fiction and musings from a gay black dude with delusions above his station
On the roof deck, guests mingled while nibbling hors d’oeuvres as mellow music played in the background. A-Five arrived late, and when he did, he made an entrance. “What’s with the fatigues?” “Hey, Buddy, you didn’t say this was a fancy dress affair!” A-Five smiled. “Didn’t I?” He grabbed grub from a nearby tray and…
In the days after Aileen’s visit, Ángel doubled down on his reading. He took her words to heart and read like their very survival depended on it. His mother was proud of him, but worried that he pushed himself too hard. “It’s wicked important, Momma,” he told her. His grandmother felt proud of him, too,…
Albertson Wallet V had a peculiar way of walking that mixed a prance with a swagger. He had a large build – he played rugby in college – which accentuated his peculiar locomotion’s menacing air. His father, Albertson Wallet IV, taught him to always have a presence when entering a room. A-Five, as he was…
I don’t remember Roots too well. I was fairly young when it came out and, truth be told, at that time I was not yet ready to process the painful history that forms the backbone of the African American experience. But I remember one scene very well. Emancipation had occurred and one slave turned the…
Anderson Cooper came out. Jim Parsons came out. Ricky Martin came out. Neil Patrick Harris and George Takei are out all over the place. Each one of these celebrity outings has weakened the walls of the closet that much more. In his eloquent coming out statement, Mr. Cooper explains that he always wanted to keep…
In a move that surprised most, myself included, not only did the US Supreme Court uphold the Affordable Healthcare Act, aka Obamacare, pretty much intact, but it was Chief Justice John Roberts who provided the swing vote. The sticking part of the AHA was the individual mandate, the part of the law which requires everyone…
Gabriel lived in a makeshift. Makeshifts were housing units made out of old, abandoned buildings, factories, shopping malls, car dealerships, whatever happened to be available. His makeshift unit sat in the back of an old car factory. It was four times the size of Lillian’s old apartment, and had high ceilings and a balcony/loft where…
In conjunction with an exhibit on the life and music of Billy Strayhorn at the San Francisco Main Library, in May of 2009, there was a concert held one Saturday afternoon. The performance featured The Junius Courtney Big Band and singer Denise Perrier. They alternated between music and short stage vignettes that dramatized various milestones in…
In one of my Civil Rights History classes way back when, the professor explained why the NAACP very specifically took up the case of Rosa Parks as a means of challenging the Jim Crow era bus segregation laws. She had been a secretary for the organization for a number of years and had an unimpeachable…
That last insult was the last straw. “How dare you!” she yelled. Her hand smacked him upside his head multiple times as her mouth frothed on variations of the same insult. Little bastard! Dirty bastard! Stupid bastard! Blasphemous bastard! Ángel started crying. Lillian restrained her mother’s hand, if not her mouth, until she finally shouted…
