their recesses in court to parttake in the upstairs "men's meeting place"...but a high-powered man in our neck of the woods was rare). He was maybe just about the stature of a real estate agent.

Once or twice a week, The American (I think we learned his name eventually) would come into the shop and get about $50 worth of $2 coins for the internet viewing booths. He would disappear into the booths for hours, just until I would have totally forgotten he was there, and then he'd re-emerge for another $50 of internet porn. He would smoke in the booths, even though we repeatedly asked him not to, and would butt them out on the vinyl floor of the booths.

The American was annoying, but needed to be tolerated for the revenue he brought to the store. The really funny thing about the American, was that every few hours we would hear his phone ring, and he would come bolting out of the booth -- porn blaring -- and run for the door. Once outside, he would answer his phone while standing in the doorway and explain to his wife that he was at the Salvation Army, a meeting, shopping with his mother, or what have you. It was amazing and shocking and oddly mesmerizing to hear this man so blatantly lie to his wife, who would then question him -- she must have suspected -- only to have him come up with a further lie to buy him at least another hour or two in the booth. But if she'd called more than three times, he knew, it was time to jet.

Colin (my co-worker) told me that once he had forgotten his phone and had to call his wife from the store phone, which on call display turns up under the shops old name "Club Femme", I believe. After he left to return to his wife, she called back the number and asked Colin what kind of store this was. Knowing what was up I think he told her it was a clothing store for women or something else that wasn't entirely untrue, but concealed the true nature of where her husband had been.

This fellow, not only treated us brusquely, and generally like automaton workers, but obviously was not in the most sharing relationship in the world. The demeanour and the "I-don't-have-time-for-you-so-fuck-off" attitudes of all three of these seemingly unconnected white men, were puzzling and unnecessarily aggressive while simultaneously being dismissive.

Maybe being a young, far-left, gentle and friendly crunchy hippy has put our attitudes in opposition, but if that's what it means to be a "true American" I'd rather stay north of the border.

*Along with the provincial election, there is also a vote on electoral reform! Vote yes for BC-STV! Check it out at http://www.bcstv.ca

420 celebrations

I didn't go to the art gallery yesterday to "celebrate" 420. I did go last year to see what it was all about, and for the amazing joy of smoking grass in front of police officers who are not doing a thing about it.
How many countries can we say that in?
Especially here on the West Coast, it is almost taken for granted that we can smoke at liberty, and before this becomes a political rant, I will segue way cleanly into my story.

When you are in a new country it is difficult sometimes to find the little things that, at home, you would instinctively know where to look, but here, you cannot find because instincts just don't work. Things as silly as "where could I get a lemon juicer on a stick" -- which with appalling frequency is given to Dollar Stores... a whole other can of worms that is not the topic of today. Sometimes they are bigger things, and it's just a matter of not knowing what the store would be called where you could buy a food processor or what the store might look like, where it is, or how to get to it (and back again!). Sometimes, it's as huge, and simple as "friends".

In Australia once we needed some muscle relaxant for a back spasm, and the "chemists" were appalled that those were sold over the counter in Canada -- instead, they just gave us some T4s.
Ha!
So, obviously, when you go to a new country, and you are not sure how relaxed their legal policies on recreational drug use is, you aren't entirely inclined to take the same liberties as you might in your own country. As such, I had no idea how to get my hands on some pot, and no idea if I should even try to do so.
In fact it took me almost a whole year in Australia to know how, who, or when I could come across some.
One day, on the weekend, a man walked into the store and introduced himself to me immediately. He had pulled up in a big, unmarked white van, and had a leather folio under his arm. His hair was slicked back and his green hawaiian print shirt was open a few more buttons than it might have been. He was friendly, and kept eye contact, and while carrying an almost boastful demeanor, he was a bit bashful at times. He shook my hand "I'm Peter".
"How do you do?"
"Well, thank you. Do you sell pipes here? Ha ha."
Peter had a bit of a nervous laugh.
"Yeah we do, I'll show them to you. Come around"
So, Peter made his way to the section of the store where we had a glass closet filled with pipes, bongs, grinders, paper, scales, and parts. It was flanked by the butt-plugs and the "novelties"(I loathed the "novelties") like penis ice cube trays, and a penis telephone, or fuzzy penis hot water bottle. I felt indifferent to the butt-plugs, other than the "door stop"... which is one of the few things in the store which still make me giggle from sheer size (see photo).

But in the end, Peter wasn't actually interested in looking at the weed paraphernalia, because Peter was, in fact, a salesman for a paraphernalia distro company and wanted to know if his company could be one of our suppliers. This was way out of my entry-level jurisdiction. I just sell the porn! I don't buy it! But, by this point, Peter and I had been joking around and although he had no further need to stay, he stuck around the store for another few hours, just shooting the shit, and having a laugh (and learning!) about all of the products we had in stock and why they may or why they may not have my personal or professional seal of approval.

Peter and I had traveling in common. We both loved it. And we were both fed up with Australia, and its retro political views and general bigotry. Peter had spent a lot of time nearby in South East Asia, and had many stories to regale me with in regards to his time spent abroad. He seemed like an honest man, happy, and warm. At the end of our meeting he asked for my number.
It is rare that I ever give out my number at work. Especially a customer. Though Peter was more of a potential business associate, I think I took Peter's number from him, and by the twinkle in his eye I had to let him know,
"I have a partner"
"Oh. We'll have to be friends then. And I'd like to meet your partner too. I can have you over for dinner!"
And so we agreed that we would meet again and go for coffee and lunch in Brunswick.

I think Peter called three days later. We rekindled our easy cheerful warmth and he was going to come and pick me up in his van.
It was the middle of summer, February, I think, and hot. The van was hot and I don't think it had anything by way of air conditioning, so we rolled the windows down and Peter tossed me a very cold white plastic cup with a lid. It had taped to it a two pronged fork and a straw, and had white squares floating in it. My hand was wet and cold from holding it.
"This feels amazing. What is this?"
"Open it up. Drink it"
And so I did, and my unstoppable love for coconut juice and meat was ignited.
It was the most refreshing drink I had had since the first Kombucha I tried at a Hare Krishna restaurant in Paris. Peter explained they were from Thailand, but you can get them at most asian food stores in the freezers (and I have ever since).

Peter and I had coffee, and we chatted. Generally, about how Peter is often kicked around, bad things happen to him, he has rough luck with women, or bad luck befalls his endeavours. Sometimes I spoke about school, what I was learning, working at the store. We were easy friends, both eager to listen and to talk, and to simply have a new friend to explore. Eventually we got on the topic of weed, and he told me about a friend of his who grew his own, and how he often got free weed from his friend for little errands, or cooking him dinner or what not. Later on, I asked him if he knew of someone I could call, or where I might acquire some marijuana and he said he could probably take care of it for me.

Amazing.
It had been a year, and finally it was a beautiful warm summer, I had a beach, and the ocean, and Peter showed up one day with two presents for me.
The first, he showed me two glass pipes that an old glass blower who worked for his company made. Both were beautiful, stunning pieces with weaving and spiraling coloured glass within. Peter told me I could pick one to have as a gift. I focussed on the pipes for a long time, trying to decide which I would enjoy more while stoned. Finally, it became clear which pipe was meant for me and then Peter handed me the other gift he brought. A beautiful little baggy of weed so fresh, it still had its seeds attached.

That beautiful pipe lives on, though has had its share of wear and tear...and tar. I'm in a totally new place now, and just starting to make friends after having been here for a year. Sometimes, it's amazing the people who are brought together by a common ganja-bond and yesterday I celebrated 420 out in the sun with a toke from the unexpected friendship pipe, and wondered what ever happened to Peter.

Crazy 'Fro

There was a fellow who lived in my neighbourhood -- the same neighbourhood as the store. I saw him sometimes when I wasn't at work, storming down the streets, talking to himself, sometimes yelling, sometimes screaming or brandishing a huge stick that he had ripped from a tree with his own angry hands. But regardless of where he was, or whether he was interacting with others or with his own demons, he was always the same.

6'5", maybe more. 6'8" with his jet black 'fro. Black hair, black tank top (though "wife-beater" seems unfortunately appropriate in his case), black jeans, black steel-toed boots. Even his eyes seemed black, clouded with rage, or urgency, or...I could never really pin-point what. He looked like a giant Bob Ross, if Bob Ross had taken steroids and gone absolutely bat shit nuts to the other extreme.

Not unlike this person's depiction in the photo above. (thanks: http://www.zakeh.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/01/4.jpg)

He came into the store a few times. Always for the same thing. I would hear the flap of the plastic door strips and before my brain could register that I had a customer, he would be at my counter...still taller than I, even though he was standing a foot below.

A quick look around to make sure no one was eavesdropping (though even when there were other customers, his volume never modulated during his request) and then always the same thing.
"Where do you keep your XXX-rated porno?"

The first time I encountered him in the store I took the time to assure him that, in fact, we had no "behind-the-counter" porn, and to explain that in Australia, since all porn was illegal except in the Australian Capital Territory, there was no such thing as XXX porn... that it was ALL equally illegal, so once it was restricted, it didn't receive further classification. I never bothered to explain that what he seemed to be after wasn't actually XXX-rated porn anyway.

After some clarification, he decided that it was satisfactory to look through the fetish section around the right hand corner of the store, and after several minutes of imploring me about which videos contained the MOST XXX material, I left him to his own devises, off-handedly suggesting if he was really torn, there was always the option of previewing a video before or instead of purchasing it.

This encounter occurred almost exactly the same every time between Crazy 'Fro and I, until one day, he did find a movie that he wanted to preview... or at least was tired of having his efforts frustrated when nurses, urination, and hemaphrodites just didn't seem to do it for him by the still shots on the back of the cover.

It was (dare I say "unsurprisingly") a Latex Fetish video from Germany, made in the 80's and likely our oldest remaining VHS tape. Unlike our "fully equipped" DVD booths, we only had one viewing booth with VHS capabilities, and much to the chagrin of countless of his predecessors -- no remote.

He agreed, in his aggressive and volatile manner, that he nevertheless wanted the room, and I gave him the usual spiel and changed his fistful of bills to the $2 coins accepted by the machine. He entered the booth and I started the film, returning to my cleaning, or sorting, or whatever I had been occupied with prior to his intrusion into the store.

Only a few moments went by before I heard the creaking of the booth door, and the amplification of the previously muffled sounds of 80s German porn. Immediately, he was in front of me again, inquiring about a remote control, the length of the film versus how much time his money would buy, the quality of the picture, whether he could watch the VHS in a DVD booth, and again, the remote control.

I explained once more that there was no remote and that if he was unhappy with the image I could try the tracking button but if it didn't work there wasn't much else I could do.
He seemed flustered, and perpetually ready to explode, and very, very upset at the lack of remote control.

Always putting customer service first, I offered that perhaps I could fast forward the film to the middle of the movie for him from the VCR which was situated behind the counter with me. Again, seeming like a satisfactory solution, and when he was finally reassured that I had, in fact, hit fast forward, he disappeared with the creak of the door back into the booth.

There was another minute or two of peace when I heard a shout, and a little scuffle in the VHS booth, followed by a quick squeal from the door and then,
"Stop! STOP!!...Hit play! HIT PLAY!!"
So I obliged, and the door closed.
Moments later, it re-opened.
"Nah. Fast forward. FORWARD!"
And so I unwittingly became his remote control for the next five minutes until he arrived in front of the counter with a different issue.
"The picture is wavy. It's bad. Can you fix it?"

I tried to explain that he was watching a VHS from the 80's and that it was unlikely that he would obtain a clearer picture regardless of my efforts, but he was adamant that I fix it, but not before he insisted on showing me just what kind of grainy image he was dealing with.

As a tangential note: I am always wary of when customers insist I take a look at the porn on the screen they are watching in a booth. Not that it is a far stretch to intrude on the privacy of someone who has already handed me the DVD case of the video in question, which I then have to locate, load into the DVD player, and hear through the plywood doors of the viewing booths behind me (sometimes at excruciating volumes) and who will eventually leave me a booth to clean, by actually bearing witness to that which he has chosen to watch. But, I am unsure of looking at a screen with the customer's "performance" of choice because I don't want to be cornered into a room with no escape, I don't want someone to get his kicks from watching me watch his porn (whether or not that happens), and I don't want to be brought into the fantasy world of a stranger in the unrealistic medium of pornography -- especially in light of the high volume of men who ask me, upon being given the go-ahead to enter the booth, whether I care to join them, if I would like to give them a "hand", If I could help them out (wink wink), or if I'd like to watch, or maybe even be satisfied. There was only one or two times that I can remember where the suggestion was even mildly tempting -- and even then, any temptation I may have felt was immediately erased by the banality, the audacity, and the un-originality of confusing a female sex-store clerk with a free prostitute. [Sometimes on the other side they would have realized this --generally if we proceeded to have a conversation-- and apologized. But generally, if I wasn't ignored afterwards, I was told that the offer was still valid, or that I missed out as they left the store.]

No part of me had any desire to behold the Latex porn that Crazy 'Fro was watching, so I had him hold open the booth door as I sat on the counter, peering around the wall at the screen.
He was right of course. The picture was shit, but amazingly viewable as far as old VHS is concerned. I tried the tracking to no avail and after he turned down the suggestion to choose a DVD (which would have a remote!) he returned to the booth for a few more rounds of our bizarre human remote control ritual. His time was running out, most of which he had spent standing at the counter staring into the booth and barking commands, and he knew it.
He wanted his money back.
He wanted to find another movie.
He wanted the stuff we kept behind the counter.
He wanted a better picture.
He wanted a remote control.

I suggested he come back another day as our booths closed an hour before the rest of the store (to allow me time to clean them), and it was already pushing a quarter past. He took all this in, nodding ferociously, said "O.K., I'll be back" and left with the same intense aggression with which he had entered, leaving behind the lingering and overpowering body odour that shadows a man who, in 6 months, I never once saw wear anything but the same black outfit.

I remember spraying the store with air freshener after he left that night, and feeling relieved that it was only his repugnant stench, oppressive as it was, that remained.

The male prostitute...

Was his name Dave? Or was it James? Every couple of weekends he'd show in the morning -- sounding like he'd pulled an all-nighter, and what was he waiting for again? Sounded like a driver, a buddy -- or a bus (but they were already running by that time...), and he worked a day job, as a mechanic. He wanted to be the best Mercedes, or Peugeot or something fancy sounding and I think with two words (so neither of those!) mechanic. His dad was a mechanic.

"The best," he had said.
And he wanted to one day take over, to be as good as his dad was -- as successful.
To make his father proud.

He was covered in tattoos, and was dirty blonde with some kind of facial hair...a goatee? He always wore a ball cap, a black band t-shirt, jeans. I knew what kind of man I expected him to be -- I'd seen his "kind" before, especially in Australia. But I was mistaken. He'd seen a lot, but was gentle and soft-spoken and seemed to have a genuine respect for women from all that he had seen, and despite everything he had seen.

He usually stayed at least three hours with me in the store, and if I had a customer, he'd browse -- or if there was a lull in the conversation, he'd find some product to mention briefly to reignite dialogue -- but he'd seen it all before and it had long since lost its appeal for him. He seemed tired of 'raunchy', with gentle blue (hazel?) eyes -- maybe always heart-broken, maybe just a little lonely.

If I was tired, he would buy me a coffee from around the corner so I could work. He had been working all night at his other life.

"Don't tell the guys I work with", he said to me once. As though I had any connection to either of his lives -- an access that would ruin him, crumple him. He knew I wouldn't.
I was his ally, his therapist, his surrogate girlfriend, his safe-haven. He came in because he found in me some kindred spirit. I understood him. I listened to him. I didn't judge him.

We both worked in the Adult Industry: I hawked illegal wares -- pornography-- on DVDs, VHS, the internet, magazines. I spent my days explaining the difference between vibrators made in China and those manufactured in Japan -- whether silicone, latex, or glass was more enjoyable, more hygienic, more affordable. At the end of my shifts, I cleaned semen from the walls of "viewing booths".

For what it was, I liked my job. I enjoyed the interactions, the opportunity to educate and to learn. The money way great. I can see why he was drawn to the store. And I was drawn to him.
He intrigued me -- I had never met a male prostitute before.

Of course, he wasn't a call-boy anymore -- though I had heard many stories about the women he worked for: either voracious for his body, for the sexual acts which they were buying from him, or else desperate for companionship, the warmth and presence of a male body, a sympathetic ear, simulated love.

He wasn't even a stripper anymore -- a job he forfeited after realizing he didn't want to be addicted to cocaine, and shouldn't have to get so high he had out-of-body experiences simply to perform the tasks required of his profession. That wasn't the life he wanted for himself. He wanted success -- he wanted to make his father proud.

By the time I met him, he worked in a brothel...as a secretary, in charge of the bookings of rooms and the assigning of women to the men who chose them for the predetermined amount of time.

I remember him telling me how the workers were required to line up for selection by the customers, how degrading it seemed, and the vicious cycle that ensued, from the girls who wouldn't get picked then losing confidence, becoming desperate and therefore undesirable, to the girls whose egos would inflate from a string of "good days". The in-fighting was debilitating, he said, the women would find ways to sabotage, slander, and frustrate the businesses of one another in a competition that makes it hard to believe there could be anything empowering about the sex trade.

I remember his cautionary tales about dating the girls he worked with -- as though I might accidentally make his mistakes -- and how the stories seemed like a confession of his loneliness, and his vulnerability.

He used to talk about being hopeless with women, paralyzed to approach anyone he liked, despite all the time he spent with them, observing them, serving them -- that it had made him overly sensitive to them. He told me several times that he couldn't, for the life of him, ever make the first move. I wondered, after a few weeks, if maybe he meant me.

I think the reason he did it was the money. I remember him saving up for something, but I don't remember what. I vaguely remember it being something admirable -- to achieve his ultimate goal: top mechanic. His father's pride. His unknowing father's pride. My Masculinities class would have shit itself over a story like this.

I don't remember what we talked about the last time I saw him. I don't remember if we knew or acknowledged that it would be the last time we saw each other, or the last time we spoke. I wish we could have debriefed, or kept in touch. There were such funny lines to be drawn in that store, and I wish one of us had done something to break through. I will not ever find him again. He always came in on a Saturday. He always stayed for hours, just for my company, my conversation.

He never once spent any money in the store -- he only ever spent his time.

In the beginning...

Here is the first blog entry I have ever written.

I have often scoffed at blogs, either for their self-indulgent nature, or because of my own ideas about what writing is worthy for web publishing. But recently, since losing my "joe" job, I have promised to dedicate more of myself to my artistic pursuits -- acting, music, writing, creation. As anyone, I have many stories rumbling through my head of my life experiences: stories I hope to not soon forget, and stories that others have urged me to write down. Ultimately, I have come to the conclusion that I have stories that I want to write, to remember, and to be able to locate. If you like these stories -- even better! I am starting this blog as a publishing space specifically for my encounters while working at a sex-store in Melbourne, Australia where I worked to help pay for my theatre MA, but it may soon become the location for fiction and non-fiction alike, for music, and for art, and for whatever this space becomes if it does not become abandoned.