Incognito

People love to talk about other people. Gays are the kings or queens of gossip. Joan Rivers move over sweetie you are nothing compared to a gay man with a drink in his hand and a secret to tell.

Here a few secrets I've been told, forwarded links to, or witnessed myself in the last few months. These are the secret lives of some of Midtown's biggest queens.

-The next time I see a certain potato queen sing Christina Aguilera's Beautiful at Burkharts' karaoke I will always envision them in drag posting ads on Craigslist claiming to be a virgin. Yet, they somehow know all the dark corners of the Heretic pool room.

-The next time I see an aging event planner with a drug habit and criminal record I'll always think of them as the person claiming to still be in their 20s on their internet profiles. Which might have been true 20 years ago.

-The next time I see a certain super thin drag queen I'll be thinking of them rushed to a Perimeter area hospital in drag suffering from a drug overdose.

-The next time I see a staffer that works at a club south of Cheshire Bridge I'll think of how bad their reputation is amongst the community and how they like to deny their heritage. I'll also be thinking of how determined yet unsuccessful they were in trying to get me in bed.

-The next time I see a certain vegan stripper I'll think of their struggling musical career and how their recording studio went bankrupt even though they claim the city shut them down.

Joy Wall

Photo by me, March 2007.

On a cold and windy January night, early morning as it was past midnight, I left the Masquerade and walked down Angier Avenue. I was walking back to the car when I noticed these pieces of street art or as others might call them graffiti. I didn't have my camera with me at the time and hoped that these pieces would not get covered over.

Photo by me, March 2007.

Photo by me, March 2007.

 

Last week I was back at the Masquerade, again in the early morning hours, and snapped a few photos.

I was surprised to see these, but then again they are hidden away off North Avenue in a rundown area.

The paintings bring to mind the sound of Joy Division.

I love grittiness.

Enter The Past

 

Hell level in the Masquerade. March 2007. Photo by me.

 

I did Saturday night backwards. First I went to Jungle instead of ending up there last. Mark Tarbox was the imported DJ of the night. The crowd was sparse, but it was only 10:30. The crowd always magically appears around midnight.

Paula is always a good source of conversation and entertainment for the first hour and a half. She was in a fabulous black gown and had feathers in her hair. She'd spent the afternoon rehearsing for a pageant. We talked, drank and smoked.

On cue the boys appeared at midnight, shirts came off and wham it was a hot party. If this is any indication of the warm weather season then it will be one long hot Summer to come.

The crowd was peaking when we started planning our next move for the night. With a lesbian in the group we decided against Swinging Richards. Halo was debated.

When someone walks by and starts a conversation with, "hey, I know you." It is either a bad pickup line or an old trick. In this case it was an old trick. I was sitting waiting on the gang to exit the restroom at Jungle when the old trick strutted past and stopped on a dime in front of me.

"Yes, you do know me," I replied with a smile. Not a smile that would indicate I was thrilled to see the person but just more a friendly 'how's it going' kind of smile.

Before I let the conversation go further than 'how are you' and 'what are you doing here.' I let him know that I wasn't alone and was leaving. I gave him a hug, passed him a word of goodbye and was off to retrieve my jacket from coat check.

Thinking back I probably came off short with Andre but I had to go and I wasn't in the mood to play the game of catch up with him. At the time I was thinking about that black leather sofa, the night swimming and the late nights we had played in the dark. Those nights were some of my last wild ones on Cheshire Bridge. That was the summer which I cared for no one, not even myself. It was a bottom for me that had me strolling in a world full of dangerous men. I was more witness than participant and he was the key that opened that door. He connected me to people that moved in circles reminiscent of Traumnovelle. He was a seductive pawn that moved too fast. One week of knowing him and he'd planned our lives down to the pet. His gym-built body had kept me in a trance and around long enough to see more than I wanted. He was all fun in a bad way.

That summer closed and I got free of him. I let him know it wasn't going anywhere, stopped returning calls and kept my eyes open at Heretic and Jungle to avoid contact. Until Jungle last Saturday night I hadn't seen him in a year. That time prior he was with an aging rice queen with a spanking and diaper fetish. Thanks to my Korean connection for that juicy piece of useless gossip.

Enter the Masquerade for Spark at 1AM. Outside I pass two stick figure queers. One says to the other, "that was one lame party." I figure well I won't have to wait in line for a drink then.

Clawing through the plastic strips hanging from the entrance I'm almost run over by a leprechaun or a poor imitation of Peter Pan. It was in green and angry I know that.

Hell had six people dancing. Since they've moved the drag show up to Purgatory it really seemed disjointed. Purgatory is a strange space to perform anyhow with that weird wooden deck structure. Most of the crowd was up on there. I took one look and went back to where I belong, in Hell.

We found a sofa, inhaled our drinks and vacated.

I voted a return to Jungle but lost in a stolen election. Like Gore I ended up in Amsterdam shooting pool. It was a horrible case of global stinking from the people playing pool next to us. Someone was wearing a dirty diaper and looked as if they'd just crawled out from under a urinal at that once cruisy gas station on Sheridan.

I was the next to last person out the door at Amsterdam. We proceeded on to the late night secret drinking destination. I belted out a Billy Joel classic, ate some damn good fried chicken and smuggled beer out in my jacket.

End night.

Playtime

In the previous twelve hours I had torn a pink streak through Arkansas, Mississippi and then Memphis. I was ready to return to more familiar territory like Nashville.

It was raining as I hurried along the sidewalks of the Nashville's West End neighborhood Saturday night. My destination was Play , I'd been here last summer and was looking forward to my return to this gay club.

I was soaked but quickly dried off inside in the mass of people watching the drag show and the Vanderbilt college boys out on the dance floor.

Boys,boys,boys!

It wasn't long before I made new momentary friends. A group of people joined me and I was quickly in the middle of an amateur table dance. Jackson was down to a dental floss thong faster than I could finish a beer.

He might have been twenty years old, built, smooth and a helluva dancer. I think I lost a few dollar bills into his crotch at some point.

Laura the straight girl in the group acting as momma tried in vain to get Jackson's clothes back on him. Those hens, they are always trying to end the fun in the name of what they consider decency.

More drunk hens came along. This time at Play there were more hens than last. I was quite disappointed in that. Hens can ruin a good bar.

"Well, of course this is Nashville," was the response I got from Laura in talking with her about how much more friendly people seemed here versus Atlanta.

Apparently people in smaller cities are more friendly? Maybe so. I've been in gay bars in lots of smaller cities and found them more friendly than Atlanta overall. Outside the gay bars I don't presume to know if Nashville is more friendly or not. But in two visits to gay Nashville I have found the people to be mostly a friendly bunch of people that like to party.

Part of going out is to meet new people if only for one night. I'm not talking about sex I am talking about hearing stories and experiences from people that I wouldn't normally meet in the normal course of living. And mix in alcohol and music and people are more open to talking to strangers.

I love to interview new people that I meet. I'm full of questions and some people may be put off by it . I like to know more about people and situations than what exists on the surface. I love to know their motivations. I've always heard that people like to talk about themselves and I test that theory all the time. I've been surprised that many people don't really want to talk about themselves and just want to control conversations by talking about the people around them instead of themselves. That is boring.

Later in the night Dustin, an 18yo from Clarkesville, came along. He sat in the interview seat, smoked and sipped a Cosmo that someone had bought for him. He was a good guest. He was willing to talk about anything freely.

His motivation for the night was to find love. He had come out with a coworker from Aeropostale that he had a crush on. His heart was breaking as his crush was out dancing with his ex boyfriend instead of him.

At eighteen he was already over the men, the sluts and just wanted to have a boyfriend.

He was out to his parents since last summer, came to Play every weekend, and seemed a little naive. When I mentioned some of things we have in Atlanta like sex clubs he was blown away that such things even existed. It was hard for him to wrap his mind around the idea that men gathered in a building just for sex without the dancing.

I guess Dustin was a romantic. I parted with him just before closing time. We hugged and he called us all gorgeous. Air kisses anyone?

Voices filled the air and slipped across the wet streets, the rain was over and my buzz was lifting. We debated on going to the after hours clubs that go until daybreak but noon comes early at the hotel and I was determined to make check out and head southward.

Nashville for the second time in less than a year entertained me well.